Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The sun hasn’t shone in days.

Not since the eclipse.

The shattered remains of the Boiling Isles lay under a veil of ash in the clouds, where the air is so
thick you have to chew to breathe. No stars. No moon. No life.

Luz stands looking over what remained of Bonesborough, her hand grasping a paslisman blade.

Twisted cobblestone, collapsed towers, market stalls reduced to planks. Flora has already begun
to creep back through the cracks. She no longer cried.

Behind her, the rocks moved.

“You’re too exposed,” Hunter whispered, stepping beside her. His voice was hoarse. He hasn’t
slept again, that was clear. “Their spies will see you.”

She flinched when he said that. She kept staring ahead, though. “I had to see it. One last time.”

Hunter tugged her arm. “Let’s go. King’s waiting.”

She hesitated, then turned away.

In the piled remains of the Owl House, what remained now was a hidden door, barely visible in the cliffside behind the ruins, carved hastily into the stone with tools, magic, and desperation. It had once been part of a root cellar. Now it was the last shelter they had. Titan bones loomed above like the ribs of a long-dead god, and inside the makeshift hideout, warmth glowed dimly from glyph-powered lanterns.

King sat on a wide slab of stone near the central fire, wrapped tightly in a patched cloak stitched from an old curtain. He’d grown taller — noticeably so. His little limbs were longer, his skull less round. The horns had thickened and now shimmered faintly when he felt strong emotion. The Titan inside him had awakened on the Day of Unity. It had not gone quiet since.

“I felt you leave,” he said as Luz and Hunter stepped into the light from the entrance.

“Sorry,” Luz said quietly. “Had to… remember.”

Eda sat by the fire. Her cursed form flickered slightly, but she was more stable now — wild magic was harder to find. Still, she hadn’t been the same since Raine.

She didn’t look up. “We can’t keep doing this, kid,” she said, voice rough. “Every time we leave, there’s fewer places to go back to.”

“I know.”

Silence fell over them too suddenly. Hunter busied himself with a beaten map, tracing the lines of hidden tunnels and Collector-free zones. He had taken on the role of scout and strategist. It gave him something to do, which is all he needed.

He tapped a circle with his finger. “I think the Collector’s set up in the Titan’s skull. I felt echo magic up there last scouting run. It’s… strange. Not hostile. But wrong.”

Eda leaned forward. “Echo magic?”

“They’re copying things. Events, people, movements. Like they’re trying to re-stage history.” He paused. “Like they’re playing house.”

“With the coven heads?” she asked, though her voice carried dread.

Hunter hesitated. Then he swallowed. “Of everyone.”

Luz winced. She’d seen the Collector’s “toys.” Hollowed-eyed recreations of witches and demons who’d perished in the Draining Spell. Gus. Amity. Raine. They danced endlessly in silent parades, never tiring, never disobeying.”

She pressed her hand to her mouth.

Later that night, Luz sat outside the door, staring at a faintly glowing glyph in her hand. Her magic was flickering — unstable. The glyphs worked differently now. Sometimes they backfired. Sometimes they did the things she didn’t ask.

“I’m going back,” she whispered.

She didn’t expect an answer. But one came anyway,

“You always say that.”

King stepped from the shadows of the doorway beside her, tail dragging slightly. He sat beside her, close enough for their shoulders to touch. He leaned against her.

“This time I mean it.”

He blinked. “You want to fight the Collector alone?”

“No. I want to talk to them.”

King stared. “Talk?”

She nodded slowly. “I think… they’re just a kid. A really powerful, really scared kid who doesn’t understand what they’re doing.”

He looked skeptical, but didn’t interrupt.

“We’ve tried everything else,” Luz continued. “We ran. We hid. We tried fighting. It didn’t matter. They’re still up there, turning our friends into dolls. And we’re just… surviving. Barely.”

King looked at the glyph — it pulsed like it was listening.

“You think they’ll listen to reason?”

Luz exhaled slowly. “I don’t know. But if they don’t… then I want them to see me. The real me. Not a puppet. Not a threat. Just a girl.”

“I think the Titan left you something,” he said. “Something even the Collector can’t see.”

She turned to him.

“In the glyphs,” he said. “In the way they’ve changed. I think there’s something in them now.”

For the first time in weeks, her heart beat fast — not from fear, but from hope.

She looked down at the glowing sigil in her hand, and for the first time in weeks, it felt warm. Not just magical. Alive.

Maybe the Titan hadn’t abandoned them.

Chapter Text

Time doesn’t move. The stars don’t shift. The tides don’t rise. The sky, once always in motion, hands in permanent twilight — neither day or night. It’s been this way since the Day of Unity.

But Luz still remembers.

It started with bells.

Soft at first, echoing from the head of the Titan. A sound too beautiful to be real, like wind chimes on a front porch. Luz had been racing through the Emperor’s Castle, glyphs flickering in her palm like frantic fireflies, when it hit her. Not a sound — but a pull.

A gravitational hum from every direction.

Magic… rising.

She made it to the platform with mere seconds to spare. Eda beside her, wild eyes full of curse. King hanging from her shoulder, panting. The sky was opening — an eclipse blacking out the sun in full, golden light bleeding down like molasses.

And across the Isles, thousands of witches stood proudly in their coven uniforms, unaware their bodies were about to betray them.

“NO!” Luz screamed. “Stop it! You don’t have to do this!”

Belos didn’t even look at her. He stood in the center of the ritual circle, arms wide.

The Coven Heads were the first to fall.

Their sigils lit like brands. Not just one — all of them. Belos had injected them with multiple coven marks over the years, and now they burned in unison. Darius collapsed, clutching his chest. Eberwolf howled. Raine —

Raine’s scream was the last thing Eda heard before she bolted towards them, curse flaring, instinct overriding sense. Luz tried to follow, but King yanked her back.

Then it spread.

All across the Isles, coven witches dropped to their knees. Golden light spilled from their mouths, their eyes. Magic, stolen, ripped from them like roots from soil. Some tried to fight it — casting spells, ripping of cloaks — but the sigils were deeper than skin.

Children collapsed in school halls. Vendors slumped over carts. A librarian clutched her heart mid-shelving and didn’t get back up. Creatures in the forest watched as color was being drowned out of their world.

Willow was flying. Gus was mid-illusion. Amity was right in front of her.

“Luz—!”

A flash of light. A scream that never finished. The ground beneath Luz and Eda cracked. They ran.

She didn’t remember how they got out. Maybe King did something. Maybe Eda’s curse surged one last time. But they made it to the Titan’s shoulder before the light stopped.

And when it did…

The Isles went silent.

No birds, no fairies. No laughter, no words. No hum of ambient magic.

Just quiet.

Luz is standing on the collapsed platform where the ritual happened. A jagged piece of concrete sticks up out of the air, enough for Luz to sit down on and dangle her legs. The stone is blackened and broken. In the center, a circle of gold still glows faintly beneath the cracks. The magic is too strong to go away.

She kneels and presses her fingers to it.

It hums.

Alive, somehow.

Hunter joins her a few minutes later, boots crunching on rubble.

“You shouldn’t be here alone,” he mutters, sitting beside her. His cloak is too big — a hand-me-down from Darius. He wears it proudly anyway.

“I’m not alone,” Luz almost mumbles. “I still hear them.”

Hunter doesn’t answer. He just examines the circle for an uncomfortable amount of time.

“Do you think they felt it?” she asks.

He knows what she means.

“The ones who died?” he says quietly. “Yeah. I think they did.”

Luz nods, eyes misting.

She pulls something from her satchel — a small stack of faded notes and drawings. Amity’s handwriting loops across the top page.

‘Plan E – Emergency Eclipse Backup’

“Her handwriting is still so neat,” she whispers, almost laughing.

Luz hops down from the structure. She approaches the circle and places the paper on the stone like an offering. A part of Hunter wants to stop her, wants to tell her that this is dangerous. The Collector might notice.

But he doesn’t.

He just kneels beside her and lets her mourn.

Raine stands in front of Eda, eyes lit gold, smiling even as their body disintegrates into ribbons of light. Their violin plays itself, a sorrowful tune with no end. The curse wraps around them both like fog.

In the dream, Eda always runs too slow.

She always wakes up screaming.

Luz finds her clawing at the earth outside the hideout, sweat beating on her brow, pupils dilated. It takes five glyphs, which luckily work, and King sitting on her chest to calm her down.

“I’m fine,” Eda croaks after a few minutes.

“You’re not,” Luz says wrapping a blanket around her shoulders.

Eda glares at her. “And you are, kid?”

Luz doesn’t answer.

King curls between them, a comforting weight.

They did in silence.

Then, Eda speaks. “I should have stopped it.”

“No one could’ve,” Luz mumbles. “I knew what the curse did to sigils. I should’ve guessed. I should’ve figured out what Belos was doing before it was too late.”

Luz grips Eda’s hand. “You did everything you could. We all did.”

Eda looks at her. Really looks at her.

The bags under Luz’s eyes. The way she’s stopped drawing. How she keeps touching her shoulder where Stringbean used to perch before the spell.

“You’re too young for this,” Eda mutters. "All of this. We should’ve gotten you home when we had the chance.”

Luz doesn’t reply. Because part of her agrees.

But another part — the part the Titan left something inside — knows this is her fight too. Her home too. And she’s not leaving it behind. Especially not now.

Not again.

A bored Collector sits in the skull of the Titan. In a makeshift throne room made of stars and bones, they twirl.

They have their toys — thousands of reanimated “friends” who dance and sing and play games. But none of them fight back. None of them choose anything. That’s no fun.

“I want Luz to come play,” they say, pouting. “She’s no fun when she hides.”

“Maybe it’s time I invited her again.”

Chapter Text

The tunnels beneath the Titan’s skull were colder than they should have been.

Moisture dripped from the exposed ribs, calcified and cracked. They echoed underfoot with each of Hunter’s steps, which he tried to keep silent — but couldn’t. Eda followed a pace behind him, one eye flicking constantly toward the curve up ahead, the other dulled in gloom.

Neither of them spoke for several minutes.

“You know this is stupid, right?” Eda said, low.

Hunter didn’t stop. “Yes.”

“Then why are we still going?”

Hunter clenched his jaw. “Because she’s in there. Alone.”

Eda grunted. It wasn’t agreement, but it wasn’t a no.

