Chapter Text
Today, Luz was learning that she did not like teleporting.
Sure, it looked cool. But the feeling of being disconnected from your body and slingshotting through space in a single second before all your bones and gravity slammed back into you was not fun.
Blinking away the golden light, she noticed two things. One, they were in a hallway even more desolate than the last hallway. And two, she was lying on top of Hunter.
Hunter, recovering fast than she did, shoved her onto the floor, and stared at her in horror. “Wha- that could have killed you!”
“But it didn’t! That was not fun, by the way.”
Hunter made an incoherent noise of rage. “You could have been split in half, or something! Don’t do that!”
“I won’t! Once is enough for me.” She slowly stood up, still feeling vaguely nauseous. “Where are we now?” Looking around only confirmed her confusion. This hallway was much smaller than the other one, lacking the wide windows and massive tapestries the other hallways had. The floors were dull, not polished to perfection, and there were what looked like several cobwebs on the ceiling. Besides a few small windows, the only thing of note was an old-looking wooden door.
At some point, Flapjack had settled on Hunter’s head again. “My room. I need to grab my emergency kit.” He pushed open the door, and Luz followed him in.
“Wait, you were serious about the emergency kit? I thought you were joking!”
“Why would you think I was joking about that?” He huffed at her and began taking off his massive platform boots, revealing cardinal-patterned socks.
Luz was distracted by the adorableness of his socks by the crinkling of paper under her sneakers, and she grimaced as she got a proper look at his room. It was small, about the same size as her room at the Owl House, but was filled with clutter. The floor was covered in dozens of stacks of papers and books, which seemed to be a mix of wild magic and important-looking government forms marked with coven sigils. The bed was a mess, the blankets half lying on the floor, and she spotted a small frog plushie shoved between two pillows. His bookshelf was cluttered with tiny knick-knacks and even more books about wild magic. The desk was also covered in papers and pencils, although she did note there was a small nest made of bits of fabric that contained a poorly made… bird doll? She couldn’t tell. The desk also had a spot in the middle cleared off to make room for a crystal ball, similar to Luz’s desk back home. The closet was empty of clothes, with a large pile of what must have been dirty laundry shoved in one of the corners. Hunter’s artificial staff was lying on top of the pile, half buried under an abomination-stained cloak.
(link)
Luz carefully stepped into the room, paper crinkling under her shoe. Hunter was now standing next to a half-packed duffel bag, and was dangerously close to knocking over a knee-high stack of reports.
“Dude.”
At that, Hunter scowled, turning to face her as he tossed his platform shoes into the laundry pile. “Listen, I’ve been busy. You try running an empire.”
“This is even messier than my room! How do you-”
She shrieked, frantically covering her eyes as Hunter began to take off his cloak. “Don’t flash me! What the hell!”
“I’m not- I have something under this!” He said indignantly. He dropped the cloak near the laundry pile, and Luz cringed at his outfit.
“Why are you wearing the exact same pajamas from last time I saw you?” His palismen shirt and sweatpants hadn’t changed, although they looked a lot more rumpled and stained.
He pointed accusingly at her. “Says you! You wear that shirt every day!”
She clutched her shirt defensively. “It’s a good shirt! It has a cute cat hoodie, you hater! And you have an entire closet, there’s no excuse for you to be dressing like a cartoon character!”
“How am I- Whatever! All my clothes are dirty! This is the only clean thing I have!”
“Can’t be that clean, if you’ve been wearing it for days! Also, just use a washing machine!”
“Ha!” He crossed his arms, looking smugly. “Our washing machine is broken!”
Luz stared at him flatly. “That’s- why are you proud of that?”
Hunter’s shoulders sagged. “I- I don’t know. I think it might be my fault the washing machine is broken, actually. Apparently, whenever anyone uses it their clothes get stained green and smell gross.”
She raised an eyebrow. “And how is that your fault?”
He grinned nervously. “Might have accidentally sent some of my Uncle down there. He has-had a curse, and he oozes this rotten sludge, and it doesn’t do well with the washing machines.”
“Ew. Gross.”
“Gross.”
The two of them stared at each other before Hunter sighed, continuing to pack his bag. It seemed mostly full already, and Luz caught glimpses of a few clothes, a first aid kit, and Roofmart groceries.
“Hey, uh. Question. Is there a bathroom near here?”
Hunter stared at her incredulously. “I-Yeah? It’s right there.” He pointed towards a door that Luz hadn’t noticed due to the several stacks of paperwork blocking it.
She shot him a thumbs up. “Great! Because I really have to pee, and I did not want to try finding a bathroom mid-battle.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Did you not use the bathroom before going to raid the castle?”
She grinned sheepishly. “I mean, I did, but I also drank a lot of water. Gotta stay hydrated, you know?” She fidgeted awkwardly. “Uh, Hunter, I’m going to use your bathroom.”
“I’m aware.” He said flatly.
“That means, if there’s anything in there you don’t want me to see, you should probably… do something about it. Because you clearly haven’t cleaned in a while.”
Hunter pulled a face at that but didn’t move to get up, continuing to pack his bag with wild magic books.
“Okay then!” Shrugging at that, Luz made her way towards the door, carefully stepping around the stacks of paper and clothing littering the floor. She pulled the door open, pushing over several stacks of paper in the process, and hesitantly stepped inside.
The bathroom, surprisingly, was the cleanest part of Hunter’s room. It was dirty, sure, but teen boy levels of dirty, which was what she had expected. There was a towel hanging on the doorknob, and a few sheets of reports on the floor, which she avoided. There also was a large piece of paper taped to the mirror, and upon closer inspection it appeared to be a list, in Hunter’s chicken scratch handwriting. And Luz thought her writing was bad!
