Demons of a Feather

It was Camila’s last day in the Demon Realm. Scapulasday, the weekend.

The last three days had been quiet. They hadn’t done much more than on Tues-er, Toes day.

There had been a small bit of excitement when a potion Eda and Luz had been working on started to destabilize, but the two of them had worked quickly in their potions workshop and gotten it fixed.

Luz and Eda were…completely in sync with each other when they were working. They had darted around the foaming cauldron, throwing bottles and jars across the room to each other, calling out brief observations and measurements and ingredients that meant nothing to Camila but that Luz and Eda understood like it was a third language.

That had made…something bubble in Camila’s gut, something that she pushed down.

Something else that made emotions she’d rather not deal with rise up in her that week had been Luz’s wall of photos. So many happy memories that Camila hadn’t been there for. So much of her daughter’s life that she missed. 

Luz pinned the photo Camila had brought up on her large collage, right between a picture of her, Eda, and King a few years ago, seemingly on her first day of school, and a more recent one of Luz with her three friends from yesterday and a few more teens, one of whom looked even more like a dog than King, all in the living room of the Owl House, just hanging out. None of the kids seemed to notice they were having their picture taken, but the words 'Afterschool BGC hangout!!!' were written across the bottom border in colored ink.

But next to those pictures, there was an old, slightly faded drawing that almost looked like it was the centerpiece of Luz’s photo wall.

It had been drawn by Luz, it looked so much like the ones Camila had carefully saved back home.

Little Luz was in the middle, horns and all, but she had drawn herself with a tail on either side; maybe she was trying to draw it wagging? Camila had been drawn holding Luz’s right hand, and Eda was holding her left. Manny was drawn next to Camila, holding her other hand, and King was drawn being held in Eda’s other arm.

Everyone had big smiles on their faces 

That had brought up more… emotion than Camila was ready to deal with. Maybe more than she’d ever be ready to deal with.

A…flock? of chittering demons swooping overhead snapped Camila out of her thoughts and back to the present.

Right now, she was following Luz and King through the streets of Bonesborough, the town where Eda had set up her market stall. Luz had wanted to get their potion deliveries done; she felt bad about being the reason their customers were having to wait for their orders. Camila was staying long enough to help her, but then she needed to head back to the Human Realm. Eda was off delivering to customers who lived further out from the Owl House.

Her hair tickled her ears under the cowl she had grabbed before they headed out. She didn’t want to risk that guard from the market recognizing her and trying to arrest her again. Eda had tried to assure her that that probably wouldn’t happen, but Camila wasn’t taking any chances here.

As Luz deftly led her through the winding streets and crowds, making sure they didn’t get separated by holding tightly to her hand, Camila tried not to stare at anything or anyone too much.

But not staring was really, really difficult.

There were just…so many things to look at. Most of which were at least a little bit horrifying. A demon trying to purchase an…ice cream cone? that wound up eating the demon. A small, flying…potato-shaped thing that fluttered around Luz elbow, only for her tail to whip around and flick it away. A kid around Luz’s age holding a food delivery whose arm was being eaten by the doorbell of the house they were at.

Camila made a note of that last one.

Maybe Hooty wasn’t the worst thing to have stuck to a house.

They had been out for almost three hours, and most of the potions had been delivered. All of them had hand-drawn labels, mostly done by Luz. Thankfully, all of the deliveries Luz had were for things like ‘boil cream’ or ‘hair growth serum’ or actual ‘snake oil’, which was apparently really good for reptilian demons when they had to shed. Camila had to ask Eda if it would be safe to use on normal earth snakes, and if she’d be able to bring some back to the clinic.

She’d had to help a nice goth kid, about Luz’s age, when their pet snake had a stuck shed just a week and a half ago. Camila had been able to help the snake, but if she could prevent things like that from happening to her patients and their owners, she wanted to.

Luz was wearing loose, dark gray pants and a hooded tunic that day. The hood was white, and the rest of the tunic was in two shades of purple. The sleeves were loose and elbow length, and the bottom part of the tunic was asymmetrical, shorter on the right side than the left. Luz didn’t have the hood up, but she had shown Camila that it was patterned to look like a snake.