Above them, through cracks in the stone, came the distant sound of laughter. Thin and musical. Hunter didn’t glance up, but Eda did. Her lip curled.

They kept walking.

The world changed when Luz stepped through the veil.

She had expected… something worse. Chaos. Fire. Echoes of screaming. Or maybe nothing at all — a blank, dead place where the Collector’s presence had leeched all meaning away.

But no.

It was… beautiful.

Horribly so.

The pupped world inside the Titan’s skull resembled the island. But it was a version scrubbed clean, airbrushed and corrected — micromanaged. As if a child had been asked to draw it from memory.

The cobbled streets were perfectly arranged, bricks neatly fitted and polished. Every building was upright and painted in dreamlike pastels. Light shone from windows in warm amber tones that didn’t flicker. There were trees, trimmed to exact spheres, with no fallen leaves.

As the sky was… wrong.

It looked like daytime, but without a sun. It was pastel. Pale golden light seeped from above, but the source was hidden — just a blank, colorless void. No clouds. No birds. Just… still.

Luz took a step forward.

No wind moved her cloak.

Even the air she breathed felt wrong. Too thin.

The only sound came from them.

The puppets.

A shopkeeper waved at her. She smiled. Her eyes were buttons, her skin a painted canvas stretched too tightly over wood. “Nice day today!” she chirped, cheerfully. “Nice day today! Nice day today!”

She didn’t blink.

Luz nodded once, but didn’t answer. Her mouth was dry. The air sucked all the moisture out of her face and lips.

More puppets filled the town square, walking familiar paths. A baker carried a loaf of bread, over and over, back and forth from a counter to an invisible oven. Children laughed near a fountain, tossing invisible coins into water that didn’t ripple.

And in the middle of the square was a banner:

‘Welcome Home, Luz!’

Painted letters, dripping slightly. Still wet.

She pressed a hand to the glyphs in her pocket, shielding their glow with her fingers. They were twitching — the ink reacting to ambient magic, or maybe to fear. Either way, she couldn’t use them yet.

She had to see more.

Hexside was untouched. Luz stood at the base of the steps for a long time. She remembered how her, Amity, Willow and Gus would sit on the steps waiting for Eda to pick Luz up. She remembered how Boscha would bully Willow until she cried. How Principal Bump found new and unique ways to keep them out of school when Amity was forced to help them get banned.

She walked in.

Inside, the main illusion classroom was frozen mid-session.

Gus sat at the front, grinning as he pointed at an illusion floating above the chalkboard — a miniature version of the Titan, performing jumping jacks endlessly.

“Did you know the Isles were once a living being?” he asked. “That means we’re walking on a corpse!” He laughed. “Get it? A real dead end!”

Silence. But Luz missed his laugh.

Then, again: “Did you know the Isles were once a living being?”

The illusion looped. The Titan continued the jumping jacks.

Across the hallway, Willow watered a potted plant. Her hair was braided just the way it used to be — the way she wore it on field trip days. The pot was empty. She smiled gently and poured nothing into nothing.

“Grow big and strong,” she whispered.

And again: “Grow big and strong.”

Luz’s hands shook.

She left.

The house waited for her.

It shouldn’t have. It had been destroyed, left in the cratered wreckage of the Owl House’s fall. But here is stood — whole, rebuilt, pristine. The door was open.

She entered the doorway and looked to her left. Hooty was left untouched. He was stuck in a smile.

Camila’s voice called out softly from the kitchen. “Dinner’s ready soon!”

No. No, that wasn’t Camila.

This wasn’t Earth.

Luz turned toward the stairs and froze.

Amity stood at the top.

She wore her school uniform — the old one, from before the rebellion. Her hair was half-loose, curling at the shoulders. It was messy. Her eyes were violet and shimmering. She smiled.

“Hey, you,” she said.

Luz couldn’t speak.

Amity followed, gently. “You made it home.”

“…you’re not her.”

Amity walked down the stairs slowly.

When she got down, she tilted her head. “Of course I am.”

She kissed Luz’s knuckles. The contact was wrong. Too light. Too smooth. Luz pulled away.

Amity’s eyes stayed locked to hers, Then, she blinked.

No — not blinked. Flickered. The paint on her eyes flickered.

And when she moved towards her, the motion was too sudden.

Marionette-like.

Luz stumbled backward, heart pounding. Her hand shot to her glyphs.

The world around her shivered.

Walls peeled like paper. The floor softened. Laughter rang from every direction — high, lilting, sugar sweet.

“You weren’t supposed to break her,” said a voice from everywhere, yet nowhere.

A shape unfurled in the ceiling — like a crack opening in a storybook sky. A long limb stretched down, pale in glimmering like moonlight through water.

A child’s face leaned through.

“You’re not playing right.”

Below, in the tunnels, Eda stopped walking. Hunter looked back. “What?”

She raised a finger. “Listen.”

The faintest sound drifted down from the skull above: the sound of a music box winding up. Then, laughter.

Hunter became pale. “She’s already inside.”

Eda nodded grimly. “And the game just started.”

Chapter Text

There was no sound when she woke up.

Not the rustle of wind through Titan bones. Not the whisper of glyph paper crackling under her fingers. Not even the soft scuff of her own breath in her ears. This silence was unnatural — it pressed on her skin, thick as damp wool.

Luz opened her eyes to a room that should’ve made her feel safe.

Her bedroom. Her real bedroom.

Soft yellow walls, lined with curling posters from forgotten things — Good Witch Azura, Cosmic Frontier, a unicorn in a space helmet that looked off-brand even when she first bought it. Her desk was cluttered with notebooks, scraps of failed story outlines, and a single glitter pen that hadn’t worked since middle school. Her Azura plush sat upright on the shelf, tag still attached. The room smelled faintly of old markers and dusty curtains — a cent she hadn’t breathed since the day she followed Owlbert into the portal.

She sat up slowly, heart a stone in her chest.

It was too perfect.

The same chipped owl lamp on her nightstand. The same off-balance stack of books she meant to reorganize before camp. Her old phone lay charging beside her bed — blinking with unread messages.

She hadn’t had reception since she destroyed the portal.

That was the first crack.

“Luz?” a voice called. “Breakfast!”

She froze.

That voice again.

Her legs moved before she could stop them. She padded down the hallway — clean, dustless, without the groan of old floorboards or the sharp scent of glyph-fire smoke that used to cling to her boots.

The kitchen was still. The lights were warm. A stack of pancakes waited on the table, golden and tall.

Camila turned to her. “Eat up, mija. You don’t want to be late.”

Luz didn’t move. She kept staring at the pancakes. The plate didn’t steam. The syrup glistened, but as she moved her head from side to side ever so slightly, noticed that it never dripped.

She looked over at Camila. Her smile never wavered, but she got closer.

“I’m proud of you.”

Her lips moved exactly like they had the first time Luz imagined hearing that — when she was eleven and wrote her first Azura fanfic. Then again when she was twelve and finally stood up to her bully. The same words hit the same beats. Same tone. Same breathy pause.

“I’m proud of you,” Camila said again, still smiling.

And again.

And again.

Luz’s breath caught.

The lights above flickered once.

And then, from behind her, the ceiling bent.

The Collector slid into view, upside down and too close, arms swinging like a marionette missing its strings. They had the same features as the last time Luz saw them — the right side of their moon face tan white, and the left purple with brown freckles. White eyebrows. A smirk always plastered, nose pointed, and another moon on their necklace. Their robe — moon and suns forever embroidered. Their hood deep purple.

They smirked like they always did — not cruelly, but with a child’s delight at a sandcastle that hasn’t been knocked over yet.

“You were sad,” they said. “So I made you happy. It’s a perfect loop! Nothing bad happens here.”

“Not real,” Luz said to herself. She closed her eyes and looked away.

The Collector tilted their head. “Real enough.”

Luz opened her eyes, still looking down at the pastel floor. “They didn’t want this. I don’t want this.”

“You don’t get it,” they said, floating into a lazy circle around her. “You’re alive. That’s better than dead. You can play forever now.”

Luz clenched her fists, but still never looked up. “Stop calling it play. You killed people.”

“No,” they said, blinking slowly, still upside down. “I saved them. I saved them before they disappeared. I made puppets so no one had to go away anymore.”

“Those aren’t people.” She finally looked at them. “They’re toys.”

The Collector’s voice dropped. “You don’t like my gift?”

Luz stepped back. “I remember something,” she whispered.

Their eyes narrowed. “No, you don’t. You’re not supposed to.”

“I do.”

The glyph came to her in a spark behind the eyes — not drawn, not taught, but remembered. Not Titan magic. Not Collector. Something older. A crooked circle. Shattered lines. Fractal edges.

She traced it in the air.

The moment it formed, it burned.

Sickly blue green. Like ocean water left too long in the dark. It wasn’t gold or coven-specific like most spell circles. This color was new.

The Collector recoiled.

“No. NO! That glyph isn’t part of the game! You can’t—”

Luz slammed her hand forward into the circle.

The air split.

Reality curled like paper on fire. Camila cracked down the middle of her body. The walls bled static. The floor peeled upward like skin. And in the instant before it all collapsed, Luz heard her own voice scream:

“I am not your toy.”

The world shattered.

In the cliffside bones of the Titan, King jolted upright from his nap.

He was wrapped in his cloak, curled in the hideout’s deepest corner. The glyph lanterns had long since dimmed, buried under wards and rock. He felt the pulse before he heard it.

It rolled through his bones. A hum, like glass under pressure.

Eda looked up from across the hideout. She and Hunter had come back from the caves when they figured she had gone exploring again. It was too dangerous to go after her. They knew she couldn’t have gone far, and figured she’d be back soon, like they always did when she did this.

“You felt that too?”

King nodded, slowly.

“She’s fighting,” he said.

Eda stood. She looked thinner than usual. Shadows under her eyes. She hadn’t been able to sleep since Luz had left.

“You sure she’s not—”

King raised a paw.

“No. That was her.”

His eyes moved to his claw that was still in the air — there was a faint glow. Not golden like Titan light, but cold. Flickering. Alive. The same as Luz’s glyphs.

In the silence that followed, from somewhere high above in the Titan’s skull, came a sound that was not thunder, not magic, nor fire —

but fear.

The Collector was screaming.