“An incriminating list of all the treason I’ve committed since Belos died.” She said out loud. Wow. It was concerningly long. Hunter had ran out of space multiple times, stapling new sheets of paper to expand it. But as interesting as that was, she did need to pee.
She quickly used the bathroom and washed her hands, resisting the urge to snoop. There was just so much of his stuff lying in the open though! Besides the list on the mirror, there were several bottles of pills and elixirs sitting on the counter.
Don’t look at Hunter’s stuff. Don’t look at Hunter’s stuff. Don’t look-
A lot of the bottles were either empty or expired, which was kind of concerning. There was a bottle labeled ‘fantasy adderall', which was the same stuff Luz took after she ran out of her human realm meds (and hadn’t THAT been a fun day. Turns out ADHD and autism did exist in the Boiling Isles, but had very different names), There was also an elixir labeled ‘hormones’ (at least she thought that was what it said, but it was in Hunter’s terrible handwriting), and a few bottles of potions of something labeled ‘Planax’ which sounded vaguely familiar. She was pretty sure Willow had some, and wait a second-
“HUNTER WHY DO YOU TAKE PLANT ANXIETY MEDICINE-?”
At that Hunter shrieked, slamming open the bathroom door. The two of them stared at each other in accusing silence.
“Why were you looking at my meds?”
“In my defense, I did tell you to hide anything you didn’t want me to see.”
Hunter scowled but didn’t argue.
She pointed at the mirror. “Also, why do you have this?”
He shrugged. “I got bored and also was losing my mind over paperwork and started keeping track of all my crimes for fun. Which is a lot, by the way, but not as big as yours.”
Luz gasped in excitement. “ I have a list of crimes?”
“Of course you do, you’re an associate of the Owl Lady and commit crimes on the daily. You’re committing several crimes right now. It’s above my desk.”
She sped out of the bathroom and over to his desk, almost slipping on a stack of papers. True to his word, above his desk was an even longer list (stapled together of course) labeled ‘The Human’s Luz’s various crimes.”
“Wow. This is pretty impressive. You’re missing a few things though.”
Hunter sighed. “I figured.”
She pulled open a desk drawer and dug through even more papers until she found a pen. For some reason, it was glittery and bright orange, which suited her just fine, and she climbed on top of the desk to reach the list, careful not to knock over the nest or the crystal ball.
She was in the middle of adding ‘owning palistrom wood’ when she remembered what she originally had asked him. “You!” She whirled around, pointing the glitter pen at him accusingly. “You never answered my question!”
Hunter raised an eyebrow. “Which was?”
“Why do you take anxiety meds for plants? And don’t try to tell me it isn’t, that's the exact same stuff that Willow uses for her carnivorous Titanarum!”
“It’s plant medicine? That explains things.”
“You mean like why it doesn’t work right? Because you, my guy, have some serious anxiety that needs to be resolved.”
“It works!”
“Even thought it’s for plants ?”
“Yep.”
Luz waited for him to elaborate. He didn’t.
She raised an eyebrow at him and he huffed, crossing his arms. “I don’t have to explain myself to you!”
“You know what? Fair. But shouldn’t you, like, be packing those meds in your emergency bag?”
He scowled at her, and ran into the bathroom. She turned back to the list, ignoring the sounds of drawers being slammed open and pills rattling around as she attempted to draw Flapjack, who was looking especially cute today.
Flapjack preened, angling themselves and holding still while she drew. At some point Hunter had entered the room again, because he was moving the crystal ball out of the way of her elbow and shoving it in his bag.
She continued sketching Flapjack, ignoring Hunter’s scowl as he set his bag down on the floor. “What is your plan, for after this?” She asked absentmindledly.
“Hm?”
“Yeah. I mean like, you have a whole runaway kit, which is smart, so I’ll give you that. But like, where were you planning on going? You have a secret Emperor’s Coven base or something?
It was silent, long enough that Luz started to grow worried. Finally, she heard a muffled noise. “...was gonna go live in the woods or something.”
“Dude, what?” She laughed, turning around, expecting to see him smirking. Instead, he was now lying stomach-down on the bed, face buried into a pillow.
“Oh, shit. Wait, were you serious?” She slid off the desk, Flapjack flying over and fluttering around Hunter’s head.
“...I mean, I don’t exactly have anywhere to go. My whole life, everything I’ve worked for, is here, and it’s currently on the verge of collapse! Your mentor is literally overthrowing the government right now . Where am I even supposed to go? What do I even do after this? I didn’t even have much of a plan in the first place besides not being here when the coven system inevitably collapsed. I’m a powerless witch, there’s no life for me outside the castle!” He had started quiet, but it had turned into full-blown muffled ranting now. “Scratch that, I’m not even a witch! I should just lay here and rot. It’s better for everyone anyways.”
Flapjack was deeply displeased by this, because they screeched and divebombed him. Thankfully for Hunter’s face, the pillow protected him.
Luz, meanwhile, was frowning. “That’s the stupidest shit I’ve ever heard.”
Hunter moved the pillow slightly, enough to glare at her with a single red eye. “Excuse me?”
Whoops. She hadn’t meant to say that out loud. She crossed her arms, glaring right back at him. “Uh, yeah. You’re an idiot, dude.”
He threw the pillow at her face, scowling at her. “What-you’re the idiot-HEY!”
Without the pillow in the way, Flapjack had taken advantage of this opportunity to yank on Hunter’s hair strand. Hard. Seriously, the little rascal was on the verge of ripping it out.
