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Luz is woken up by her scroll, which she fell asleep with in her hand because it turns out the best thing to do after a day spent in the past is to stay up super late texting Amity and Alma—her girlfriend!!—buzzing. Mari, an owl perched on her pillow, hides her head in her wings.
“Nugh,” she says, “I feel like I’ve barely slept.”
Luz digs their scroll out from where it’s jabbing into her hip. “Oh,” she says, “that’s ‘cause you haven’t. It’s like eight am. I think we conked out around like, five.”
“Gross,” Mari says, though she does lift her head up out of her wing when Luz realizes who, exactly, this text is from. She shifts dragon to creep up alongside Luz, nearly steps on King, who Luz didn’t even realize was in their room, because she’s like, pretty sure he wasn’t when they fell asleep? But nope, there he is, curled around François and slumbering away against her side.
Luz angles the light of her scroll away from him and reads her messages.
💜💖💜our GIRLFRIEND!!! 💜💖💜
Hey, so the twins are telling me school is canceled again today if you want to
uh
do that thing we
talked about
yesterday.
Haha ignore me its way too early um but
yeah if you like
want to go on a
a date or like
something
just uh let me know.
YES I WANT TO DO THAT!!!
sorry we just woke up lol but yes!! yes one thousand percent!!! do you want to meet somewhere or???
you could come to the owl house but i think lilith spent the night so it’s a bit crowded and you’d have to see her and hooty being best friends which is sort of scary the first time you see it
or we could meet up in town!!!
Oh! Luz! Mari! Good morning, ha.
In town would work best for me because the twins are already heading that way and refuse to let me travel alone. Because they’re the worst.
haha i get that if firefly wasn’t stuck being within 100 feet of eda im like 99% sure shed want to follow me even at school
but yeah! town is good! just like in town center or something?? we can figure out what to do from there!! maybe get ice scream??? since um im banned from a lot of places lol
Ice scream would be good!
If you’re banned from anywhere we want to go I can always go in and get it as take-out.
crimes…
eda would be so proud
It’s not really a crime if I’m not banned. I’m just…helping someone who is. By association! It’s not like you did anything.
okay that’s fair for most places but king and i did burn down like one diner lol
in my defense i was sleepy and hes like super powerful with fire glyphs
I think I saw that in the news? The one right across from the butcher’s, right?
yuuuuuuup eda left us unsupervised for like three seconds came back and there was a fire. but she was proud of us and the guy there was mean to firefly anyways
so!! date!! around noon maybe??
Noon it is.
I’ll see you then! <3
you too!!!
<3333333
“Ahhhh!” Luz shrieks, twisting around to hug Mari against her chest, Mari’s wings splaying out at awkward angles. “We have a date!”
“My wings still hurt!” Mari protests, flailing her way out of Luz’s grip, shifting maned wolf as she tumbles off of their bed and onto the floor, her tail wagging. “We have a date!”
“A date!” Luz echoes.
“A date!”
“A—”
King grumbles, “can I please sleep for a little bit longer.”
“Gah! Haha, sorry, King.” Luz pats him on the back as she stands, him curling into a tighter ball with a yawn. “We’ll leave in a second. You want to miss breakfast?”
“Eda’ll make me something later,” King says, clearly half-asleep already, as Mari begins to nose through the clothes in their closet. Oh, Titan, they have a date! Luz has to look presentable!
“Mari—”
“Already on it,” Mari says, “what do you think about…?”
In the end, it takes them nearly an hour to be satisfied, during which King burrows under their covers and continuously complains about them being too loud, which like, sure, but he did choose to stay. Luz is pretty confident in their outfit choice, at least: not like, super fancy, but she feels a lot more put together than just pulling on her hoodie and calling it a day. Plus, she’s got her witch’s wool cloak, because it makes her look dashing, Mari, and also maybe a little because of the crimes they might commit.
Mari’s contented herself with just a bowtie, that Luz carefully affixed around her neck. Means she’ll mostly be stuck to maned wolf and similar-sized animals unless she wants to have to readjust it again, but, y’know, Luz can do that if she needs to.
“Okay,” Mari says, sitting next to Luz has she stares at them in the mirror. “This is great. Our first date. With Amity and Alma. And we—Luz you haven’t even brushed your hair! Fix it! Fix it!”
“Mari!” Luz yelps, as her daemon practically tackles her into the bed, “you’re gonna make it worse!”
King shrieks rage when he’s crushed underneath Luz, which turns into a little impromptu tussle, which turns into Mari pinning him down with her teeth bared and Luz holding up a smoking fire glyph above him while King tries to grab it out of her hands, which turns into all of them freezing when the door creaks open.
Firefly stands in it, clearly taking in the scene: the smoke, the rejected outfits Luz and Mari have left scattered across the floor, François, sitting in the windowsill, tilted to the side. Luz coughs. Mari lifts her paw up off of King.
“Ha!” King yells, lunging to grab the glyph from Luz’s hand, “now I have the fire, and I’ll—”
Firefly chirps.
“I’ll, uh.” King looks to Luz, Mari. Back to Firefly. “…what are we fighting over again?”
Luz shrugs. Mari lifts a paw and wobbles it side-to-side, dunno.
Firefly warbles, her sounds that mean amusement and you guys are silly, before clicking out c’mere, a short, blunt sound.
“…yeah,” Luz says, “okay.”
Together, with Firefly leading the way, Luz-Mari and King head downstairs, where Eda and Lilith are both already in the kitchen, talking quietly, though they pause their conversation and greet the both of them as they arrive. Firefly stops at the table to swallow a pancake whole.
“Menace,” Eda says, affectionately, and then, turning to them, “you were trying to burn the house down?”
“We were trying to burn King down,” Mari says, tossing her head. “Big difference. Hi Lilith!”
