Chapter Text
Grom was not what Hunter had expected.
As with any unknown upcoming skirmish, he had thoroughly researched everything he could prior to actual engagement. All the books he had read had led him to believe Grom was a night of peril with subsequent mild revelry dependent upon victory, in which the peace of the Boiling Isles was defended by a champion whom everyone lauded afterward.
It had taken every scrap of patience Darius had to convince him not to wear plate armour to it and he had conceded only on the protective enchanted vest under his tux. With a pocket full of glyph papers, hours of extra combat practise and Flapjack at his side, Hunter had entered the school gym loaded for werebear.
This? This was a … he didn’t even have the words.
“It’s a party, dude.” Gus rotated his fists over and under each other in what Hunter presumed was some sort of dance – or maybe an elaborate spellcasting ritual peculiar to illusionists in frilly blue tuxedoes. “Y’know, a party?”
“I know what a party is,” Hunter deadpanned. “We had them at the castle.”
“Yeah, and I bet they were totally dead. A bunch of old witches trying to impress the emperor and stab each other in the back all night.”
“There was only ever one incident of actual stabbing and Terra Snapdragon was thoroughly reprimanded afterward.”
Gus’s dance stuttered. “Seriously?”
Hunter nodded just once. He was a master of economy of movement when busy casing a room for all possible entrances and exits. His eyes scanned over Gus’s shoulder as he spoke. “Dagger coated in neurotoxin from one of the plants in her private greenhouse. There was a matriarch witch from one of the noble families in attendance. She had called Terra an ‘old has-been’ at a previous social engagement. Terra got her from behind between her third and fourth ribs in a single strike. It took three healers to save the noblewoman and she still lost the use of her left arm and had extensive necrotic scarring across her back and side. She moved to the Toes and never came back. Still hasn’t, I think.”
Gus stared at him with an expression Hunter was beginning to recognise as ‘Hunter just said something colossally messed up like it was normal and I’m not sure how to react’.
Frustration bubbled up. “What? You literally said old witches stabbing each other in the back.”
Gus spread his arms wide. “It’s just a saying, dude!”
Hunter resisted the urge to pinch between his eyes. No matter how much progress he made in talking to witches around his age, sometime he just couldn’t get it right. There was just so much jargon he did not understand and so many social cues everyone else just seemed to know without needed to be trained. He was beginning to suspect some of his difficulties were less to do with being brought up isolated from the rest of society by a sociopathic dictator and more just him.
“Anyway, there’s none of … that at Grom,” Gus added hastily, reading Hunter’s tense shoulders. He was good at perceiving changes in body language. Either it was some talent of illusionists who needed to be able to mimic others or it was a Gus thing particular to when it came to his friends. “We just drink punch and dance and have fun and junk.”
“And junk?”
“Taking photos. Gossiping. Y’know, teenagery junk.”
“The ‘and stuff’ party being fighting Grometheus himself?”
“Uh, yeah.” Gus winced. “Mostly we don’t really think about him until the time comes. It makes it easier to enjoy the festivities.”
Hunter frowned. “That seems counterintuitive. Mental preparation for a battle is imperative for success.”
“Why else do you think Skara isn’t out here with the rest of us?”
The two boys glanced at the gym’s double doors, through which Amity and Luz had fled half an hour ago. Viney stood guard like a sentinel, the frown she had worn when not allowed to bring Puddles to Grom deepening into the kind of scowl usually seen on bouncers outside exclusive nightclubs. She scrubbed up quite well, Hunter had to admit. As ever, Viney’s colour scheme ran the gamut from muddy green to muddy brown but whoever sewed her dress had somehow made it work. The selection of sharpened bones pinning her bun in place somewhat ruined the effect, especially since Hunter was relatively sure she had put them there to use as weapons if necessary. The practical part of him that still unconsciously looked for weaknesses in people to exploit in a fight admire her preparedness. She would not fit in at an Emperor’s Coven event but she would not seem out of place at a lesser nobles’ shindig.
He blinked, once more having to remind himself that there was no Emperor’s Coven to throw parties anymore. Because there was no Emperor. Because Belos was gone.
Some days still he woke up convinced he would open his eyes to see the austere ceiling and few permittable personal items of his bedroom in the castle, and that Belos’s defeat, the Collector, his stay in the Human Realm, the last battle after their return: all of it would have been nothing but a dream.
Gus’s scroll buzzed in his pocket. He withdrew it and scanned the incoming message. “Willow says Skara was freaking out real bad before but she’s a lot calmer now.”
“The Captain can be a very calming presence,” Hunter said with a nod.
“Good thing it was Willow who found her and not Boscha.” Gus’s fingers flew across the scroll’s surface. “Boscha still hasn’t forgiven Skara for jumping ship to take up with the Emerald Entrails off the field as well as on it.”
“Viney would take care of Boscha if she tried anything.”
“Uh-huh,” Gus said absently. “Willow says to tell you she’s sorry and she hopes you didn’t think she stood you up when she was late.”
“I didn’t think that.”
He had. The little voice of doubt in his head that sounded far too much like Belos had insisted Willow realised he wasn’t worth it and stayed away rather than honour their agreement to meet at the school. It didn’t matter that Willow was the one who had asked him to Grom, or that Luz kept telling him how excited she was, or the photos Amity posted on Penstagram the day they all went shopping for Grom outfits together. When she was late, Hunter’s anxiety had spiked until her first message about finding Skara hiding in the Bard Homeroom.
Everyone had been surprised when Skara’s name was announced as Grom Queen. Usually, Grom monarchy was handpicked from the strongest, bravest, most talented witches at Hexside. Last year Amity had been chosen, though Luz had helped and, even though Grometheus had briefly escaped his prison, between them they had vanquished and recaptured the beast. The year before that a witch from the Beastkeeping Track who bred attack wyverns had been chosen; the year before it was one who specialised in explosive potions; before that an illusionist student whose mastery of all types of physical combat had earned them a fast track into the Emperor’s Coven at graduation. A bard had not been chosen for over thirty years – not since Raine Whispers themself had, with the ‘help’ of Eda Clawthorne when she tried to rescue them, collapsed a third of the school into a sinkhole and infected the rest with stinkbats during their battle with Grom.
