... What now?
But Hunter couldn’t sleep and Luz couldn’t sleep and it seemed a time as good as ever to be putting the question out there when it was just the two of them.
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The Day of Unity is over, and the gang is trapped in the human realm. Some Late Night Conversations are inevitable.
I knowwww, I should be working on all my other projects and AUs but this just came to my mind and before I knew it I had written over 6k words for it.
WE'RE ALL SUFFERING OKAY THIS IS MY WAY TO COPE
Anyway, suffer with me.
That being said, the new chapter for Built to Last is coming along well and I've started on my Bartender AU!
Otherwise, have fun with this first lmao
TRIGGER WARNING:
- PANIC ATTACK
Ao3 / FF.net
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The evening bled into the night before either of them could even blink.
Camila had taken them all in immediately, having Vee ordering in Pizza to feed them all and preparing makeshift beds, mattresses, and mats for them to sleep on in the living room.
It hadn’t taken long for the first to break down. The others followed suit.
It hadn’t come as a surprise for anyone that the first had been Amity. She had swallowed all her concerns about her father and siblings to function in the fight. Gus had been next to break out in tears again, immediately comforted by Willow and Hunter while Luz and Amity had lied down on the couch, tightly cuddled up, as Amity wept.
Camila had taken a chair next to them to listen to Luz quietly explaining the past few months, while she had held her girlfriend in a warm embrace, patiently waiting until her tears had dried.
Willow had managed to hold on the longest and by the time she shed the first tear, it was late at night already.
These were the first few shocks.
Just a while later, the anxiety started.
And the big looming question of “What now?”
Camila had immediately shut down any doubts about going home. She had made sure everyone had new clothes on, was warm and fed and bandaged up, and she wouldn’t hear any fears about the future.
Somehow, her firm denial of any doubts put the children to rest.
Gus had been the first to fall asleep. Curled up into a little ball, he had made himself comfortable on one of the mattresses on the living room floor, the blanket wrapped around him so snuggly only his ear poked out from beneath it. Willow made sure to keep close to him, one of her hands constantly keeping contact with him, and that’s how she fell asleep, too.
She had long given up trying to hold onto him, so her relaxed, half-closed hand merely lay somewhere on the little huddled pile of witchling while she was sleeping tightly.
Hunter had made himself comfortable next to her, even if he couldn’t fall asleep yet. He was the closest to the couch where Luz and Amity stayed since Amity hadn’t been able to move from the spot after her breakdown.
Luz had turned to the side by now, overlooking her friends on the floor, and managed to wrap her girlfriend’s arms around her to spoon her, making sure she was comfortable.
Amity had contently snuggled into Luz’s back, her arm tightly wound around her middle as if she was afraid of losing her once she let go. Luz had only been able to loosen her grip somewhat by interlacing their fingers on her chest, occasionally placing a little kiss on Amity’s curled-up fingers.
But she couldn’t sleep, either.
She had pretended to sleep for the past ten minutes after her mother had shut off the lights and checked on them one last time. She had kissed Luz’s forehead and told her not to worry, they would find a solution, before tucking a strand of hair behind Amity’s ears and making sure the other kids were looked after as well.
Scrunching her face, Luz huffed quietly, listening to Willow’s soft snores because she was lying on her back, then she opened her eyes for just a short moment.
It wasn’t a surprise to her that Hunter stared back at her in the otherwise dark room, only illuminated dimly by the moon outside. It had stopped raining for now and the clouds had broken up to allow a little bit of the night sky to shine in, but the weather forecast had predicted it would begin raining again in a bit.
He was lying with his back to his captain, staring up at Luz unmoving, and she found herself staring back at him. She had meant to close her eyes again, but she supposed the unrest she had felt was partly due to him staring at her.
Amity behind her huffed softly and snuggled tighter into her back, she could feel her girlfriend’s adorable nose getting scrunched up against her shirt.
Pulling her arm a bit higher, Luz adjusted ever so slightly, Amity following her movement to stay close, then she nodded at Hunter.
“… Can’t sleep either?”, she asked in a hushed whisper, not to disturb her friends’ sleep. The boy in front of the couch shook his head softly, not wanting to make too much noise either, before sighing.
“… No.”, he whispered back, equally as quiet. Luz almost couldn’t hear him in the soft rustling of the wind.
They stayed quiet for another little while, none of them wanting to start first. Luz looked out the window across from her and Hunter looked at her. Both couldn’t seem to break the quiet.
Until Gus huffed and turned in his sleep. The silence was broken.
“… What now?”, Hunter asked, causing Luz to look back down at him with the dreaded question out there. The question Camila hadn’t allowed in her presence, not wanting the looming threat of despair to consume the teens quite yet.