“Cool Aunt Lilith,” Luz corrects with a giggle, holding up her hand for a high-five that Lilith takes as she passes. Burkit’s one of those extinct mollusks they saw back in the past, and Luz rubs at her arms as she takes her seat at the table. She’s…
“Luz and Mari have a date!” King crows, as he leaps up onto his seat, tail wagging, and all thoughts of the past are blown out of Luz’s head. “They’re in loooooove!”
“KING!” Mari yells, tackling King right out of his seat. “You nightmare! Don’t say that!”
Luz sinks down in her seat until her chin hits the table, hiding her face in her hands.
“Aww, kid,” Eda says, “that’s adorable.”
“Not it isn’t! It’s—I’m not adorable! I’m fierce! Like a bear!” Mari’s shape wobbles for a second but stays a maned wolf, because down their bond she’s rumbling uggggh can’t mess up my bowtie! and settles instead for trying to bite King’s skull.
“No, you’re adorable,” Eda says. Luz feels her cheeks go hot. “With Boots, right?”
“What if I say something really stupid and she hates me forever and ever and ever,” Luz whines. Behind her she can feel Firefly prodding her back and rumbling, like a purr, and it should make her feel better but it sort of makes her feel a little bit pathetic. Like, she has a date and she’s not even there yet and she’s already blushing? What if she trips over her own feet? What if she spills ice scream all over Amity? What if she steps on Alma’s tail?!
“Boots is like, head over heels for you,” Eda says, as Firefly clicks out a series of sounds that Luz assumes means something similar. “I think you’ll be pretty good. But,” and Luz hears the sound of a offended yell from King, and lifts her head to see Eda’s picked him up by his scruff, “we’ll lay off of you. Right, King?”
He snickers. “Her thoughts are all Amity, Alma, you’re so pretty and cute and I love—”
Mari rears up to balance her forepaws against Eda’s side and bites one of King’s horns.
King shakes her off. “Okay fine. You’re no fun.”
Mari sticks out her tongue at him and trots primly to sit next to Luz, puffing out her chest. King, as he returns to his own seat, mimics her, pausing only to tuck François between his horns. Luz returns to hiding her face in her hands, and at Mari’s probing are you going to eat? shoves her plate more in front of Mari. Mari shrugs and gnaws at a pancake.
“Do you not have school today?” Burkit asks, somewhere to her left. “I thought you went to Hexside.”
Mari says, swallowing, “’s canceled again today. Greenhouses were overrun. Dunno the details, Willow-Clover is our plant-savvy friend but she’s not answering her texts. I think because she’s helping out.”
“Ah,” Burkit says, “that sounds…about what I remember, from my own schooling.”
Eda snorts. “Kitty, Lily, remember that one time Owlbert and I convinced you to cause chaos with us? Ah, and then we nearly got the school destroyed by an angry dragon…”
“Angry dragon?” King asks, poking Eda. “How’d you do that?”
“Turns out if you piss off the kid who is always a dragon, the school catches on fire.” Eda shrugs. “She was a dick, though, so like, she really had it coming.”
“You’re—mentioning Owlbert?” Lilith asks, sounding somewhat confused. “I thought you…”
“Didn’t do that? Well. Had a talk with Dad, you know how it goes. Owlbert is—gone. But, y’know, he was around for a while. I can appreciate Firefly and still talk about him.” A pause, and then Eda continues, “Lily, don’t you give me that look, if the next words out of your mouth are I’m proud of you I swear I am going to strangle you to death right here and I know Luz-Mari and King would vouch for me in front of the law.”
Luz laughs. It’s—freeing, a bit. Just…being here. The past is all—swimming, still, around her head. At least she doesn’t still have a headache. But—it doesn’t feel great. Knowing Philip was just a big dumb liar.
We’ll figure something out, Mari says, we’ll make a better portal. And apparently he didn’t even need some Collector for the portal so it doesn’t matter that we know nothing about them.
Yeah, Luz responds, like that’s the part she’s hung up on. Like she isn’t closing her eyes and seeing a sea of palistrom trees, a sky of palismen. Changing, onto eternity. A whole world of people like Dell and Avis, like Lilith and Burkit, like her and—
Mari lands on the floor with a click of her claws. “I’m going to head into town now,” she says.
“It’s barely ten,” Luz points out, “we agreed to meet Amity and Alma at—okay, nevermind, our range has stretched but not that far, ow, Mari!” At the sharp yank in her chest caused by Mari turning owl beast and clambering her way out of the door, hopping into the air and flying, Luz hurries after her. “I guess I’m leaving now! Bye guys I’ll probably be back at some point!”
She races out the front door, feels that sharp tugging in her heart lessen—huh. Mari’s like, really up there in the sky. She doesn’t think it’s 100 feet yet—she’s seen Firefly go further—but it’s…something.
MARI! Luz yells down her bond, is rewarded a second later when Mari’s wingbeats falter and she dips out of the sky, landing messily as she crashes through the leaves. Luz hurries to catch up with her, saying, “you just ran without me, what was that about?”
Mari shoves herself to her feet, trying to scrape her talons against her face and beak to knock loose the twigs sticking into her feathers. “Just. You know. Wanted to be on time.”
“Sure.” Because it’s not like they share a bond or anything. Mari rolls her eyes and spreads out her wings, nipping at a few loose feathers, that fall onto the ground, where they ooze golden Dust against the dirt.
“It’s weird,” Mari says, tucking her wings back and poking a talon against her own shed feathers, “how solid it is.”
Luz hums. “I guess.”
“It’s.” Mari hesitates, gives her head a shake. “Back in the human realm, this wouldn’t…”
“Well, there’s like, a ton more magic here,” Luz points out, “so.”
“I guess.” Mari sighs. “Just—whatever. Even if we’re early, we should scope town out. Find somewhere nice that we aren’t banned from. And get out of the front yard before King comes and tries to tag along.”
Luz giggles, swinging up onto Mari’s back. As an owl beast it’s a tad more cramped, but if Mari wants to keep her bowtie, this is what they’re going to have to do. “Nah, he’d get too grossed out and run off in like, the first ten minutes, tops.”
