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Assistant: Title: No Fate Only Family
        Author: Janoha Janoha 
        Chapter: 41/46 
        Summary: Luz' parents had their secrets. Camila had a rough time growing up, but she never told anyone how bad for fear they would not believe her. Manny looked and acted human, but knew more about the Demon Realm and the workings of magic than any human should.Now that Luz has found the Boiling Isles, those secrets will come to light, and the realms will never be the same.Now on TVTropes, courtesy of The_Literary_Lord and friend:https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Fanfic/NoFateOnlyFamilyNow with a Discord Server! https://discord.gg/R2DETBPBua
        Contents: Chapter 41: Nature's Blessings
    

    

        
          
          
            It is a time for family, a time for life, love, and rebirth.As the seasons change on the Boiling Isles, the festival of Nature's Blessing is revived.
          
        

      
        
          CW: Blood, minor character deaths, discussions of child abuse, possession, mention of medical malpractice, deadnaming.
            
            (See the end of the chapter for  more notes.)
            
      
  

  
  
    
    
  “Well this is awkward.”

  Eda broke the tension in the air around the table. On one side of the table sat two generations of Pines Twins, while on the other side sat Camila, Eda, Raine, and Luz.

  After the ordeal of fighting and slaying a Fused Colossus, and then delving an ancient temple to free the stolen magic, the Owl Family had been planning a quiet day in of rest and recuperation. Those plans had been given the kibosh when Luz and Eda had received a text from Camila telling them to either call her or meet her in the Human Realm.

  Dipper and Mabel, the brilliant detectives they were, had figured out a potential connection between their own family and the Nocedas, courtesy of their great uncle’s anecdote. Through the use of a simple ritual, they had confirmed that Luz was related to the twins, and promptly dragged their grunkles back onto dry land for an impromptu family reunion.

  Their chosen meeting place was a diner on the edge of town, one of the few places where Eda hadn’t been already banned for her magical shenanigans, and it was a quiet enough day that the only other people in the restaurant were Vee and her friends in a nearby booth, including one slightly-confused-looking Clara.

  “That’s one word for it,” Stan added, rubbing the back of his neck. “So, uh, how have you been, Marilyn?”

  “The name’s Eda, actually,” the witch postured. “Marilyn was the name of my favorite aunt growing up. She taught me everything I knew about Illusions and sleight-of-hand.”

  Luz quirked an eyebrow, and jotted down a note, the name ringing a bell.

  “I’ll be honest, I was not expecting to learn that I’m a grandfather when we checked in on the kids,” Stan gestured to Dipper and Mabel.

  “It’s not that surprising, Stanley,” Ford elbowed his twin.

  “Wait, Stanley? I thought your name was Stanford?” Eda pointed.

  Ford rolled his eyes. “I got lost in the multiverse for thirty years, and this con-artist here chose to fake his death and take my identity.”

  “Hey, it all worked out in the end, didn’t it?” Stan defended. “And I’m not the one wanted in forty-eight 
  
    entire dimensions
  
  .”

  Mabel snapped her fingers. “That’s why you knew Gideon was a fake psychic from the start!”

  Stan smiled and ruffled his niece’s hair.

  “Uh, what’s that you’re working on there, Luz?” Dipper asked, noticing Luz filling out a complex chart.

  “Trying to map out my family tree, accounting for the revelations of the past couple days,” Luz explained.

  Camila leaned over and read what she’d listed so far.

  With an aggrieved sigh, she commented “My…
  
    mother’s
  
  …name was Rosa Rivera. She took her husband’s name when she got married.”

  “Oh, yikes,” Stan noticed the tone in her voice.

  “In hindsight, I’m glad my stepdad let me keep the Noceda name. It made it easier to cut ties after…”

  Luz and Eda both patted Camila’s shoulders to comfort her.

  “She kicked you out?” Stan asked, aghast.

  “She did not approve of my ‘lifestyle’,” Camila spat. “And after surviving the Hunter’s Moon, I cut contact with that whole family. The only time I went back to that house was so Rox and I could get my personal effects and documents from my room.

  “Sheesh, history really likes to repeat itself, doesn’t it?” Stan shook his head. “My dad kicked me out when I was seventeen, after an… incident.”

  He and Ford gave each other a knowing look.

  “And I forgave you for that, Stanley,” the older twin sighed.

  “I was sixteen,” Camila said softly.

  “Our family just has the worst luck, doesn’t it?” Stan asked.

  “Guess that’s the trade-off for playing with gods and punching some of them in the face,” Camila said with a toothy smile, then with a shrug she added. “Okay, more of a stab than a punch, but the idea’s the same.”

  “You stabbed a god?” Ford asked.

  “The Huntsman, an Archivist who had it out for my husband and his family even before a lowly human with a couple week’s worth of sorcery training and a fancy spear managed to wound him.”

  “Huh, during my travels I heard rumors about the Huntsman being defeated, but I never got to follow up on them,” Ford was surprised.

  Camila stared wistfully. “Azur and I managed to banish him and his temple to Despondos, and then Azur gave their life and soul to bring me back. On the bright side, I now have all the magical knowledge of an incredibly skilled Etherian sorcerer.”

  “At least we can say taking on immortal creeps runs in the family,” Stan said with a strained smile, as he explained how he had shattered Bill Cipher with a single punch.

  Eda had a question about his recollection. “Wait, if your memories were erased, how do you remember that?”

  “Sixer and I fell into a Fountain of Youth type deal a couple years back,” Stan explained. “Knocked the clock back about ten years, and fixed up the rest of my memories.”

  “And where is this fountain?” Eda asked, a glint in her eyes.

  “Unfortunately it only appears once a century,” Ford shot down her query.

  “Dang,” Eda swore half-heartedly. “Hey, just because I rock the silver fox look doesn’t mean it doesn’t sting sometimes to look older than my own parents.”

  “And you still managed to swindle me in Vegas,” Stan pointed out.

  Eda snorted with a laugh. “That I did. Six hours of clearing out the casinos and then a high-speed chase.”

  “At least you left my car behind,” Stan grumbled.

  “It wouldn’t fit through the Portal Door!” Eda crowed.

  “Wait, I thought the Portal was locked to the cabin here in Gravesfield?”

  Eda sighed and leaned back.

  “When I found the Owl House, I also found a fob that went with the Portal Key, and let me summon it anywhere in the Human Realm, though it sometimes ended up in the most random locations.”

  “What happened to it?” Luz asked.

  “Your brother ate it a couple days after I brought him home.” Eda said flatly. “You know how babies are with small objects. I’m just glad he didn’t get sick from it. Then again, outside of shedding season and getting trapped in ice, I don’t think he’s ever gotten sick. Must be a Titan thing.”

  Luz thought for a moment. “Huh, now that you mention it, I don’t recall ever getting sick either, except when I had dairy.”

  “Your growing pains were a nightmare,” Camila observed.

  “Did you ever visit the Crawlspace?” Dipper asked Eda, changing the subject.

  “Crawlspace…” Eda wracked her memories. “Wait, that’s in the Human Realm? I thought someone had hijacked the Portal’s connection.”

  “So you did end up there,” Dipper jotted something down in his journal. 

  “Yeah, some slimeball swiped Owlbert, and I may have gone on a bit of a rampage to get him back,” Eda admitted the last part with equal parts pride and sheepishness.

  “Didn’t you once say you’d annihilate anyone who hurt Owlbert?” Luz pointed out.

  Eda nodded and raised a sparking fist. “Yep, and that staff thief learned that lesson first-hand and permanently.”

  The palisman in question poked his head out of Eda’s hair.

  “I guess someone heard us talking about him,” Eda smirked.

  Mabel quickly began cooing over the little magic owl, and once they made sure the coast was clear, the others brought out their Palismen as well.

  Mabel was in tiny animal heaven, while Dipper and Ford were both sketching the carved familiars in their journals, to which Stan chuckled.