Hunter shrieked, swatting at the palismen, who began furiously chirping at him. Luz couldn’t help but giggle as she watched the chaos, and he stuck out his tongue at her.
Flapjack eventually settled on his head, immediately making a nest of his hair. Luz stepped closer, and when Hunter didn’t react, sat down on the bed next to him.
“Wow dude, this mattress sucks.”
He shrugged. “It’s comfy. Better than the floor.”
“You know where you wouldn’t have to sleep on the floor, and could sleep on a better mattress?”
He scowled at her.
She spread out his arms, almost smacking him in the face. “The Owl House! Dude.”
Hunter looked away from her and she sighed, dropping her arms. “Look, Hunter. I’ve said it before, and I’m gonna say it again. You can stay at the Owl House!”
He scoffed, and now she was determined to change his mind because he looked like a kicked puppy. “No, listen. You can stay with me. Eda is chill, and she’ll love you once you tell her about all the treason you committed. You can tell King about all the military stuff you’re an expert in, and Hooty’s a bit weird, but you’ll get used to him after a while. We can have sleepovers every night! We can hang out and play shitty games on your crystal ball and eat pancakes! And you can have actually good clothes that aren’t pajamas!” She ignored the cry of outrage from Hunter as she continued rambling.
At some point she had scooted next to him, their legs bumping together. He just looked so tired , with his silly shirt and massive eyebags and sad face she wanted to squish. “You don’t have to go be feral and live in the woods, and Hooty can protect you from anyone who tries to assassinate you. I’ll teach you glyphs and we can talk about wild magic and I’ll make Flapjack cute little bird clothes. You won’t have to fill out any more paperwork or worry about taxes, and you can get so much sleep that those dumb eyebags of yours will go away. It’ll be good .” Her voice cracked at the last word and she ignored it, giving Hunter her strongest puppy dog eyes.
Hunter stared at her. “What if I want to go feral and live in the woods though?” He said quietly.
Luz snorted at that and shoved his arm. “No! Absolutely not.”
Flapjack chirped, and Luz nodded. “See, Flapjack agrees!”
Hunter pulled a face, which meant Flapjack definitely agreed with her. “I still think I should stay here.”
She grabbed his arm and started gently shaking it. “C'mon, dude. You don’t wanna do that. Look at the state of this room man, you really wanna stay here? You don’t even have a microwave or a fridge.”
“I could get those.”
“Do you really want to deal with that? If you live at the owl house, Eda will let you use her microwave and fridge for free. It’ll be great. Oh, I keep forgetting you guys don’t have microwaves here. They’re miracles. Eda has one, cause she stole it from the human realm, and I thank her every day for it. It's great. You’ll love the microwave. You seem like the kind of guy who would thrive off microwave meals.”
Hunter still looked upset, but it was confused-upset and not crisis-upset s she considered it a win. “You’re just saying nonsense again.”
She shot him finger guns. “I do that a lot my guy! Get used to it if you’re rooming with me. Or you could have your own room. Both work great. But listen, listen. I know you wanna stay here in your paperwork mess and wallow in pity because you’re sad. Don’t do that. I actually have a really compelling reason for this. You ready to hear it?”
She paused for dramatic effect, taking a deep breath. “The coven heads are gonna be looking for you, mister golden guard, because they just overthrew the government and wanna make sure you’re arrested. Do you really want them to see all this ?” She gestured to… everything.
Luz wished she had been recording a video, because the face Hunter pulled was hilarious.
“And then, after they see your room,” she continued. “They’ll arrest you in your pajamas .”
“Maybe I should burn the room with me in it,” he mumbled, and that was worse , no! Flapjack screeched loudly at this and yanked on Hunter’s hair again.
Luz shoved him off the bed. “No! No burning! No wallowing! You’re coming back to the Owl House with me, and we’re going to get you a therapist, and I will kidnap you if I have to!” She pointed angrily at him, fingertips inches from his nose, and his eyes crossed looking at it.
She booped him, just because, and he yanked on her leg, pulling her onto the floor with him. “Ugh. You make a few good points.”
She sat up, puffing her chest proudly. “I made a lot of good points.” She sighed, turning to look at him. “So… does that mean you’ll come with me?”
Hunter bit his lip, averting his eyes. Flapjack began fluttering around his head, chirping rapidly. She couldn’t understand what the little guy was saying, but by the way Hunter’s ears were pinned back in response, it was hopefully good.
Eventually, the chirping stopped, and he huffed. “Fine.”
“Yes!” She cheered, fist-pumping the air. She immediately regretted that as Hunter stared skeptically at her. “Hehe, this is gonna be fun. Don’t even worry about it.” She offered a hand down to him, as he was still laying on the floor.
He snorted, grabbing her hand and pulling himself up. “Alright. I’m definitely not going to regret this. This is fun. I am excited.” He seemed to be muttering to himself, looking around the room.
“You should be so excited! Also, uh, I have no clue if we’re gonna be able to come back here, or if this room will even still be intact? Cause a fire started at some point mid-battle, and I have no clue if anyone extinguished it. Or even noticed it. Besides me, that is.”
“I think I have everything. Although, there’s a few things I should grab, then. Besides what I already have.” He unsubtly untucked his plushie from his pillows and shoved it in his duffle bag.
Luz shrugged. “It’s all cool. I have no clue how long we have until someone thinks to check here. Seriously, if the coven heads are looking for you, wouldn’t they check your bedroom ?”
Hunter shrugged, attempting to shove a few more wild magic books in his already full bag. “I mean, not really. My room is super out of the way. There’s this massive staircase you have to climb, and my room is the only thing up here, so no one ever ‘accidentally’ wanders by.”