Chapter Text

When Luz opened her eyes, it felt like her body was the weight of a truck.

Her chest didn’t rise at first. The air burned like frost. Something hummed low in the bones of the earth. Not a voice, not yet. Just pressure. Static against her skin.

“—Luz? Luz!”

Shapes formed above her: golden eyes, tired. Red cloak. The edge of a staff.

“Hunter,” she croaked.

His breath hitched. “She’s awake!”

She felt the world tilt. Arms under her shoulders. Cool stone under her back. The dampness of the cave air pressing into her pores like judgement.

Then King’s voice, small and piercing: “You were gone for three days.”

That couldn’t be right.

“I was just…” Luz tried to sit up, and the room spun. Eda’s silhouette blurred in from the side, her face carved with worry.

“Kid,” she said, “you vanished. No trail. No glyphs. Not even echo magic. Where were you?”

“I—I was at home,” Luz whispered. “But it wasn’t real.”

They stared.

She gripped the stone beneath her nails, scraping softly on her cloak. “It looked like home. My room. My mom. Even Hexside. But the sky… it was paper. And the people didn’t blink right. And I kept hearing my voice from across the street.”

Eda muttered a curse under her breath.

“It was like a loop,” Luz continued, her voice tightening. “The kind the Collector uses in their puppet shows. But it felt real. I could smell shampoo. I could taste the food. My heart beat like I was awake.”

Hunter knelt beside her. “Why would the Collector build a fake Isles?”

Luz turned to him slowly, and they locked eyes.

“...because I’m the one thing he couldn’t rewrite.”

Silence. Hunter looked down.

King’s skull shifted ever so slightly.

“They didn’t erase me,” Luz said. “They… isolated me. Put me somewhere they could monitor. Keep me quiet. Safe.”

“Why now?” Eda muttered. “He’s had months. What changed?”

“I don’t know,” Luz said. “But there was someone else in the dream. Not a person. A presence. It didn’t belong.”

Hunter’s expression darkened.

“You think someone else was in your head?”

Luz hesitated, then nodded. She sat up slowly.

“It was watching me. Not like the Collector. Not gleeful. Just… staring. At the seams. At what I was missing.”

She clutched the edge of her cloak. “And when I saw it—when I saw me— everything glitched. I fell through the sky. And now I’m back here.”

King shuffled closer, his voice barely audible.

“You think the Collector’s losing control?”

“I think,” Luz whispered, “his world is too small to hold all the ghosts he’s made.”

Later that night, they sat around the fire. The glyphs buzzed unevenly, casting thin light.

No one talked much.

But Luz watched the flames, and for the first time in weeks, a name pressed behind her teeth.

“Amity.”

Eda turned her head and raised an eyebrow.

“She wasn’t in the illusion,” Luz said. “Not even a puppet. Nothing.”

“Maybe that’s good,” Hunter offered. “Maybe the Collector couldn’t reach her.”

Luz shook her head. “No, that’s not it.”

She remembered the ache in her chest. The hollowness. The missing piece the illusion kept trying to distract her from.

“She’s out there. Somewhere.”

And in her gut, something twisted — not pain. Something true.

“I need to find her.”

Chapter Text

The glyph pulsed like a heartbeat in her hand.

It was one of the old ones — brittle and temperamental. Fire, maybe, or light. She couldn’t tell anymore. The ink bled in the cold, its lines fraying just enough to make everything unstable. But it still glowed when she pressed her thumb to it. That had to mean something.

Luz folded the page back into her coat and stood.

The sun hadn’t risen — not really. The sky just grew less dark, a smoggy gray washing over the bones of the Isles. Shapes that might’ve been trees leaned too far. Clouds didn’t move. The air tasted like rust.

Luz spotted one of their spies less than a mine from the hideout — a blur of paper-thin limbs crouched in the hollow of a tree next to the path. It shimmered between forms. A bat. A child. A silhouette with no mouth and a paper mask scrawled with a smile. It blinked out when she looked at it directly. It reminded her of Stringbean.

She didn’t stop walking.

The path to Blight Manor used to be familiar — a twisted rail of cobblestones through Briar’s Hollow, past the old lantern trees and the abandoned snack shack Amity had once refused to admit she liked. Luz knew it well.

But now the road had changed.

The Collector didn’t care for logic.

She found herself looping the same path twice, each time with one less tree in the clearing. Then the rocks began repeating. The clouds above her flickered in and out like faulty stage lighting.

Finally, the world snapped — and there it was.

Blight Manor.

Untouched. Perfect. Shining like it had never burned.

The gate creaked open without a touch.

She didn’t expect it to smell like her memories. But it did.

Lavendar and steel polish. Faint magic smoke. The scent of formality and forced dinners.

The foyer was immaculate. Velvet wallpaper glowed warm. The chandelier flickered gently above her, its light unnatural — not golden, but performed.

And deeper in the house, waiting by the tall, curtained window in the sitting room, stood a figure.

Short stature, tiny hands, green hair — Amity.

She didn’t speak until Luz did.

“Amity?”

The girl turned.

Her hair — mint green and glossy, not a strand out of place.

Her uniform — the Abomination track, crisp and lavender.

Her face — symmetrical, perfect. Amber eyes. And she was smiling.

“I don’t believe we’ve met,” she said, voice soft and polite.

Luz stepped forward.

“No, you—we have met,” she said chuckling.

Amity’s face didn’t move.

“Sweet potato?” Luz said, eyes watering.

“I’m sorry, I’m not familiar with guests outside of scheduled visits,” said Amity, already turning toward a tea table set for two. “Would you like chamomile or bail-berry?”

Luz didn’t sit or take her eyes off hers. “You’re not her.”

“I’m Miss Blight,” she said, pouring tea that steamed without source. “Daughter of Odalia and Alador. Star pupil. Model citizen. I’m very glad you’re here.”

Her smile didn’t waver. But her hand trembled when she set the cup down.

Luz followed her through the house.

Watched the routines repeat. The same bookshelf. The same book. The same line. The same sentence. Turn page. Forget. Begin again.

She placed tea in Odalia’s empty hands and waited for an answer that never came.

She fluffed the same cushion three times in one hour.

She stood at the top of the stairwell and stared into a mirror for twenty seconds.

Every time.

The rhythm was clockwork.

But Luz had been close enough to see the hairline cracks.

At midnight, she sat again.

Same chair. Same smile.

But then—

“…Did I set the table?”

“You did,” Luz said quickly.

The puppet looked up. For the first time, her smile was gone.

“I know you.”

And then, softer: “You’re not supposed to be here”

Luz stood up. “You know me.”

Amity’s eyes followed hers.

“I’m perfect,” Amity said, but her voice caught.” Mother says I’m perfect now.”

“Then how do you know the word friend?”

That hit.

That broke something.

Amity’s lips parted.

“…I think I dreamed of you,” she whispered.

Her fingers curled into fists.

The lights above them flickered.

Something in the walls groaned.

And then the mask slammed back into place. Her smile came right back.

“I’m afraid visiting hours are over.”

Luz walked into the twilight alone.

Her coat was damp with cold. Her boots cracked on dry leaves that hadn’t fallen from any tree. The Collector’s sky didn’t move.

But in her hand, the spellbook glowed softly.

It hadn’t done that in days.

Not for anyone.

She touched the page gently. The glyph there hummed back.

“I saw her,” she whispered.

Not a ghost.

Not a copy.

Amity.

Trapped.

Somewhere under all the polish and programming — she was still in there.

And Luz wasn’t leaving without her.

Chapter Text

The glyph-lanterns flickered in the hideout like they always did — sputtering, buzzing faintly with unstable magic — but tonight, the shadows felt hungrier.

Luz hadn’t spoken since returning from the Manor. Not to King. Not to Eda. Not even Hunter, who had quietly laid a bowl of mushroom broth by her side and walked away. Her legs still ached from the trek, her mind still hung from the way Amity’s voice — her voice — had cracked for a heartbeat before the smile came back.

Now Luz sat alone by the stone wall, knees hugged to her chest, watching as the little egg-shaped plastic toy in her hands flickered to life.

A Tamagotchi.

Still working, against all odds.

She didn’t remember putting new batteries in. She didn’t remember packing it for the fight at the Eclipse. But here it was — nestled in her hoodie pocked like it had always been.

The screen beeped once.

Luz blinked.

Then it beeped again.

She pressed the button on the right.

The little creature — customized long ago to look like a cartoon abomination with a bow — stared up at her. And it wasn’t just idling. It was jumping. Panicking. Its arms flailed. Text scrolled across the top, garbled and staticky:

‘help_ami’

Luz shot up.

The screen blinked again. This time, a broken image appeared — a crude pixel art version of Blight Manor. A window in its top left corner was flickering.

The screen glitched. The image shook. And then—

—a third figure appeared onscreen.

It was crudely drawn, but Luz would recognize that shape anywhere. A shadow, with a swirl of stars for a face.

The Collector.

She dropped the toy and put her hands to her face. It landed face down.

When she picked it back up, the screen had gone blank.

She didn’t wait for Hunter. Didn’t tell King or Eda.

She just left. Again.

The path to Blight Manor wasn’t the same.

The forest had rearranged itself. Glyph magic bled through the roots in every step Luz took, like leaves did for Willow. A puppet spy hovered in the air — a bad-shaped creature with glassy eyes and too many arms — but it twitched, jittered and phased out when Luz got close.

The Collector was losing grip.

Or… he was letting her in.

Either way, she wasn’t stopping.

Her walk turned into a jog. Jog turned into a run. Run turned into a sprint. The glyphs on her arm — drawn hastily before leaving — sparked in angry, unpredictable patterns. Light. Fire. Plant. Ice. They fought each other. But the Tamagotchi in her pocket stayed warm.

And it led her forward.

She didn’t go through the front this time.

She fell through the ceiling when she approached the gate.

The sky rippled — like the fabric of the Collector’s world was tired of consistency — and gravity tilted 90 degrees. Luz screamed as the stumbled sideways through a window and landed in the upstairs hallway.

Paintings blinked at her.

The wallpaper peeled. Somewhere downstairs, music played. A slow, warped version of the Abomination coven anthem.

Luz stood.

The hallway let to Amity’s room.

She opened the door. And there she was. Sitting on the bed, reading a book with a blank cover, was Amity.

The puppet version.

Only… she wasn’t smiling.