  “Okay, not to jinx anything, but it’s a little surprising no one’s noticed anything here,” Luz whispered.

  Dipper smiled, and held up a charm bracelet, of which one of the charms was glowing. “A little misdirection ward. Turns out that at some level of investigating the paranormal you just have to start embracing wizardry for protection.”

  “I mean, what’s that saying about magic just being science we don’t understand?” Luz shrugged. “Just steer clear of the casual drapery. ‘Wizard’ is kinda another word for charlatan on the Boiling Isles. My second day on the Isles a wizard named Adegast tricked me into thinking I was some sort of chosen one, when really he was just trying to get revenge on Eda for stealing his customers.”

  “Clarke’s Third Law, and I’ll keep that in mind,” Dipper made another note.

  Raine then chimed in. “So what sort of things do you investigate?” they asked Dipper.

  “There’s actually a lot of supernatural hotspots around the world, places where the barriers between dimensions are weaker, or where there’s just a lot of involvement by magical beings,” Dipper explained. “I’m actually working on a degree in Cryptozoology, with a focus on interdimensional and extraterrestrial phenomena.”

  “And I just got my Bachelors in Fashion Design,” Mabel cut in. “More recently I’ve been working with the more magical materials, like the unicorn hair thread in mine and Dipper’s jackets. Right now I’m looking for anything that might help against telekinesis.”

  Luz shuddered as she remembered exactly why Mabel would be looking into that. The only thing worse than the physic aura that had disrupted her magic was watching the corrosive effect it was having on the amulet’s holder. Whoever had created those amulets was a truly vile piece of work.

  When she returned to the conversation, the topic of discussion had shifted to the upcoming Harvest Festival on the Boiling Isles, an old tradition that had been suppressed by Belos and was being brought back by the Seekers.

  The Pines’ were enthusiastic about the prospect of attending, at least once they confirmed there would be no human sacrifices.

  “No, human or witch sacrifices are just the propaganda Belos used to shut the festival down,” Eda waved off. “It’s all about connecting with the magic of the Isles and celebrating a good harvest and hunt as we start preparing for the winter.”

  “Well I’m in!” Mabel exclaimed.

  Luz smiled, and continued working on making sense of her family Yggdrasil.

  When Stan Pines was cheerfully informed by his grand niece that he had a daughter and granddaughter, his first reaction had been disbelief. Then he had given it a few moments of recollection, and proceeded to speed-run the five stages of grief in the time it took for Ford to bring them back to shore.

  Stan Pines had considered himself a family man. Not father material by any metric, but he embraced the title of Uncle with aplomb. When his grand niece and nephew were born (even if he was the only one who knew that he had a nephew), he had made sure to wear his best suit to give them a good first impression, though circumstances conspired to keep him out of the loop of their lives until that fateful summer when Dipper and Mabel were sent to live with him, ostensibly to get some fresh air, but it didn’t take a genius of Ford’s caliber to recognize that their parents were having marital troubles that they didn’t want their kids exposed to.  He had tried to keep the twins away from the weirder side of Gravity Falls, but that had become a moot point the moment Dipper found the elusive Third Journal and Mabel’s boyfriend turned out to be five gnomes in a hoodie. And if he couldn’t protect his family from supernatural weirdness, he could at least try to prepare them for dealing with a world that was indifferent at best, if not actively hostile.

  And then he had to come clean about everything, with the solace that he had gotten his brother back after thirty years, even if it took weeks for Ford to actually thank him for his work.

  It had been heartening for him to see his grand niece and nephew avoid making the same mistakes as the original Pines Twins, even avoiding the curse that had plagued generations of Pines’.

  But now, faced with the daughter he’d never known he’d had, and her family, Stan realized that some higher power was probably having a laugh at his expense.

  At first glance, the two had very little in common. She did inherit his brown eyes, and the fluffy brown curls that ran in the Pines family, though the rest of her features were her mother’s - not that he would bring that up, considering what Camila had to say about the woman who had sent her running into the rain.

  Then they started talking, and it turned out she had gotten the best of him, a dedication to her family and the sheer stubborn determination to take on the whole world if it meant protecting the people she cared about. At sixteen she had survived a monster that would have given a certain equilateral creep a run for his money, and then gone on to become a well-respected veterinarian with a loving - if less conventional - family.

  It was certainly awkward to learn that the woman who he had been married to for all of six hours in Vegas before being swindled was dating his daughter, especially when her other partner, a musician, made a comment about “like parent, like partner” which left most of the table who were paying attention red in the face.

  Stan swallowed his embarrassment to check on the kids. His granddaughter clearly inherited some of the Pines family’s quirks, like a staggering imagination and penchant for creativity. Eda had also mentioned that Luz taught herself to pick locks even before she’d met her, which Stan couldn’t help but take some pride in. 

  Luz also seemed to get along quite well with the twins, able to match both Dipper’s wit and Mabel’ sheer energy. 

  But it was also quite clear to Stan that his family was involved with otherworldly forces. There was a feline quality to the way Camila moved, like a lioness. Not to mention the shock of snow white in her hair that was more than age and stress, and the jewel-like glimmer in her eyes. Her partners were even more distinct. Stan remembered Eda’s bingo-hall pale skin, golden eyes, and equally golden fang, though her hair being mostly silver save for some hints of fiery orange at her temples was new - it had been the other way around when they first met. Raine on the other hand had that same arcane glimmer in their mint-green eyes, and mint hair that he could tell wasn’t dyed.

  The pointed ears were also a dead giveaway, but that was a given.

  For all she appeared human, being in Luz’ presence reminded him of the Portal Ford had built and he had repaired. The sheer power his granddaughter held was staggering, but he was surprisingly not afraid of it. Then again, it was hard to be afraid of someone who was currently fawning over pictures of his niece’s pet pig, whose familiar was shapeshifting to mimic the photos.

  Camila also had an adopted child of her own, who was sitting with her friends at a nearby booth from which they could unsubtly eavesdrop. He could respect their concern, though they could use some pointers if they planned to make a habit of it.

  …And Stan wouldn’t mind passing on his hard-earned skills to a new generation.

  Amity shot awake, her breathing labored and her skin clammy with fearful sweat.

  “Ugh, just another nightmare,” she muttered as she rubbed the sleep and tears from her eyes. Glancing down, she noticed that Luz was still asleep, one wing splayed behind her while the other folded King’s sleeping form. Carefully unthreading her fingers from where they were entwined with her girlfriend’s, she slipped out the window with catlike tread.

  In her wake, King opened one eye.

  Resting her back against the outside wall, she sighed into the cooling night, a chill breeze ruffling the oversized Bad-Girl Coven t-shirt that she’d started wearing to bed after moving into the Owl House.

  The vision that dominated her nightmare flashed in her mind’s eye, and she winced, leaning her head back with a soft thunk.

  
    Everything was on fire as screams filled the air. The sun’s light was a pale ring against the shadow of the eclipse, as dark tendrils danced among the burning forms. A pair of hateful vermillion eyes stared down over all, while Amity staggered through the chaos, until coming upon a sight that made her blood run cold and her heartbeat freeze. At the center of the fire was a familiar winged form, the membranes of her wings burned away to leave only the skeleton beneath. Surrounding her were the broken bodies of their friends and family, riddled with spears and slashes. A clawed hand raised in her direction as she met those golden hazel eyes, bleary with agony. The hand fell, and the fire consumed her, all while that vermillion gaze laughed.
  

  That same nightmare had been haunting her for over a week now, ever since that fight with Mercy in the Human Realm, where she had been rendered helpless against the modern witch hunter’s telekinetic amulet, which Dipper had informed her and Luz had been created by a wizard in the Human Realm Dark Ages as a way to appease the Dream Demon he had imprisoned.

  If the goal of the amulet had been to give people nightmares, then it had certainly succeeded in its task.

  “Can’t sleep?” Hooty’s normally grating voice was surprisingly gentle, though still startled Amity.

  “It’s nothing,” Amity shifted to face away from where the House Demon was stretched.