“Really? Climbing all those stairs sounds awful.”
“Well, I usually just teleport.”
“Ah.” Luz chanced a peak out the window, and wow that was a dizzying drop. “So what I’m hearing is you live all alone at the top of a tower, with minimal visitors.”
“I mean, I guess?” He had resorted to sitting on the duffle bag in hopes of shoving more books inside.
She snickered. “Heh. Rapunzel. Blonde, signature hair, animal companion, you’ve got it all. Oh, and Belos is the perfect Mother Gothel!” She turned around to see Hunter had somehow managed to zip up the bag. “Oh hey, you’re finished packing! Wow, is that all wild magic stuff?”
He shrugged. “Mostly. Theres a few essentials in there, but the books are the most important.” His eyes were sparkling with nerdiness. “It took me years to get my hands on all of these, and I refuse to leave them here if I can take them with me.”
Despite Hunter’s duffel bag being stuffed to the brim, the room still looked the same, minus a few books on the ground and items on his desk. Then again, the mess was due to an entire government being run out of a teen boy’s bedroom.
“Is it a good idea to leave all these important documents here?” She mused.
Hunter shrugged. “I honestly do not care. If the rebels want to run the government, they can sort through all this.”
She shot him a thumbs up. “Fair enough! Are you ready to go? We can think up speeches to convince Eda you’re chill on the way.”
He looked vaguely panicked at that. “Oh Titan, how am I going to convince her? I should write a speech. You can help me, you know her well.” He darted towards his desk, pausing to look at her. “Maybe flashcards would be better?”
She grabbed the back of his shirt, dragging him away. “No! No flashcards! It’ll be fine!” She screeched.
He hissed at her. “She can turn into a harpy! What if she tries to stab me with her harpy claws?”
“She won’t do that, because I’ll tell her not to!”
“She also won’t do that if I have flashcards!”
“You are seriously overestimating the power of flashcards!”
He swatted at her. “Ugh, fine! If I get killed by her, I’m blaming you.”
She grinned. “Fine by me! I’ll take that bet.”
“It’s not even a bet!”
Flapjack chirped angrily, interrupting their bickering. Rude. Hunter sighed, pushing his hair back. “Flapjack says we should go, and you should be more mature.”
She stuck her tongue out at him. “They did not. Bet they said we should both be mature.”
He huffed and said nothing to that, which confirmed her suspicions. Sure, it meant that a literal bird thought they were both immature, but it was still a win for her!
Hunter opened the door, stepping outside when Luz halted, caught up in a glorious idea. “Hunter!”
He raised an eyebrow at her. “What now?”
She grinned at him. “Can I use your staff? Your artificial one, that is?”
His face scrunched up in confusion. “What, why?”
“Because it’s fun and I really really want to?”
He stared at her, contemplating. “Only if I get my flashcards.”
“Deal!”
___
To anyone who looked down a specific hallway, they would have been greeted with quite the sight. Two teenagers, one a human girl wearing a grudgby jacket and a cat hoodie, clutching the Golden Guard’s staff, and the other an exhausted-looking boy with bunny slippers, slightly stained pajamas, a duffel bag about to burst, and a cardinal perched in his hair. The boy was writing on a set of flashcards while he walked, chewing on an orange glitter pen.
Tragically, no one was anywhere near the random hallway Luz and Hunter were wandering in, due to all the rebelling and fighting that had taken place in a different area of the castle.
Luz stared in disbelief as Hunter continued muttering to himself, writing and crossing out words on his flashcards. “How are you writing while walking? That’s the most magical thing I’ve ever seen anyone do here, and this is the Boiling Isles!”
“Years of practice. Now, do you think this sentence looks okay?”
Luz sighed. “Your flashcards look fine. You’ll be fine! Although, you should shoot her finger guns at the end of that sentence. It’ll raise your coolness factor by like, a hundred.”
He squinted suspiciously at her. “What exactly are ‘finger guns’?”
Luz frowned. “Right, no guns here, because it’s a magical fantasy world. Not a PG one, though. Actually, when were finger guns invented? Did they have a name before guns existed? Like, there’s no way they were only invented after guns were. When were guns even invented? They definitely existed in the 1600’s. I think. They had guns in Hamilton. Did they? No wait, they did!” She began singing to herself. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, it’s the Ten Duel commandments-”
“The 1600’s! I didn’t tell you about Philip!”
Luz stopped singing, shooting Hunter a confused look. “What about Philip? You mean Wittebane?”
Hunter was giving her a concerned look. “I can’t pull it out of my bag right now, because it’s buried in the bottom, but there’s something really important I need to tell you about Philip. And Belos. Oh my Titan, you guys don’t even know the truth about the Day of Unity.”
She frowned at him. “The rebels know there’s some kind of draining spell?”
Hunter laughed nervously. “Ha! Well. Yes, but it’s worse than that. Belos recorded a bunch of journals, actually, detailing all of his secrets and evil plots. And oh did he have a lot of them. So fun! That was a fun day.”
Flapjack chirped, and began tugging on his hair again, snapping Hunter out of his nervous spiraling. “Thanks, Flap. But yeah. He left all kinds of records about… everything.”
Luz laughed. “Wow. That’s pretty convenient, huh?”
Hunter rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah! Thank Titan he did. If he didn’t, we’d have to do something crazy like go in his mind or something.”
She shuddered. “Oh, that sounds terrifying. I’m glad he’s dead now, because that sounds like it would be super fucked up.”
Hunter snapped his fingers. “Portal!”