She had a thick leather belt too, fastened with an owl-shaped buckle. It had pouches full of extra paper and pre-drawn glyphs, many on thicker cardstock to make them easier to throw, and adjustable straps that were full of potion bottles of varying colors and shapes. She also had purple fingerless gloves that looked artfully torn around her fingers.

"Alright hermanito," Luz glanced at King from his perch on her shoulder, "Where are we breaded for our next delivery?"

King and Luz had been throwing mostly bread-themed puns at each other since breakfast.

Four hours ago.

It was cute…at first.

“It’s crust across the street.” King pointed at the house in question. “A Mx Mycha is waiting for a vial of ‘chushroom growth enhancing serum’.” He untied Eda’s bandana from around his neck and re-tied it.

Earlier in the week Camila had learned that the ‘precious’ items Warden Wrath had stolen were more ‘sentimental’ than actually precious; he’d taken the bandana that Luz had given King, and a stuffed rabbit by the name of ‘Francios’ that Eda had found in something called a trash slug and gave to the little demon instead of selling when he looked like he really liked it.

Upon hearing that, Camila had offered to help steal their stuff back against her better judgment, but that was turned down. Luz told her that they had another plan to break into the…Conformatorium, but having a human to get through the barrier was just quicker.

The three made their way to the home, and Camila watched Luz on the porch just long enough to see her ring the bell and get her hand out of the way of the snapping mouth, then looked back out at the town of Bonesborough and tried to get used to…everything she was seeing.

Like the rat that scampered across the street that had an eyeball growing on its back.

Or the group of people in brown robes who were hauling a giant lizard demon with six eyes and two mouths down the street, bound with glowing chains to a wheeled platform.

As Camila watched, the demon went from motionless, faking unconsciousness probably, to thrashing and roaring, rearing back and breaking several of the chains holding it down, right as the platform was passing the house she, Luz, and King were at. She scrambled onto the porch, grabbing Luz’s arm just as the door closed and she was turning to leave.

“Luz!'' Before Camila could start to run, there was a loud zapping noise cutting the demons roar off. She looked back at the escaping demon to see it limply fall back onto the platform, the remnants of a spell crackling like green lightning along its skin. Several of the people around the monster bound it again with magical chains they summoned with spell circles.

“Uh oh.” Despite the demon being subdued, Camila felt Luz tense up next to her. This time, Luz grabbed Camilas arm and dragged her off the porch and around the side of the house. She wasn’t sure what had spooked Luz, but she was going to follow her. Luz peeked around the corner, and then she and King both relaxed, with Luz giving a relieved sigh.

“Good, they didn’t see us.” 

“Who didn’t see us?” Camila was a bit concerned by the way Luz stiffened at her question.

“The bounty hunters.” King spoke up from Luz’s shoulder.

Camila’s eyebrows shot up, “What?”

“Uh, yeah, those guys are a gang of bounty hunters.” Luz jumped in. “If  they saw us and recognized us as…being connected to Eda, they might try to use us to get to her and get her bounty.” She rubbed the back of her neck, “Eda’s got the highest bounty in the history of the Empire, and the longer she goes without being caught or choosing to join a Coven, the higher it’s gonna climb.”

Camila couldn’t shake the feeling squirming at the back of her mind that there was something a bit…off with Luz, like she was holding something back or downplaying what she was talking about. But, instead of pressing that, Camila gave her baby a soft smile.

“Alright then.” She placed a hand on Luz’s shoulder as they walked around the back of the house and back onto the sidewalk, keeping the houses between themselves and the bounty hunters. “Let’s get back to-uheeee!!” Camila jumped and shrieked as she saw the mass of flesh and eyeballs and… whatever it was she was looking at clumped around a light post. It’s eyeballs squinted at her. “Uh…I mean, good afternoon, my good…sir?”

The…whatever it was blinked, before the eyes looked like they were smiling? Maybe?

Camila gave a shaky chuckle as the three of them walked off, King looking for their next stop on the list Eda had handed him when she handed Luz the sack of potions. “Oh, wow! This place sure is full of…the most interesting people!” She gently elbowed Luz, “I, uh, bet that guy had some…interesting stories!”