Her face was relaxed. Eyes glassy, but wet.

And in her lap— was the Tamagotchi.

The real one.

Luz stared. “How—”

“I dreamed of this,” Amity said, her voice faint. “You gave it to me. I dropped it at Eclipse Lake. It beeped for days.”

Luz stepped inside. Her glyphs didn’t work — she could feel them wither.

“I came back for you.”

Amity looked at her. “Why?”

“Because you’re you.”

She blinked slowly. “No. I’m a performance. I’m a dream the Collector dreamed. I’m perfect.”

“No.” Luz took another step. “You’re Amity. You’re the girl who read to me in the library Who made Abomination warriors blush. Who kissed me even though I was scared.”

Amity winced. “I don’t remember those things.”

“But you felt them,” Luz whispered. “That’s why it hurts. That’s why you know something’s wrong.”

Amity clutched the Tamagotchi. “I’m not supposed to have this,” she murmured. “It’s… forbidden. It’s not elegant.”

“Then forget elegance,” Luz said.

The room shimmered.

And then the walls shattered.

They weren’t in the manor anymore.

They were in a black void.

Just… floating.

Luz stood opposite of Amity, who now looked frozen — hovering midair, her puppet form flickering like a dying bulb.

Then —

The Collector’s voice. Echoing from everywhere and nowhere.

“You’re ruining it! She was finally behaving!”

“She’s not yours!” Luz shouted. “She’s not a doll! She’s not a memory!”

“She was broken. I fixed her. That’s what you do with toys.”

Luz turned to Amity, ignoring the voice. She reached into her pocked. Pulled out her Tamagotchi — the one that had led her here.

It beeped again.

And she held it out.

“Take it.”

Amity didn’t move.

Luz took a step.

Another.

She pressed the toy into Amity’s palm.

And whispered, “You made it better. You named it. You taught it to laugh.”

Amity’s eyes widened.

And she cried.

One tear. Just one.

But the spell cracked.

Her puppet skin peeled away, like cheap paint. Her hair fell loose — a messy lilac again. Her uniform frayed. Her heartbeat returned.

She gasped.

And fell forward into Luz’s arms.

Real.

Alive.

Back in the real world — what was left of it — Luz and Amity stumbled through the forest as the first light of dawn cracked across the sky. The trees loomed like twisted shadows, their limbs reaching out to hold them captive, but the pair kept moving, step by slow step.

Amity, still shivering, clutched Luz’s sleeve. Her breath came in uneven gasps. “Is this… real?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper. “I don’t feel like it’s real.”

Luz glanced at her. “It is. I promise. We’re both here. You’re not a puppet anymore. You’re you.”

“But everything’s still… blurry. The manor. The Collector… I was… wrong. I wasn’t real.”

“Amity, you were always real,” Luz said, squeezing her hand. “You just needed to remember that.”

Amity bit her lip. Her fingers trembled as they brushed against the Tamagotchi that still sat in her palm with Luz’s hand in the other. “I remember… pieces. The Tamagotchi. The memories… but they don’t feel like mine. They feel like… something else.”

Luz stopped walking. She looked into Amity’s eyes. “They’re yours now, Amity. You taught me about that little thing. You gave it to me. It’s your connection to everything — you can’t forget that.”

Amity nodded slowly, though doubt lingered in her eyes. “I… I think I’m starting to understand.”

The forest whispered around them, the wind shaking the dead leaves overhead. The path ahead twisted like a thread pulling them back home. But Luz could feel something heavy still sitting in Amity’s chest.

“It wasn’t just the Collector, was it?” Luz asked after a few moments of silence. “You weren’t just… trapped. You were… broken.”

Amity’s lips trembled. “Yeah. Like a shattered mirror. Every time I thought I could see myself, I just saw something else. Something perfect. Something that wasn’t me.”

“You’re not perfect. You’re real.” Luz’s voice softened as they stepped over a fallen branch. “You don’t have to be perfect to be… enough. You’re more than that. You’re Amity.”

Amity swallowed hard, her throat tight. “But I wasn’t always this... strong. I couldn’t fight it. I couldn’t remember.”

“That’s the thing. You didn’t have to fight. You just had to remember. And you did. You found yourself again.”

Amity stopped, her voice shaking. “Luz… when I was… trapped... I thought I’d never be real again. I thought I was lost forever.”

“You weren’t lost.” Luz turned to her, cupping her face gently. “You were just waiting to wake up.”

They continued walking, the quiet stretching out between them, but it was a peaceful kind of silence. It was real now, too — real and true, the kind that only comes after the storm.

As they neared the hideout, Luz turned to Amity with a small, almost hesitant smile; the first smile she’d cracked in months. “You ever think you’d be walking back from the Blight Manor, not as a puppet? That’s kind of wild.”

Amity chuckled softly, her voice still wobbly. “I didn’t think I’d ever leave it.”

“I know, but hey, look at you. You are leaving it.” Luz’s grin widened, breaking muscles she’d been dying to touch again. “And you’re gonna be the one to tell everyone you didn’t turn out to be the villain. Pretty cool, huh?”

Amity raised an eyebrow. “I think I’d rather have a quieter story to tell.”

“Well, too bad. We’ve got way too many twists in this one to make it boring.” Luz nudged her playfully. “Plus, you’ve gotta help me explain this to Eda. She’s probably wondering what kind of weirdness I brought back this time.”

When they reached the hideout, it was still dark inside, the glow from the lanterns casting strange shadows on the walls. Eda and King were lounging in their usual spots, though both of them stiffened when they saw Amity standing beside Luz, pale but alive.

Hunter, who had been pacing nervously by the fire, froze mid-step and almost dropped his dagger.

Luz exhaled, her voice barely more than a whisper. “She’s back.”

Eda blinked, her sharp gaze darting between the two girls. “Amity? How—?”

“I’m not sure,” Amity muttered, her voice still unsteady. “I—I woke up. I remember now. I think.”

King blinked, eyes wide. “That’s great! So, uh, what was all the drama about?”

Luz leaned in, resting her head against Amity’s shoulder. “Amity got her memories back. The Collector... was using her. She wasn’t herself. But now she is.”

Amity nodded, swallowing hard. “I think I’m still figuring it out, but I know... I know I wasn’t a puppet. I was never meant to be.”

Hunter stepped forward, eyes uncertain but warm. “Are you—okay?”

Amity met his gaze. “I think so. I will be.”

Luz squeezed her hand. “You’re not alone anymore. And you’re real. You.”

Amity’s eyes glistened. She let out a shaky breath and then whispered, almost to herself, “I dreamed for so long.”

Luz wrapped her arm around her. “You’re awake now.”

Chapter Text

There were things in the dark now.

Not just monsters — those were familiar. Expected.

No, these were quieter. Slower. Like breath caught in the walls, like shadow where shadow shouldn’t be. They made no sound when they moved. They didn’t try to hurt you. They just… watched.

Luz had been watching Amity sleep for three hours.

Or, at least, she told herself Amity was sleeping. She wasn’t sure anymore.

Amity’s breaths were steady, her face soft against the wool blanket King had curled beside her. Her hair — still short, still dyed — looked wrong under the dim glyphlight, like it didn’t belong to the person underneath it.

Luz’s fingers hovered over her shoulder.

She didn’t touch.

Not yet.

The hideout was too quiet.

Too tense.

King had gone to the far end of the tunnels after an argument with Hunter, who was now redrawing tunnel exits in a frenzy. Eda was trying to make soup from moss again. No one spoke last night. Not really.

Because no one knew what to say.

How do you talk about someone coming back from the dead when you’re not sure they ever fully left?

“Do you remember the Collector?” Luz asked when Amity sat up.

It was the kind of question you don’t ask someone still healing.

But Luz was tired of silence.

Amity’s eyes didn’t shimmer yet. That stubborn Amity-bright that always pulsed behind them.

“Sometimes,” she said. “In dreams. In pieces.”

“What does it feel like?”

Amity didn’t answer at first.

“Like drowning. But you’re smiling while you do it.”

Luz swallowed.

“Do you think they… let you go?”

“No.”

Amity’s voice didn’t waver.

“I think I broke something.”

That evening, the Tamagotchi started beeping again.

They hadn’t turned it on.

It was face down on the stone table by the fireplace, battery long dead — or so they thought. But the screen blinked now, softly. A single pixel blinking in the center. Then two.

Then a pair of eyes.

Hunter dropped his spoon.

“That wasn’t there before,” he muttered.

King stepped closer, fur on end. “It’s trying to tell us something.”

“It’s Amity’s,” Luz said. “She gave it to me… before the Day of Unity. She said it had a piece of her.”

Amity stared at the screen.

“I think it still does.”

The Tamagotchi beeped again — not the cheerful tone it once had. It sounded glitchy. Warped. Like a music box was left outside.

The eyes on the screen shifted.

And then they spoke.

But not out loud.

Straight into their heads.

“She left a crack. The world saw through it.”

Hunter swore. King growled. Eda flinched.

Amity didn’t move.

She picked up the device, turned it over in her palm. Her hands trembled. Not in fear.

In recognition.

“I saw this place,” she said softly. “Before I woke up.”

“What place?” Luz whispered.

“The mirror hall,” Amity said. “Where they store us.”

Her voice was so paper-thin you could hardly hear her anymore.

“They don’t destroy souls. They file them.”

They left the next morning.

Luz begged Eda to stay behind. Someone had to keep the base secure. Besides, King didn’t want to go near puppet things again with his Titan soul going haywire every now and then.

So it was just Amity, Luz, and Hunter.

The forest had changed.

Again.

More trees stood still like mannequins. More vines curled into words they couldn’t read. Everything smelled like rust and sugar.

Luz drew glyphs with shaking hands. Amity carried the Tamagotchi like a compass. Hunter scouted six paces ahead with a borrowed stick.

They walked for hours, not a word.

And then they reached it.

The Mirror Hall.

It wasn’t a building, or a temple.

It was the sky.

A massive shard of obsidian, tilted in the forest like a cathedral had crashed from the stars. The surface rippled like water. Faces swam in the reflection. Not theirs.

Theirs.

But not now.

Past selves. Future selves. Warped selves. Luz saw herself laughing in a blue hoodie. Crying in a portal tunnel. Screaming under the eclipse.

Amity gasped.