Luz snapped her fingers. “Finger guns! This is a finger gun, by the way. I can’t remember if I’ve shown you before.” Hunter nodded, mimicking the motion and making a note of it on his flashcards.
He shoved the glitter pen behind his ear, then turned to face her. “I forgot to give you the portal! It looks mostly done, and there’s some Titan’s blood, so you should be able to move it to the Owl House and get it working! Especially with my Uncle’s notes.”
Luz tried very hard to not think about the promise she made to her mom. “Y-yeah! As long as we aren’t activating it now.”
He shook his head. “Oh, definitely not. I have no clue how well it works, and I don’t want to break it. Here, let's go.” Flapjack fluttered off his head and transformed into a staff.
“Wait!”
“What?”
Luz hugged the artificial staff closer to her. “Can I try teleporting?”
He stared flatly at her, and grabbed her arm. “No.” And they were off in a flash of nauseating gold.
As soon as her vision cleared she stumbled towards a wall, taking a second to lean on it and gather herself. Hunter watched her, Flapjack settling on his head again. “I wonder if your nausea is a human thing or just a you thing.”
“Whatever it is, I hate it. Ugh.” She stopped, looking around. “Hunter, this is another random hallway. Did you get us lost?” Although it did look a lot more damaged than the last hallway.
“What-no!” He sputtered. “I didn’t get us lost ! You think that little of me?”
Luz looked at him. “You want me to answer that?”
He sighed. “No. The portal door is far, and you have to teleport more than once to get there. I just teleported us as close as I could in one trip, and we can walk the rest of the way.”
She placed a hand on her chest. “Aw, that’s so sweet! Aren’t you considerate?” She booped his nose, and she scowled. “In that case, lead the way, golden gayboy!”
“Please stop calling me that.”
“Never.”
The two of them walked in silence, keeping an eye out for any coven scouts or rebels. The only sound was their footsteps against the brightly polished tile floor, and it was extremely nerve-wracking.
Hunter suddenly paused, ears perking up. “Do you hear that?”
Luz paused, trying to listen. There, in the distance, was the faint sound of arguing.
The two of them looked at each other. “Maybe it’s Eda?” Luz asked hopefully
“Maybe it’s coven scouts.”
“Wanna go find out?”
Hunter sighed, but began walking forward. Flapjack made no move to transform or leave their perch from Hunter’s head, so Luz hesitantly followed, clutching the artificial staff.
“Hey, maybe we can pretend I’m holding you hostage.” She whispered to him.
“That’s a stupid plan. Why would anyone believe that?” he whispered back.
“I mean, I have your staff. And Flapjack is napping on your head.”
“They could still turn into a staff. Maybe I should take you hostage.”
“You only hate the plan because you’re the hostage!” She whisper-shouted.
“Shush!” He shoved a finger in her face, and she instinctively bit it. Hunter shrieked at that. “Why would you bite my finger?”
Luz gagged, and immediately spit on the floor. “Ew! Gross!”
“Of course it’s gross, you bit my glove!”
“That is nasty !”
“Then you shouldn’t have done it!”
“Well, maybe you should know better than to shove fingers in people’s faces! You can lose limbs like that, you should know better!”
He pointed a finger at her, then immediately thought better of it. “Why was that your first reaction anyways-” He froze, looking suddenly panicked.
Luz opened her mouth to ask, but froze when she also heard it; the sound of footsteps and voices, getting closer. Of course.
“Shit.” Hunter grabbed her arm, shoving both of them behind a tapestry right as several people rounded the corner.
“I know I heard something over here!” That was Lilith! This was good! She started moving, but Hunter squeezed her arm, and she stopped.
There was a sigh. “Well, clearly this hallway is empty.” That was Darius.
“Lilith is right. I also heard voices.” Raine said.
“But was it Luz and Hunter?” Eda said, sounding stressed. Luz felt extremely guilty now, but Hunter was squeezing her arm very tightly.
“I’m almost certain of it. The Golden guard’s voice is very… distinctive.” Lilith replied, and Hunter bristled. Luz resisted the urge to laugh.
“Ugh. They might have passed through here, and we just missed them.” Darius groaned.
Eberwolf chirped something. “So they were here, then!” Lilith said in excitement.
“The kid probably just teleported away,” Raine said.
“And took Luz with him,” Lilith said darkly.
Eda sighed. “Lily, I’m telling you. They’re friends now, I think. Luz somehow befriended the kid. Either way, she can kick his ass no problem.”
“Surely the Golden Guard can’t be that intimidating? Isn’t he 14?” Raine asked, and she heard Hunter make a disgruntled noise as Luz tried not to laugh.
“Ehhhh, I dunno. Not old enough for you to have beef with him, Lily.”
“Hey-!”
“Please save the bickering for later,” Darius cut Lilith off exasperatedly. ”We can deal with the Golden Guard, you can have your kid back, and everybody goes home happy.” At that, Hunter stiffened.
Eberwolf chittered something, and the others suddenly fell silent. “You think-” Eda said, but cut herself off. Luz glanced at Hunter, confused, but he shrugged back at her.
The sounds of a pair of claws skittering and someone sniffing the air grew closer, until something began tugging on the tapestry hiding them.
“Ah, shit.” Hunter whispered, before the tapestry collapsed on both of them.
The tapestry was surprisingly heavy and had a horrible scratchy texture. You’d think the Emperor’s Coven would be able to afford something a bit nicer, but what did Luz know?
The tapestry levitated off of them and was tossed to the side, and Luz took a moment to enjoy being able to breathe properly again. She looked up to see several adults looking at them with varying looks of anger and disappointment.
Her gaze zeroed in on Eda, whose expression was warring between frustration and relief.