  “It doesn’t sound like nothing,” Hooty said, his brow furrowed.

  Amity sighed. “I’m not…I’m not strong enough to protect the people I love.”

  “Says who?” Hooty asked. “You once beat me up, and I’ve been protecting this house for ages.”

  “I doubt I could pull that off again,” Amity nestled her head in her arms. “How can I protect my friends and family if I couldn’t protect myself and Luz from one human our age with a magic amulet? I’ve pushed my magic to the limit, and it still isn’t enough.”

  She spun a spell circle that summoned a small abomination.

  “Your only fourteen,” Hooty pointed out. “And I may not have the best sense for witch aging, but even Eda didn’t become her most powerful until she was a lot older.”

  “I don’t have time to wait!” Amity slammed her fist against the wall, just hard enough to make noise without cracking the stucco.

  “And it’s not like even this much power isn’t anything short of a miracle,” Amity muttered darkly. “The healers checked, and my bile sac is smaller than it should be for a witch my age. I’ve had to work twice as hard to be top student, and without my Frankenstein sabotaging my classmates, I’m only barely holding onto that spot.”

  “Being the best isn’t everything,” the House Demon hooted. “And it won’t change how Luz feels about you either, hoot hoot.”

  “It doesn’t change the fact that I’ve become the weak link,” Amity fell back onto the roof, the tiles digging into her back. “Willow and Gus are straight-up prodigies in their tracks, and Helyna didn’t even need a bile sac to be a match for me without those Calamity Powers and Luz’ glyph blessing.”

  “You have more magic at your disposal than just the bile sloshing in your veins.”

  Mara’s spectral form stepped through the wall to join Amity on the roof.

  “You’ve been practicing with glyphs, and you have my strength, as I promised when we formed our Pact,” Mara explained.

  “It’s still not enough against what’s coming,” Amity stared off into the distance.

  “There is no shame in asking for help from those around you,” Mara offered her advice. “I was taught that I alone could save my people, but it was all a lie. To stand alone against the storm is to be washed away. My superiors wanted me to be alone because it made me easier for them to control, and when I rebelled, I had my friends to fall back on for support, to be strong beyond raw power.”

  Mara stood up, holding out a hand. “You don’t need to be the strongest witch on the Isles to stand up to evil, to stand up for yourself, or to be worthy of respect and love. Hold fast to those dear to you, and those bonds will see you through.”

  Amity accepted the hand up, and returned to her room, before heading downstairs for a glass of water.

  As she passed the living room entrance on her way back, she heard a shuffling and voices from the living room.

  “Are you sure it’s here?”

  “I’m pretty sure the book was on the second shelf from the top.”

  “King? Collector?” Amity asked, entering the room. Her innate night vision allowed her to make out the form of the young Titan clinging precariously to one of the bookshelves.

  “Weh?” King jolted, and promptly lost his balance.

  Acting on instinct, Amity summoned an abomination cushion to break his fall. 

  “Sorry for startling you,” she apologized as she dissolved the goop out of his fur and propped him up on the couch. “What are you doing up so late?”

  “What are 
  
    you
  
   doing up so late?” King countered. The Collector’s shadow had already retreated into their mirror shard, unable to manifest in the dark.

  “Had a nightmare, needed some fresh air and water,” Amity answered defensively.

  King patted the seat next to him, and held up his stuffed bunny.

  Amity’s eyes went wide, before her expression softened at the familiar plush.

  “Thanks, King,” she hugged the plush that she hadn’t held in years, since Odalia had declared her too old for ‘such childish things’.

  She told King as much, and his response would have earned him a scolding for language if they were in public - even if she agreed with the sentiment.

  Their commiseration was interrupted by another person’s shuffling footsteps.

  “Amity? King? What’s going on?” Luz asked, rubbing the sleep from her eyes as she entered the room, her eyes glimmering in the darkness with her own night vision.

  With a weary sigh, Amity explained her recent nightmares and the accompanying anxieties and insecurities.

  By the time she was done recounting the former, Luz had joined her on the couch, holding her hands.

  “Every time you’ve been in life-threatening danger, I haven’t been able to help. At the Castle, Lilith cut off my arm. On Palisman Adoption Day, I wasn’t there when you were poisoned. And then against Mercy, I wasn’t strong enough to fight her powers with that amulet.”

  Amity was crying.

  Luz brushed the tears from her eyes.

  “I’m scared too, Amity,” she admitted. “But I’m still here, I’m still alive, and that has to count for something.”

  Amity met her gaze, those glowing crucibles shining in the dark.

  “And, there’s something else. Something…selfish,” Amity turned away. “Even if we make it through all this - Belos, the Titan Trappers, the Archivists… Even if we survive them, you’ll still outlive me.”

  Luz gasped.

  “You’ll live hundreds, thousands of years, and I’ll be lucky to make it past a century,” Amity choked out.

  As Luz wrapped an arm around her shoulders, she remembered what her dad had told her in the In-Between, and the casual way he had said it.

  And Manny Noceda was not the kind of person to play with his loved ones’ hearts.

  Which meant that there was some way for mortal witches to stand on even ground with Titans.

  Conjuring her glyphs, the gears turned in Luz’ head.

  “I think we ought to talk to dad.”

  A week later, eight humans crossed the Portal Door, arriving in the front yard of the Owl House, half of them for the first time.

  Ford took a deep breath.

  “Ozone, cordite, and just a hit of sulfur,” he identified. “Yep, this is the Demon Realm alright.”

  “You get used to it,” Marcy shrugged, just barely reining in her enthusiasm for being the presence of the Human Realm’s foremost scholar in the paranormal.

  Marcy had forgone her typical ranger armor for something a little more formally festive - a seafoam green knee-length dress cinched with a golden belt and topped with a sand blue capelet clasped with a coral pink spiral brooch.

  Marcy led the group down the forest path to Bonesborough, where the fairgrounds that had previously hosted the traveling carnival had been turned into the main ground for the festival.

  Where the carnival had consisted of rigged games and unique magic that had managed to slip under the notice of the Emperor’s Coven, the Nature’s Blessing Festival was a proud display of wild magic.

  The Boonchuys and the Pines’ were in awe. Dipper and Ford couldn’t help but whip out their journals to record everything that caught their eyes, while the others were content with enjoying the festivities themselves.

  Vee approached the group to greet them, arm-in-arm with Masha. Despite being on the Isles, the Basilisk was in her more human-passing form, with the notable addition of a large bandage on her cheek.

  “Whoa, what happened girl?” Marcy gestured in surprise.

  “It’s fine, Ivy’s just getting really broody, which means Nil’s clutch is going to hatch soon,” Vee waved off with her free hand.

  “And what about that?” Marcy gestured to how the human and Basilisk were holding hands, her voice pitched with enthusiasm. “When did that happen?”

  “About yesterday,” Masha answered with a bashful shrug. “Vee asked if I wanted to go with her to this whole festival shebang and I said it was a date.”

  Marcy promptly pulled her friends into a hug while squeeing at how cute they were together.

  “Oh, good, you’re here just in time,” Luz greeted, looking a little frazzled. “Hope you all enjoy the festival. Oh, and Sasha, Anne, we’ll need you here at sunset for the big ritual.”

  “Ritual? What ritual?” Anne asked. “I thought there wasn’t going to be any sort of sacrifice?”

  “Not that sort of ritual,” Luz deadpanned. “The ritual we’re doing requires six people to hold my glyphs. You and Helyna already have two of them, and Willow and Gus have already agreed.”

  “Well who can argue with that,” Sasha nudged Anne.

  “What about Amity?” Anne asked.

  Luz smiled. Anne’s eyes went wide.

  “You’re roping us into a grand romantic gesture for your girlfriend, aren’t you?” Anne pointed. “I’m in.”

  The two shook hands. “Thanks Anne, it means a lot to us.”

  “Happy to help,” Anne smiled back.