“Mamá, you don’t have to pretend to like the Isles just for my sake.” Luz glanced over at Camila with a small smile on her face, and a look in her eyes that was a bit too tired for Camila’s liking.

“Ff- Whaaaat?!” Camila hoped her smile didn’t look as frantic as it felt. “I’m not pretending! I love that you’ve been living on a giant…carcass for the last eight years. I-I bet that had something to do with that taxidermy hobby you were telling me about! That fake giraffe you showed me was really impressive mija.”

“Really?” King said, “I always thought the weird bug mouth was unnecessarily horrifying.”

“I’m telling you hermanito, they had to have been banished for a reason!” Luz reached up and booped King’s snout, “What better reason for banishment than giant weird soul-eating bug mouths?”

She turned her attention back to Camila, “But really Mamá, this place can be kinda crazy.” Luz gestured around the three of them, “It took me some time to adjust, and I was treated like a local from day one. Y’know, the fact that just meeting Hooty didn’t send you screaming into the woods is impressive.” She gave a small snort, “I actually bit him when he showed up on the door.”

Camila snorted, “Really?”

“Yeah!” Luz smiled; she had been slowly perking up over the past few days, so it was a big, genuine smile. “He wasn’t a part of the Owl House when Eda found us.” She waved her free hand a bit as she spoke. “It was a few days after that. Eda had taken me and King to the Slayground, and when we got back home, boom! Hooty was there!” She looked happy as she recalled the memory.

“Me and King had worn ourselves out, so Eda was carrying the both of us back asleep. Hooty introduced himself by yelling,” Luz cleared her throat, and then tried to impersonate Hooty, “‘Welcome home new friends! Hoot Hoot!’ We were startled awake, King freaked out pretty badly, and I just kinda,” She mimed holding something up to her face and biting down, “pounced. It took Eda like, twenty minutes to calm King down, and at least ten more to get me off of Hooty.”

Camila couldn’t help but laugh at the mental image that story brought up.

Luz and King both laughed with her.

“Mamá,” Luz stopped and pulled Camila into an alley to get out of the foot traffic, “You don’t have to force yourself to love this place like I do right away.” Camila’s heart clenched as Luz spoke; she wasn’t sure why. “If you don’t want to, you never have to leave the Owl House. When, uh, when you visit.”

Camila sighed, smiling at Luz. “When did you get so mature?”

King gave a surprised little ‘weh!’ when Luz practically jumped on her to give her a hug. Camila chuckled as she returned the hug. She felt King trying to stand on her arm while his perch on Luz’s shoulder was mostly occupied by Camila’s face.

“Ok, we’re on the last delivery, right bud?” Luz asked King after pulling out of the hug.

"Yep! Last and definitely yeast , hehe," King chuckled, settling back on Luz’s shoulder while they walked back into the street, "is that really annoying guy who was mad he didn't get his 'suction cup ointment’.” He stood on Luz’s head, trying to find the right way to their last stop.

“That way!” He pointed down the street and towards a dark alley.

“...ah.” Camila tried to hide her grimace with a smile.

They walked towards the alley, and Camila squeaked when Luz had to pull her down as four kids around her age in red shoes with little wings on their heels swooped low over the crowd, cackling as they passed a ball with an eyeball and teeth on it back and forth. As they flew off, Camila noticed they were all wearing a different uniform than the one from Luz’s school.

“Wait a minute…” Luz murmured as they entered the alley, peering around the surprisingly deep shadows. It took every ounce of self control Camila had to not shriek when she noticed the deep reflective glow in Luz’s pupils. “King, doesn’t this lead to the abandoned Imperial summerhouse?”

“Uh, yeah, I think so.”

“The what?” Camila stumbled a little as the toe of her shoe caught on a crack in the alley.

“Before Belos decided that the Isle’s were his Empire, he and his followers seized this big fancy family manor on the edge of Bonesborough when they invaded the town.” Luz started to explain, “He claimed that they were a family of ‘dangerous wild witches’, who were trying to lead the town to ruin. Once the town was on his side and the ‘wild witches’ were…dealt with, he used  the manor as his base of operations, until he was able to con enough witches into building his ugly castle in the Chest.”