Mari charges and leaps into the sky, wings catching wind. “Yeah, fair.” She tilts sideways to flap out over the sea, where the warm updrafts from the boiling waves carry them higher into the sky. “…you excited?”
Luz presses a hand in the space between Mari’s shoulderblades, because she’s like, pretty sure she can feel her own heartbeat through the feathers there. “You need to ask?”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Mari sends faint amusement down their bond, rolling easily. “I know. I am, too.”
They’re way, way too early. Luz distracts herself with texting Gus and Bailey, firing off a few messages to King who’s stolen Eda’s scroll, even gets a series of nonsense texts King claims were Firefly’s attempt to say luz and mari are in loooooooooove, which Luz doesn’t really believe, but she lets King have his fun.
All the while Mari grooms herself, repeatedly. Goes owl beast to maned wolf back to owl beast, bristling up, and it pricks its way down Luz’s skin, settles against her there as gooseflesh, making her shiver even in the sun. She tells Gus she’s on a date. He reminds her that girls are more scared of her than she is of them.
Hey know what’s up with willow-clover, Luz asks.
Nah, says Gus, guess she’s busy fixing the greenhouses. But she’d be rooting for you too.
Thanks, dude.
And so on, until the time comes.
Mari’s the one who notices Amity, as she and Alma come spiraling down for a landing, Alma a kraift, her feathers a glossy purple. Up above them in the sky Luz can faintly hear the twins shouting encouragements, and the second Amity’s off of Alma’s back, Alma’s shooting back up into the sky, biting one of Pie’s feathers, nearly knocking Edric off of Egg.
Amity smooths down her skirt and brightens when she notices Luz and Mari. She’s—oh. Oh no she’s really pretty and Luz can already feel her face going hot and her mind shutting down because she has literally no clue what she’s supposed to do here because this is their first date and she’s banned from every single nice place they could ever go to and maybe she should’ve asked. Eda. For advice. Actually Mari where are you—
“Amity!” Mari’s already charged right over to her, tail wagging away. She gives her chest a few licks, her ears pricked. “You made it! Hi!”
“Hi,” Amity parrots right back, her voice shaking, somewhat. Up in the sky Alma’s wingbeats falter and she plummets right out, thudding into the ground as a living shadow, the void of her form spread out as she stumbles to pull herself back together. “Um.”
“You look really nice!” Mari blurts out, as Luz struggles to get her brain working again because right now she doesn’t remember how to move and she’s sort of just standing a little bit behind Mari like a freak. “Your hair is—is really vibrant, did you dye it again?”
“I did!” Amity nods a little too fast as Alma scrambles up to wrap around her shoulders, little wispy bits of shadow curling up and her eyes burning that gentle blue-purple. “I, um, Emira offered since it was getting a little light, and, yeah. Um.”
“Yeah.” Mari’s tail smacks Luz in the leg as Luz creeps her way up, each step a thing she has to force out. “Yeah that’s like how I bit…King…this morning.” Mari blinks. “Um.”
“Um,” says Amity.
The silence stretches like some huge gap between them. Mari shuffles her paws, her tail flagging. Amity shifts her weight from side-to-side. The gap widens. This is—going terrible, Mari’s thinking down their bond, why did I agree to this, we can’t date Amity, she’s way too cool for us, we’re just some stupid weird kid who doesn’t know how to even Settle, what made us think we could—
Luz blurts, “this is really awkward, right?”
It’s Alma who laughs, a rumbling purr. “It really is.”
“Can we just.” Luz presses her hands together. “Like. Agree this is gonna be really weird at first and like—just do something? Because um. Amity, Alma, I don’t—I don’t know what I’m doing! I’ve never dated anybody! This is my first date!”
“Ours too!” Alma creeps down Amity’s arm, one paw in front of the other. “We spent like hours getting ready.”
“Us too!” Luz laughs, and Alma laughs, and it’s—lighter, somehow. She crosses the gap and offers her hand to Amity. Mari’s frozen where Luz left her. “Um. So do you want to like walk around and. Do. Something?”
Amity squeaks, but takes Luz’s hand. It’s—nice. It’s. Oh. Oh that’s.
Luz, perhaps erratically, giggles.
“Ed told us the key to dating was to remember that girls are more scared of us than we are of them,” Alma says, hopping off of Amity to touch her nose to Mari’s. Mari’s fur stands right on end, and the sound she makes is somewhere between a whine and a desperate plea for help. Alma purrs and rubs the side of her head against Mari’s, shadowy ears sideways.
“Gus said that too,” Luz says, squeezing Amity’s hand. Alma catches her gaze and smiles, crinkling up her eyes, this perfect little shadow that is simultaneously the cutest and most eldritch creature she’s seen on the Boiling Isles, and she never wants to see cute the same ever again. She wants to always instead see Alma there. She shivers, but not in a bad way. In a—this is really happening, isn’t it, sort of way. “If we’re both scared, does—does that mean they’re wrong?”
Alma tilts her head. “I can hold that over Edric’s head when we go home, so yes. I like that.”
Luz grins. Amity’s still holding her hand, and her entire face is red, and it’s—they’re both scared! What was Luz getting all worked up for!
She says, “want to get ice scream?”
“Yes!” Amity blurts out, and then stumbles, “I—mean—that wasn’t supposed to be the first thing I said I’m so sorry I was going to be really smooth and you were going to love it and—.”
“I did,” Luz says. “I—I did. Um.”
Amity giggles. So hard she nearly doubles over and Luz has to check on her, and over with Alma Mari lets out a huge sigh that breaks into laughter, too.
And things go way, way better from there. It’s still hard, sometimes, to talk, because Luz will be hit with it like a grudgby ball to the face, of how pretty and awesome and cool Amity and Alma are, her girlfriend is, and just sort of get giddy all over because she did that??? She DID that! Somehow! This is! Her real actual life she is living! And it rules??? It rules so MUCH!!