But Hunter couldn’t sleep and Luz couldn’t sleep and it seemed a time as good as ever to be putting the question out there when it was just the two of them.
Luz looked at him for a minute that felt like an eternity, her mind only working slowly, as she went over all that had happened in the short time of this day. She didn’t know if Eda and Raine and all the other witches were really okay after the Collector had stopped the draining spell.
Sure, Hunter had stopped feeling the effects, and the magic flow had stopped, but she didn’t know if Eda’s curse had affected her too much.
King was at the mercy of a godchild now, and there was no way back. No Titan’s blood, no portal, no key, nothing. There wasn’t even a point to start at. No plan to follow, no lead to pursue, nothing.
Luz was just about ready to throw herself off a cliff with the uncertainty she was facing now.
Most of all – she felt responsible.
Not only responsible for helping Belos achieve the goals that had been necessary to lead up to this mess, but she also felt responsible for her friends ending up in the human realm along with her.
She was the human. She was the one they knew best, not her mother or Vee.
She was their guide, their anchor, she had to take responsibility to keep them safe.
Herding them, teaching them, educating them, and making sure they’d fit in, that all fell into her responsibility.
And finding a way back home. She knew that if she failed, she would consider herself the reason they were stranded here, away from their home, their families, and their other friends. Any familiarity they had.
And it was her fault, of course.
Philipp, Belos, the portal, the mess. Everything was her fault.
Breathing through, she squinted her eyes, then she looked back down to Hunter who was looking worried by now but didn’t seem to want to get up to comfort her, in the fear of waking Willow or Gus with that. Or Amity.
“… Tomorrow you’ll recharge and rest. I’ll go to the library and see if I can find anything. And to that guy’s museum, the one who captured Vee, to see if he has any other magic stored.”, she whispered, furrowing her eyebrows. She was sure she could find something if she looked hard enough.
Who knew, maybe they could recreate the way Philipp and his brother had ended up in the Boiling Isles. Eda’s mother had said garbage from the human realm got swept through the realms all the time, and that humans slipped through on occasion as well.
And the diary had made it sound like Philipp and his brother hadn’t come through to the Isles out of their own free will.
Whichever way it was, Luz would find it.
“… I’m coming with you.”, Hunter whispered and Luz already began shaking her head, but he wouldn’t let her object, “I want to know my roots.”
She couldn’t argue with that.
He was a grimwalker, which apparently meant he was a clone of Philipp’s brother if she could trust the bits and pieces of info they had gotten from fleeting glances at his memories.
She could understand him wanting to get to know his counterpart, the inspiration for his creator to make another. Especially if he looked the most like him, in Belos’ words.
But if she let Hunter come with, Amity would want to come as well. And with Amity, Willow would insist on coming, as well as Gus. If she was unlucky, Vee would want to help out, too, as well as her mother.
And then she would have a hell of a lot more pressure on her shoulders to find a solution to this.
Shaking her head, Luz huffed.
“No. You guys need to recharge and rest. I will go out to start. Maybe you can join me later.”, she tried but Hunter merely gave her a deadpan.
“Nice try.”, he dryly commented, “But you need rest, too. I won’t let you run off alone again.”
With an indignant pout, Luz nestled deeper into Amity’s embrace to escape his knowing glare, biting the inside of her lip.
“But you guys look like witches, you can’t just-”, she tried but Hunter was having none of it.
“We can wear hats, or use illusions.”, he pointed out, unimpressed by her weak protest, “Don’t try to do this alone.”
Luz hid her face in the pillow for a minute, before breathing through and rubbing her eyes. She had to convince him to leave her alone. It was her fault they were all here. It was her fault she couldn’t get them back to the Isles, that she didn’t know Eda was safe, or where that godchild had taken him. If the collector had enslaved the Isles or killed them all.
She remained quiet for a while, not wanting to move as she felt Amity’s hand curling and uncurling over her heart. She could probably feel her agitation in her sleep and didn’t like it.
Finally, Luz looked back up and out the window.
It was still quite windy, but still not raining. She could see the illuminated outlines of trees outside softly swaying in the wind, leaves rustling with each gust plowing through the crowns.
It was somehow serene, almost calm, as she stared out the window.
“… What now?”, it was now her turn to ask this question and Hunter sighed softly, shrugging as he adjusted to lie on his back, looking outside as well.
“We’ll have to adjust.”, he suggested, and Luz knew that was true. They wouldn’t find a way back within a few days. Maybe not even weeks. They would have to find a way to keep everyone safe here in the human realm. And help out her mom with some money and work around the house.