… in the Chest?

Luz continued, “After that, he used the manor as his so-called ‘summerhouse’, but all of his so-called ‘vacations’ were really suspicious.” Camila wondered briefly if Luz was going to get cramps in her fingers from all of the air quotes, “He declared that he was abandoning it about three years ago, and he had his Coven Head cronies seal it off. It took Eda two days to crack through that ‘impenetrable’ barrier they set up. We went-”

Luz cut herself off with a sharp gasp through her nose, and glanced away from Camila. Her pace picked up a bit.

“What did you find, Luz?” Camila stopped and prompted, placing a hand on Luz arm and growing a little wary.

“Well, the manor itself looked like it hadn’t been touched in like, four hundred years. Except for a bunch of destroyed paintings though. Those were clawed to shreds.” Luz kept her gaze down, “But there were…big numbered cages in the basement. Like, ‘hold a person inside’ big, and they looked like whatever had been in them had clawed their ways out. Eda sent me out as soon as we saw that, and she came out a few minutes later. She never told me what else she saw, and as we were flying back home, she changed a bunch of o- her ‘Wanted’ posters into ‘Looters welcome at the abandoned Imperial Summerhome! Full of cool stuff, everything must go!’ posters.”

She finished with a little chuckle, “People have been breaking in and defacing it ever since, and all the cages and creepy stuff make people think it’s haunted. My schools Grudgby team uses it to haze newbies that the captain doesn’t like to get them to quit.”

Luz pushed past the dirty sheets that were hanging up at the end of the alley, and gasped as she looked past them. Camila ducked out of the alley, and gave a gasp of her own. There was a massive building, practically a castle walled in at the end of the alley. She could see a part of the wall was wood, but it looked like it had been fused into the stones around it. But the building didn’t look rundown or looted, it looked pristine! Almost sparkling in the sun, with big flags waving from…were those parapets? Or just normal towers?

“Huh.” Luz sounded puzzled, “I guess someone moved in and fixed it up in the last few months?” She hesitated for a moment, before smiling and walking up to the door. “Well! I hope they liked my graffiti!”

“Uh…” Camila wasn’t sure about this. Maybe it was what Luz had said about the basement making her feel uneasy, or maybe she was just on edge from…everything else she’d run into while out with Luz. But Camila didn’t like this.

“Eh, big houses always belong to big whack jobs.” King spoke as Luz pressed the not-arm-eating doorbell, which rang out as the massive doors opened, revealing a dark hallway “Luz, can you just punt the bottle in so we can go get Not Dogs or something?” He hopped from Luz’s shoulder and onto Camila’s when the teen took another step towards the door.

She stiffened for a moment as he got settled, but King was surprisingly unobtrusive once he found a good spot. The side of his broken horn brushed against her check as he messed with his temporary replacement bandana.

“And skip out on a potential mystery?” Luz strode into the manor, which sent a small spike of worry through Camilas chest. Luz noticed her hesitating before following. “You can wait out here with King if you want, Mamá. I’m just curious about who moved in, I shouldn’t be more than a few minutes.”

Oh no, that wasn’t happening. “I’m just…admiring the architecture mija.” Camila walked to stand next to her daughter. She didn’t know which would be worse; letting Luz walk into this off-putting building alone, or Camila being out in the Demon Realm without her.

The inner hallway was fairly plain, and dark, but as they entered the large first room and Luz called out, “Hellooo? Owl’s Finest Potions, we’re here to deliver your order!”, lights chimed on, one after the other, illuminating a massive library. It looked like it had been pulled right out of one of the illustrations in the Azura books.

A massive portrait of the most stereotypically wizardly looking wizard Camila could think of loomed over the massive staircase in front of them, and as the lights fully illuminated the room she could see the actual wizard making his way down the stairs.

“Great, a weird old man in jim-jams.” King groaned, and Camila could almost hear him rolling his eyes. She tried to hold back a laugh at that, and only partially succeeded.

“Weird old man in jim-jams who’s a paying customer.” Luz murmured out of the corner of her mouth, before walking over to meet the man as he reached the bottom of the stairs.