But here in town Amity and Alma are just as likely to be hit with that grudgby ball, or both of them at the same time, and so—so it’s okay. Luz laughs and blushes, and points out all the places Eda’s been banned from and thus she’s been banned from, too, since everyone knows she’s the Owl Lady’s kid. They get their ice scream and trade off to try each other’s flavors, and you know, Amity’s is a bit too. Meat and blood? Heavy??? For Luz’s tastes, though Mari tolerates it a tad better, and Amity tells Luz that she has ‘the taste of a three-year-old,’ which is sort of the funniest thing Luz has ever heard because when she was three years old she absolutely hated vanilla.
The sun is warm above them. It melts their ice scream into sticky puddles. Luz stares up at it, trailing behind, at the sky so unblocked by trees, by interlocked branches, by leaves rippling like ocean waves. The only trees she does see are small and pathetic, barely cresting the tops of buildings, obviously planted there later. Everything is just—smaller.
All the EC scouts with their raptors, their dogs. Fellow Bonesborough-ians, but there’s no motley mix of palismen like she saw in the past, all sorts of wild animals, the skies filled with them: there’s just…canines. Felines. The occasional ungulate, a mouse or a rat. In front of Luz Alma stretches out, swimming through the air as a glowfish, her scales lighting up. Amity has her hand over her mouth as she laughs at something Mari said, Luz’s own daemon currently an owl beast, her head held high.
Luz catches up. Amity takes her hand and Luz squeezes it, feels firm skin, bone. She’s not alone here. Amity glances at her, mouths, you good?
Luz offers a thumbs-up, and then, as a store catches her eye, “ooooh, the bookstore! Do you think—”
“They have any Azura books?” Amity finishes for her. “They haven’t announced any new ones.”
“We should check, though, right?” Mari asks, tilting her head.
“…yes. We should.”
They don’t find any new books, but they do have a grand old time doing a dramatic reading of the one book they do find, book three, at least until they’re kicked out for disturbing the peace and thus that bookstore is the first place they’ve been banned from together. Outside of it Alma’s tail, once again a shadow, waves, wriggling with pent-up energy.
She says, “I don’t even think Ed and Em have been banned from a store yet.”
Mari laughs. “You can hold this over their heads, then.”
“Yes.” Alma grins. “I absolutely can.”
The afternoon carries on, casting their shadows long. They browse the Bonesborough market, trying on gaudy bits of overpriced jewelry. Luz lingers near a bench, sat next to a community garden—four hundred years ago she stood in this very spot staring at a sapling that would never get the chance to grow. Someone’s growing carrots. Luz pulls out a plant glyph, rubs it between her fingers. She’s not good at plants like Willow-Clover is, but she’s still able to grow something small. Something in remembrance.
She puts on a smile when Amity calls her over, and it’s mostly real.
They stop to get food at a diner that Eda hasn’t yet gotten herself banned from. Cool air blows against Luz, chilling her warm skin. She and Amity split a thing of fries. They’re pretty good. A little crunchy, but it’s not like the Boiling Isles has potatoes that are the same as the ones back in the human realm. Outside of the diner Luz traces the lines of an old plaque, worn wood, letters faded away. The wood has been painted over a soft blue though most of it is peeling away.
It reads, for our tree.
The dates underneath mark the tree as being nearly five hundred when…something happened to it. Luz probably saw it, yesterday, from up above.
Mari fills Luz’s silence with her own conversations. They end up back where they started, in town’s center, sharing a bench. Mari stretches across Luz’s lap, her tail thumping idly away.
She’s saying, “…yeah, so that’s how we ended up in the past.”
“Oh?” Alma tilts her head. “I thought time pools were just an urban legend. You know, be good, or you’ll fall into the Savage Ages, and die!”
Mari laughs. “I mean, it seems unlikely. King had to use one of his overpowered glyphs to even find the things. We met Philip.”
“That sounds cool,” says Amity.
Mari shrugs. “Eh. He turned out to be a dick. Tried to kill Lilith.”
Amity frowns. “That’s—terrible.”
“Yeah.” Mari sighs, rests her head on her paws. “I really was hoping we’d find some answers about the portal, but it turns out our only lead—some guy called The Collector?—yeah, Philip wasn’t even looking for him for the portal! So we wasted all that time for no reason.”
Luz glances back up to the sky, blinding. She pets Mari’s fur backwards, rubbing against the grain.
“What was it like?” Alma asks. She’s curled around Amity’s shoulders, curling bit of black shadow. “The Savage Ages.”
Mari shrugs. “Alright.”
“It was…” Luz trails off, but Amity squeezes her hand, and so she swallows, and says, “it was weird.”
“Weird?”
Luz hesitates. Mari’s ears twitch, but she doesn’t move. “It wasn’t—it wasn’t that savage. It was…witches were doing all sorts of magic. And. It…I…”
She jerks her gaze away from the sky and looks instead to Amity and Alma, waiting for her. Who—who would get it. Right? They…they aren’t the cat they used to be. Won’t ever be again, even if they Settle.
“There were so many palistrom trees,” is what Luz manages, a hushed whisper, “more—more than you could ever count. It was like a sea, and—and Amity, Alma, the skies were so full of witches and palismen, going from place to place…and it wasn’t just kids but adults, too, and—and everyone was changing. And I saw Eda’s—Lilith’s—my—I saw a palistrom tree, and, and I think it was trying to warn me. About Philip, and how he would—he would betray us. And he didn’t know I was a human. He thought I was a witch. And I didn’t correct him. And—and—and—”
Amity says, “Luz—”
“None of them made it,” Luz whispers, burying her face in her hand. It means she loses Amity’s warmth. “There were—even then. Saplings were being killed. And I saw so many trees, and none of them made it. And everybody was changing, and nobody knew what I meant when I said Settled, even the adults. And none of them made it.”