  “Now, the ritual isn’t until sunset, so you guys have the whole day to enjoy,” Luz said before flying off.

  The group of humans quickly split up to explore the fairgrounds, which had been expanded quite a bit from when they had hosted the carnival.

  Dipper and Ford were in awe of the wildlife, particularly the fauna that they had already seen during their time in Gravity Falls, like the scampfires being tended to by beastkeepers to provide cooking fires for all manner of roasted meals, the most common of which seemed to be skewers of vegetables and chopped tentacles, which Anne and Sasha had assured them were safe for human consumption.

  “I’ve certainly survived off worse,” Ford told his nephew as he took a bite.

  There were vendors hawking their wares, and a number of exhibits both magical and more mundane.

  Sasha had been drawn to a makeshift arena where witches and demons were testing their martial prowess. Taking up a pair of practice swords, she joined the tourney. Her first competitor was a demon twice her height, who laughed at the blonde.

  She promptly made him eat the dirt, sliding under his first swing and catching him in the ankles.

  “Alright, who’s next?” the Calamity Warrior of Strength boasted.

  “Impressive for a skirmish,” one cloaked fighter commented as he hopped the railing. “But how about an opponent your own size?”

  The figure doffed his cloak, and picked up one of the practice swords, giving it a few experimental swings. He was a more insect-like biped demon, with a single compound eye, green carapace, and large clicking mandibles.

  The duelist charged forward with no warning, but Sasha parried the blow between her swords.

  “Showy, I’ll admit,” her opponent buzzed. “But can you keep up?”

  With more flexibility than she thought possible, the demon kicked off her guard to knock her off balance and return to his ready stance.

  A flurry of blows were exchanged, until Sasha saw a hole in his guard and struck.

  He was counting on that, and knocked one of her swords from her hands.

  “You are decent with two blades, but how about with one?”

  Sasha caught her breath, and firmed up her grip on her remaining sword, feeling a welcome burn behind her eyes.

  “Let’s see if I’ve still got it.”

  The next exchange was even more frantic, and the crowd was roaring with delight at the skill on display.

  One thing became clear to Sasha as they matched each other blow for blow.

  They were too evenly matched for one to win, and her endurance could only go so far.

  Which meant finding an alternative.

  Falling back into a defensive stance, Sasha weathered the next flurry, before standing her ground against an overhead swing.

  Her opponent’s eye shone with shock as he realized the trap he’d fallen into, right before Sasha turned his strike into a lever that catapulted him out of the ring.

  The bell screamed for her victory, and she approached her opponent with a hand out.

  “Gotta admit, that was a workout,” she kneeled to help him up. “Got a name?”

  “Zorek, of the Eastern Hive,” he replied. “You surprised me, human. I assumed by your aura that you were of fire, but you clearly bear the strength and fortitude of earth.”

  “Yeah, well, sometimes you’ve gotta be your own anchor,” Sasha shrugged, thinking on how chaotic her life had been during and after her stay in Amphibia. She had gone from an unhealthy status quo of being a toxic friend, to being a prisoner, to earning her freedom and allowing her worst qualities to take over, until she got a much needed reality check. Thinking back, she’d always thought of herself in terms of fire, and how brightly she’d burned. Even her Calamity Powers were distinctly more flame-like than Anne or Marcy’s. But she had burned her bridges, and had to rebuild them. Fire was passion, and transformation through destruction. On the other hand, the same attributes that had made her worthy of the Strength Gem were the same qualities as the newly-uncovered element of Earth - Strength, Fortitude, Persistence, the parts of herself that she still took pride in, which had kept her head up through the rough time she’d been having between saying goodbye to Amphibia and saying hello to the Boiling Isles.

  She knew which Glyph Luz wanted to give her, and understood exactly why.

  She had to wonder if her opponent had known that, but she didn’t ask.

  Towards the center of the festival grounds, a number of Palisman Carvers worked their craft, carving new Palisman, while some of the Bat Queen’s charges found new witches to bond with, or rekindled those bonds with those thought lost to the Emperor’s foul petrifications. The Seekers and CATTs had been able to refine Marcy’s technique for undoing petrification, with King being the one to figure out that a combination of incorporating the Earth Glyph into the array and using Titan Ichor as a power source was enough to undo Belos’ b@st@rdized glyph combo. They had started with the most recent petrifications, the ones that Belos had kept hidden from the public, but lined the road leading to the Conformatorium all the same. It was an arduous process, but worth it to undo some of the damage Belos had done to the people of the Isles.

  Dell Clawthorne was overseeing Helyna carving a Palisman herself, guiding her in putting the finishing touches on one of the projects he had been able to start thanks to the brace around his hand.

  “Looks about done there, Helyna,” he patted his apprentice on the back. “Now all that’s left is to help her find her partner.”

  “Huh, so this is how Palismen are made?” Dipper commented.

  “In most cases, yes,” Dell greeted before introducing himself to the paranormal researchers.

  There was a slight tensing in Helyna’s shoulders at the word ‘nephew’ being used by the older human, but she shook her unease off, as she felt an invisible tether reach out from the dormant Palisman in her hands toward the humans.

  “Would you like to see how a Palisman bonds?” she offered.

  “Really?” Dipper’s eyes lit up.

  “Just say your deepest wish, and a Palisman will more than likely choose you.”

  The older human, Ford, pursed his lips before stepping forward, looking at his six-fingered hand.

  “For the longest time, I wanted my intelligence to be recognized and appreciated,” he began. “But after spending thirty years drifting between dimensions, and getting tricked by a needy theater kid of a demon, I just want to put the past behind me and spend more time with my family.”

  The Palisman in Helyna’s hands opened her eyes, staring at Ford before leaping to his hand and summoning her staff.

  “Oh,” Ford’s own eyes went wide, before he smiled. “Hello, Jhess Frilliam, old friend.”

  The axolotl Palisman gave a meep of recognition.

  Dipper was quickly scribbling notes and sketching in his journal, before he stepped up himself.

  “I want to publish my research,” he stated. In a smaller voice, he added “and find the surgeon who was at my birth and kick him in the nads.”

  Helyna winced at the twinge of some sort of commonality, before a midnight blue speckled bear leapt into the young adult’s arms.

  “Mizar, huh? How fitting.” Dipper lifted his bangs out of his face, revealing a birthmark shaped like a Human Realm constellation. The bear gave a playful growl and bapped his forehead, earning a laugh.

  “Oh, you and Mabel are definitely going to get along.”

  “Who and I are going to get alon-YOU HAVE A MINIATURE BEAR!” Mabel made her presence known as she glomped her twin.

  After being informed how Palismen chose their partners, Mabel was quick to voice her desire to be a “worlds-renowned fashion designer, and maybe President.”

  A glittery purple puffball with eyes floated over from the Bat Queen’s brood, leaving a trail of fairie dust in its wake.

  “Oh aren’t you the cutest!” Mabel squeed as the Palisman hovered in front of her before shifting into staff form. From the front pocket of her sweater, Waddles gave an oink of acknowledgment.

  After much grumbling, Stan was dragged in by his niece, and was won over by an otter with a scar on his shoulder that managed to pickpocket his wallet.

  “An otter after my own heart,” Stan smiled dryly as he took his wallet back, allowing the magic mustelid to perch on his shoulders. “My granddaughter’s gonna love you.”

  Helyna smiled at the humans accepting the magic of the Isles.

  Luz wiped the sweat from her brow once the last person had left her station. Beside her, King groaned and fell back.

  “That’s every branded witch on the Right Arm, and probably half the Isles by now,” the young Titan sighed.

  Luz raised a tired hand, and received an equally tired high-paw in response.

  “Wanna get something to eat?” Luz suggested.

  “Do I!” King wagged his tail with a sudden burst of energy. “Undoing all those sigils is hungry work.”

  “Hoodie ride?” Luz offered.

  “With pleasure.”

  King hopped into his sister’s hood, and pointed ahead.

  “Onward, mighty chariot!”