“I was in my oscillarium, reading the stars.” The wizard started, with a gentle cadence to his voice that did nothing to make Camila feel less on edge. “And who might you be, with eyes full of curiosity?” He gestured at Luz.

“Hi! We’re here to delive-” Luz started, before the wizard leaned closer and cut her off.

“Young lady, dareth I say, I sense something unique about you.” The wizard summoned a table decked out with a steaming teapot and a large spread of little snacks, and three chairs, the largest one across from the other two. “Please, won't you and your companions join me for tea?”

“Sure!” Luz, for some reason, chirped out. “We’d love to.”

“No we wouldn’t.” King was deadpan as he spoke, and Camila was on his side. She didn’t like any of this.

“C’mon, be nice.” Luz turned back to face them, and winked at them while the wizard couldn’t see her face. That made Camila pause for a moment. Was Luz planning something? “Plus, there are scones.” She finished in a sing-song tone.

“Where?!” King practically launched himself off of Camila’s shoulder at that, charging across the room on all fours and jumping onto the table.

As Camila followed Luz over to the table and sat, she still couldn’t shake the feeling something was off, but it seemed like Luz had a plan? Or at least, Camila hoped that wink meant Luz had picked up on the same bad feeling Camila had, and she was just playing along with the wizard. Trying not to be rude and lose a customer maybe?

As King went to town on all of the little snacks that had been laid out, Luz spoke again, “Thank you for your hospitality, Sir Wizard. And I would like to formally apologize on behalf of the Owl Lady for your delivery being late.”

“Please, call me Adegast.” The wizard held a teacup, but never moved to drink out of it. “And don’t fret too much over the late delivery. I run a small business of my own, I know how things like that can go.”

“You should run another small business, one of more scones into my mouth!” King looked up from the empty plate on the table, then jumped over to Camila and back onto her shoulders. The end of Luz’s tail gave a few wags under the table before stilling.

“Speaking of the Owl Lady, I thought she delivered all of her packages herself?” Adegast swirled his teacup, “I hope nothing bad happened to her!”

Luz gave a small chuckle, “Oh, no, once I got old enough to help with the deliveries, we started splitting up to get them done faster.” She rubbed the back of her neck, “Eda just never changed her fliers.”

“I...see. Well, that’s a relief.” Adegast gave a small smile. “You know, young lady, I couldn’t help but notice your rather unique ears.”

Camila saw the tip of Luz's tail lash under the table, and out of the corner of her eyes she could see the fur on the back of her neck and a bit of the hair surrounding it at the base of her skull start to flare up, but her voice stayed chipper, almost overly so. "Heh, I get that a lot."

"They're exactly as described in the prophecy I've been studying!" Adegast set his teacup down and rested his elbows on the table, folding his hands in front of him.

"Prophecy?" Camila spoke for the first time, which got Adegast to glance at her briefly before returning his attention to Luz.

A week ago if someone brought up a prophecy to Camila, she would have thought they were either crazy, or a LARPer who took it far too seriously.

But here?

In the world that took her daughter from her and gave her back half demon?

A part of Camila couldn't help but wonder…

That part of her wasn’t louder than her gut feeling that this Adegast character wasn’t trustworthy, but what if there was something else? Some reason for everything that she and her family went through, some force that pulled Luz away from her and Manny?

It wouldn’t make things better, of course, but at least it would give her something to blame. Something to be mad at .

"Indeed." He stood, reaching into a pocket on his robe and pulling out a worn looking roll of paper. He unrolled it, revealing a stylized map. There were two towns drawn on it, one called ‘Serpinia’, and the other ‘Doll Village’. The focus of the map seemed to be a staff at what was labeled ‘Celestial Lake’, “The prophecy speaks of a young demonling with round ears, the Chosen One, who will claim the Celestial Staff, and free this world from an ancient evil.”

He handed Luz the map, “Perhaps thou hath cometh here for a reason.”