For a long moment Amity and Alma are silent. Luz can’t bring herself to look up, to peer out from behind the darkness of her fingers. Mari’s fur scratches against her sides and Luz doesn’t move.
But then Alma says, “that sounds…nice.”
Luz lets out a wet laugh. “It was. I was talking to this person, probably our age or so…they said they were all connected. All the palistrom trees, their root systems, and I just—there were so many of them. And they were…they were beautiful, and now…”
“I…” Amity trails off. “I’ve never…heard of the Savage Ages as anything except…war, and bloodshed. And wild magic destroying everything.”
“It’s so heavy,” Luz manages. She can feel Mari twinging against her, something else, too, something reminding her to keep pushing, keep talking, and her throat is sore but she swallows and keeps going. “It’s—I just—it doesn’t make any sense. Everything…everything says the trees were all burnt down. But I go there and I don’t—did it happen later? What changed? And, and I keep—Dell and Avis, they aren’t…and Lilith-Burkit isn’t…and everybody back there, and…”
“I.” Amity hesitates. “Luz, I…”
Luz says, “have you ever seen a palistrom tree?”
Amity shakes her head. Luz knows because Mari is seeing it because Mari has her ears pressed flat, a whine coming out of her throat, can’t we just focus on what is easier? On the portal? But Amity says, “other than the one field trip Eda took us on…no. I haven’t. I don’t even know which one is mine.” Alma curls tighter around her. “Mom never told me. I don’t—I’ve always wanted to think if I saw it, I’d know. Like, if sometime far in the future, I was going to have a kid, and got to see the trees in the botanical gardens…but then I saw Eda’s tree, and…I knew nothing I came from was ever going to compare.”
Luz jerks her head up and sees Amity illuminated by the sun, her hair glowing with golden light, Alma’s dark shadows iridescent from this angle. “You aren’t—”
Amity laughs. “No, I’m not—it doesn’t really bother me. I guess I just…never really thought about it before. That palistrom trees, they were supposed to be…so grand, so alive. And I know Mom and Dad’s trees were the garden ones…I know for everyone our age, that’s true, too. I guess when Mom and Dad were kids there were rumors of a few wild palistrom trees left. But now? Now, there’s just…”
“Nothing,” Luz finishes. “There’s just nothing.”
Amity shrugs. “Yeah.”
Luz manages, looking down at Mari curled quiet in her lap, “what do we do? Amity, Alma, I thought—they didn’t even know what Settle meant. But witches—”
“Have always Settled.” Amity frowns. “That’s what I’ve always thought. Maybe if we go to the library, we can—”
“Not gonna work,” Mari says. Her voice is flat. “Lilith’s a historian. Even she didn’t know. What hope would two kids have in figuring it out?”
“I…”
Alma creeps down Amity’s arm, tilts her head up at Luz. “I think,” she says, “that maybe we won’t have any good answers. That we’ll just have to sit with all of this and we don’t know how to put it together. But—Settling is a thing we worry about when we’re 18. So I think we can take a break from worrying about it, and have fun on the last few hours of our date.”
Luz swallows. Mari says, “but daemons are supposed to Settle between 12 and 14.”
Alma shakes her head. “You do magic. You have a palistrom tree. If you want to be a witch, and not think about it until 18—I think you’ve earned it.”
And Mari doesn’t believe her, not really, and Luz isn’t sure if she does, either. That having those things makes her a witch, even if it sends a thrill right to her heart, even if Philip assuming, the entire time, even if he turned out to be a terrible person—well. It still made her steps lighter. Like shedding some weight.
She doesn’t know what it means. How the Boiling Isles could’ve gone from a place with so many palistrom trees, without Settle—maybe they were too far back. Maybe things got worse. Maybe they did Settle, Luz just couldn’t explain it right. Maybe some of those saplings were able to grow, before their inevitable deaths.
But right now she’s here with Amity-Alma and she isn’t alone, and when she goes home, she’ll be with Eda, and Firefly, and King, and she won’t be alone, even if her head’s a mess. Against her heart something yawns survive, which she’ll have to do. She can’t just give up. Mari needs her.
“Okay,” Luz says, and she holds out her hand for Amity, “finish off this date with a bang?”
Amity laughs, and takes her hand. It sends a thrill up Luz’s spine, makes Mari’s fur stand on end. This thing they never thought they’d have. Alma curls around Amity’s shoulders, and Amity says, “yeah. Let’s do it. And—Luz? Mari?”
Luz hums.
“If you ever want to try and figure this out—I’m here. I get it.”
“Yeah,” Luz says, softly, “I know.”
They stay out in town until King starts blowing up Luz’s scroll with texts to come back to dinner, and Amity gets a similar treatment from Edric and Emira, and as they say their goodbyes, Luz realizes—huh. Dates…aren’t actually that scary, are they. Once you get used to them.
Mari leans into her side. I guess not.
It’s only once King has excused himself to the roof, and Hooty has confirmed 100% that there are no kids listening in, that Eda and Lilith retire to the living room to resume their conversation.
“And you’re sure they didn’t know what Settling was?” Eda asks.
Lilith nods. Burkit’s pacing on the table, which, seeing as he’s currently a slug, sort of just looks really funny, despite the seriousness of the situation. Firefly’s head bobs as he moves. “Not at all,” she says. “I asked around at our tree, I even described it—nobody had a single clue what I was talking about. All of them were like Dad, except—Dad knew what it was, even if he didn’t know the word. But all of them…”
“Titan damn it,” Eda says. She has no clue what they’re supposed to do with this information. She’s never fully bought the whole everyone Settles at 18 thing, because, well, one, her Mom remained Unsettled until Eda was a teenager, and Dad never did, but that was just—a Clawthorne thing, they always told her. Eda’s grandmother Settled when she was 22, her grandfather not really until he was into his 30s. But there were more palistrom trees back then. There…
Her dad was alive when trees were being burned down. Trees had been being burned for years before he was even born. So if it was happening then, sure, it was probably happening in the Savage Ages. That’s what all the history books said, at least.