  Luz laughed as they made their way towards the vendors, and passed by the Pines Family meeting Gus’ Human Appreciation Society.
 
  “So how many Human Realm items end up on the Boiling Isles?” Ford questioned. “I know Gravity Falls is a weak spot that allows other dimensions to leak through, but I didn’t realize it worked the other way around, too.”

  “It’s mostly stuff that’s been thrown away, since the Titan’s Blood in the water allows temporary rifts to form, but those usually lead to the Boiling Sea, which…isn’t exactly safe for actual humans,” Gus explained. “Though that’s not counting all the stuff Eda brings over to sell.” The illusionist rubbed the back of his neck. “I may have been buying from her for years without realizing that Eda was the notorious Owl Lady, at least until I befriended Luz.”

  “You were buying from the most wanted witch on the Isles and didn’t notice?” Matt asked incredulously.

  “Hey, she’s not as blatantly intimidating in person,” Gus defended.

  Luz and King had replenished their energy with a hearty stew before meeting with the rest of their family, who were enjoying the festival. Her cousin and great uncle were insistent on documenting most things they encountered, and she couldn’t exactly blame them. The fact that her human family now had Palismen of their own warmed her heart, as Mabel and Stan introduced Nebbie and Clyde.

  Vee suddenly staggered, her eyes going wide as her pupils narrowed to slits. The Pines’ took a wary step on instinct, but there was no accompanying maniacal laugh of possession, only the flaring of her nostrils before she burst into a wide, warm smile, the kind of smile that usually greeted Mabel in the mirror.

  “It’s happening…” Vee whispered cryptically.

  “What is? What’s happening?” Masha shook their girlfriend’s shoulder.

  “They’re hatching.”

  “What’s hatching?” Mabel asked.

  Luz gasped, grabbed her adopted sister’s hand, and summoned a shadow portal.

  “C’mon!” she waved.

  The Pines’ looked to each other, shrugged, and followed, accompanied by Eda, Raine, and Camila.

  They arrived in an unfamiliar part of the forest, the blood pines like a palette swap of the woods around Gravity Falls.

  “Uh, should we be concerned about the number of bones littering the ground?” Dipper asked warily.

  “BQ leaves those out to deter trespassers,” Eda waved off. “The nest is a ways deeper into the forest, the better to avoid prying eyes.”

  “What’s going on?” Mabel asked again.

  Luz turned around, walking backwards as she explained. “Okay, long story short, Belos drove the Basilisks to extinction, then brought them back with Grimwalker rituals and alien technology, just so he could study how they drained magic. Helyna set them free, and the oldest of them, Nil, fled to the Knee, where she laid a clutch of eggs. Nil was captured, and possessed by Belos’ curse, which killed her, so Ivy’s been brooding over the eggs, which are hatching today.”

  “Just keep your distance,” Eda warned. “Basilisks get very territorial when they’re brooding. Thankfully for you guys, they don’t view humans as prey, and Titan magic is unpalatable to them.” Stopping for a second, she corrected herself. “Slight correction, Titan magic is too spicy for most of them. This little one still managed to make a meal off it.”

  Vee blushed. “It wasn’t my smartest idea.”

  “We all get dumb and impulsive sometimes,” Masha assured her. “That’s just being a teenager.”

  The younger Pines twins nodded in affirmation.

  “We’re here,” Raine intoned, allowing Vee and Luz to take the lead.

  The clearing had been largely cut off from the surrounding forest by a ring of felled trees, the gaps packed solidly with earth. A depression had been dug out in the center of the clearing, with a large, flat stone raised and propped up as a makeshift shelter, atop which the red scaled form of Tria was sunning. 

  Inside the hollow, a pair of wide, frog like blue eyes gazed out, accompanied by a deep, growling hiss.

  Luz bared her fangs and growled back, and the basilisk shifted, cowed by the presence of a magically-developed Titan.

  “I can’t wait to be able to do that,” King muttered. “There’s still way too many demons that want to make a meal of me.”

  Camila approached, her hands raised placatingly. Tria waved her in. Conjuring a witchlight with a glyph, the vet started checking on the basilisk and her clutch. The eggs were healthy, with the veins along the surface a shimmering opal in color, compared to the red when they had been first recovered. Ivy herself was thinner than usual, a result of her devoting all her energy to keeping the eggs safe, thus requiring others to bring her food, which she ate with ravenous vigor. The eggs began to shake, the leathery shell quivering as their contents began to try to break through. Ivy curled over the eggs, and extended a claw to cut a slit in the shells. From one of the eggs, a tiny set of claws emerged, followed by the rest of the baby basilisk, which quickly grew larger than its egg with its first breath. The other two were not far behind. The baby basilisks looks like Vee’s basilisk form in miniature, with wide, curious eyes on round faces, forked tongues flicking out to taste the air. Unlike Vee, their ears were webbed rather than frilled, and their soft scaly skin was in shades of olive, sand green, and tan yellows. A shock of dark hair ran from the top of their heads and down their spines, and they made an adorable “meep” sound as Ivy picked them up. Each one was about two-thirds the size of King.

  “They’re adorable!” Mabel squeed as they were allowed to see the babies.

  “What are their names?” Luz asked.

  Ivy and Tria smiled, nodding at Vee. “These are Freida, Libra, and Jubilee. We were brought into this world with only numbers to identify us. But Titan willing none of our children will know those foul cages.”

  “I’m not sure how much power I have over that, but you have my blessing,” Luz told the family of her adopted sister, before tapping the gentlest claw to the baby basilisks’ chests. With a flare of light, a tiny light glyph glowed on their scales. “May they always hold a light, even in the darkest days.”

  Everyone found themselves wiping tears from their eyes.

  As the sun began to set, Luz stepped up to the main stage of the festival grounds, having donned a violet silk robe that the Seekers had insisted was tradition for the twilight ceremony.

  “My fellow witches and demons!” Luz announced, reading off an illusory teleprompter. “We are all born of the Titan’s magic, and blessed with that gift. For centuries, the rotten deceiver Belos claimed that magic had to be divided and sealed to please the Titan. But that could not be further from the truth. My father, the very Isles we stand upon, always meant for magic to be free, to use it to thrive in this harsh world. Our magic is our life, our blessing of nature. The Titan does not wish for supplication, but to respect each other and the world around us. So go forth, and revel in nature’s blessings.”

  Raising Stringbean to the sky, the fireworks went off, filling the air with light and sound, drowned out only by the cheers of the crowd.

  “That was an exemplary performance, Luz,” Raine complimented once Luz had left the stage. “I don’t think I could have gotten through that half as well as you did.”

  “Thanks, Ren,” Luz hugged them. “Now, we’ve got one more thing to do tonight.”
 
  The Grand Temple of Patellans had been fully restored by the work of the CATTs and the Seekers, who cleared out the rubble and painstakingly recarved the stonework. The biggest change, however, was in the ritual circle itself, which had been rearranged with an additional two spokes for the Titan’s newly-rediscovered glyphs.

  Willow looked down at the glowing glyph on her sternum, feeling the power charging her like the buildup before a storm, only in her veins.

  Next to her, Sasha was flexing her hands after receiving Luz’ Earth Glyph, the coppery glow shining through her shirt, a new surety in her stance. Gus was similarly admiring the magic now coursing through his veins, a cold mist drifting from his hands from the Ice Glyph. Marcy was similarly admiring the nebulous sparks generated by her access to Luz’ Darkness Glyph. Filing into the central chamber, Willow noted the benches were filled. Luz’ human relatives were sitting with the BATTs, along with Amity’s father and siblings, the former and the latter chatting amicably. On the other side, the rest of the Emerald Entrails were seated. Higher up, she could see both her dads, who were directing looks of support her way. Gus’ dad was also there, as were a number of the CATTs. Luz’s parents were standing on the other end of the chamber, King perched on Eda’s shoulder.

  Standing in the center of the room were Luz and Amity, both looking apprehensive.