Principal Bump’s reasoning was that bard magic was just as valid as any other, so he had chosen the strongest student from that Track this year. Skara had reacted by enthusing about her role for weeks, telling anyone and everyone who would listen how she was going to kick Grom’s ass, how bard magic was totally awesome, how musician witches were criminally underestimated – and then hiding in the homeroom when it came down to following through on her words.
She’s never been in actual combat before, Hunter thought. She’s scared of the real thing.
He had come to Hexside several evenings since the announcement, at his friends’ request, to help train Skara in the weapons on offer. Dell didn’t mind him taking time out from curating the new palistrom nurseries for it. He had even told Hunter stories of when he used to chaperone Grom for his daughters until Eda begged him to stop because she was sick of beating up kids for making fun and calling her Daddy’s Girl.
Skara was a competent combatant. A childhood of riding, skating and fencing made her especially adept with a rapier, even if she was used to pulling her strikes at the end of each lunge instead of stabbing her enemy’s vitals. Hunter had run kata with her, taught her some basic hand to hand in case she was disarmed and worked with their other friends to simulate a mock Grom fight as best they could. Gus created illusions of Skara’s fears and Willow hid vines inside the illusions so they packed a punch if they actually connected. Hunter, Luz and Amity dashed between these, using their own styles of fighting to add an edge to proceedings. Viney stood by with a medkit that she had to use more than a little but never for the same mistake twice, which Hunter took as a good sign Skara would actually survive her Grom fight and arise victorious.
“It isn’t just about being able to best Grometheus physically,” Amity had said at their last practise session. “It’s about being able to withstand him psychologically. The fears you think he’s going to exploit aren’t necessarily what he’ll actually go for.”
“He’s tricky!” Luz added with a shudder. “And he doesn’t play fair.”
“I know!” Skara had protested, evading one of Hunter’s strikes and dancing out of reach from Willow’s thorny vines. “I’ve been practising my meditation so I don’t get overwhelmed by him replicating my biggest fears.” She her performed a perfect handspring, lopped the head off Amity’s abomination golem and landed neatly on her mark. “I’m ready for this. You’re all going to be super impressed by how quickly I finish him off! I’ll set a new Hexside record!”
Provided she actually turned up, of course.
Gus tapped again at his scroll. “They say they’ll bring Skara through as soon as they’re done fixing her make-up.”
“Why does she need make-up to fight Grometheus?” Hunter asked, nonplussed.
Gus paused long enough to stare at him. “Why wouldn’t she need it?”
Hunter assumed this was another thing about modern teenagerdom he didn’t understand and just shrugged.
Eventually Gus pocketed the scroll and went back to trying to convince Hunter to dance. “C’mon, dude, it’s a party.”
“I think we’ve been over this part of the conversation before.” Hunter steadfastly refused to move from his post by the wall.
Other students littered the dancefloor, gyrating in ways that would not have been permitted at a castle event. They weren’t following any of the carefully memorised steps Hunter had been forced to use whenever Belos deemed it important for him to attend in civilian attire instead of his Golden Guard uniform. Mostly this seemed to be so that noble houses could push their marriageable offspring at him in an effort to get in good with the throne, seeing him as nothing more than an eligible bachelor whose attentions might buy them power. They were willing to donate their children to make Belos like them more, which of course led to soft conversations between them and the emperor about what else they were willing to donate to support him.
Hunter had hated it all. The nobles did not see him as his own person, merely as an extension of Belos. And why wouldn’t they? That was exactly what he had been crafted to be. He had literally been grown and shaped and moulded to be exactly what Belos – Phillip – wanted him to be, with no leeway for him to develop into an actual person around that role. Hunter had always loathed being on display like nothing more than a gilded statuette at parties, his face exposed, vulnerable without his staff or armour, judged by witches of lesser birth who nonetheless still had more magic than him. None of them knew that last part but he always felt so uncomfortable that he half convinced himself they did and were whispering giggly judgements behind artfully positioned painted fans.
He could not imagine any of those nobles here at Hexside, wiggling about to whatever it was the DJ was playing and not seeming to care how stupid they looked. There was not a single painted fan in sight.
“You okay, dude?” Gus had sidled up close. When had he done that? Hunter cursed himself for losing focus. “You’ve got that expression again.”
“What expression?”
“The ‘flashback to my traumatic time as Golden Guard’ expression.”
“I have an expression for that?” Hunter blinked. “You have a name for it?”
“You get it less than you used to but … yeah.” Gus shrugged. “You doing okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“Hunter, do you remember that conversation about not saying you’re fine just because you think it’s what people want to hear?”
How could he forget. Camila Noceda had practically staged an intervention after he nearly dropped dead from exhaustion in the Human Realm and was still protesting how fine he was as he hit the kitchen floor and gave himself a concussion. She had discreetly thrown away the dishtowel he bled on when she couldn’t get the rusty red stains out.
“I remember.” Hunter forced his fingers to unclench from off his biceps. “But seriously, I’m fine. I was just remembering the parties at the castle.”
“Oh.” Gus seemed to search for the right words. “Were they … all like the stabby one?”
“No. Not all of them. Typically, there was a lot of jockeying for the emperor’s favour amongst the nobles and other high-profile members of witch society. I was security detail most of the time. My job was to make sure nothing, uh, ‘stabby’ happened. Belos made me attend as a guest at the event wherein Terra Snapdragon had her tantrum. He wanted one of the noble families to donate money to the coffers of the Emperor’s Coven. Their daughter, um … liked me so he thought my face being on show and assigning me to dance with her would give them hope and make them more pliable.”