“Edalyn,” Lilith says, and on the table Burkit freezes, “do you think—do you think there is some truth, in the idea that wild magic…?”
“I don’t know,” Eda says. Because she doesn’t. Because she’s been a wild magic user since she was a kid, and it had nothing to do with her losing Owlbert. That was all on Lilith. But—
Firefly puffs up and squawks, her emotions pounding in Eda’s chest like a second heartbeat. Something like anger, Eda knows. Firefly most certainly doesn’t understand the nuances of witch-magic, but she does know it’s hurting their kids.
“Yeah,” Eda mutters, as Firefly claws at the ground, shakes out her wings. “Pisses me off too. Lily, you haven’t found anything in your poking around, have you?”
“No official Settling records that date back before Belos came into power,” she says, which Eda already knew. “Unofficial ones are more like—I don’t know. Edalyn. I think something is seriously wrong.”
Eda snorts. “Didn’t pick up on that before?”
“Oh, hush,” Lilith say, crossly. On the table Burkit waves his palps.
“We mean,” he says, “that…we’ve been thinking. Covens were made official policy when Belos came into power—it was his entire thing. Purify the Isles by ridding them of wild magic, but unofficially they were still a thing before that, just not mandatory. That was our grandparent’s time, their parents—they knew what Settling was. Maybe not the word—the word isn’t used in any official records that predate Belos’s rule—but they knew the concept.”
Eda nods. “Yeah, I know. But…you really think it has to do with wild magic, that it corrupts?”
“Let me finish,” Burkit snaps, and Eda shuts up, though she does notice Firefly roll her eyes, and like. Good on you, Eda sends her way, you’re really coming around.
Firefly rolls her eyes again. Maybe not.
“We know a hundred years ago, there were 34 palistrom trees left,” Burkit says, “because our tree was almost certainly the last wild tree, and in these past one hundred years, the deaths of 34 trees were reported. Of those, 24 of them were found in cities, the other 10 in various locations across the isles. All the city ones had always supported larger numbers of witches than any other tree.”
“Yeah,” Eda says, still not entirely sure where her sister is going with this. Closer to the door Firefly tilts her head.
“Most importantly,” Burkit continues, “is that fact that these trees existed before covens were made official policy, and after. And while nearly all of them would not survive ten years past covens being made official, they were still able to support new witches. It was after the loss of them all that the Botanical Garden trees started supporting all younger generations. Edalyn, think. Some of these wild trees—they would go on to support witches that would Settle, when before they supported witches that likely never did, at least not as we define the word now.”
“So…” Eda frowns. “You’re saying it doesn’t have anything to do with, what, the palistrom trees? If…if the wild trees and the garden trees…huh. Wait, that’s a good point. It’s not just a shitty garden tree thing, then. I mean, you didn’t have a shitty garden tree. You had the most wild of all the wild trees!”
“Exactly,” Burkit says. “But think about it. Edalyn, we are supported by the same tree. Yet Mom and I Settled when you and Dad never did. And the only difference is that—”
“You two,” Eda realizes, “joined a coven. And you Unsettled when you—Kitty, are you saying—”
“I don’t think it has anything to do with wild magic,” Burkit says. He draws himself up taller on the table, palps waving. He’s entirely unmarred by any coven sigil he might’ve once worn, so long ago—has been since he Unsettled. Since he… “I think it has something to do with coven magic. I think that’s why the records don’t go back further. Because covens weren’t made official. So some witches would’ve Settled, because they would’ve been in covens, if unofficially. But it wasn’t every witch. And back in the Savage Ages—Belos wasn’t around, then. So neither were the covens. And so no reason to have a word for a thing that hadn’t started to happen.”
When Burkit finishes Eda just sort of sits there for a moment, letting everything digest.
Coven magic, not wild magic. Goes against literally everything that’s ever been said, every thrown wild magic corrupts the witch-palismen bond, because if base-state is to be like Dad, then…
“Lily,” Eda says, “what are we supposed to do with any of this?”
Lilith shrugs, holding out her hand to allow Burkit to crawl up onto her arm. “I don’t know,” she says. “I have absolutely no idea. There’s still so many questions we can’t answer. What started killing the palistrom trees? I wasn’t able to get any answers. Saplings were being killed, but…”
“Basilisks were still long extinct,” Burkit says. “Nobody reported any sightings, and—it would be more than saplings, if somehow there were any basilisks still around. It could’ve been some sort of disease, maybe, we just got there in the early stages? But that—that doesn’t match up with any records. If trees were being killed by some sort of rot, why say they were burned? We saw them burn.”
Eda manages, “yeah.”
She did. She remembers, still—school was canceled for it. She was, what, ten, or something? And some teacher from three hallways down came running into the classroom, screaming about the tree in Bonesborough center being on fire. It was the last remaining palistrom tree in Bonesborough proper. Six of the kids in her class, it was their tree. Her teacher’s, too. When Eda finally got into town the crowd was so huge and the air so packed she and Owlbert could barely even see what was going on, save for the thick, dark smoke that choked everything.
The Emperor’s Coven cut the tree down. Claimed it was the only way to save the town—the tree was too big, to massive, too burnt, for the fire to be put out. And then after, the Emperor himself gave a whole speech: about how it was the garden trees that managed to survive, due to the Emperor’s Coven protecting them. And they were…well, for the most part, they were all that was left.
Eda didn’t entirely ever buy that story, and especially not now, after what happened to her palistrom tree: yeah right cutting it down was the only way to save the town. But what can she even do about it? She has Luz-Mari and King to think about, and she’s not going to put them in the line of fire.
“Lily,” Eda says, cutting off whatever it is her sister is currently ranting about, “do you think—do you think we even survive this?”
“Huh? What do you mean by that?”