“Don’t look in it,” she whispered.

“I see you,” a voice said from inside the mirror.

It was hers.

The puppet version.

Still smiling, still trapped.

They approached carefully.

Luz pressed a glyph to the glass — it sizzled, hissed, fizzled out.

Hunter muttered, “We need a tether. Something from before.”

Amity stepped forward.

She held up the Tamagotchi.

“I remember this,” she said.

The mirror blinked.

Inside it, the puppet appeared again. It locked eyes with Amity. Then, it looked down in her hands.

Amity looked down as well. Another Tamagotchi.

The moment rippled.

And then the two devices linked.

A bolt of magic surged through Amity’s arm — she didn’t scream. She refused to scream.

Images flashed.

Birthday cake. Library stacks. Grom photos.

And then…

Luz’s hand in hers.

When the light cleared, the mirror shattered. Luz hugged Amity’s back to protect her from the glass. After a few moments, they stood.

They were both panting.

The puppet was gone.

And in her place, reflected in every shard — herself. Whole. Alive. Unpolished.

“Amity?” Luz whispered.

They locked eyes.

“I remember it all now.”

Hunter exhaled.

Amity stepped out of the ruins of glass.

They held each other for a long time.

No explanations. No apologies. Just that fragile, quiet kind of safety they had once found in a tower of books and whispered spells. Amity was back.

Tears, real ones, ran down her face.

And for the first time in months, the glyphs glowed steady.

Chapter Text

It began with a whisper.

No sound. Just the idea of one — like something was calling your name in a dream you couldn’t wake up from. That’s how it started.

A shudder ran through the hideout. Not wind. Not magic. Something deeper. Like the Boiling Isles exhaled all at once.

Then—

Light.

Pale, childlike, giggling light. It didn’t touch the walls. It touched their minds.

Luz dropped to her knees first, clutching her skull. Then King. Then Eda. Then Hunter. Then Amity, still fragile from recovery, curled right and whimpered. Glyphs shorted out. Candles bent away from their wicks. The hideout howled without moving.

And one by one, they fell inward.

Not to sleep, into memory.

Not their own.

Willow.

She stood in the greenhouse at Hexside. Not the crumbled ruins, but the pristine version from a day she’d almost forgotten — where the sun shone through leaves and she thought, for one small second, that everything might turn out okay.

Her fathers were there. Watering plants. Laughing. Alive

Gus was beside her, younger — too young — and she didn’t question it.

“Captain,” said the voice.

She turned.

Her reflection stepped out of the soil. Same freckles. Same stance. But colder. Paler.

“I thought we grew stronger,” it said.

“I— We did. I did.”

The reflection tilted its head. “Then why did you let the garden die?”

Willow’s hands shook. The plants around her curled inward, thorns forming flowers. Her fathers faded into mulch. Gus turned to fog.

“You said you’d protect them,” her reflection whispered.

“I tried—!”

“But you couldn’t. Not without us.”

The vines wrapped her wrists. Tight.

Willow screamed — and woke up gasping, her real body drenched in sweat.

Gus.

He stood in the library, surrounded by infinite rows of books. But when he pulled one down — it bled.

Not ink. Memory.

He opened it. Saw his face. Twelve years old. Alone in the human realm. Speaking to his reflection and pretending it was company.

Another page — his dad turning away from a portal.

Another — Luz falling, and Gus unable to catch her.

“You wanted knowledge,” said a voice from above.

He looked up.

The shelves grew mouths.

“You wanted to be more than the funny illusionist. You wanted truth.”

“I still do!” Gus shouted.

The books opened in unison, howling with every moment he’d failed someone.

“You can’t know everything,” the voice said. “And you still don’t know what happened to them.”

The books closed. A mirror stood in their place.

In it, Gus saw a ruined version of himself — bitter, hardened, older.

“Would you trade kindness for control?” the mirror asked.

Gus hesitated.

Then slammed the mirror with the book that was in his hand.

Hunter.

His dream didn’t begin in the Emperor’s castle.

It began in the forest. Quiet. Gentle. A memory he liked.

Flapjack was there.

So was Darius, leaning against a tree, smirking.

“You’re doing good, kid,” said Darius.

Hunter smiled for the first time in months.

Then Flapjack vanished.

Darius turned to ash.

And Belos stepped forward, hands bloody.

“My Grimwalker,” he said sweetly. “Back where you belong.”

Hunter raised his staff — but it was gone. Replaced with a brand. The Golden Guard’s brand.

“No,” he whispered.

“You’re not free,” Belos said quietly. “You’re a copy. A second draft.”

“I’m real!” Hunter roared.

“Then why do you still flinch when someone says your name?”

The forest fell apart.

Hunter stood in an empty room — one mirror, one bed, and a box of masks.

He didn’t scream. He didn’t cry.

He just clenched his fists and walked forward.

Amity.

She stood alone in her old room.

The Blight family crest hung above her bed. The voice of Odalia, her mother, played on repeat — clipped, pristine, cruel.

“You almost had potential.”

Her younger self sat on the floor. Crying.

She knelt beside her. “I’m sorry.”

The girl didn’t respond.

“Everything we did to survive… it doesn’t define us.”

The girl looked up way too suddenly. Her eyes were black buttons.

“You left me behind,” she said.

Amity’s hands trembled. “I’m not her anymore.”

“Then why are you still afraid of her voice?”

From the shadows, Odalia stepped out — monstrous and many-eyed, holding a leash made of memories.

“A Blight always upholds their end of the deal.”

Amity ran.

The walls melted.

Luz.

She was alone again.

In the empty Bonesborough streets. Eclipse overhead. Her paslisman blade cracked.

“Why do you keep walking?” asked a voice.

She turned.

Her mother stood there.

Not Camila.

Her real mother. The one from before she left. The one who said it was time to grow up.

“Because I have to,” Luz said.

“No one asked you to.”

“I did.”

“You failed.”

Luz lowered her head. “I know.”

“You killed them.”

“I know.”

Her mother’s shaped flickered.

Became Eda.

Then King.

Then Amity.

All of them speaking with the same voice.

“You chose to stay.”

“I didn’t know what would happen.” She fell to her knees.

“But you still stayed.”

Luz curled her arms around herself.

“I’m sorry.”

“No you’re not,” said the voice.

“You’re scared.”

The ground gave way.

They all awoke screaming.

One by one. Gasping, crying, panicked.

The hideout was silent again. The light was gone. The glyphs flickered back.

Eda pulled herself up with a groan. “What the Titan’s entrails was that?”

King was clutching the wall. “The Collector. It was him.”

Hunter didn’t speak. He was already standing. Still. Pale.

Luz’s eyes were bloodshot. “He’s… He’s showing us what could have been. Or maybe what still could be.”

“Or what we already lost,” whispered Amity.

No one moved.

No one breathed.

The world was breaking apart — not at the edges, but from within.

And somewhere, far above, the Collector sat on his throne of bones and blocks, humming a lullaby made from dreams he stole.

Watching.

Sobbing.

Chapter Text

It began with a sound that no one heard.

A whimper, swallowed by stars. A cry so small, so sharp, it cut nothing — only trembled.

The sky remained pastel.

But it... changed.

The stars twitched. Like nervous eyes pretending to sleep. And the moon, once bloated with cold light, seemed to pull inward, as if recoiling from the very world it watched over.

Far above the Isles, where the bones of a dead god twisted like mountains in the clouds, the Collector sat cross-legged in the air, toys scattered beneath them like broken promises.

Their fingers tapped against the air, creating new puppets. New games. New perfection.

But the rhythm was off.

“Why won’t they play right anymore?” the Collector whispered so quiet it was almost an inner thought.

They hovered a hand over a new puppet — tiny, smiling, with grass-green eyes and red-framed glasses. It waved stiffly, only bending at the elbow.

It did not laugh. It kept a straight face.

None of them laughed anymore.

The Collector swirled in a lazy loop, cape dragging stardust. “Maybe they’re tired. Maybe I should let them rest.”

They snapped their fingers. Dozens of puppets collapsed, strings cut. But the silence that followed wasn’t peaceful.

It was heavy.

Accusing.

“Ungrateful,” the Collector said to the stars. “They were all gone. All broken. I just... fixed them.”

The sky twitched again.

In the space between clouds, a mirror hung — one of a thousand. Each one showing something they did not ask to see.

One showed King curled asleep in the hideout, cradling Luz’s torn sketchbook.

One showed Eda pressing her hand against an old doorway, mouthing a name she hadn’t spoken in months.

One showed Luz holding Amity’s hand. Not just holding it — clutching it. As if it might vanish again.

The Collector shut their eyes.

No. Don’t look at those. Not those.

But they saw more.

Willow’s cracked flyer derby badge.

Gus walking alone, speaking illusions to no one.

Hunter tracing a scar on his face that hadn’t fully healed.

“Stop it!” the Collector screamed. “This isn’t how the game goes!”

Another mirror appeared.

This one showed themself.

Not as they were — but as they had been.

Younger, if such a thing was possible for stars.

Smaller.

Lonelier.

Alone in the Archive. Drawing on walls. Singing to shadows. Waiting for friends that never came.

They turned away.

They turned away from the mirror, from the toys, from the laughter that had once felt real.

The blocks around their throne began to crumble.

Slowly at first.

Then faster.

They weren’t breaking — not exactly.

They were forgetting how to be solid.

Because something else was forgetting, too.

The world.

The Isles pulsed beneath them — a low, bone-deep tremor that meant something was waking up. Or breaking. Or both.

The Collector dropped to the floor of their tower.

They sat in the dust.

Pulled their knees to their chest.

Whimpered again.

“I just want to play,” they said.

The sky flickered.

The stars dimmed.

And in the growing dark, the puppets around them began to tilt their heads.

Unscripted.

Unprompted.

Watching.

One took a step forward.

One whispered, “Why?”

The Collector covered their ears.

But they were the ones who gave them voices.

They had no one to silence but themself.

And somewhere, far above, the sky began to peel — just slightly — like paper left out in the rain.

A hush fell over the Isles.

The kind of hush that follows grief.

The kind that waits.

The Collector blinked.

They could feel it.

Something slipping through their fingers that had never been theirs to hold.

Not Eda’s laugh.

Not King’s loyalty.

Not Luz’s light.

Not Amity’s love.

Not even the silence.