Gus frowned. “Give them hope?”
“Of a future marriage alliance.”
His eyes widened. “Dude! Were you, like, some kind of stud muffin at those parties?”
Hunter’s whole face flushed crimson. “No! I don’t even know what that is! But no! Belos just used whatever advantage he had to get what he wanted and … sometimes I was an advantage to be used to get social-climber witches to do what he wanted.” Why did it sound so much worse when he said it out loud? It wasn’t like Belos had ever made him follow through on courting anyone, much less marrying them. Hunter’s mere presence and the odd dance was all that had been required of him.
Gus shook his head. “That is messed up.”
“It’s common practise amongst noble families.”
“Doesn’t make it any less messed up, dude.”
Hunter frowned and looked at his feet. The shoes Darius had picked out were shiny and black. Dangling above his head, the glitter ball reflected off their polished surfaces. He had a moment of feeling unstuck from time and place, his body here in the school gym but his mind back at Belos’s side.
Everything he thought he knew about his ‘uncle’ had been wrong. It left him questioning so much: what else in his life had he thought of as facts but were also not true? What other behaviours that he had accepted as perfectly normal were, in fact, ‘messed up’ by other kids’ standards? Or even by the standards of adults who had existed in the world of the emperor. Darius’s orbit had often intersected with the castle’s but even so he also often looked at Hunter strangely upon learning of what life there had been like for him.
Dell never looked at him like he was abnormal. Hunter gained a great amount of peace from the simplicity of time with his mentor. For Dell, silence was as important as talking and acceptance was everything. He never asked for any information that Hunter was not willing to volunteer about himself. He never judged Hunter for being what Belos had made him. There was clarity in the simple acts of scouting for the right location, preparing the earth, planting palistrom seedlings and caring for the new trees that would be used to carve the next generation of palismans. Trees were easier to understand than people.
“So, uh … is that a no on the dancing?” Gus just did not give up.
Hunter angled his chin to indicate the dancefloor denizens. “That’s not dancing.”
“You sound totally old, dude. Like, at least fifty.”
“Fifty isn’t old.”
“That’s what an old person would say. Watch out, you’ll be yelling at kids for playing on your lawn, next.”
“Darius’s house doesn’t have a lawn.”
Gus closed his eyes and pinched the spot between them.
“You insolent little whippersnapper,” Hunter added with a small smile.
Gus opened his eyes. His grin came slow. “Dude, was that an actual joke?”
Hunter shrugged.
“Maybe there’s hope for you yet.”
The double doors opened. Viney took up her vanguard position. Both Gus and Hunter looked over to see Luz, Amity, Willow and Skara walking in side by side, elbows linked, like a kick-line from one of those vaudeville shows from the Human Realm that were apparently super old but still not as old as the Wittebane Brothers. The girls were clearly making an entrance of solidarity, hampered only a little by the fact they could not all fit through the door that way and Luz and Willow, being at the ends, had to squish their elbows inwards and half turn sideways to pass through.
Hunter’s brain skittered and jumped.
He was not especially knowledgeable about ladies’ fashions. His bookish studies had run more to wild magic, medicine, ancient curses and other things that might best serve him in serving the emperor. He had not even sampled much fiction until after he joined the Emerald Entrails and realised just how out-of-touch he was with the very concept of being a teenager. What he did know of fashion was influenced largely by interactions with nobility and Coven Heads, who were powerful and influential enough not to have to follow any trends. In point of fact, they often set trends with whatever they chose to wear, or at least frightened others into not questioning whether things like leaf dresses, capes or ridiculously tall hats were in vogue.
Therefore, Hunter was not able to say whether Willow’s green dress was particularly fashionable. What he could say was that it provoked a curious flipflop sensation in his stomach, which increased to uncomfortable levels when she squeezed her arms inwards to get through the door and her lace-decorated bosom became squished between her elbows. Willow laughed, hopping on one foot at the awkwardness of maintaining her elbow link with Skara. The light from the disco ball shimmered off the gold rims of her glasses as she briefly bounced up and down and her bosom concurrently boun–
Hunter realised he was staring and quickly looked away.
“That’s a heck of a blush, dude,” Gus smirked.
“I’m not blushing!” Hunter retorted. Why did his voice sound so strangled? He coughed to clear whatever was causing that. “It’s … it’s merely very warm in here with all these … bodies present.”
“Uh-huh.” Gus did not stop smirking. “Sure.”
The girls reached them. Hunter stared staunchly at their shoes as they approached. Shoes were safe. Shoes did not make his stomach flipflop. He could absolutely look at shoes all night. His other senses were finely honed for combat. He could survive with only those and peripheral vision until this party was over.
“And the guest of honour has finally arrived!” The Owl Lady’s voice was like a bucket of cold water over his head.
He looked up to see her striding towards them, tailed by Raine Whispers. The Bard Coven Head looked dapper in a plain black tuxedo with minor, tasteful red accents. A pin twinkled on their lapel and Hunter realised it was shaped like a little gold owl. The Owl Lady had a matching pin of a viola on the lapel of her fire-engine red suit. Her outfit was just like her: loud, brash and tasteless by upper class standards. She grinned broadly at the girls.
“This party has been boring as heck so far. Not that I’m complaining, after what happened last time. Boring is good for Grom Night.” Her grin softened into a smile that was almost motherly. She leaned forward and lowered her voice. “You doing okay, Skara?”
Skara thrust her chin out and nodded. “Much better, thank you. And, uh, thank you for lending Luz your make-up kit to fix my face.”
The Owl Lady waved a hand. “Pfft, it’s fine. What else are chaperones for?”
“To make sure no-one spikes the punch?” Raine suggested. “Oh wait, no, that’s why I’m here: to stop you spiking the punch, Eda.”
“Spoilsport.”
“You used real spikes at our Grom.”
