Chapter Text
Luz was rudely awoken by a sharp rapping on her window. Someone at her window wasn’t unusual in-and-of itself (since SOME demons had no concept of the difference between a door and a window), but they typically came around well after dawn, not, as she could see from the meager but too-bright light of her phone, two fluffin’ in the morning.
She moved to answer the window like she would a door, opening it and staring down her unexpected guest, and her burgeoning irritation dissipated. “Hunter? What are you doing here? I thought you weren’t getting back from the palistrom forests until day after tomo--”
“I need your help.”
She took in his appearance, then. His hair was all over the place, likely from running his hands through it (which he tended to only do when stressed), and his eyebags were more pronounced than they had been. The moment she stepped aside to let him in, he jumped easily into her little attic-space-bedroom and began pacing back and forth, resuming the hair-messing. His eyes were red, not from an uncommon sclera but from prominent veins that stood out against the brown. More indications of a lack of sleep.
He’d been doing better, she thought. He’d been fine when she’d seen him last week. More than fine, actually--he was excelling in his new classes (Potions, Plants, and some Beast Keeping that was admittedly a weak spot), had returned to training with the Emerald Entrails despite not having a staff (he worked out with them and strategized with them and talked and laughed and didn’t watch longingly as they put his ideas into motion), he spent weekends with her Mami and weekdays with Darius (who teleported him to Hexside with feigned annoyance but was always early to pick him up and frequently brought him a snack), and hung out with their little posse (The Hexsquad, as they’d come to call themselves) (and spent quite a bit of extra time with Willow, when they would sneak off to sit together and talk quietly and closely with frequent touching when they thought no one else was looking) and and and--
He’d been okay. He smiled and waved before he rode off with Dell to meet the Bat Queen and help out with the replanting they’d been working on. So what had happened?
Hunter wasn’t explaining, so Luz interrupted his frantic pacing with a hand and a quiet “Hey. You there?” He paused long enough for her to ask, “What happened? You look awful. Did you run out of your sleeping nettle tea?”
The panicked look on his face was briefly replaced with something more sheepish.
“You have been drinking your sleeping nettle tea--right?”
“It’s--I can’t,” he sputtered, “I keep seeing him. And the tea just makes it--makes it worse.”
“There are alternatives to sleeping nettles, I know they can cause more vivid dreams--”
“They aren’t dreams!” He grabbed her shoulders and the absolute fear in his eyes made her blood run cold.
“They’re memories. They’re memories and they’re not mine and they all have him. ”