“So, uh, hi Eda-oh!” She was suddenly pulled into a bone-crushing hug. Idly, she noticed that Eda was still in her harpy form.
Eda eventually set her down, checking her over for injuries. “Kid, do not do that again!”
“I mean, I can tell you I won’t be teleporting again. It’s absolutely nauseating, but-!”
She was cut off by the sound of Darius shouting in horror. “What in the name of Titan are you wearing?”
She turned to see Hunter patting his pockets, looking vaguely panicked. Darius thankfully hadn’t made any move to arrest the teen, and was instead staring at Hunter’s shirt with an aghast expression. “Luz!”
“What?” Oh shit. The coven heads were staring at him, and looked vaguely threatening. Time to go with her plan. She whipped her head around frantically, running over to the artificial staff and aiming it at the coven heads. And Hunter. They were all standing next to each other, in her defense.
In the background, she could hear the sound of Eda sighing.
“Do not fear, dear rebels! For I have, uh, captured the Golden Guard, so maybe please don’t arrest him immediately?” She said the last part in a rush, and gasped for breath.
Darius grimaced, apparently over his shock. “Please point that thing away from us.” Still, they took a step back from Hunter, which was always a good sign, because he looked a mixture of panicked and annoyed.
“Luz, that was not what I meant! Don’t point that at me!”
“Well, sorry! What did you want, then?” She twirled the staff around, almost smacking herself in the face.
“My flash- you don’t even know how to use that properly! Give it!” He lunged toward her, but she quickly stepped back. Not quickly enough, because he grabbed ahold of it, yanking it towards him.
“You said I could use it!”
“Not anymore! You clearly don’t know what you’re doing-AUGH!”
One of them had somehow activated the staff, which sent a bolt of magic flying into the ceiling. The two of them immediately let go of the staff, and it clattered to the ground.
Luz sighed. “Maybe you’re right.”
“I’m definitely right! It’s my staff!”
She threw up her hands defensively. “Okay, sorry! Also, that pen is still behind your ear.”
He patted his ear, pulling the pen up to his face and staring at it. “Huh. That explains why I couldn’t find it in my pocket-my flashcards!” Within seconds, he looked panicked again. He grabbed her shoulders. “My flashcards are missing.” He whispered frantically.
She patted him on the shoulder. “You’ll be fine! Who needs flashcards anyways?”
“I do!”
She waved a hand. “Psh, you’ll be fine! The rebels probably won’t hurt you. Look at them, aren’t they harmless?” The majority of the rebels did not, in fact, look harmless, but also looked like they were watching a trainwreck and were too horrified to look away. Eda had pulled microwave popcorn out of somewhere (her hair, probably) and was munching on it, calmly watching.
She patted him on the shoulder again, then shoved him towards the coven heads. “You got this! Go get them, tiger!” She gave him a thumbs up.
He frowned at her. “What even is a tiger? Is this another of your weird insults?”
“What? No! It’s like, a big orange cat with black stripes.” Hunter still looked skeptical. “Look, it’s a feared predator. You should feel encouraged. It’s a compliment .”
“I don’t want to be feared!”
“It’s just a saying! Now say something!” He blew a raspberry at her, then turned to face the coven heads, who seemed too confused to intervene.
He sighed, brushing dirt off his shirt (it didn’t make a difference), before taking a depe breath. “Uh, hello. My name is Hunter.”
“We already knew that.” Eda added, unhelpfully. Raine elbowed her.
Hunter opened his mouth to continue, but Darius pointed at him, cutting him off. “Sorry, but I have to comment on your outfit, because that is the most horrendous thing I’ve ever had the displeasure of laying my eyes on. If anything, you should be apologizing for that.”
Eda flicked a piece of popcorn at Darius, the popcorn sticking in his abomination goo. “I think it’s great! Very treasonous. And rebellious.”
“Me? Treasonous? HA! I’ve never committed treason in my life!” Hunter laughed nervously.
Luz smacked her forehead. “Hunter!”
Lilith raised a judgemental eyebrow. “Your shirt says otherwise.”
“Me and my palisman are allowed to have different opinions!”
“But having a palisman is treason!” Lilith said.
“That’s not the point! And you know what, I’ve committed way worse treason then having Flapjack!”
Raine looked confused now. “I thought you said you hadn’t committed treason?”
“I was lying!” He said smugly.
“Why are you smug about that?”
Luz moved next to him, shaking his shoulders. “Ok, time out! Hehe.”
Hunter turned to glare at her. “I told you flashcards were a good idea! This is going terrible.”
“No, you’re fine! This is going great! Just tell them what you told me about your uncle and everything will be fine!”
He looked nervously at the coven heads, who looked very interested in their conversation. ‘What if I don’t want to do that? They might actually kill me if I explain.”
Luz made an inarticulate noise of rage. “Hunter! They won’t kill you! Probably!”
Raine was still looking confused. “Wait, who is your Uncle? Should I know this already?”
Hunter clapsed his hands together, looking away. “Uh, will you arrest me if I tell you?”
Darius sighed, rubbing his temples with his hands. At some point during their bickering, he had transformed back to his witch form. The popcorn was still stuck in his abomination hair He didn’t seem to have noticed, and Luz had no intention of telling him. “I think we’re going to arrest you anyways.”
Hunter’s face scrunched up at that. Luz shot him an I-told-you-so look. “You know, if you confessed everything, maybe you wouldn’t be arrested .”
Hunter looked even more uncomfortable. “That isn’t the worst thing ever. Maybe.”
She threw her arms in the air, trying to resist the urge to slap him. “HUNTER!”