Ok, now this was reminding Camila too much of the time she got suckered into selling energy drinks for a pyramid scheme. She stood, probably a bit too fast, grabbing the wizard's order from the sack and placing it on the table, “Well, thank you for the tea and snacks, but we really must be going!” She grabbed Luz’s hand and started pulling her to the door, “We have lots of deliveries to get done, right kids?”

“Yeah, your food is gone and we are too.” King said

“Uh, yeah.” Luz was still looking at the map as Camila dragged her out, ignoring Adegasts attempts to talk more about the prophecy. Thankfully, he didn’t follow them out of the library.

Camila breathed a sigh of relief as she, Luz, and King walked back through the dark alley. “Luz-” she started, ready to do damage control and stop Luz from wanting to go on a dangerous quest or something.

“Boy that guy was laying it on thick!” Luz exclaimed, still peering at the map, but now in a more scrutinizing manner, instead of the awestruck look she had when Adegast was talking about the prophecy at first. “How stupid does he think I am! This isn’t even aged convincingly.”

“Well maybe if you stopped being so cheery all the time, people would stop thinking you’re an easy mark.” King teased from Camila’s shoulder.

Luz blew a raspberry at him, then noticed the look of mild confusion on Camila's face. "That guy was trying to scam us. I, uh, had him pegged when I saw the cart of potions next to the stairs."

"Oh!" Camila said, relieved, "I had a bad feeling about him, but I didn't notice anything in particular. How did a cart of potions tip you off?"

"We've got a lot of competition for our potions.” Luz started, tilting the map back and forth in the dark, "A couple of the potions on his cart don't interact well with each other, so I knew he had to be selling them, not using them.”

Luz shrugged, “Once he mentioned my ears, and then brought up a ‘prophecy’, and a ‘chosen one prophecy’ at that, I knew what he was up to. I was just gonna play along like I was buying it, but I’m glad you got us out of there quick.”

“Prophecies and visions and fortune telling don’t work like that.” Luz pulled out a glyph, creating a ball of light that she held above her head, flipping the map upside down and examined the back through the light as it shone through. “One person doing one thing can’t just guarantee that the entire world will end up a certain way. Actions and consequences of individual people ripple out, but not in super certain ways like that.”

She held the map close to her face and sniffed it, her expression brightening, “There it is!” She glanced over at Camila, a proud smile on her face. That quickly changed when she saw the look of confusion on Camila’s face, flashing briefly to confusion before her eyebrows shot up.

“Uh, there’s special ink on this map. Watch.” Luz stopped at the mouth of the alley, pulling a glyph out of her belt and using it to produce a wave of heat under the map. She held it into the sunlight, and Camila watched as glowing words appeared.

THE CHOSEN ONE

The path will only reveal itself to the worthy

The map also changed, the uncompleted path gaining a glowing ending piece leading right to the staff.

“It needed a little heat to finish setting, he was probably expecting that to come from body heat from my pocket, then add a little sunlight and boom!” Luz flicked the map as she started walking, “Confirmation of a prophecy.” She smiled at Camila, “Inks like these are pretty simple potions, so they were some of the first ones Eda taught me to make.” She snorted, “King accidentally tipped a bottle onto himself once, and he was glowing for a month before Eda could scrub all the ink out of his fur.”

Camila giggled at that, “Like a little glow stick.”

“What’s a glow stick?” King asked, and a glance at Luz showed similar confusion.

"It's a human device," Camila ignored the weight that settled in her gut as she spoke. "It's…so you have two plastic tubes, each filled with a different chemical, at least I think it's only one each, and one tube is made of heavy plastic, while the other is more fragile."

"The fragile tube is floating inside of the bigger tube, and what you're supposed to do is 'crack' it, to break the fragile tube." Luz had spent more than half of her life living as a half-demon in the Demon Realm, of course she wouldn't remember much about human stuff. "Then you shake it to mix the chemicals, and the whole thing glows for…however long the reaction lasts, usually only a few hours."

They stopped to sit on a bench near the shop Eda had dropped them off at, ‘Mr Elixir’, and a widely grinning Luz handed her…what was it, Pensta-gram? scroll to King to let Eda know they were done.