Not anymore.

They reached out — not to control, not to puppeteer — but to touch. Just once.

The blocks didn’t respond.

The stars above flickered again. And then, for the first time, one went out.

Just one.

But it was enough.

They sky was watching.

The world was remembering.

The game was ending.

And somewhere deep in their stolen throne, the Collector curled inward — arms wrapped tight, voice small as starlight.

“...I think I made a mistake.”

No one answered.

Not yet.

Chapter Text

No one noticed the sky had stopped breathing.

At first, they thought it was just fog. Then clouds. Then a trick of the mind. But it wasn’t.

It was silence — real silence, the kind that rang in your teeth and settled behind your eyes. Birds didn’t fly. Shadows didn’t shift. The glyphs Luz drew no longer sparked or burned; they simply vanished, as if embarrassed to exist.

Luz awoke in the middle of the night, heart pounding. Not from a dream — she hadn’t had one. That was the problem. Sleep had become a blank page, over and over again.

She sat up. The hideout felt smaller. Tighter. Like the bones above were slowly curling inward.

From the far end of the cavern, the Tamagotchi screen flickered on. No one touched it.

And on the screen, in flickering pixel-light:

“come home.”

Luz crept towards it, breath held.

Click.

The screen changed.

A grainy image — static. The outline of a figure. A child? No. Not anymore. Too tall. Too blurred at the edges. A crown hovered like it had been scribbled on with shaking hands. And two eyes. Immense. Sad.

The Collector.

Not them directly. A projection, maybe. Or a tether. But Luz could feel it, in her bones, in her heartbeat stuttering like it was hearing a lullaby in reverse.

Eda stirred. “Luz?” Her voice was dry. “What’s going on?”

“I think they’re calling.”

Hunter pushed himself up, one hand on the wall behind him. Amity hadn’t moved. She was still pale, still recovering, but her eyes were open now, watching the light dance across Luz’s hands as they moved.

Luz turned the Tamagotchi around to show them.

King flinched when he saw it. “That’s… not how it’s supposed to work.”

“I think it’s breaking down,” Luz said. “Or maybe… the Collector is.”

Amity shot up. “Then we have to go.”

“No,” Luz said. Her voice didn’t rise, but it darkened. “Not yet.”

The glyphs weren’t working anymore. The sky was fading. The Isles themselves had started… unraveling. Not visibly, but emotionally — spiritually. Like the world had been stitched from memory, and the thread was pulling loose.

In the stars, the Collector knelt in their palace of cracked glass and broken gravity, hands trembling around a doll’s head with no face,

“I didn’t mean to,” they whispered. “I didn’t mean to.”

They could feel it — in the way their games didn’t feel fun anymore. In the way the stars no longer giggled when they hummed. In the way silence crept in after they spoke.

They dropped the doll. It shattered like clay, not fabric.

And for the first time, the Collector wondered if maybe… they hadn’t just lost their friends.

Maybe they had broken them.

The windows cracked. A mirror swallowed itself. They clutched their hands over their ears, but the lullabies kept playing.

Not sung to them.

About them.

“Once was a child made of starlight and pain,

Who played too long and forgot their one name…”

“No,” they wept. “No more songs.”

But the island kept humming them anyway.

Amity pressed her hand against the wall, steadying herself.

“What do we do if they’re breaking?” she asked.

“We break the rest,” Hunter said softly. “We finish it.”

“No,” Luz said again, louder this time. “We can help them see it.”

Amity looked at her. “After everything?”

“They’re not just a monster. They’re a kid. A scared, broken kid.” Luz looked down at the Tamagotchi, still glowing faintly. “I know what that feels like.”

Somewhere between time and space, the Collector rolled back and forth on their throne. Mirrors cracked like frost. Stars blinked out like snuffed candles.

And through the silence, through the shaking of their own breath, they asked the question out loud:

“What happens if even I can’t fix this?”

They looked down.

And for the first time in a thousand years, they didn’t like what they saw.

Chapter Text

The first real sunrise in days came like a cracked egg over a battlefield — gold spilling over the jagged horizon, soaking the dead woods in a sick kind of light. It wasn’t warm. It wasn’t comforting. It was just there, watching.

Luz stood alone at the edge of the clearing, one foot pressed into the dirt where the grass had never regrown. The Tamagotchi now dangled from her neck, warm against her chest, ticking like a heart that didn’t quite belong to her.

Beside her, the others stirred. Eda, sitting with a cup of something bitter that barely passed for tea. King, asleep under Hunter’s cloak. Amity… still resting inside. Still recovering. Her mind had returned, but her body had yet to catch up. She spoke in full sentences now. But she hadn’t laughed. Not once.

Not since Blight Manor.

Luz clenched her jaw.

She’d pulled Amity out of the Collector’s web. But the stickiness of that place… it clung to all of them now.

“I know that face,” Eda said softly from behind her. “That’s a ‘gonna-do-something-dangerous’ face.”

Luz didn’t turn around. “I’m not.”

Eda didn’t laugh. She only sighed. “You always are, kid.”

Hunter hadn’t spoken in days.

The sky coughed. It was the only word for it. A low, gurgling cough — like something too big for the world had just choked. Then,

cracks.

Not physical. Not visible. But felt.

The glyphs on Luz’s arms glitched. Eda’s magic blinked out mid-sip.

The Tamagotchi went still.

A pulse.

Everywhere. Throughout the bones of the arm. Throughout their chests.

Luz rolled over, having already been sitting down. “What was that?!”

Amity came running out of the hideout and hugged Luz from behind.

Hunter gripped his dagger tight. “The Collector.”

Silence.

No one argued.

Luz felt the truth settle into her bones like old snow.

This was the beginning of the end.

And they didn’t even know whose end it would be.

By morning, the world tilted.

The firepit in the center of their den cracked open, spilling smoke that whispered names. Luz closed it with a spell that nearly shattered her hand.

The Tamagotchi began to glow.

Just a little.

And King said, quietly:

“I think it’s time we made him listen.”

They didn’t pack much.

There wasn’t much to take.

But before they left, Luz drew a final glyph — just one — in the dirt floor of the hideout. It fizzed. Popped. Then stayed.

A small light.

A promise.

And as they walked out into the collapsing forest, Luz whispered:

“We’re not done.”

Chapter Text

The ground no longer behaved like the ground.

One moment it was firm, moss-coated stone underfoot. The next, it sloshed like water, then fractured like glass, then curled upward into spirals that made Luz’s stomach churn. The Boiling Isles — or what was left of it — bent with every step, like walking through a dream that hadn’t decided what it wanted to be yet.

But they kept moving.

Luz let the way. Her spellbook, tattered and mostly useless now, hung from her belt like a relic. Amity walked beside her, clutching the Tamagotchi like a tether to the world she had nearly lost. Eda trailed behind, one hand on King’s back, the other holding her staff — which no longer hoisted Owlbert. She didn’t have it for protection, she had it to lean on. Hunter flanked the rear, pale and tight-lipped, staring at the map which no longer made any sense.

The path stretched ahead, but not straight. It folded back on itself, rippling like memory.

They were getting close.

“Are we sure this is the way?” Hunter asked, voice sharp and cracking from nerves.

“No,” Luz said, “but the world keeps pulling us this direction.”

Amity didn’t speak. Her eyes flicked from illusion to illusion — shadows with her own father’s voice, walls shaped like the Blight manor, footsteps that echoed like her own. She saw herself in every reflection. Not puppeted anymore, but still haunted. Still not whole.

The terrain shifted again.

A corridor opened to the right. Not built — conjured. Carved into the air like someone had remembered it too hard. The walls were lined with masks — not of bone, but of chalky paper, faces sketched into charcoal. Luz. King. Eda. Amity. Hunter.

All of them wore the same expression. Fear.

“This is a trap,” Eda muttered.

“No,” Luz whispered. “It’s a memory.”

The corridor pulsed.

“Come back… Come back…”

They kept walking.

Not because they trusted the path, but because they had nothing else.

The next landscape was worse.

A hollowed-out forest. Trees made of broken glyphs. Leaves that spoke.

Luz brushed one by accident, and it hissed in her mother’s voice.

“You should’ve come home…”

Amity touched a branch, and it whispered:

“You left her to rot.”

Eda stepped on a root, and it groaned:

“You were never a good mentor.”

King shivered.

Even Hunter, silent and tight-jawed, heard Flapjack’s voice in the wind.

It wasn’t real.

But it still hurt.

They passed through without speaking. Every glance was a weight. Every footstep pulled echoes out of the dirt.

Eventually, the land opened.

They stood on a field that wasn’t a field. Just a void with fake grass, and a single playground set in the center — rusted, but glowing faintly. Swings swayed without wind. A seesaw clicked with ghost weight.

A mural covered the far wall of the void. Scrawled in crayon strokes.

The Collector.

In every frame.

Smiling and laughing, yet alone.

Thousands of childish sketches layered over each other: the Collector with stars, with animals, with friends. The Collector with Luz. The Collector holding hands with King. The Collector building a world out of clay and paper and dreams.

Luz stepped forward.

The mural quivered.

And the Collector’s voice came — not loud, not booming. Just… sad.

“You’re not supposed to be here yet.”

“We’re not waiting,” Luz said.

The mural flared.

And they were inside it.

Now the playground was endless.

The sky was paper, the grass was shredded notes. The swings screamed when they moved.

Figures sat on the merry-go-round — puppet versions of the group. But broken.

Luz saw a copy of herself with a torn face and bloodstained glyphs.

Amity’s copy wore a blindfold, hands sewn together.

Eda’s had no mouth. King’s fur was darker. Hunter’s didn’t have a face.

None of them moved. But all of them — except for Amity’s — stared.

“I’m not playing anymore,” the Collector’s voice whispered from nowhere. “I thought you’d all be fun. But you break too easy.”

“We’re not toys,” Luz said. “We never were!”

Silence.

Then:

“Why do I feel bad?”

Luz reached for her glyphs. “Because you’re starting to understand what you did.”

“No. No I didn’t do it. I just… I fixed things! I made them better!”

The world glitched.

A sun flickered in, then exploded.

The swings bent sideways.

“People cried before me. They were hurting before I came. I just wanted to stop the hurting!”

Amity stepped forward.

“You made copies. You buried us alive.”

“I played! That’s what friends do!”

