Luz stared at the ceiling of her room without closing her eyes even though it was well past her bedtime. Everyone in the house was sleeping soundly, in fact the house itself was sleeping since Hooty was snoring rather loudly. But Luz was still awake, waiting for Hunter to come get her, and even if the boy hadn't accepted she still wouldn't have been able to sleep.

The guilt was eating away at her soul. She knew that what she was about to do was a very wrong thing: beyond the broken promise, she would have stealed the lamp from Raine and would have forced Darius to fulfill her wish even against his will. Her conscience was practically screaming at her not to do it; she felt like she had a boulder placed over her heart. But she couldn't back out... that was her only chance. If she had become human, at least she could have been like everyone else; it mattered little if she would remain a puppet in spirit. She would continue to search for the answer to what it meant to be a real girl, but in the meantime she could grow up like everyone else did, and she wouldn't risk being left behind.

Eda would be angry... and Luz didn't blame her. But she was also doing it for her after all. Even if Eda didn't care, Luz couldn't risk her turning into the Owl Beast again. Since she had started living with the fairy she had made fewer mistakes than before, but she had still made them; she couldn't know if in the future she wouldn't commit a huge one that would once again condemn the fairy to transform back into that horrible mass of feathers, fangs and claws. She had to sever the bond she had with her as soon as possible, and she couldn't do that while she was a puppet who needed her magic to move, so she absolutely had to become human. And if she had to take a djinn's magic lamp to do that, then she would do it. Even though it was causing her a sense of guilt that was growing more and more every second and threatening to crush her.

At midnight Luz saw a shadow appear outside her window and heard someone tap the glass three times; as she had promised, Hunter had come to get her. Luz got up from the bed and quickly walked to the window and opened it, allowing the cool night air to enter the room, and despite the darkness she could clearly see the blond boy in front of her. "Are you ready?" Hunter asked her.

"Give me a minute" Luz replied, and very quickly began to change, throwing away her pajamas and grabbing her clothes; Hunter respected her privacy and looked in the opposite direction, never peeking once. Luz was grateful for that. She dressed as quickly as she could and in less than a minute she was back in her usual outfit, complete with brown jacket, red hat, green trousers and red shoes. "I'm ready" she said at that point.

Hunter finally looked back at her. "Okay. Jump on my staff"

Luz stared at Hunter's staff and felt a lump form in her throat. She could still back out: she could still tell her friend that she preferred to give up and keep the promise she made to Eda. She could tell him that she wanted to wait a few days and think about it. She could tell him she wasn't okay in doing it. She was sure that Hunter wouldn't mind: even if the wish he wanted to make was very important to him, she could simply point out the location of the lamp and he could go get it on his own. She could still listen to her conscience, send her friend away, close the window, go straight to Eda's room, wake her up, confess everything to her, tell her that she was sorry for thinking of betraying her trust and beg her to forgive her once again. She could still do the right thing.

But deep down Luz had never been good at listening her coscience. And although the guilt weighed so heavily on her heart that she was sure its weight would cause Hunter's staff to fall to the ground, she climbed aboard anyway and sat behind her friend, gripping his shoulders firmly to keep from falling.

"Are you ready? You need to make sure you hold on to me tightly" Hunter asked her. Even though it wasn't the first time he'd carried Luz in his stirrup, he still wanted to give her some advice so she wouldn't fall and break her neck. After all, even though Hunter could use staff magic to create a shield that protected them from air friction, sudden acceleration was certainly not something to be trifled with. He was used to it, the puppet wasn't.

Luz nodded, and to confirm this tightened her grip on her friend's shoulders even more. "I'm ready. Go ahead"

"Not so fast!"

Luz froze at that voice; she turned quickly and saw that Eda had appeared at the door of the room and was staring at her with a rather severe look and her arms crossed. The puppet gulped and cringed under those judging eyes. "Eda... I..."

"How did you find out about us?" Hunter, who unlike Luz had no reason to feel guilty towards the fairy, asked curiously.