  “You sure about this, Sweet Potato?” Luz asked. “No one’s done this exact ritual in thousands of years, and there’s no going back.”

  “I want this, Luz,” Amity answered softly. “You saved me from Odalia’s mind games, and I’ve tried to protect you from the Huntsman. When I learned the truth about myself, you were there to bring me back to reality.”

  “But only after you helped me deal with being stuck in Titan form,” Luz countered.

  “That’s why we work so well together. We protect each other, from the monsters out there and in here,” she gestured between their hearts.

  Luz smiled, and kissed her on the forehead, before summoning Stringbean to her hand and beginning to carve her glyphs into the sand, forming a radial design around a symbol for dualism, within which they both took their places as the rest of the Hexsquad stepped up.

  Willow stood across from Sasha, with Gus to her left and Anne to her right. Across from Anne stood Marcy, with Helyna opposite of Gus.

  “Six blessed with Glyphs stand around us, to bear witness to the ascension of a Titan’s Champion,” Luz announced. “Amity Blight, do you accept this mantle? Do you accept this responsibility? This burden?”

  “I accept.”

  “Then by the light of the Titan…” Luz paused for breath.

  “With this spell declared, let my strength be shared!”

  The entire glyph array shone in a rainbow of colors, like a mirrored prism. The magic flared out, reflecting within the bounds formed by the Hexsquad.
 
  When the light faded, Amity and Luz were both on one knee, before slowly standing up.

  “Did it work?” Amity asked.

  Through the blush across her face, Luz was able to nod. “It worked.”

  Amity had gained a few inches in height, largely due to the way she was standing on her toes, or rather the feline-esque paws she now sported. Lavender fur covered her legs and her arms below the elbow, while a cat-like tail swayed behind her for balance. Her fingers were now bony claws, just like those of both Luz and Angella, and she sported a pair of short triangular horns poking through her hair, almost like flower buds or cat ears, with that same silvery-gray bone as her claws. Her eyes had changed, her pupils slitted and her sclera the same pitch black as her girlfriend’s. Her dress had become a midnight black trimmed with gold, her Starstone Amulet clasping her cape together and her abomination flask hanging from a gold belt. The inner lining of the Witch’s Wool cloak flowed with abomination goop that manifested gold and magenta eyes like their witch, a mark of her enhanced magic. When she smiled, her fangs were even more prominent.

  And then the cheering began.

  “Oh, how revolting.”

  The cheered cut off as a familiar voice spoke.

  “Honestly Mittens, debasing yourself on this hybrid freak? I thought I’d raised you better.”

  Odalia Blight appeared in a cloud of dispelling Illusion magic. The green-haired witch wore an eyepatch that didn’t hide the claw marks, and her right hand had been replaced with a clawed abomatech prosthesis. She also notably wore a white cloak trimmed with gold over her business suit. More clouds of blue mist burst around her, revealing a platoon of Titan Trappers, Abomatons, and Coven Loyalist lead by Lieutenants Barnum Wolfsbane and Tepes Lucille, who had vanished during the Battle of Fomhor’s Temple before everything had gone to hell in a handbasket. To Odalia’s left stood a mountain of a Titan Trapper, whose armor and the ram horns of his skull mask denoted him of being high in rank. To her right stood a figure that made Helyna stagger back.

  Belos had a new Golden Guard. He was clad like a Human Realm crusader, gilded mail and a white tabard bearing the bird-like crest, while his mask sported a pair of short antlers, with a more tapered face. From the eyeholes of the mask, two pinpricks of baleful blue shone.

  “You!” Amity hissed. “You didn’t raise me, you puppeted me. You tried to make me a mirror of yourself, but this life is mine, and you have no place in it!”

  The newly-empowered Champion summoned her Palisman, Ghost now sporting a glowing gemstone on her own chest, and drew a massive spell circle.

  “Abominations! Rise!”

  From the ground rose a pair of raptor-like abominations, simulacrums of their conjurer’s Grimstalker form.

  The audience in the stands rose, taking up combat stances.

  Stan and Mabel both slipped on brass knuckles, the later also pulling out her trusty grappling hook. Ford unholstered his own weapon, flicking between settings on the sci-fi device before landing on the freeze function. Dipper flipped through his journal, and his eyes began to glow as he started incanting a spell. Eda quickly shifted to Harpy Mode, while her partners took their Gargoyle Forms, and King narrowed his eyes while his fur stood on end.

  The Golden Guard flash-stepped forward, only to be thrown back by a fireball.

  Helyna stared at her replacement with the fury of an inferno.

  “I guess it was too much to ask you to come quietly, Mittens,” Odalia shook her head. “Leave my family untouched. Kill the others if you must.”

  “For the Huntsman!” the lead Titan Trapper bellowed a battle cry.

  The Hexsquad and CATTs met their charge head on.

  Luz barreled into the lead Titan Trapper, hurling him across the room and into the wall above the door, before unleashing a flurry of elemental magic upon him, which he barely deflected with his spear.

  Amber smiled wickedly as she saw her gathered opponents, giving a sharp whistle as she drew a spell circle. From the circle, a flurry of reddish-brown and black feathers rushed forth, as the griffin-sized Owl Beast launched himself at the Trappers, staggering them with buffeting winds before bearing down with his talons.

  “Go Buho!” the bat-like bard cheered.

  “Weh, somebody had a growth spurt,” King commented between tossing Coven Scouts with his Shout. “I’d wondered where he’d gotten off to.”

  “He got too big to stay inside all the time, and Amber managed to bond with him,” Eda explained as she blasted an Abomaton’s core out.

  One of the Trappers tried to wrangle Buho, only for Viney’s griffin Puddles to ram him off. The unlucky Trapper was quickly frozen in his tracks by Ford.

  For the Calamity Trio, Marcy and Sasha were learning just what their new elemental magic could do. The Darkness Glyph allowed Marcy to summon tendrils of shadow to intercept and attack, while also generating a dark mist that made it harder for her opponents to see and move. Sasha, in between channeling her inner Earthbender, also discovered that her elemental powers extended to shaping metal, which she used to literally tear a pair of swords out of an Abomaton’s components, before forming a third that she tossed to Anne, who promptly used it to cleave an Abomaton in half.

  Gus and Helyna found themselves back to back, unleashing their respective powers over ice and fire against their foes, before nodding to each other.

  Slamming his staff into the ground and holding out the Mentalist’s Mirror, Gus cast a selective illusion over the Temple, using the mirror to focus the spell such that his allies would be unaffected. He also conjured illusions of himself, a common trick, but overlaid them around person-shaped clouds of freezing mist, giving a semblance of matter to the illusory forms.
 
  Odalia staggered back as the Temple became a sprawling ruin filled with pit traps, glowing magenta eyes glaring from every shadow. This was supposed to a simple raid, taking out the Titans and their allies and leaving the Isles ripe for reconquest, while bringing her traitorous family back to the proper way of thinking. She shouldn’t have been so quick to dismiss the twins. She should have kept the same firm hand on them that she had guided Mittens with. She would not make that same mistake again.

  Raising her mechanical hand, she fired a bolt of ectoplasmic energy at one of the approaching Grimstalkers, exploding it into mist. With her other hand, she summoned her Oracle Spirit, her oldest ally still loyal in its bindings, and to her blood.

  It was certainly the most useful thing her worthless father ever provided, and the Emperor’s own favor that allowed her to keep the traitor’s spirit on his death - Nevermind that the accusations of treason had come from Odalia herself.

  The Spirit was immune to the deception of the illusion, and a simple spell allowed her to use its spectral eyes in place of her own, though doing so left her with a splitting migraine, thanks to that Huntsman-damned freak of a human hybrid.

  A wicked grin split Odalia’s face as she took aim at the hybrid, who was occupied with Tarak. She took the shot, already anticipating the scream of retributive agony.