“You didn’t ask if we wanted to.”

A silence fell.

Then the sky cracked.

White light poured through.

“You’re all going to leave me,” the Collector said softly.

“Not if you help fix this,” Luz said. “Not if you really try.”

More silence.

Then—

“Keep coming.”

The playground vanished.

The world shuffled.

A staircase appeared, never ending.

At the top: a throne of bone and blocks.

The Collector.

Watching.

But not stopping them.

Just waiting.

Chapter Text

They didn’t have a choice but to ascend. Luz walked ahead, boots dragging through ash that used to be grass, leading her crew toward what should’ve been the end. They reached the top at dawn. Or something pretending to be dawn. It kind of just suddenly became brighter.

The Collector’s throne loomed at the center of the crumbling Boiling Isles, stitched together from bones and glittering blocks, playthings from a god who’d long since stopped playing. It floated above nothingness, suspended by whims and denial. Below it? Mirrors — shattered ones, some with faces still twitching inside.

A silence greeted them.

“You came.”

The Collector drifted down, hovering inches above the ground, arms limp at their sides. Their eyes, usually playful and shining with cosmic mischief, were cracked. Light spilled from the fissures in their skin.

“You found your way back.”

Amity stepped forward, shielding Luz instinctively. Her voice was calm. “We didn’t come to fight.”

“Good,” the Collector whispered. “Because there’s no one left to fight for.”

Their voice echoed with thousands of others — puppet voices, laughter, sobbing. Behind them, fragments of people shimmered in and out of view. A merchant’s hands, a teacher’s chalk, a parent’s lullaby. Disconnected from bodies. Lost in time.

“What happened to them?” Luz asked.

The Collector stuttered. “I… didn’t destroy them. I kept them safe. I saved them.”

This was probably the sixtieth time they said this. They reached into the air and pulled down a mirror — one that showed the Boiling Isles as it had once been. Broomsticks, bustling markets, chaos, laughter.

“They were going to ruin everything. So I took the parts of them that mattered — their spirits, their dreams — and I put them away. Where they couldn’t get hurt. Or hurt me.

Hunter’s voice was sharp and pierced through the quiet. “You turned the entire Isles into a graveyard.”

“No,” the Collector said, softer. “I turned it into a story.”

“You buried everyone in it.”

The wind stilled. Blocks crumbled from the edges of the throne. Stars began dripping from the sky like tears.

The Collector jumped. “You don’t understand!” they snapped. “I tried to fix it! I tried to make them happy! I gave them games and music and puppet plays—”

“You gave them cages,” Amity said.

The Collector shook. “Then what should I have done? They were afraid of me. They left me. Just like the Archivists. Just like the Titan. Just like—”

Their voice broke into static.

Luz stepped forward.

“You can still fix it,” she said quietly.

The Collector turned to her, wide-eyed. “Fix it?”

“You said you saved their spirits. So bring them back.”

“I can’t. If I release them, they’ll hate me. They’ll scream and cry and curse me.”

Luz’s hand closed into a fist. “Then let them. But let them live.”

A long pause. The Collector turned their back to the group.

“No.”

A pulse of power knocked everyone back. Stars exploded overhead. The ground cracked open, revealing a hollow underworld of reflections and forgotten laughter.

“I won’t just give them back,” the Collector whispered while looking back at them over their shoulder. “You want them? Prove you’re worth them.”

The world twisted.

Each of them fell — not down, but inward.

Eda stood in her childhood bedroom, facing a version of herself untouched by the curse, wide-eyed and hopeful. “Why did you stop fighting?” the girl asked.

King stood before the Titan, who said nothing — only stared.

Hunter relived the moment he first disobeyed Belos, again and again, each time wondering if that was when it all began to fall apart.

Amity saw her old room in Blight Manor — empty full of light, full of expectations. Her father’s voice: Why did you change?

And Luz… Luz stood in a hallway of doors. Similar to Belos’ and Willow’s mind… only more barren. Each door was marked by someone she’d lost.

Her Abuela. King. Eda. Amity. Her past self. Behind one of them, the future. The door pulsed like a heartbeat.

A voice behind her whispered, you can’t save them all.

She turned and said, “But I’ll die trying.”

One by one, the doors broke. The reflections ended. Everyone hovered back up to the throne room, panting.

The Collector sat weeping on their throne.

Luz stood and stepped forward, hand out. “You’re not alone.”

The Collector peeked through their hands. “Why are you being nice to me?”

“Because you’re still here. Because you can still choose.”

They didn’t take her hand.

But they nodded. And when they blinked, the world broke.

A sound. A low, resonant hum that passed through the world finally remembered. It came not from the sky, but from the bones of the Isles themselves — deep, ancient, Titan-bred. It vibrated through the dead grass, through every shattered home and dust-clogged ruin. It ran through rivers that had long since dried and trees that had stood still for too long. Even the clouds seemed to stir, yawning open as if waking from a long dream.

Then came the light. It didn’t explode or blaze, it… unfolded. Soft, like dawn. Gentle, like apology. It rose beneath the surface in ribbons, pouring up through cracks in the earth and drifting through the streets of Bonesborough, through what remained of Hexside, through abandoned covens and puppet theaters frozen in a parody of joy.

At the same time, the pastel sky, marked with rippings and scars from the quakes, faded. It peeled away, all of it this time. And where the light touched — people began to return. Not all at once. Not with fanfare. But gently. Memories — finding their way home.

A baker in Bonesborough blinked awake, fingers still dusted with flour that hadn’t existed for weeks. Her first breath was sharp, like she’d been drowning. Then came the sob — and the shout of her daughter, now in her arms.

A librarian in Latissa rubbed her temples and looked around the empty stacks. “I was just organizing,” she murmured, dazed, “and then… and then—” she never finished. She simply cried, hugging the books in her hands.

In Hexside’s gym, Coach Abomaton stumbled backward as the walls reformed themselves — bricks uncracking, banners unfurling. “Where—where are my students?” he muttered, even as footsteps echoed in the hallway behind him.

It spread like music. In the forest near Eclipse Lake on the knee, Willow’s body jerked with a sharp inhale. She gasped, clutching her chest as her spirit snapped back into place like a root reclaiming soil. Her braid was damp from mist, but her eyes were dry. The wind, which had been still for so long, carried the scent of her memories: greenhouse mulch, sweat, laughter, heartbreak.

Near the remains of the Emperor’s castle, Gus awoke sprawled in the ruins of the illusionist’s tower, papers scattered around him. He picked one up — it was blank — then laughed, long and disbelieving. “This isn’t one of mine,” he whispered to himself. “This is real.” And when he stood, the glyphs on the wall glowed like they were proud of him.

Further out, in places light barely touched, others returned more slowly. Graves scattered in the hills cracked open, not with death, but with presence. Names long forgotten echoed once more: a seamstress, a schoolboy, a protestor, a playwright. Their souls no longer held in stasis, they emerged blinking into a world they did not remember — but one that remembered them.

And in the shattered remnants of the Detention Pit at Hexside, a flickering spirit coalesced into a full shape. Jerbo. Confused, heart pounding. “Am I…?” He didn’t finish. Viney’s voice called out nearby. Then Barcus’s. Then tears.

The Boiling Isles weren’t just alive again.

They knew.

They remembered every fragment of every being that had been taken — and returned them not to where they had been, but to where they were needed.

The Collector didn’t pull their strings.

The Isles did.

The magic of the Titan itself, long dormant beneath layers of dust and sorrow, had stirred to help the spirits re-root. The Titan didn’t speak — but its presence was undeniable. A rhythm underneath everything. A wordless thank-you.

The puppet theaters collapsed, one by one, releasing their prisoners.

Statues once carved to honor a lonely god shattered, revealing coven heads, shopkeepers, children — blinking in the new sunlight. They emerged in silence, walking into streets filled not with fear, but with people like themselves.

In Blight Manor, Odalia screamed as her reflection dissolved — and was replaced with her own face, untouched and alive. She didn’t understand. She didn’t want to.

But Edric and Emira burst in moments later, both clutching their chests, their eyes wide with light and relief. “Mom?” Emira asked.

And Odalia… didn’t answer. She just sank to her knees.

High above, someone unfurled a flag — not of a coven, but of peace. It caught wind that hadn’t existed in centuries. The Isles breathed.

The bones beneath the land hummed one final note.

And then the real rain came.

Not acid. Not an illusion.

Real, cold, stinging rain.

People screamed at first, not recognizing the sensation. Then laughed. Then cried. Children ran barefoot. Old ones kissed the ground. The Boiling Isles was no longer haunted.

It had come back.

Not perfect or fixed, but free.

And across it all, the group stood on the rise overlooking everything. Eda watched the returning souls with her arms folded tight. King huddled against her shoulder. Hunter stood behind Amity, who held Luz’s hand.

And Luz?

Luz didn’t say anything.

Because somewhere in the wind, the whisper came again:

“A world restored must still be paid for.”

She looked at her friends, the Isles, the freedom.

And wondered what it would cost.

Chapter Text

The Boiling Isles was alive again.

It pulsed with the returning rhythm of magic and memory. Spirits that had been frozen in time walked again, stumbling into light as though they'd never seen it before. The air carried a strange calm — like a battlefield long abandoned by fire, only the ghosts left behind. And through it all, the path stretched on.

Luz walked ahead of the others, one hand grazing the wall of a newly reformed building — the bricks warm beneath her fingertips, almost alive. Behind her, Eda muttered something under her breath and adjusted King in the crook of her arm. Amity stayed close, too close, as if worried that a step too far might make Luz vanish again.

The others said nothing.

Not because there was nothing to say — but because no one could find the right words.

Not after what they’d just seen.

Not after the way the Collector had stared at Luz, trembling, half-child and half-cosmos, and whispered through shaking lips: “I’ll let them go. I swear. I’ll fix it.”

And they had.

Sort of.

They came to the Titan’s spine by late morning.

The path was steep and crumbling, slick with new moss and water that hadn’t flowed in years. Luz slipped once. Amity caught her. Luz didn’t say thank you.

Eda, squinting at the horizon, muttered, “Did this place always smell like mildew and regret, or is that just me?”

King snorted.

“I think it smells like home,” Amity whispered.

Luz looked away.