He raised his hands in surrender. “Okay! Fine!” He turned back to the CATS. “So. My Uncle. As you may know. Is Belos.”
Eberwolf chirped smugly, and Darius scowled, digging around in his pocket before handing them a few snails.
Eda raised an eyebrow. “So I’m assuming you already know about your Uncle being dead, then?”
Raine’s eyes bugged out, and they stared at her. “Eda! You can’t just say that-”
Hunter, however had turned very pale. “You guys know he’s dead?”
“I told you the Golden Guard knew something!” Lilith shouted.
Darius had buried his face in his hands. “Okay, fine, the Golden Guard knew something, you were right-”
“See, I wanna know how he died, because it looked like he exploded-”
The adults continued arguing amongst themselves, while Luz slowly turned to face him. “Hunter.”
He didn’t respond.
“Hunter.”
He slowly turned to face her, horrified. “Luz.” He said slowly. “I forgot.”
She suddenly felt very afraid. “Hunter, what did you forget?”
He swallowed.
“The corpse.”
Luz had never understood what people meant when they experienced the five stages of grief in sveral seconds. But now? Oh, they weren’t exaggerating.
“Hunter,” she said lowly. “What do you mean you forgot the corpse.”
He was shaking now. “My Uncle. He was okay at first. But, he started decomposing over time, and then Flapjack tried to eat him-” He cut himself off. “I just left him in the bedroom. He was so rotted Luz, the smell was awful, you don’t understand-”
“Didn’t your Uncle die a month ago?”
He nodded miserably.
Luz stared at him. “You left your Uncle to decompose in his bedroom for a month ?!”
He flushed red. “Well, it wasn’t a month , more like a few weeks, there was a bit when I had him, uh, moving around, and-”
“What do you mean you had him MOVING?”
“Listen, it was Flapjack’s idea!”
Flapjack chirped from their position on top of Hunter’s head.
“Wait, sorry, the Emperor has been dead for a month ?” Raine said incredulously, interrupting the two of them.
Hunter whirled around to point accusingly at them. “You know what? Yeah, Belos has been dead for a month. It’s been me the entire time! I’ve been ruling the entire isles, in secret, for the past MONTH! And none of you guys figured out it was me, or evern realized something was wrong!”
Lilith stared, mouth agape. “Sorry, what?”
Eda snickered. “I can’t believe you didn’t notice Belos was dead for an entire month .”
Darius stared at him flatly. “I mean, we did suspect something was wrong. Just not…. this.”
Lilith scoffed. “I still am having a hard time believing that you of all people would commit treason.”
Hunter shrugged. “In my defense, it was Flapjack’s idea. Mostly.”
Raine looked very distraught. “How- explain? Please?” They sounded just a little bit desperate, and Luz felt kind of bad. But also not that bad. The others deserved to go on the same rollercoaster of emotions that Luz did approximately 30 minutes ago. Wss it 30 minutes ago? It might have been an hour. She wasn’t exactly keeping track.
Eberwollf chittered something, and Eda sighed. “Okay, enough with the hissy fit. Let’s all try to be mature adults here.” She glared at the coven heads, who looked somewhat embarrassed. “So, Blondie, can you explain the whole deal?” Thank god for Eda. Luz loved her so much.
Hunter took a deep breath. “Yes.” He straighted his shoulders. “Approximately a month ago, there was an… incident, and Belos… passed away. So-”
Raine raised a hand. “Wait, how did Belos die?”
Hunter bit his lip. “Can we- is that really relevant?”
Darius raised an eyebrow. “You’re being awfully shifty about it, so yes.”
Hunter fell quiet, long enough that Luz started to grow worried. “Uh, Hunter. I can tell them if you want-”
“No, it’s just-” He sighed, burying his hands in his head. “...he saw Flapjack and had a heart attack.” He mumbled.
Eda choked on her popcorn. “Sorry, what?”
Flapjack chirped, puffing up proudly. Hunter sighed, shoulders sagging, and pointed at his head. “Basically everything is because of this guy. Belos saw them and was so ‘shocked’ he just. Died. They were the one who suggested pretending Belos was still alive. And they’ve been giving me advice on running the government.”
For a moment, the adults fell silent.
Raine stared. “Sorry, but, are you saying that for the past month, the Boiling Isles has been ruled by a teenager and his pet bird?”
Flapjack twittered cheerfully, and Hunter sighed. “Yes. Any more questions? How much do I need to tell you so you won’t kill me?”
“We aren’t going to kill you, little prince.” Darius said, face twisting. “It just… explains a lot.”
Eda was laughing hysterically. She was trying to say something, but kept cutting herself off with laughter.
Raine’s face twisted. “But you said you were his nephew? Shouldn’t he have prepared you to rule, since you’re his only family?”
At that, Hunter awkwardly laughed. “Ha! Oh. That’s, uh. Funny. So funny. Yeah, he didn’t give me any training? At all? I mean, he never planned on dying, so.”
Darius’s face fell in his hands. “Are you fucking kidding me,” He mumbled.
Lilith looked distressed. “How- he never planned on dying? That’s ridiculous! Surely he had some kind of plan?”
Hunter srhugged. “Nope! I mean, he lived for 400 years, so I guess he figured he would be fine until the Day of Unity. He didn’t even write a will or anything. It was the one thing he didn’t write. Not that I would have gotten anything if he did have a will.”
“WHAT DO YOU MEAN HE’S 400 YEARS OLD-” Lilith shrieked.
The CATS seemed even more distressed by this. Luz leaned towards Hunter while they shouted. “Hey, does that mean I can just call dibs on whatever I want? Since he didnt make a will?”