“No-one was hurt!” She paused. “Not seriously, anyway.”
“You spiked the punch at your Grom, Eda?” Luz’s eyes shone like she had just heard someone say they had a pocket full of kittens and another of puppies. Hunter shook his head. Of course Luz thought breaking the rules like that was fun. “That is so cool!”
“It wasn’t so cool at the time,” Raine deadpanned. “Professor Crabtree was very peeved that you stole spikeweed seeds from the Plant Track homeroom to do it.”
“Meh, she was just annoyed she didn’t catch me stealing them and couldn’t figure out how I broke her enchantments on the restricted cabinet without tripping her alarms.” The Owl Lady’s grin showed her gold fang this time. She was clearly still proud of herself for that heist. She and Luz were a well-matched mentor and student: equally enamoured of rule-breaking and causing chaos. “And I didn’t hear you complaining, Rainestorm, when I used those spikeweeds’ spikes to help you defeat Grometheus.”
Raine’s cheeks coloured slightly. “Given I was unconscious at the time, that would have been impressive.”
“No, what was impressive was how I swung in like Tarzan and totally saved your butt by stabbing Grom in the head with spikeweeds so big that even Crabtree herself couldn’t have grown bigger ones.”
Raine blinked. “Tarzan?”
“Human folk hero,” Amity whispered. “I can lend you a few of books about him sometime. I did a lot of reading in the Human Realm.”
“Uh, thank you?”
The Owl Lady tossed her hair. “I knew Bump should have picked me to be Grom Queen that year. He only didn’t do it because the school governors would have had a fit.”
“May I point out that you destroyed half the school fighting Grometheus, so their concerns were somewhat warranted?” said Raine gently.
“Details, details.”
Luz kept looking between them like she was about to faint from sheer enjoyment at their banter. “You two are so unbelievably cool.”
Raine’s faint colouring turned into a full-out blush. The Owl Lady made finger guns. “You know it, girl.”
Hunter was grateful for the whole exchange, since it gave him time to feel the blood retreating from his cheeks and ear tips. Surreptitiously, he took a steadying breath and wondered whether he had forgotten about pulling photos of memories from his head at some point and someone was currently burning them, causing this intense heat in his damn face.
“Hunter?”
His head snapped around. He regretted and also absolutely did not regret it instantly.
Willow’s smiles were not big things. Luz’s smiles were gigantic and full of teeth and probably mouth strain. Amity’s were quiet and small, like a mouse edging from its burrow but ready to disappear again at the first sign of trouble. Gus smiled like he did everything: guilelessly and openly, leaving nothing out. Skara always smiled like she was in on a juicy piece of gossip no-one else knew yet, while Viney’s smiles were more like snarls with the sharp edges filed off. By contrast, Willow’s smiles were soft and gentle with an odd underpin of steel that should have been counterpoint and yet somehow was not. Her smiles had a habit of making those around her feel better just because if Willow was smiling, that meant things had to be okay, right?
She was smiling at him. And he was just staring at her mouth like a dumbass. Hunter shook himself.
“Yes?”
Her smile faltered. “Did you not hear me?”
“Sorry, I was distracted.”
“Yeah, by your b– oof!” Gus let out a gust of breath even though Hunter absolutely had not elbowed him that hard.
“By my … boof?” Willow blinked at them both. “What?”
“By your, um… beautiful earrings?” Hunter tried.
Willow touched the little gold leaves. Her smile reappeared. “Thanks. They were a gift from my dads last birthday but I never usually wear them. I’m too worried about them getting damaged or losing one of them in the greenhouse. I keep them for special occasions and, well, tonight is Grom and all. And a pretty special one.”
Hunter nodded like he understood. “Very wise.”
For some reason that made her smile dim again. He could just see Luz smacking a hand to her forehead in his peripheral vision. Why was she doing that? Was it a human thing? Was she squashing a bug between her eyes? Hunter knew he was cloned from a human but their ways still left him largely confused – even more than regular teenager things.
He faltered. “Did you ask me something before, Willow?”
“Oh! Yes, I asked if you wanted to dance. There’s still some time before Skara’s big moment.”
Someone was definitely burning memory photos. There was no other possible reason for why he felt heat rising up his neck and face. “Uh, dance? With you?” He lifted a hand to gesture vaguely at the dance floor where students were wantonly gyrating. “Like … that?”
“Well, dancing is kind of what you’re supposed to do at a dance,” Willow chuckled. “But it’s okay if you’re not comfortable with that. I’m happy to just hang out here with you instead if that’s what you’d prefer.”
She meant it, too. Willow was not given to lying. Sometimes she tried it to preserve others’ feelings but she was always terrible at it. Her face started twitching and she broke out in a nervous sweat. She would be an awful poker player. Right now, her expression was smooth and her brow unsweaty. She was willing to dress up, put on make-up and jewellery, then just stand at the side of the room with him all evening if he didn’t want to dance.
Hunter was aware that his friends went out of their way to stay within what they perceived were his comfort zones. They were not fully aware of what life had been like with Belos as a guardian, or what Hunter’s childhood and formative years had involved. He had not furnished them with details, his growing awareness of what constituted ‘normal’ making it very clear that his upbringing had been anything but. He was already enough of an outsider to their ways without adding that information to the mix; that would just make him even more of a freak in their eyes. Hunter found that he did not want to stand out that way; he did not want to be the teen prodigy who didn’t match with his peers anymore. He wanted to fit in. He wanted to be normal – or as close as he could manage.
Yet his friends had clearly figured out a few things from his many panic attacks and contrair reactions to ‘normal’ stuff in the Human Realm and tried their best not to force him into triggering situations. Sometimes their efforts were subtle, sometimes not. They knew he was damaged and also that he hated being that way, so they walked a fine line between acknowledging his abnormality and just pretending he really had just been home-schooled for his whole life and that was all that separated him from them and their lived experiences.