  Her smile was wiped off her face by the wall of vines that rose to catch the bolt, before receiving a punch to the gut that folded her, and a kick to the chin that reversed her momentum swiftly enough to give her whiplash.

  “Blight,” Willow sneered. “You certainly earned the name.”

  Odalia sneered back, wiping the blood from where she’d bitten her lip as she stood back up.

  “Oh right, you’re the little half-a-witch who was bringing down my Mittens.”

  Willow growled. “She’s not ‘your Mittens’, Blight. She’s her own person.”

  “Oh really?” Odalia drawled. “I conquered death itself for her. Her soul is my property, whelp. And what is a pathetic witchlet like you going to do about it?”

  “How pathetic are you then, getting your ass handed to you by a child?” Willow growled, her eyes glowing fully green as thick thorny vines whipped around her, dragging the oracle up by her ankle.

  “And we are not your property!” Edric, Emira, and Amity stepped through the grove of vines to confront the woman who called herself their mother.

  “Mothers are kind,” Amity growled, slinging a tendril of abomination goop to swipe her oracle stone.

  “Mothers protect you,” Emira snarled as she locked Odalia’s muscles with her healing magic.

  “Mothers raise you!” Edric shouted as he sent Batric to tear at her hair, undoing her bun and making her hair a veritable bird’s nest.

  “You left us to raise ourselves, except where you forced us to conform to your ‘perfect family’ illusion.” Edric met his mother’s hateful sneer with a scowl of his own.

  “And you violated my mind to carry out your petty grudge against my first friend!” Amity shouted as she shattered the oracle stone, releasing the spirit within. The mummy-like wrappings fell away, revealing the spectral form of a witch that vaguely resembled Edric with a full beard.

  
    “Thank you, my granddaughter,”
  
   the spirit said as he faded into the aether.

  “You little brat! You ruined everything!” Odalia screamed as she brought her cannon arm to bear, whining with energy buildup as she aimed at her Grimwalker.

  “Oh no you don’t!” Willow declared as she grabbed the metal arm with her bare hands and squeezed. Her fingers dug into the exposed mechanisms, and the whine grew loudest as the metal groaned and buckled. With a mighty yell, she ripped the arm roughly out of the socket, mangling the connection as she threw the now explosively unstable scrap over her shoulder, where it detonated in a burst of concussive force and burning ectoplasm.

  The vines holding her up dropped her, and Odalia found herself right-side up, her hair hanging in her face, and buried up to her neck in abomination goop and more vines.

  Alador joined his children in confronting the blight on their lives.

  “Alador!” Odalia shouted. “Get me out of here!”

  “No,” he replied plainly. “It’s over, Odalia. Goodbye.”

  Clenching his fist, Alador willed the abomination goop to completely envelop his ex-wife, sending her to the CATTs holding cells.

  The fighting was wrapping up inside the temple. Tarak had been knocked out by the explosion of Odalia’s cannon arm, after Luz had put him between herself and the blast, and the rest of the Titan Trappers were either dazed, unconscious, maimed, or frozen. The Abomatons had been reduced to scrap, and the leftover goop collected by Amity and Alador.

  The only combatants left were the Golden Guard and Coven Lieutenants, along with a scattering of Scouts.

  Barnum Wolfsbane summoned his own menagerie of beasts, every one of them covered in scars, while he lashed at his opponents with his bullwhip. Buho and Puddles were grappling with a particularly grizzled Bristlebeast while Eber dodged around a much larger dire wolf. The biggest threat was the manticore, who was missing two of its six scorpion eyes.

  As the Calamity Trio took a breath after dealing with the last of the Abomatons, Anne noticed the larger demon, and a shine came over her eyes.

  “I’ve got this guys,” she said as she approached the charging demon.

  Then she began to dance.

  Somehow, the dance completely mesmerized the massive beast demon, causing it to sit like a dog at her feet.

  “...How!?” Marcy and Sasha stared.

  “It’s the Plantar Family Hunting Dance. Works on Scorpileos, Giant Herons, and Manticores,” Anne explained as she patted the beast gently on the head.

  “What sorcery is this!?” Wolfsbane shouted, noticing his most powerful beast laying like an oversized puppy. “You. Obey. Me!”

  He cracked his whip, only for Sasha to slice the leather apart.

  As he stared incredulously, Eberwolf lunged, tearing into his spine with his Wild Heart-enhanced claws.

  Tepes Lucille, the Healing Coven’s master hemomancer, was being kept on the ropes dueling against Elder Seeker Kosh, who expertly wielded the golden spear retrieved from Fomhor’s skeletal corpse. The pale vampire of a witch snarled as her blood whips were so effortlessly deflected.

  “You may have found ways to extend your life at the expense of others with your blood magic, but I have walked the Demon Realm since the days of the first witches on these Isles.” Kosh scored another glancing blow to their opponent, forcing her to spend more of her reserves of blood to heal.

  “What’s your secret then, Seeker?” Tepes crooned. “I can smell the power rolling off of you.”

  “The conscience of a god is both a blessing and a cursed burden, vampire,” Kosh stated. “Your allies worship the Huntsman, but a fragment of one of his siblings rests within my heart.”

  Tepes’ eyes lit up. “Then why don’t I take that power for myself?”

  The hemomancer lashed out, a clawed hand slipping through their defense to pierce their chest.

  Kosh smiled, their Capran eyes glowing as Tepes realized her fatal folly. Her veins lit up with golden-orange fire, the raw power of even a sliver of an Archivist more than a normal witch could withstand. With a scream of fury and pain, the two century-old hemomancer was reduced to a large pile of ash.

  The leader of the Seekers of the Fallen Star tutted at the self-disposing arrogance, before wiping the blood from their spear.

  The Golden Guard continued to flit around the chamber, taking potshots with his mechanical staff at anyone in sight, and teleporting out of the way of any return fire. Eventually, his luck ran out, and a sound wave batted him out of the air.

  Raine stood proudly in their Gargoyle Form, violin poised for battle.

  “Ah, the 
  
    Bard
  
  , Luzura’s 
  
    sire
  
  ,” the Golden Guard audibly sneered, before ducking out of the way of a gout of fire from Helyna.

  “And the last failure, 
  
    Hunter
  
  .”

  “That is not my name, 
  
    Philip
  
  .” Helyna’s eyes flared as her phoenix wings formed behind her.

  “No, you just had to go and defile the body the Almighty granted your wicked soul,” the Golden Guard said in Belos’ voice.

  “Oh, you’re one to talk, Philip. How many have you murdered and defiled with your curse? You talk about salvation, but you really mean the other thing. All you really are is a petty little slimeball who still can’t get over that big bro got a hot witch girlfriend and didn’t need your dead weight holding him back!”

  That got the expected reaction from her foe. The Golden Guard roared as he lunged - right into the path of Helyna’s swing with the b@tt of her staff, shattering his mask and knocking him to the side.

  The Golden Guard rose with heaving breaths, clutching his staff while still on all fours, his hood falling back as he raised his head to glare at Helyna.

  Both her and the Blights gasped at the face of the Golden Guard.

  The Golden Guard whose face resembled Amity’s in shape, with the same brown hair as her natural color. The rot of the Bane of Magic ran in tear tracks, the baleful blue of Belos’ eyes leaving only a ring of magenta to indicate the Grimwalker’s nature.

  Amity was frozen on the spot.

  “I am going to kill her,” she whispered, realizing 
  
    exactly
  
   who the ortet for this Golden Guard was.

  The Golden Guard rose to his feet, though his weight was on his mechanical staff.

  “As distasteful as this body is, it has proven…useful,” Belos said through labored breath.

  Amity responded by letting the Titan magic now flowing through her gather and release, unleashing a roar of magenta and orange sound that hurled the Grimwalker into the stone of the stands.

  The possessed Grimwalker stood, and spun his staff, causing a massive green worm monster to appear from the ground, arcing towards the gathered witches.

  Amity stood her ground, glyphs manifesting around her that she arranged into a spell circle, launching a tiny fireball down its gullet that completely incinerated the construct within seconds of it closing its mouth.