“Uh, sure?”
She grinned at him. “I call dibs on his staff. And the rest of his mask. Did you know I broke off a piece of it?”
He stared at her in disbelief. “You-what? Why? How do you always do these things?”
Luz puffed out her chest. “Eda says it’s because of my ‘main character vibes’ and ‘sparkling personality’,” She said proudly.
He scrunched up his nose. “Eugh.
She shrugged. “I mean, look at us. Look at what we’ve accomplished,” She gestured to the ruined hallway, eyes sparkling. “The magic of friendship is real and strong enough to topple the government!”
“I think that’s because of Flapjack, actually.”
“Still the power of friendship!”
“You know what, I’ve decided. I’m going back to my room. That’s clearly the best outcome.”
She glared at him. “No! Do not do that!”
“I must agree with Luz, I don’t think you can be trusted by yourself.” Darius added.
Hunter stared at him, flabbergasted. “What- I’ve been handling myself, unsupervised, ruling the Boiling Isles for a month!”
Darius raised an eyebrow. “And look how that turned out.”
A chunk of the ceiling chose that moment to fall to the floor, thankfully not near anyone. Still, Hunter winced. “I can handle myself just fine.” he said weakly.
“Hunter. I’ve seen your room. And you said you’d come with me, remember?”
He sighed. “I'm starting to reget that.” Flapjack chirped angrily, yanking on his hair strand, and Hunter yelped. “Ow, ow, okay! Stop!”
“The only issue is where you’ll be staying.” Raine said. All the adults looked extremely nervous.
Lilith shrugged. “We could play rock paper scissors? Flip a coin?”
“No!” Both Luz and Hunter shouted.
Luz shot Eda a look, and the older woman sighed. “Ah, kid-”
Hunter grinned nervously. “Luz, you said Eda would be okay with it-” He whispered to her.
She shushed him, focused on giving Eda her biggest puppy eyes. “Eda, you promised you’d help him, and he doesn’t have anywhere to go! You’re the best option here, and he can share my room, and-”
Eda waved a hand, looking guilty. “Ah, jeez! Kid, I was gonna say yes! You didn’t need to do all that.”
Both her and Hunter looked at her hopefully. “Wait, really?”
Eda rubbed the back of her neck. “Yeah, I mean, I promised you. You don’t need to worry about that stuff, remember? That’s the adult’s job, and I’m a very responsible adult. I’ve got a few extra room anyways, so you kids can figure out housing arrangements back at the Owl House.”
Luz cheered, wrapping an arm around Hunter’s shoulders and tugging him closer. “Yay!” Flapjack began flying in circles around their heads, chirpping cheerfully.
Eda looked at his dufflebag, and raised an eyebrow. “You all ready to leave, kid?”
Hunter nodded, adjusting his grip on his dufflebag. “Everyhting I need is in here.” He patted it reassuringly, and Flapjack swooped down to perch on his shoulder.
She shot the teens a thumbs up, grinning. “Great! Because this place might be on fire, and we should probably get out of here before it catches up to us.”
Raine winced. “Ah. I knew I had forgotten something.”
Eda shot them a fond grin, then turned back to the kids. “Alright! We can leave, the coven heads can deal with running the government, and I’ll see you later,” That last part was directed at Raine, who blushed in response.
Luz gasped. “Are you guys finally getting back together?”
At that, both Eda and Raine blushed. “That’s-we’ll see. See you later! Have fun dealing with the coven heads and the government!” Eda said, shoving Luz down the hall.
Darius groaned at that. “Ugh, I forgot about them.”
Eberwolf chirped something. “What-No! You can’t eat them-well.”
“Maybe after everything settles down?” Rain suggested, voice echoing through the hall as Hunter chased after Luz and Eda.
The sounds of the CATS arguing were audible, although Hunter could no longer hear the words as he caught up to Luz. Eda was blushing and ignoring Luz, who was waggling her eyebrows and looking especially smug. Hunter sent the human a questioning look, and she grinned. “Eda and Raine have history ,” Luz explained gleefully. “They dated, and then they broke up, and then Eda joined Raine’s rebellion and they were both super flirty and they tried to kill Darius and Eberwolf together, and it’s all super dramatic!”
Hunter nodded, still confused. “So are they dating?”
Eda sighed. “It’s complicated! We have to talk. Which we can do later. After all of this.” Luz grinned at that, tugging Hunter’s arm.
“Oh, I’m so excited for you to see the Owl House! I can show you my room, and you can meet King, and Hooty, and I can teach you how to use glyphs, and show you my Good Witch Azura collection, and- oh my gosh! Do you know what Azura is?”
He raised an eyebrow. “No?”
She squealed. “It’s only the best book series of all time! So there’s five books, and they follow the adventures of the Good Witch Azura!” She paused to strike a dramatic pose. “She travels to all kinds of enchanted lands, fighting monsters and bringing peace to all! The language is a bit flowery, but it’s really good, and the story is actually a lot deeper then you would think! My favrite part is the relationship between Azura and Hecate. Hecate starts off as a villain, but later Azura befriends her, and they have a really close friendship! Well, they say it’s a friendship, but if you look at the subtext, it’s clearly romantic, and- do you know what shipping is? Ok, so shipping is-”
Luz’s voice echoes through the hallway as she rambled, and Hunter found that he surprisingly didn’t mind. Walking through the hallways, listening to her talk about ‘fanfiction’, he suddenly felt a lot less nervous. He wasn’t sure about leaving the adults to run the coven, or living with the owl lady, but hanging out with Luz? Being her friend?
That was something he could look forward to.