Probably the scars had clued them in to some of it, too. Long sleeves, gloves and high collars usually concealed the worst of them but there had been times when more of his scars than he would have liked were on show due to the limited human clothing options available. Cargo shorts and muscle-tees were his sartorial nemeses.
One incident in which Camila Noceda had accidentally walked into the bathroom to collect the laundry hamper while he was showering stood out in his memory, not least of all because Luz had been forced to explain what ‘Dios mío, lo siento mucho’ and ‘Necesito comprar una cerradura para esta maldita puerta’ meant.
Afterwards, Camila had been odd around him, which he had thought was because both regular witches and humans had such different attitudes to communal bathing than castle scouts who routinely had to share large one-roomed showering facilities. That had not, as it turned out, been the case; something made abundantly clear when Camila waited until he and she were sitting alone together at the kitchen table in the quiet of pre-dawn, sipping coffee and listening to the others snore upstairs because their body clocks were not set so early. It had become their routine and was usually marked by silence and reading; her the morning paper, him whatever books Luz had brought back from the local library for him and Amity.
“Dios, dame fuerzas,” Camila had murmured, staring at her mug, the newspaper unopened beside it. “Hunter, may we have a little talk please?”
She had steepled her hands in front of her face and fixed him with a look that instantly stood all the hairs on the back of his neck on end. He was ashamed to admit that he had considered running, his survival reflex kicking in when the adult authority figure in his life wanted to ‘have a talk’ behind closed doors. She had noticed the way his spine instantly straightened and responded by holding her hands out in what was clearly meant to be a soothing gesture. Unfortunately, the quickness of the movement had made him flinch and freeze in place, braced to take a blow that never came.
“That … answers that question,” she had said, soft and cryptic.
“What question?” Hunter had reached for his own mug and lifted it to his mouth, feigning nonchalance, absolutely no liquid passing his tightly pressed lips. His hands had been shaking. It had been visible even through the usually obfuscating dragonhide of his gloves.
“Hunter … do your friends know?”
“Know what?”
“Please, do not play dumb with me. You have been here a month. I have seen how you are. You are an intelligent boy, a reliable boy, a troubled boy – but not a dumb boy.”
“I still don’t understand what you mean.”
“Who used to hurt you, Hunter?”
Some coffee had sloshed over his hand. He had put down the mug and reached for a napkin like nothing was wrong and he wasn’t fighting the urge to flip the table and escape out the window. “I was the Golden Guard. Luz already explained to you what that means. I got hurt a lot in the line of duty.”
“Are … all your scars from your duties as this ‘Golden Guard’?”
“Yes,” he had lied.
Too bad for him Luz and Camila had equally perceptive bullshit-o-meters inside their brains. “I think you are lying to me, mijo.”
Mijo. Darling. A term of endearment. Masculine form of mija, which she called Luz all the time. Because Luz was her daughter and Camila loved her. No-one had ever called him an affectionate nickname before without being sarcastic.
“I think,” Camila had gone on while he was still processing this, “that you were hurt by someone who taught you how to be hurt. By someone who taught you how to be afraid. By someone who also taught you that love is a finite resource and receiving it is reliant on being useful. By someone who convinced you that you are not worth loving except for what you can do for others. I think that is why you always try to do all the chores, why you get antsy when you don’t feel like you’re pulling your weight around the house, or with Luz’s plans to get back to the Boiling Isles, and why you look after everyone except yourself. And, also, why just now you thought I was going to hit you and yet you did not get out of the way.”
Hunter had wanted the kitchen floor to spontaneously break open and swallow him up. Facing the Collector would have been easier than sitting there and listening to her talk.
“I have seen how quick your reflexes are, Hunter. When Willow fell off the ladder while watering the hanging baskets, you crossed the whole backyard so fast to catch her, I could barely see you. And your fast reaction just now was to sit and wait for me to slap you or hit you or … whatever else you thought I was going to do.”
She had sounded wounded, like him thinking she was capable of violence was something personally hurtful, which was ridiculous. All beings, whether witch, demon, human or otherwise, no matter how nice on the surface, were capable of violence given the right circumstances.
“You were taught how to be … obediently punished by someone whose influence you are still under, though I think you do not wish to be. I think you are … trying very hard not to be the person they taught you to be. But I think that some habits are harder to break than others.”
Camila had taken a deep breath then and finally sipped her coffee, like that gesture would be enough to puncture the weighty hush that had fallen over the room.
“That is what I think.”
Hunter had not known what to say to that. They had sat in silence for several long minutes before either of them had spoken again.
“Am I wrong?” Camila had asked, a little hopefully.
Answers had whirled in Hunter’s head: Of course you are! You’re crazy. I was the Golden Guard. I was the emperor’s right-hand man. No-one in all the Boiling Isles was ever able to hurt me until your stupid daughter came along and somehow then there was an assassination attempt every other week, usually from Kikimora, who was a hateful, power-hungry little midget demon with delusions of grandeur who detested me on principle and only tried to kill me after her sanity started to slip. And I always survived! I fought back against her every time! You’re absolutely, positively, one hundred percent wrong in whatever crackpot theory you have going, lady. No-one ever taught me the things you just said. I was feared by my colleagues and underlings. I was respected by the masses. I was loved by my uncle. I was –
“No,” he had found himself saying instead, much to his own surprise. “You’re not … entirely wrong.”
“Oh.” He had heard the disappointment in her voice, seen it in her eyes, and wished he had said anything except that.
“Mami?”
Both of them had looked up at the sound of the kitchen door opening to reveal Luz, rubbing her eyes and holding her stomach. Her skin had a greenish tint and there had been dark circles around her eyes that competed with Hunter’s own.
“Mami, I don’t feel so … s-so good …”
Camila had hustled Luz off to get cleaned up while Hunter busied himself mopping vomit, scrubbing and disinfecting the floor, then making breakfast for everyone else who did not have tonsils so swollen they made her gag mid-sentence. It wasn’t because he had been taught to be useful or that he might lose his place if he was not. It was because he liked being useful.