"You don't expect that I too didn't take precautions after discovering that a powerful witch lives not far from here? The house is surrounded by a spell that warns me if some dark magic enters the house's surroudings" Eda replied. In reality she had placed that spell much earlier, since the day she met Hunter, since his inability to read his heart and the fact that he walked around with a staff full of dark magic worried her quite a bit, and so even if he seemed like a good guy she had still preferred to take precautions in case he turned out to be dangerous or hostile, but there was no point in revealing it at that moment. Rather, she didn't move her gaze from Luz in the slightest: "Am I wrong, or did you promise me that you wouldn't go get that lamp?"

Luz was breaking into a cold sweat. Eda had never scolded her as severely as she was doing now; it was even worse than that time she entered the forbidden section of the library and discovered that she and her friends had caused a mess in it. "Um... who tells you I'm going to get the lamp?" she tried to say, trying to remain as vague as possible to avoid to make her nose growing.

Eda rolled her eyes. "Is there any other reason why you should try to leave the house at midnight through the window to go who knows where with that blonde? I might believe it if it were Willow, but you're not her"

"Why should Willow... okay, I'll shut up" Hunter tried to ask, but stopped immediately when the fairy glared at him. This was a family argument and he needed to stay out of it.

Eda looked at Luz again; the eye contact lasted less than a second, but to the puppet it seemed like a century. Then the fairy said: "Luz, come down from that staff and come here immediately"

The puppet trembled slightly, feeling the guilt in her heart magnify a hundredfold. But despite this she didn't give up. "I... I can't, Eda" she said finally. "Eda, you know that I hate to disappoint you. I hated myself every single second of this night because I knew I would hurt you. But... I can't pass up this chance. It could be my only chance to no longer be imprisoned in this body of wood. I have to take it, even if you don't like it"

Despite the stern look, a small veil of understanding passed into Eda's eyes. The fairy thought that perhaps she was wrong to behave so severely; even if a good scolding wouldn't have hurt the puppet, at that moment it was better to use more nice words. "Luz, I know how you feel and I know how deep your desire is, but this isn't the right way..."

"No, instead! You don't know what I feel! You don't know what it means to be stuck in these wooden limbs, without ever the possibility of changing or improving!" Luz exclaimed as a few tears started to flow from her eyes and her voice began to tremble. "I'm tired of waiting, Eda! I can't stand it anymore! I've done everything to understand what it means to be real. I racked my brain day and night, I went to school, I interacted with a lot of people, I read countless books, I've tried everything, but still I haven't had any results. Darius can finally turn me into a human being, and I'm not going to give it up just because you don't like it!"

"Luz, you know that I would never do anything to stop you from being happy. If I ask you not to do this it is because this is not the right way to fulfill your dream. Now why don't you get off that stirrup, come here and let's talk a little?" Eda tried to tell her, and she pointed to the bed as if to tell her to go sit there and try to have a quiet conversation together.

But in response, Luz clung to Hunter even tighter. "No! I don't want to do that!" she exclaimed with determination, despite the tears that were pouring down her face. "I don't care what the right way is, I want to become human! I don't care about everything else! And I'm sick of listening to you! I'll go there and make that wish, even if it means disappointing you!"

Eda felt a little pity for the puppet; her words clearly showed how frustrated she was with her apparent inability to become a real girl. However, such compassion didn't stop the fairy from getting angry: "Luz, you should have learned by now that it is better to listen to people who have better judgment than you! Get off that staff right now and come here!"

"You can't order me! You're not my mother!" Luz screamed.

For a moment there was silence. Eda's eyes widened and her face stiffened like never before. Luz also turned pale and put a hand over her mouth. "Eda, I didn't mean..."

"Come here now"

"But..."

"I told you to come here now!"

Luz almost jumped; it was the first time she heard Eda raise her voice. This time she had really made her angry. Just the sight of her furious face hurt her like a stab in the chest. She felt the urge to obey her, to go back... but she didn't; on the contrary, she in turn assumed a hostile expression and replied: "No! Sorry Eda, but this time I intend neither to obey you nor to keep any promise I have made to you!"

"Luz Noceda, come right back... ARGH!"