“I mean—witchkind, or whatever.” Eda gestures with her arms as if trying to indicate everybody, and isn’t so sure she’s successful. “There’s three palistrom trees left. And sure, Dad has one seed, but…what happens when it gets found? When it gets burned down, just like every palistrom tree before it? And that’s not even counting any of this Day of Unity stuff, that’s some whole other problem. What do any of us even do?”
“I don’t…” Lilith glances to the window, running a finger down Burkit’s back. “I don’t know.”
Next to her, Firefly ruffles her wings, croons low worry. Eda continues, “I just—Lily, I can’t let Luz-Mari and King get wrapped up into all of this. Not when Luz and Mari have finally stopped freaking out so much about forcing a Settle, and King—he thinks everything is a problem he needs to solve, because he sees—he sees so much more than any of us. And it terrifies me. I’m so scared that they’re both going to get drawn into this, and they’re just kids. They’re just…”
She has to keep both of them safe. No matter what else happens, what any of this means—she refuses to draw them into it. She did it once, when her curse overtook her, when she was caught by Belos, and it nearly got Luz and Mari and King killed. She’s not letting that happen again. She’s responsible for them, damn it. Those are her idiot kids.
Firefly rumbles out her agreement, throwing out her wings wide like she does when she’s trying to hide the kids behind her, scratches determined against the ground. Her conviction is a thunderstorm brewing up inside of Eda, something that will scream and shriek until it sends everything scary hiding away.
“They’ll be fine,” Lilith says, and it’s maybe the least convincing thing her older sister has ever said in her life. Eda glares at her. “I—I will at least do my best to make that true. Eda, I don’t know any more than you do what all of this is about. But…I can promise you, me and Burkit, we want to figure it out. We’ve been trying to since we Unsettled. Dad—he doesn’t know much more than us, not about why. But whatever this is, it is happening. And…”
Eda sighs. “No, Lily, I—I get it. You just want to understand. I’m not going to stop you, just—please. Don’t draw the kids into this. It stays between us.”
Firefly punctuates her thought with a growl.
“Of course,” Lilith says, “promise.”
“With that out of the way, though…” Burkit flaps up as a snowbeak. “Luz and Mari are out, and King is on the roof. Hooty can alert us if he comes near, but—until then. Can you help me with my research? You might be able to find something I can’t.”
“Yeah,” Eda says, as Firefly stands, take up position right at the window, keeping her eyes peeled for any straggling kids, “yeah, ‘course I can. Maybe I’ll crack this right open, huh?”
She doesn’t believe it. But Lilith laughs, and says, “yes. Maybe you can.”
And as she passes Eda some old papers to read—
Well. Eda’s not been able to be much help to Raine or Cadenza and whatever is up with their memory, to Luz and Mari and Unsettling, to King and his thought-vision. But maybe she can figure this out. Maybe, at the very least, she can find some way to keep all of her kids safe.
Day two of staring at the old river of thoughts that drifts through the sky is, as King is finding out, about as useless as day one was.
“Come on,” he mutters, flipping from his belly to his back, holding François up high above him, where the wind tugs at his ears. “There has to be something here! Surely there isn’t nothing!”
He’s honestly not even sure what he’s looking for. Old thoughts from whoever The Collector was, maybe? He’s not really confident they’re even a person, anymore, because when Luz and Lilith were retelling their time in the past, Luz explained that what Philip had been calling The Collector was some sort of glass tablet, which wouldn’t have thoughts of its own, but…she also said Philip was a liar! So, maybe he was lying about that, too?
But whether he was lying or not doesn’t change the fact that King cannot find a single bit of useful information. The river of thoughts flows through the sky and is silent, like it often is, thoughts so old they only say movement and tumble and are barely more alive than like, any random rock King might pick up off the ground.
“But I can’t give up,” he tells François. “I have to help Luz-Mari somehow, and this is all I have to go off of.”
François, like he so often is, is silent, other than the faint golden thoughts around his well-worn ears that say love, and somehow manage to stick with him despite the tugging wind. King sighs and drops François onto his chest, hugs him close. Above him the thoughts drift on, uncaring and distant.
…he’s bored. He’s bored, and alone, and he wants to find Luz and Mari and hang out with them but they’re out on a date and he’s not about to watch that because gross, and he could go see Eda and Firefly or Lilith and Burkit but they’ve been talking about boring adult stuff. He has François, up here, but.
King flips onto his side, balances François sideways too, and pokes his button-eye. “Maybe I could look for my dad again,” King says. “Like, put up signs around town or something. Missing Dad. Contact King Clawthorne at the Owl House if you have any information. Do you think he’d be cool?”
François falls forwards against his snout.
“Yeah,” King sighs. “If he was, he would’ve replied to that video I made. François, do you think…”
He doesn’t want to say it. He doesn’t want to put the thoughts out into the word and make them true, because they exist and can’t be taken back. But it’s been curdling in his gut ever since he returned to his castle, or…not castle, he knows that, now. The place he hatched. When he first got proof, in that faintly-remembered roar, that he did have a dad. And then hasn’t ever been able to see said dad ever since.
“…do you think he even remembers me?” King whispers into François cloth belly. “Do you think that’s why he isn’t—isn’t—”
He sniffs and hugs François closer. He wants to go find Eda and curl against her side, let Firefly sit on top of him and croon, because that always makes him feel better. But he doesn’t want to let Luz and Mari down. He doesn’t want to go back to her empty-handed. Would his dad get it? Would his dad be able to see everything King can, all the thoughts that fill the world, loud and quiet and everything between, impossible to ignore?
He can’t imagine a world without them. How do Luz and Mari and Eda and Firefly even see?
Gold sparkles in François button-eye, the one he and Luz sewed back on, and King’s chest heaves.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers, “for—for getting mad at you a lot. I know you’re just…trying your best. You’re. Trying, I’m…” He sniffs. “This is pathetic.”