At least, that was what he told himself.
He and Luz’s mother had never continued that conversation. Sometimes he had gotten the feeling she wanted to but he had shut down all attempts until, finally, Luz succeeded in returning them to the Demon Realm and he didn’t have to look up from his morning coffee or over the edge of his book to see her mother’s sad eyes looking at him anymore.
He just wanted to be normal.
Willow was waiting expectantly for his answer. Hunter breathed out and offered her his arm, much like he used to at high society functions. He was not sure whether this was the way regular teens did it but she seemed to appreciate the gesture and hooked her arm with his. His stomach did that absurd flipflop again but he stalwartly walked forward, keeping pace with her onto the dancefloor … where he had no idea what to do next and ended up staring at the top of Willow’s head and fumbling for something to say.
“Are you okay?” Willow asked.
He flushed. He wished again that he knew how to be normal so fewer people had to ask him that. “Yeah. Sure. Um … I’m not trained in this sort of dancing though.”
“I don’t think it requires any training, actually. You just sort of move to the rhythm of the music. Um, I think. I’m not exactly an expert in this. Last Grom I went stag and kind of stuck to the side-lines making corsages but I think it’s kind of like this.” To demonstrate, she started swaying back and forth, moving her arms from side to side and occasionally clicking her fingers. Dots of colour appeared on her cheeks. “I probably look like a complete dork. Sorry.”
“No, no, I … you’re not a dork.” He mimicked her movements. He felt like an antelope trying to jump with four broken legs but it made her smile so he found he didn’t care.
Wanton gyrating turned out to not be so bad, actually. There were a lot fewer rules to remember than formal dancing and the expectations were definitely not as harsh. Willow stepped on his foot twice and all he could do was laugh like he didn’t care – because he really didn’t. He did not know the steps, did not recognise the music, did not know the majority of the people around them and was not expected to have memorised all their socio-political leanings and gauge how much of a threat they were to the throne. He was just supposed to wiggle about under the disco ball with Willow and have fun. He caught sight of Luz and Amity doing much the same, giggling together and almost falling over each other as both tried to lead.
For the first time in a long while, Hunter felt … happy. No other emotions crept in at the edges. He was just happy.
It lasted until Willow frowned and looked past him. He turned to follow her gaze.
Skara and Viney were at the punch bowl. It was well-named, since Viney looked like she was about to start punching. Viney was still making up for time officially lost while on the Detention Track and so all her peers tended to be a year or more younger than her and significantly shorter. The pink-haired girl squaring up to her was right on her eye-level. Well, two of her three eyes were.
“Boscha,” Willow muttered.
A skinny girl with lime green hair and a much shorter brunette in square-framed glasses flanked Boscha like bodyguards, arms folded and chins raised. They were clearly copying her lead, judging by how their eyes kept flicking to her for guidance. Hunter immediately categorised Boscha as one of those ‘Queen Bee’ types from his research into high schools; a popular student whose power came more from intimidation than other, more subtle pressures. He was given to understand that Amity used to be one such Queen Bee, before Luz’s influence softened her and her reconnected friendship with Willow widened her social circle to include the rest of their little friend group. There really was a pattern to how the denizens of the Owl House, past and present, had a tempering effect on jagged personalities – his own included.
Boscha and Viney were talking. It did not look like a fun conversation. Yep, that was definitely a fist Viney was making. If she threw hands, she would be ejected from Grom.
Hunter moved on pure instinct. One moment he was by Willow’s side, the next he was pulling on his magical connection with Flapjack to run across the room in a blur of gold. He arrived just in time to grab Viney’s rising arm.
“Viney,” he said in a low voice. “Stop. It’s not worth it.”
“Yeah, Viney.” Boscha gave a condescending smile. “Listen to your washed-up friend here.”
Hunter eyed her, his expression falling into the impassive mask he used to wear under the real one when he stood at Belos’s side. “Mind your manners.” The words came out clipped, like an order.
Boscha snorted. “Mind your own, Fail Face.”
He was temporarily mystified. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me. Or would you prefer Golden Guard? Nah, I think Fail Face suits you better.” Boscha traced the outline of his v-shaped scar on her own cheek.
Hunter felt Viney try to lift her arm again. He pushed it back down, still addressing his words to Boscha. “I suggest you stop that and step away.”
“Oh, you suggest that, do you?” Boscha exchanged a look with the other two girls behind her and tittered. “You don’t even go here, Fail Face.”
“Boscha.” Willow’s eyes were not fully green but an emerald sheen rolled over her irises as she purposefully walked towards them. Hunter guessed she had just entered hearing distance over the music. “Whatever you’re doing, stop it and leave. Now.”
“Or what?” Boscha simpered.
“Or I will put you in the ground and cover you in weedkiller. It’s perfect for getting rid of ugly, useless things no-one wants.”
Boscha spluttered. “Tchah! Did you just say what I think you said, Half-a-Witch-Willow?”
“Oh please.” Willow came to stand by Hunter’s side and folded her arms. She smirked. Hunter had never seen her smirk before. It was both endearing and terrifying. “The days of that name bothering me are long gone. Get some new material.”
“Watch your mouth!” Boscha snapped.
“Make me.”
“Oh, I will!” Boscha raised a finger and started to draw a spell circle. “I’ll burn it clean off your stupid, fat face!”
“If you finish that spell circle, Boscha, we’re going to have a problem.” Amity stalked over, Luz beside her. “I thought I told you to quit messing with my friends.”
Boscha dropped her arm. The spell circle died only half-cast. “Like you get to tell me what to do anymore, Blight? Your family is social poison these days. How’s your dear old mommy doing? Still rotting away in a prison cell? Or did she buy her way out already? Whoops, no, she can’t anymore, can she? Not since Daddy Dumbest divorced her and took all his family fortune with him. It seems like you take after your mom, Amity: you both fell in with the wrong crowd and ruined your lives.”