The sky above wasn’t quite blue. It shimmered faintly, like the veil between dream and memory hadn’t fully closed. Somewhere, high above, stars flickered in full daylight — and sometimes they blinked like eyes.

They reached a clearing where a long-forgotten shrine had once stood. Nothing remained but a circle of unmarked stones and the faint feeling of being watched.

Luz turned.

“All of them are back,” she said quietly. “Willow, Gus… even Viney. They’re back.”

Eda tilted her head. “So why do you sound like you’ve swallowed a bag of fire bees?”

Luz didn’t answer. She sat down on one of the stones, staring at her hands like they were no longer hers.

Amity crouched beside her. “Luz,” she said softly. “Talk to us.”

Luz’s throat moved. She opened her mouth, then closed it again.

Then she said: “I saw it.”

King tilted his head. “Saw what?”

“The spell,” she whispered. “The one that locked everyone away. The one that cracked the Isles. I saw it from inside. And I… I felt it break.”

No one spoke.

She looked up. Her eyes were shining, not with tears, but with something heavier. Older.

“I felt the threads snap. I felt the spirits rushing back. I felt the Isles welcoming them. But I also felt… something leave. Like there was a hole. Like—like there was a trade.”

Eda stiffened.

King sat up straighter.

“You think it took something from you,” Eda said.

Luz nodded. “No. I know it did.”

A long silence followed. Wind crept through the clearing, rustling leaves that hadn’t grown in years. The sun dipped behind a cloud, and for a moment, everything went still.

Then Amity reached out and took Luz’s hand.

“What did it take?” she asked.

Luz looked at her. Really looked. Then smiled — small, sad.

“I don’t know yet,” she said.

And that terrified her more than anything.

They camped that night in the bones of a long-forgotten watchtower.

There were no puppets here. No illusion walls. Just old stone, dried herbs, and a crooked roof that still somehow held. Amity built the fire with trembling fingers. Hunter sat across from her, eyes hollow.

Eda and King were outside, guarding. Or pretending to. Luz sat by the window, watching stars begin to return to a sky that had once forgotten how to dream.

Amity approached her, a blanket draped over her arm.

“Do you want—?”

Luz shook her head.

“I’m scared to sleep,” she said.

“Because of dreams?”

Luz nodded. “Because I think the next one will be real.”

They sat in silence for a moment. Then Amity reached into her coat pocket and pulled out the Tamagotchi.

It beeped.

Luz laughed, startled. “It still works?”

“I think it’s just stubborn,” Amity said.

The screen flickered. On it, a little cartoon version of Luz appeared, spinning in a lazy circle.

“She’s smiling,” Amity said.

Luz blinked. Then smiled back.

“She always does.”

Later that night, as the fire turned to embers, Luz closed her eyes.

The world spun.

And she dreamed. Not of fire, not of war.

But of everyone — standing together on a shore of light, laughing. Gus conjuring butterflies. Willow building flower crowns. Hunter rolling his eyes, caught smiling. Amity in the center, radiant, alive.

And Luz just outside the circle.

Watching. Smiling.

Far above, the Collector stood on the edge of a dream of their own making. Their eyes were wide. Their hands shook. In one palm, they held a model of the Isles, tiny and trembling. In the other, a single broken star.

They didn’t hum.

They didn’t giggle.

They whispered Luz’s name — and the world shuddered.

They knew what had to happen next.

And they weren’t ready.

But ready or not…

It had begun.

Chapter Text

The fire had long since burned down to its final coals when Luz stood. No one noticed. They were sleeping, or pretending to. Even Amity, curled in a tight knot of exhaustion beside her, didn’t stir.

Luz didn’t leave a note. She didn’t speak. She only touched her spellbook, kissed the tiny Tamagotchi screen once, and stepped into the night.

The Boiling Isles were quieter than they had any right to be.

But it wasn’t just silence.

It was waiting.

She didn’t need a map. The pull was in her bones. The direction wasn’t north, south, or anything that could be charted. It was inward. Deeper. Like a string tied around her ribs, yanking her forward—down into the Titan’s remains.

And the further she walked, the more she felt it: the ache of unfinished magic, the rustle of forgotten things beneath the dirt. Shadows moved in patterns that didn’t belong to wind. Stars flickered in arrangements no one had named.

Somewhere far above, in a place past sky, past gravity, past sense, the Collector stirred.

They sat at the edge of their hollow throne, legs tucked to their chest, eyes shining too bright for their own face. There were toys everywhere—scattered puppets, broken masks, crumbling game boards. None of them moved. None of them spoke.

Not since Luz left.

The sky outside their window was cracked glass, bleeding color.

They watched her.

And waited.

Luz passed through ruins older than language. Her glyphs barely sparked now; the book pulsed faintly in her arms like a weak heartbeat. Still, she pressed forward. The terrain was jagged here—black rock blooming with bones, trees split down their middles like something had screamed through them.

Then, at the edge of a cliff that had no other side, she stopped.

And they were there.

The Collector didn’t float. They walked.

Their feet hit the ground like they remembered how, and it hurt.

When they reached her, they didn’t speak.

Neither did she.

The wind came up from below, wrong and warm.

“…You felt it too,” Luz finally whispered.

The Collector nodded, slowly. Their eyes were the color of bruised starlight.

“It’s calling us,” they said.

Luz clutched her spellbook tighter. “Why now?”

They blinked. “Because everything is almost over.”

Silence again.

Then the Collector turned, and began to walk—not up, not down, but through.

Luz followed.

The path didn’t appear. It admitted them.

The world around them rippled like it was being remembered wrong. Mountains breathed. Rivers whispered names Luz had never said aloud. There were voices—soft ones—coming from under the skin of the Isles.

They reached the chamber without doors at the center of nothing.

The Collector stopped.

“This is where it began,” they said.

Luz didn’t ask how they knew.

The walls of the chamber were made of woven bone and petrified magic. Symbols carved themselves in and out of existence as she watched. In the center was a still pool—liquid, but not water. It reflected not their faces, but their truths.

Luz saw herself. Not as she was, but as she would become.

She gasped.

The Collector looked too.

And recoiled.

“No,” they said. “No no no no no—”

Their voice cracked into a thousand pieces. They dropped to their knees.

“I didn’t mean to. I just wanted to play. I just—”

The pool pulsed.

“You took everyone,” Luz said quietly. “But not because you hated them.”

“I wanted them to stay!” the Collector sobbed. “They were going to leave me. Everyone always leaves!”

The chamber quaked.

Luz knelt beside them.

“I know,” she said.

The Collector looked at her. Eyes full of galaxies and guilt.

“I tried to fix it. I really did. But it’s not enough, is it?”

“No,” Luz said. “But it could be.”

She dipped her fingers into the pool. The reflection rippled.

The Titan's voice came up from the deep.

Not words.

Just knowing.

The sacrifice hadn’t been made yet. The wound hadn’t been sealed. The Isles hadn’t healed—but they wanted to.

The Collector flinched at the sound.

“…It’s asking you,” Luz whispered. “And it’s asking me.”

The chamber darkened.

And still, neither of them moved.

Luz took the Collector’s hand.

They didn’t pull away.

For the first time, the Collector didn’t look like a god, or a monster, or a mistake.

They looked like a child.

“Will it hurt?” they asked.

Luz nodded. “Yes.”

“…Will it fix things?”

Luz looked back at the pool. At what was waiting.

“I think it will.”

They didn’t move for a long time.

Then the Collector said, in a voice so soft it barely registered:

“I’ll do it. But not alone.”

Luz’s breath hitched.

“No, I’ll go.”

A heartbeat later without another thought, the chamber shook.

The sky screamed.

The Isles began to awaken.

And far above, the firepit at the hideout flared with purple light.

Chapter Text

There was no sky.

No ground.

No sound.

Just light — thick, golden, slow as syrup. It surrounded Luz like water she couldn’t feel. There was no air, no pressure, no heat. Only presence.

And silence.

Then — footsteps. Not loud. Not soft. Just… final.

She turned.

He stood tall as a mountain, antlers arcing like thunderclouds, cloak trailing into the void like smoke from a star. But his eyes — they weren’t burning.

They were kind.

“You came,” the Titan said.

Luz swallowed. “I think I died.”

“Yes,” said the Titan. “You did.”

She looked down at her hands, expecting to see blood or nothing. But they were still there — not glowing, not fading. Just hers.

“Am I a ghost?”

“Not yet,” he replied. “This is the moment between. You gave everything to bring them back.”

She bit her lip. “Did it work?”

He nodded.

“All of them?”

“They’re safe now. Even them.”

A flicker of guilt passed her face. “The Collector didn’t mean to hurt anyone. Not really.”

“I know,” said the Titan. “But intentions don’t undo consequences. You reminded them of that.”

Luz crossed her arms. “So… what now? Do I stay here forever?”

He didn’t answer. Not with words.

Instead, he raised one hand — and with it came the world.

Below them bloomed the Boiling Isles. Restored. Whole. The forests were green again, the mountains intact, the stars in place. Birds flew. Bells rang. Laughter echoed from houses that had been rubble only days before.

She saw Eda, her arms tight around King.

She saw Amity, holding the Tamagotchi to her heart.

She saw Gus and Willow and Hunter and Raine and so many others. Alive.

Free.

Luz blinked fast, tears welling up in her eyes. “Okay. That’s… yeah. That’s what I wanted.”

The Titan stepped beside her, lowering his hand. “You gave yourself so others could remember who they were.”

“Was it enough?”

He looked at her.

“Luz. It was everything.”

Silence again. But it wasn’t empty this time.

She sighed. “So. If this is the end… do I get one last question?”

“You get as many as you want.”

She turned to him. “Was I good?”

He smiled.

“You were more than good. You were brave. You were messy. You were stubborn. And you were loved.”

Luz sniffled.

“That’s enough,” she whispered.

The light grew brighter.

Her feet left the ground — or what passed for ground — and slowly, the world around her turned to stars.

“I’m not scared,” she said.

“I know,” he replied.

And as she faded, her last words were soft, but steady:

“Tell them I said goodbye.”

The Titan raised one hand again. Not to stop her.

To wave.

And somewhere, far below, in a cottage lit by firelight, Amity sat by the window, clutching a worn spellbook and a Tamagotchi.

She looked up at the sky.

“I miss you.”

The stars didn’t answer.

But they shone.

Brighter than they ever had.