Eda's expression instantly went from one of fury to one of pure suffering; the fairy grabbed her left arm, from which hundreds and hundreds of tar-colored feathers sprouted, and the fingers of her hand lengthened and the nails turned into claws. Luz froze, and Hunter's eyes widened at that sight as well. Eda fell to her knees and emitted a very high-pitched scream similar to the hoot of an owl, which was heard throughout the house and probably also a good part of the surrounding countryside; Gus, Willow, Matt, King, Hooty and Owlbert immediately woke up when they heard that. Luz feared for a moment that she would see Eda completely turn into a monster, but fortunately the transformation didn't extend beyond her arm; however, the fairy still seemed somewhat distressed by the situation. Eda just looked up, showing her face drenched in sweat, and for a moment her eyes and Luz's met; as soon as the puppet saw that look that begged her to stop, she felt as if an avalanche had just hit her. "HUNTER, GO NOW!" she screamed, sure she wouldn't be able to hold it another second.

The order was so peremptory that Hunter obeyed almost without thinking; he gave his staff a swing and zoomed off into the night sky with Luz in tow. Eda raised her still healthy arm as if trying to reach them, and shouted the puppet's name as the other tenants of the house rushed to help her, but Luz was flying too fast to hear her. As soon as they were far enough away, Hunter finally asked: "I've never seen anything like this. What was happening to your fairy?"

"It's... It's the Owl Beast. Eda is hurting because I'm behaving badly" Luz replied while sobbing. She seemed to want to try and tear her hair out, although she definitely couldn't since it was made of wood. Her poor heart was racing every second and it was even becoming difficult for her to breathe. "Hunter, we must find that lamp immediately! If I become human, I will sever the bond I have with Eda, and she will no longer risk turning into a monster!"

"So, your fairy godmother becomes a monster if you behave badly?" Hunter repeated confused. He had never heard of such a characteristic of fairies. Maybe it happened because Luz was her pupil, and becoming human meant severing the bond between them since Eda was the fairy godmother of only Luz the puppet? He wasn't sure he fully understood how that strange dynamic worked.

But fortunately he didn't have to try too hard to understand, because Luz explained to him: "The magic that is inside me... it's not just that of the Palistrom wood. That's what gives me life, but it's not enough; for to really be born I needed a push... and it was Eda who gave it to me with her magic. Since then she and I have been connected. If I do wrong things... my actions reflect on her and she transforms into the Owl Beast. But if I become human now, that connection will no longer be there and she will no longer take this risk!"

Hunter felt a lot of pity for the puppet; he couldn't remember ever seeing her so desperate. And he also felt bad for Eda; even though he had tried to keep his distance from the fairy, he couldn't deny that she had treated him very well every time they met. She was a good person and certainly didn't deserve to turn into that... Owl Beast.

However, Hunter was not a person who let emotions and feelings dominate him. He was a soldier, and as such logic was the dominant power in his brain. And that aforementioned logic was already piecing together information to form a more complete picture of the situation. "Okay, okay. I got it, let's go get that djinn right now" Hunter said, while trying not to let it be known that his mind was boiling, although he doubted Luz would notice given the desperate state she was in.

And the reason for so much thinking was only one: he had just discovered a new, very interesting characteristic of Luz and especially of Eda, a characteristic that was definitely a huge weakness for the fairy; even without a full transformation, it was clear that any of Luz's bad actions would debilitate her greatly, so even causing her to undergo a partial transformation like the one he had just seen would put her at an extreme disadvantage in any fight. Hunter doubted that Eda could even transform back into her true fairy form at that moment, or she would come after them by flying. Once that situation was over he would have to investigate about it very carefully. After all, it was appropriate for him to take into account what to do if by any chance the djinn they were going to recover proved incapable of freeing him; if such an eventuality occurred, then it would be appropriate to continue to make his uncle satisfied with his actions, as he always had done... and Hunter was sure that his uncle would have greatly appreciated that information.

Sooner or later Hunter had to discover about the connection between Eda and Luz and what it can cause, and it was pretty obvious that his first thought would be use that information to please Belos. In his defense, keep in mind that Hunter is terrified by Belos, he knows very well what will happen once he will become too disappointed, and as he said is a fate worse than death; we cannot blame him if is first thought after discovered about the Owl Beast was to tell it to Belos, despite he doesn't like it (as clearly showed, he cares about Eda and Luz by now, but he fears Belos more)