“Those are really similar to my free-lab project from last year!” Luz pulled a few small vials, about the size of her little finger off of her belt. They were full of clear liquid, both slightly tinted, one yellow and one purple. Each one had a small, dark colored crystal floating in it. She shook them, and Camila watched the crystals start to fizz and dissolve, causing the vials to give a soft glow that was barely visible in the sunlight. “These small ones last about thirty minutes, and then the crystals take fifteen to reform before you can use them again.”

Camila carefully took one of the vials when Luz handed it to her. The glass was cool in her hand, and she cupped her hands around it to see the light better. “These are amazing mija!” Pride and a bit of awe filled her chest. “Is this what they teach in schools here?”

“Yeah! Well, this wasn’t a ‘follow the teacher’ type project, it was for my free study lab.” Luz placed the glowing vials back on her belt, next to four more. “I got moved into the advanced free lab after the ‘Abomination Incident’ near the end of last year.” Camila wasn’t sure she wanted to know what that entailed.

“Princey B, er, Principal Bump wanted to move me up at least a full grade, but I share a lot of classes with Amity and Willow, and always have at least one general class a year with Gus, so I didn’t want to.” Luz rubbed the back of her neck, “Putting me in the advanced free study lab was the compromise. It’s a little awkward since everyone else is in the graduating class, but it gives me a lot more equipment and ingredients to work with.”

“And it’s built to withstand the type of explosions your experiments can cause better than the lower level labs.” Eda spoke from behind them all, ruffling Luz’s hair.

“...explosions?” Camila asked, her voice tight, and she watched as the smiles on Luz and Eda’s faces froze.

“Uh, that’s a running joke for us.” Eda said, “Potioneer humor.”

Luz stood up, a little too fast, “Well, we just need to pick up your elixir order and then we’re good to go!”

Camila stood as well, and when she was standing close enough to Eda, King leapt onto her shoulder before disappearing into her mane for a moment, before sticking his head out over her shoulder.

“Elixir?” Camila asked, and Eda stiffened just a bit.

“Uh, yeah. I’m cursed.” Her tone was matter-of-fact. “Have been since I was about Luz’s age. Don’t know who did it, don’t know why, but I have to deal with it.”

Camila gaped a bit at that. A curse sounded…bad, “Uh, what does that…entail?”

“Eh, going gray early, this-” Eda removed her hand for a moment, before putting it back into place, “-neat party trick, occasionally I sprout feathers, and it’s a bit of a drain on my magic.” She knocked on the shuttered window under the ‘Mr Elixir’ sign. “Which is what my elixirs help with.”

The window opened, revealing a witch who looked like he was in his mid-to-late twenties. “Oh, hey Eda, hey kids!” He greeted them, “Here for your order?”

“You got it Morton!” Eda said, before King handed her a coin purse from her hair and she counted out the payment.

“How’d you do on your exam Luz?” Morton asked as he pulled a clinking, labeled sack off of a shelf.

“Aced it, thanks to that trick you gave me to keep the mantras for the five disciplines straight.” Luz grinned as she took the sack from the witch. “Are they worded so similarly to confuse people on purpose?”

“Pf, probably.” Eda groaned, taking the sack from Luz and tying it around her staff, the wings popping out with a hoot. “See you in two weeks Morton!”

Camila was starting to get used to flying on a staff, so her stomach wasn’t curdling in dread as she climbed on behind Luz and in front of Eda and they took off. She didn’t like it at all, and was probably never going to like it, but she wasn’t holding on so hard it made her hands ache anymore.

Luz had given Camila a ‘flying’ lesson the other day with Owlbert, which had just been Camila hovering two feet above the red grass while Luz walked next to her, to help her feel more comfortable whenever she had to fly.

As they got to the Owl House and started putting the elixirs away, Camila recognized them as what Eda had been drinking on that first night. It sounded like it was medication for her curse, essentially.

It only took a few minutes to put them away, for some reason scattering them around that house, and then it was time for Camila to go back to the Human Realm.

Without Luz.

There was a solemn air in the Owl House as Eda opened the portal door.

Luz pounced on Camila again, with a bone cracking hug that she returned.

"You're sure you're comfortable using the scroll?" Luz asked, not for the first time.

“I am, mija, don’t worry.”  Camila assured her daughter.