Amity’s face reddened. Her mother’s transgressions were public knowledge – all those who had thrown in their lot with Belos and, subsequently, the Collector were well-known to just about everyone – but it was a sore spot for her all the same. Hunter knew that her father had, in fact, quietly paid off her mother’s bail money and Odalia had run off to the Shin to try to build a new life. She had not spoken to her children since she left.
“My ‘wrong crowd’ you’re talking about saved the entire Boiling Isles from the Collector,” Amity gritted. “Including your stupid life.”
“Mmm, yeah, thanks or whatever.” Boscha faked a yawn. “Still a bunch of freaks. And you’re just as freaky as them, Amity. Total pariahs, all of you. I was just trying to talk some sense into Skara before she can’t fix her mistake either.”
“You were not!” Skara protested. “You came to insult my friends and try to make me re-join your group instead because you only have Amelia and Cat left! Well, I’d rather die that be your friend ever again, Boscha. You’re a bad person and I don’t like who I turned into when I was with you.”
Boscha’s eyes flashed. “Careful what you say, Skara.”
“Don’t talk to her that way!” Luz stepped in front of Amity, ready to square up to Boscha despite only coming up to her chest. “¡Esto es una fiesta! ¿No podemos llevarnos bien todos por una noche?”
“Ugh, again with that stupid human language nobody understands?” Boscha picked something out from under one long nail and flicked it at Luz.
Purple magic rolled over Amity’s eyes.
“You’re just pissed that so many people wised up about what a terrible person you are and chose not to be your friend anymore. You can’t rule the school without a crew, right?” Skara kept talking, words tumbling out of her like water over rocks in a stream. “A-and it looks totally bad for you if people keep leaving your group. First Amity, then me, then Maura, Celine, Jane and Bo. Amelia and Cat are only sticking with you because you have dirt on them that they’re scared of you spreading around school. Don’t forget, I was part of your inner circle, Boscha. I know what you know and I also know all the nasty, nasty things you pulled and how you managed to never be punished for them.”
A muscle in Boscha’s jaw jumped. “Skara, I’m warning you –”
“No! You don’t get to push me around or tell me what to do anymore, Boscha! I have real friends now – friends who don’t want me around just because I’m from the right family or because I have money or for what I can do for them. They just like me for me.” Skara’s pretty face contorted into pure rage; eyelashes spiked with angry tears. “You … y-you think you’re such hot shit, Boscha, but all you really are is cold diarrhoea!”
“Oh, it is on!” Boscha raised both hands this time, index fingers glowing. “Amelia! Cat! Set fire to their dresses!”
Flapjack slid under her chin in a blur of gold, the sharp wooden curl of his tail gently pressing against her cheek. He crackled with faint curls of magic. Boscha froze. Her fingers stopped glowing. Without moving her head, her eyes traced the line of Flapjack’s staff down to where Hunter’s hand gripped it, then further on to his cold eyes.
“Do not even think about it,” hunter murmured, too soft for anyone but her to hear. “You hurt them and I hurt you. And I know a great many ways to hurt people.”
“Of course you do.” Boscha’s lip curled into a snarl. “Why they keep a dangerous extra freakish freak like you around I’ll never understand. You’re like a ticking timebomb just waiting to go off. And when you do, you’ll take them all out with you, Fail Face. Who’ll be laughing then? Oh yeah, it’ll be me.”
He did not have time to respond before a voice crashed down on them all.
“All right, break it up, break it up!”
Flapjack’s staff melted away, his little body reverting to soft flesh and feathers. He twittered onto Hunter’s shoulder and berated Boscha in language only his witch could understand. Hunter scratched the little cardinal on top of his head with a fingertip, sub-vocalising shushing noises to calm him. Flapjack was very annoyed that Boscha was spoiling the lovely evening Hunter had been just starting to enjoy.
The Owl Lady physically interposed herself between the two groups. “Allo, allo, allo. What’s all this then, guv’nah?”
Raine followed her. “Eda, why are you talking like that?”
“Luz taught me how to use that portable DVD player I thought was a magic lunchbox and apparently my coasters were all DVDs of British police procedural dramas. We’re kind of like security tonight so I figured I’d act like it.” Eda preened. “I think I pull off the accent quite well.”
“Please never speak like that again.” Raine folded their arms and eyed the collection of teenagers. “You all know there’s no fighting at Grom outside of the pit.”
“Boscha started it!” Viney growled. “She was being a total bitch.”
“I was not!” Boscha adopted an expression of wounded innocence. “I was just minding my own business when these hooligans started picking on me and my friends. I was just defending my girls like a good friend should, Right, girls?”
Diligently, if not exactly enthusiastically, her two hangers-on nodded.
“See?”
The Owl Lady looked unconvinced. “Uh-huh. You lie as well as your moms did when we were at school, kiddo. Which is to say: not at all. You’re Boscha, right?”
Boscha instantly dropped the innocent expression and scowled up at her. “Yeah? What of it?”
“You’re henceforth under strict instructions to stay at least ten – no, twenty – feet away from any and all of these kids for the rest of the evening. Am I making myself clear? You are not to get in their faces, get in their business, get in their grilles or in any way, shape or form get in trouble for disobeying this instruction. And I’m a chaperone tonight, which means I’m practically a teacher, which means you have to do what I say. Get it?”
“But –”
“Get. It?”
Boscha’s elbows locked at her sides. She looked ready to explode with anger. “I get it. But my parents are totally lodging a complaint with Principal Bump tomorrow.”
“You do that. I’m sure he’d love to see this footage Owlbert helpfully took of you threatening people.” The Owl Lady tapped her palisman and his eyes glowed yellow. He hooted, just once, and a tiny replica of them all projected from his gaze to replay in the empty air.