  But in the time the Titan’s Champion took to cast, the Golden Guard had summoned a dozen mudclaws that sparked with tortuous red lightning as they reach up with grasping claws. Helyna hit the ground with a ripple of fire that burned away the mudclaws, before throwing a flurry of projectiles that the Golden Guard caught with a wave of ice. Using the resulting gout of mist as a distraction, the Golden Guard teleported to the other side of the chamber, casting even more mudclaws from every direction.

  A trio of Titanic “WEH!”s battered the mudclaws away and into each other, melting into inanimate lumps. The Golden Guard was forced to leap out of the way of a bolt of lightning hurled his way, and retaliated with a crimson bolt of his own that knocked Kosh to the floor as it conducted down their spear. Camila launched a vine at the Golden Guard while she rushed to check on the Elder Seeker, who was thankfully still conscious. 

  The Golden Guard ducked around the benches, occasionally flash-stepping to throw off his opponents’ lead on him, before a shadow portal bloomed directly into the path he was moving, allowing Amity and Luz to closeline him as he appeared in the center of the room.

  In such close quarters, the Golden Guard resorted to swiping the Titan hybrids’ legs out from under them, conjuring a dagger in his offhand to swing at Luz, who deflected it with her claws, before he scored a thin cut along Amity’s exposed arm, getting slammed head-first into the ground for it. The rot of the Bane of Magic grew over the Golden Guard’s face, and he sank into the ground, rising out atop the front of the benches, and tapping his staff to the stone, causing dozens of crystals to pop up and cast a net of crimson lightning that drove all present to their knees, even as many tried to fight through it to cast shielding spells, a dome of glyphs forming in the center from Luz and Amity’s united magic.

  “This is for the good of your souls, humans. Turn back now, or share their fate,” he turned his attention to the Pines Family, who were underneath the protective dome.

  “The last bastard who messed with our family got erased. When you get to hell, tell Bill Cipher that Stanley sends his regards.” Stan shot back.

  That baleful glow dimmed, an expression of pure shock blooming across the Golden Guard’s face. He had just enough awareness to teleport out of the way of the barrage of magic and plasma thrown at the spot he had been standing. The dome of glyphs expanded, lances of the elements lashing out to destroy the Pain Crystals.

  “This isn’t over!” The Golden Guard shouted as he flew through the skylight, teleporting again to dodge the spells thrown at him outside, and vanishing through a crack in the ceiling.

  Luz snarled as she and Emira tended to Amity’s wound. “He got away.”

  “And Odalia gave him my bones to make more Grimwalkers,” Amity growled as the revulsion at the woman’s actions.

  Eberwolf growled his own two snails, mentioning the mission given to him and Darius to recover Selkidamus scales for the Emperor before everything changed at the Castle.

  “Mom snuck in and destroyed Caleb’s bones, so he must have turned to Odalia for a new source,” Helyna commented with a distant look. “And he’s not even pretending anymore.”

  “He’s probably nostalgic about his old title in Gravesfield,” Mabel chipped in, the absurd plausibility of her statement for those who knew Belos giving their thoughts pause.

  Alador held his children close, as did the other present families, while the others took stock of the damage, finding a set of Abomatech-augmented wardstones placed around the temple that had kept anyone else from getting in. 

  Once the wardstones were disabled, the rest of the CATTs were able to get in and assess the damage, treat the wounded, take the prisoners, and figure out how the Emperor’s Coven had managed to infiltrate the heart of the underground city.

  The Hexquad found themselves in one of the alcoves overlooking the city, as witches and demons bustled about. While the CATTs were working to recover from Belos’ sudden attack, the rest of the city was still reveling as the festival gained its post-sunset second wind.

  Luz and Amity held hands as they people-watched, vicariously enjoying the celebrations, while the Emerald Entrails chatted in whispered tones, eavesdroppers warded off by Gus’ illusions and Skara’s bard magic.

  Gus patted his best friend on the arm. “Go for it, girl. You deserve to be happy.”

  Helyna gave Willow a smile, and held her hand. “I may not be the best with people, or an oracle, but if I’m reading them right, I think things will work out in your favor.”

  “Thanks, Helyna, that…that means a lot to me,” Willow said softly.

  “You’ve got this,” she reassured, before Gus dispelled the ward.

  Willow looked across the plaza, took a bracing breath, and stepped around the fountain to where Luz and Amity were bantering.

  Clearing her throat to get her attention, Willow found those two crucible-like gazes turned on her.

  “Can we talk for a moment?”

  “Sure, Willow, what’s on your mind?” Luz asked.

  “There’s something I need to get off my chest,” pausing for a moment, Willow looked down. “Not the glyph, that’s fine, but kinda part of it?”

  Running through her breathing exercise, Willow refuted discretion as the better part of valor and looked them both in the eyes.

  “Luz, I’ve had a crush on you since the day we met.”

  Before the Titan could form a response, she turned to Amity.

  “And Amity, you were my first crush, back when we had been friends. And after all we’ve been through…”

  She found both her hands being held, and looked up to see Luz and Amity both in witch form, both sporting a violet blush across their faces.

  “You still have a crush on me? Even after all I’ve done to hurt you?” Amity asked, her voice faint.

  “You’ve changed, Amity. You’re not the same person you were even a year ago, and…I like the real you, more than as a friend,” Willow replied, feeling her own face heat up.

  “And Luz, you were the first person in ages to believe in me as a witch. You helped me get into the magic track I’m actually good at, and you’ve always been supportive and affectionate, and no matter what this world throws at you, you just keep being a ball of sunshine that refuses to go out.”

  Luz’ blush was reaching her ears, while Amity’s ears were beginning to flutter. The two looked to each other, seeming to gather their thoughts, nodding as if they were speaking without words or gestures. Then they turned back to Willow, and with a deep breath, began to speak.

  “Willow, you were the first friend I made here in the Demon Realm, and the first person I could consider a peer who actually liked me for me. You are the strongest witch I know, bar Eda, and the day you met, you risked getting in trouble for my sake.”

  “You were my first friend too, Willow. You literally gave me my name. And even after the years I’ve spent making your life hell, you still gave me a chance to make up for it. You were never half a witch - I could only dream of being half the witch that you are.”

  “I think, what we’re trying to say, is…”

  With a deep breath, Luz and Amity spoke at the same time.

  “Willow Park, we would be more than happy to be your girlfriends.”

  The plant witch felt the warmth in her chest bloom, and pulled Luz into a kiss on her cheek, before doing the same with Amity.

  “Oh, was-was that too forward?”

  The blush faded, and Willow found her affections reciprocated.

  The moment felt like it would last forever.

  Which was when the sound of the Emerald Entrails cheering reached their ears.

  Luz snapped her fingers, tugging on the connection to her glyph blessings, startling Gus, who dispelled the illusion he, Helyna, Skara, and Viney had been under.

  “Uh, whoops,” Gus chuckled.

  All three of them just rolled their eyes at their friends’ antics.

  Then Viney gave a firm pat-slash-shove to Helyna, sending her stumbling forward.

  Clearing her throat, Helyna met Willow’s eyes.

  “Okay, I know this is a bit sudden, but… do you think your heart has room for one more?” Helyna winced, muttering to herself. “Oh my Titan why did I say that?”

  Willow giggled, before glancing back to Luz and Amity, who nodded sagely.

  “I may only have two hands, but I think we can make it work.”

  Luz and Amity both held one of Willow’s hands, while she offered her other to the girl who had introduced herself saving her from an undead horror.

  Helyna took the offered hand, before being pulled into a four-person hug, wrapped in Luz’ wings.
 
  By the time the clock struck midnight, the polycule had piled into a cuddle pile in the Owl House, exhausted from the events of the day. Their apprehensions about the future were allayed by the knowledge that whatever happened, they would have each other.

  
  

    
      
        
        
          Next Chapter: Escape From The Leviathan.'
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