Over the week, they had come up with a plan for Camila to keep in touch and see Luz as much as possible. Eda and Luz had learned years ago that the scrolls witches and demons used could send text messages between realms, as long as the portal was open.

On weekdays, Eda would open the portal for her in the morning and in the afternoon, so Camila could see Luz to and from school. And she was going to spend as much of her weekends at the Owl House as she could. Eda would text her as soon as she opened the portal, and even if the messages weren’t going to get to the other if the portal was closed, Camila and Luz were planning on texting each other as often as possible.

Reluctantly, Camila pulled out of the hug. "I'll see you tomorrow for breakfast, and every day after that, alright cariño?" Luz was tearing up just as much as Camila was. "I love you so much Luz."

"I love you too, Mamá." Luz wiped her tears away as she spoke.

With a heavy sigh, Camila turned back to the open portal door. Eda was standing next to it, bandana tied around her ears, and she was picking Kings fur off of it. She was going to walk Camila home again. It was Camila's idea; she said she wanted to make sure Eda knew which house was Camila's, in case she needed to go get her for emergencies.

That wasn't entirely a lie.

Eda walked through first, and Camila felt an ache in her chest as she followed the witch back to the Human Realm.

*****

Eda gave a heavy sigh in the afternoon sun. There was a part of her that had been squirming all week, waiting eagerly for Camila to finally leave so things could go back to normal with her and her-

…

The rest of her had been trying to ignore that part.

And the bit of relief that that part of her was feeling was quickly smothered by guilt.

Luz had been separated from her real, actual mom for years, and Eda had the gall to be happy that she couldn't be properly reunited because it meant-

It meant Eda didn't have to-

No. Nope. Not going there.

Those feelings were getting shoved down and locked away deep down where Eda was never going to have to deal with them again.

Because that worked so well every other time she told herself that.

Eda heard Camila come through behind her and took a breath to settle her nerves before turning to face her. "You gonna be okay?"

Camila gave a heavy sigh, "I don't have a choice not to be."

The two started walking in an…it wasn't as awkward a silence as it had been on Shinsday, but it wasn't friendly, either.

"Eda, I have a question for you." There was an edge to Camila's words when she finally spoke, despite how quiet they were. "One I'd like a fully honest answer to."

Eda’s stomach dropped, but she didn’t show that on her face. “Ok.”

Camila kept looking ahead, and Eda didn’t look over at her either. “Will I ever be able to live with my daughter again? Or is the rest of my life going to be…this?” She waved her hand around, gesturing all around them. “Having to, to commute through a magic portal just to hear about how her day was?”

Eda chanced a glance over at Camila, her controlled expression wavering as she saw the shorter woman wipe away a few tears. “Can I ever bring Luz home?”

A flash of something reared its ugly head in Eda’s chest, raging about how Luz already had a home, thank you very much, but she shoved that down and locked it away as quickly as it rose up. “I…don’t know.” There was a barely perceptible waver in her voice. “Everything I know about magic, and that is a lot, leads me to think that whatever actually happened to make Luz half whatever King is permanent.”

“Uh-” Eda continued quickly when she saw Camila’s face start to fall in a way that was painfully similar to Luz, “We won’t know for sure until we figure out what actually did happen.” She hesitated a moment, warring with herself over whether to tell Camila about her project. The human had wanted honesty…

So Eda settled on just omitting a few details. “But there are some things in the Boiling Isles that might be able to help disguise Luz as a human temporarily. It’s mostly illusion-based stuff, and nothing I’ve been able to find would be a viable long-term solution, but it’s something.”

Eda watched as Camila’s face shifted from resignation to contemplation to the tiniest bit of hope as she spoke. She had to swallow down more… feelings than she wanted to think about anytime soon at that.

Camila really did look a lot like Luz.

They walked in silence until they got to Camila’s house, and exchanged brief goodbyes before Eda headed back home, practically sprinting to the portal.

And of course, as soon as she stepped through, Luz and King were waiting for her, holding the plans they’d come up with to steal back Francois and King’s bandana without a human.

Luz gave her an awkward smile. “Feel up for a heist to end the day?”