He’s alone on a roof talking to a stuffed rabbit because he doesn’t have a palisman.
Far above him the thoughts drift on, uncaring, and for a second King wants to scream up at them. Wants to use that newfound power of his, and demand that they listen to him, demand they tell him about The Collector, so he can actually help Luz and Mari for once, and if they refuse, then he’ll keep pressing, until his very force breaks the river into two and it never flows the same again.
He could do it. He just has to open his mouth and demand, and then the world has to listen. It’s sort of like using the glyphs. He wants fire, he will have fire. He’ll shape the thoughts around him until they can’t say anything else, until—
His claws pierce the fabric of François’s belly and King yelps, nearly tripping off the roof. François falls unharmed and limp and King scrambles to his side.
“Sorry, sorry, sorry,” he says, rubbing François ears, “I didn’t mean it I’m sorry I can’t do anything right, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry…”
He hides his face against François until all he can see is darkness and the occasional spark, a gold so faint it might as well not exist, that echoes love lonely against his skull. When he’s finally breathing straight he picks himself up and climbs to the highest point of the roof, and sits there until his vision is going blurry and the stars are starting to come out, shiny and empty of all thoughts, and the river coils around them.
“Whatever you are,” King says, “you aren’t out there, are you.”
The river and the stars do not answer him.
King sighs, picking up François and tucking him between his horns. “Yeah,” he mutters, and begins to make his way down, “that’s what I thought.”
The first thing King notices when he comes back inside is how thick with worry the living room is.
“Um.” Eda and Lilith both are practically buried in old books and paper, surrounded by golden thoughts that cling terrified to each other, too scared to get too far lest they be swept away by something bigger. Hooty, also reading a book, proceeds to swallow it and another stack of them whole, and the walls of the house shimmer, thoughts sinking into them as Hooty pulls away. “Are you guys…okay? What happened?”
Firefly stands from where she’s resting just in front of the couch, and picks up King by the scruff before he even has a chance to react, rumbling hatchling hatchling hatching so bright and mixing into her worry. Eda’s gone stiff, shuts the book she’s looking at, shoves it into Lilith’s hands. Lilith fumbles with it while Burkit shifts snowbeak to land on the table.
“We’re good,” Eda says, her voice a tad fast, “got a bit too caught up in research. I enlisted Lily to help me see if we could learn anything new about Raine and Cadenza.”
“Oh. Did you find out anything new?” King wasn’t actually able to see Raine-Cadenza up close, so he has no idea what might be wrong with them to make them like, forget Eda entirely, or at least what she was doing with them a while ago she still hasn’t explained super well.
“No. Freaks me out, is all. Sorry if you got hit by all of that.” Eda digs her scroll out of her pocket and tosses it at King, who fumbles to catch it while still dangling from Firefly’s beak. “It’s getting late. Can you text Luz-Mari and tell her to start heading home? She can invite Boots over if she wants, but I doubt she’ll take me up on that.”
“Yeah! I can do that!” King’s tail wags as he squirms around, able to yank himself free and clamber atop Firefly’s back, settling into the space between her wings. The worry is still there, but it’s not so strong, anymore, as Lilith-Burkit and Eda clean up, and Hooty returns to apologize for eating a bunch of books. King navigates to Eda’s Penstagram and pulls it open, finding Luz and sending her come hoooooooooome are you done being all gross and in love with amity and alma already its dinnertime!!! eda says you can bring her over but if you do you arent allow to be weird about it
It takes Luz a solid ten minutes to type out her reply, a simple, im coming and also shut up!
haha, King replies, and looks up to find that Firefly has brought him into the kitchen. “Luz says she’ll be here soon.” He throws Eda’s scroll on the table and scrambles over to join her. “Can I help you cook?”
Eda pats his head. “Yeah. Just no touching the knife.”
“I accidentally cut myself once,” King complains, dragging over a stool. “I think you should trust me again. It didn’t even bleed!”
“You cried,” Eda says, “for nearly an hour. And I had to chase you around the house to disinfect the cut, and then you cried for another two hours.”
King crosses his arms. “The disinfectant you have stings. François says you’re being stupid.”
Eda laughs. “Yeah, yeah. Let’s not chance it, okay? Wash your hands first.”
“Fine,” King complains, but he’s grinning.
After dinner, once they’re all ready for bed, and King’s curled up on Luz’s bed, next to Mari, who’s an owl beast, right now, with her wing thrown over him like a blanket, and very warm which King really, really likes, he tugs François out of his horns and rests him against Luz’s side.
Luz blinks a little more awake. “King?”
He shrugs. “Sorry. I couldn’t find anything about The Collector again. I don’t know if they were a person.”
“Oh,” Luz says. “That’s okay, King. I don’t mind.”
Mari yawns. “Wasn’t nothing to do with the portal, ‘nyways.”
“Still,” King says. “I just…feel bad.”
Luz giggles sleepily, reaches out to tap his skull. “Well, don’t,” she says, “I forbid it.”
“You forbid it?” King asks. “Who’s the King of demons, here? Because it certainly isn’t you.”
“I could be,” Luz says, “I’d duel you for the title.”
King huffs, stretching out his paws in front of him. “You’d lose,” he says.
“Wanna bet?”
“Um.” King scratches at his side with a hind paw. “…maybe tomorrow. Staring at the sky for the entire day is really tiring.”
“Oh,” Luz says, “yeah.” Her thoughts are held close against her, tiny bits of drifting gold. They’re wondering, not that King can pick out about what. They’re stuck through with ancient things that have stayed with her from her trip to the past—he’s pretty sure it’s from the palistrom trees. “I get that. Tomorrow? After school, though, it’s open again…”
“Tomorrow,” King agrees. “Night, Luz. I love you.”
“Aww, King,” Luz coos, as Mari tugs him a little closer, drifts off into sleep. King feels his own eyelids draw heavy, and he yawns, burrowing into Mari’s warmth. “I love you, too.”