At the end of the replay, Boscha trembled with barely suppressed rage. “You … you … you …”
Skara leaned out from behind Viney to twinkle her fingers in a wave. “Bye, Boscha.”
“Don’t let the door hit you where the griffin should’ve bit you,” Viney added.
‘Ugggh!” Boscha unleashed a loud groan of frustration and stalked away. Her friends – though Hunter doubted the word could really be used to describe them now – fell into step behind her and soon they were swallowed up by the crowd.
Skara wilted. Viney caught her. “Oh my gosh, that was terrifying. How was she even scarier to face down than Scouts from the Emperor’s Coven?”
“I hate her,” Amity gritted. Hunter was surprised to see tears beading in the corners of her eyes. “I hate her so much.”
“Está bien, batata.” Luz laced their fingers together and pulled her in for a quick kiss. Hunter averted his eyes to give them privacy but still heard her murmuring. “She’s a b-with-an-itch and I’m not about to let her ruin our night.”
“Estúpida,” Amity chuckled, her voice thick with unshed tears.
“Has estado estudiando tus lecciones de español,” Luz said delightedly. “¡Eso es genial!”
“Not much,” Amity sniffled. “But I’m trying.”
Hunter felt a hand gently touch his arm. “Are you okay?” Willow asked.
He blinked at her. “Yes? Why wouldn’t I be?”
“I don’t know.” Her hand retracted, instead raising to scrub at the back of her neck. “Yeah. You don’t have a history with Boscha and her crew, do you? Different context than us. This … fighting with people like her, that was probably just like some … some normal Tuesday or something for you, right?”
He frowned. “I didn’t face down a lot of school bullies on Tuesdays. Those were for catching up on paperwork.”
Willow looked at him in surprise and for a moment he saw something waver in her eyes. He wasn’t sure what it was but it made his stomach clench. It was the absolute opposite of the flipflop and he hated it even though he did not understand it.
“Uh … yeah,” Willow said dejectedly.
Hunter got the feeling he had just failed a test of some sort, except Willow was not the kind of person to put her friends through arbitrary mind game tests like that. Yet the feeling persisted.
“Boscha is a crummy friend and a crummy person and just … just so crummy!” Skara vented. “Do you know that when we all went to fight the Emperor Coven Scouts to rescue Gus from Adrien Gray, she hid under a desk in the potions homeroom and then lied about fighting alongside us? She’s such a hypocrite! Even Matholomule fought those bozos and he’s frightened of everything!”
“Calm down, kid, you’ll wreck your make-up again,” said Eda. “And I don’t think you’ll have time to fix it this time.”
“She just makes me so mad, is all!” Skara replied. “She had no right to say those things to any of my friends!”
“She never had any right to pick on us except the one that existed in her own head,” said Willow. “Unfortunately, Boscha is Boscha’s biggest fan and she gives herself permission to do a lot of horrible things because what’s best for Boscha is, of course, what’s best for everyone. Or at least everyone who matters to Boscha. And I have now officially said Boscha way too many times tonight and my mouth feels dirty as a result.”
Her words struck a chord in Hunter. They were far too reminiscent of the way Belos thought about the world and his place in it.
Microphone feedback screeched, cutting through the air like an aural knife. They all winced. On stage, Gus chuckled weakly.
“Sorry about that, folks. Hope you’re all having a great time this evening!”
A chorus of cheers answered from the dancefloor.
“You all sound stoked – and well you might! We’re only five minutes away from the main event of the evening: Skara Calliope versus Grometheus the Fear Bringer!” Gus elongated their names, which seemed to fuel the crowd even more. Applause broke out alongside the cheers. “Be sure to get a good spot for the viewing, folks! I personally have been helping Miss Calliope train and I can assure you; tonight’s fight is going to be a doozy! See you all in five minutes!”
Principal Bump grabbed the mic as soon as Gus replaced it on the stand. “And let me please remind all of you students that this is the only fighting I expect to happen tonight, and that there will be severe consequences for anyone else who starts one.”
“Sounds like Bumpy-poo already heard about Big Bad Bitch Boscha trying to start shit,” the Owl Lady said behind one cupped hand. It still amazed Hunter how she had regenerated a whole arm from nothing with the power of her curse. He still thought of curses as invasive, deadly things, but he was coming to understand that symbiosis was much easier to attain than he had been led to believe and was much more beneficial to the cursed person.
“Please don’t call him Bumpy-poo,” Raine replied with a sigh. “You know he hates that.”
“And I hate cleaning the toilet but we all have to deal with shit we don’t want to in life.”
“Edaaa!”
“Whaaaat?”
“Eda?” Luz tugged on the Owl Lady’s sleeve. “Where’s King?”
She jerked a thumb over her shoulder. “Snack table.”
“Still?”
“He’s attempting to eat his own body weight in not-dog sliders dipped in rotten candy.”
Luz smiled. “He’s such a little rascal.”
Flapjack hopped onto Hunter’s head and cheeped at his old nickname.
“Not you, buddy.” Hunter scratched his palisman’s head feathers.
“All right!” Luz clapped her hands together with an air of determination. “Game time, people!”
“Ready, Skara?” Viney asked.
“As I’ll ever be,” said Skara. There was the merest hint of a waver in her voice but she disguised it well. Hunter was impressed. “But ... would you guys come with me to the Weapon Wall to get ready?”
“Of course!” Luz cried. “That was always the plan!”
Viney took Skara’s hand. She looked startled but pleased. “C’mon,” said Viney. “You’re totally going to kick ass tonight, no matter what Boscha says.”
Like an amoeba, their group moved as one away from the punch bowl table and towards the Weapon Wall. Hunter found himself trailing along at the back. He told himself it was because he was bringing up the rear, making sure no bullies came at them from behind, but inwardly he worried at the sudden sense that he was outside the group instead of part of it.