She supposed she would have to go back to school again.
“… We’ll have to help Mama, somehow.”, she mumbled and Hunter nodded, uncertain what that entailed but he was sure he could do some job to keep the woman that had taken everyone into her house financially stable. He could go bounty hunting or maybe he would be proficient as a soldier.
“Yeah…”, he lamely replied and Luz had the nerve to laugh softly, stifling her giggling as Hunter shot her a glare.
“I really don’t know what job you could be doing here.”, she said, as if she had read his mind, which made him huff indignantly.
“I’ll find something.”, he mumbled and heard her giggle again, before shuffling a bit. A small smile from Amity followed.
“Maybe you could help out on a construction site. Or in a supermarket. Though, I really think we should keep you away from interacting with too many people. You’re not the best actor.”, she mused and while Hunter wanted to protest that, he actually had to agree with her on this one. Interacting with fewer humans meant less stress for him to keep up a façade.
“Amity could help out in the library. She has some experience there, at least. Willow could help out as a gardener. I’m sure she would have an easier time working within her expertise. And Gus could help out in the cinema, maybe.”, she mumbled to herself, and Hunter realized this was more wishful thinking. She followed suit, “But we’ll probably just all end up in fast food anyway.”
He sent her an amused glance, prying his eyes away from the window to look at her briefly, before turning back to the moon.
“What’s fast food?”, he asked and Luz chuckled.
“Like not-dogs, but more of that.”, she decided on the simplest explanation. He could hear the tiredness in her voice. Turning back to her and lying back down on his side, he looked back up at her.
Luz was still looking out of the window, even as she noticed Hunter had returned to his old position of looking at her. The wind was picking up a little and she could see the little drops of the previous rain glistening in the moonlight. It was mesmerizing to see something as normal and bland as leftover raindrops sparkling in the moonlight.
“… You okay?”, he finally asked and Luz sighed, feeling the dread pooling in her stomach again. She was tired and exhausted and overwhelmed and most definitely not okay. But she wouldn’t tell him that.
On the other hand… She really should begin telling the others that she was not okay. She wouldn’t be able to hide it in the long run, especially with her mother and Amity around. Her girlfriend had proven more than once that she was capable of looking right through her, and her mother knew her all her life. Now living together with Willow and Gus would surely make them more sensitive to her actual mindset.
She gave herself until tomorrow when they would start to notice something was seriously wrong.
Biting and chewing on her lip, she contemplated if she should start now with Hunter and risk the wrath of her girlfriend in the morning when she realized she had not been the first to be included in Luz’s wellbeing, or wait until tomorrow and risk not telling anyone at all until they’d inevitably pick up on it.
Finally, she decided against her usual way of trying to keep it a secret for as long as possible. Eda had taught her as much. It was always better to talk about what weighed down on her and to find a solution together. She had been able to look right through her as well. Luz wondered how she was doing right now.
“I-… I feel like… Why we’re here, I mean…”, she gulped and played around with Amity’s fingers, trying to procrastinate actually having to say it. It would mean taking responsibility. Something she knew she had to do but was terrified of.
“Stop blaming yourself.”, she finally heard after a few minutes and looked up to see Hunter still staring at her. He looked sympathetic, and she could tell he’d been through this for himself already.
“… How can I not?”, Luz finally asked, blinking away her tears. She could feel her sleeping girlfriend press a soft kiss to her neck at her sniffles as if to comfort her.
“It’s not your fault.”, Hunter simply stated, narrowing his eyes, “But if you believe helping Belos was your fault, you have to blame me, too. I’ve been helping him all my life. I got him your Titan’s blood.”
Immediately, Luz shook her head.
“I wouldn’t ever blame you-”, she started and he cut her off.
“Then don’t blame yourself either.”, he said, pulling the blanket tighter around him. Suddenly, he looked so mature to Luz, even if he was just sixteen, just two years older than her. The way the moon illuminated the back of his head and the way his expression spoke of a deeply rooted guilt he’d been carrying with him ever since they had left Belos’ mind, made him look older.
He looked back up at her and Luz worried her lip, trying to think of a way to go against his argument. She couldn’t do anything against the feeling of guilt that was weighing heavily on her shoulders. And she didn’t want to work against it either. It felt righteous, justified to be blaming herself.
“You were just following orders. He would hurt you when you didn’t obey. I was helping him out of my own free will.”, she argued and Hunter scoffed at that.
“I still enabled him. And you didn’t know better. At the end of the day, he just exploited us both.”
Luz still wasn’t happy with his reasoning. Grumbling, she once again pushed her nose into the pillow, eyeing him, before facing him.
“Ignorance is no excuse in law.”, she mumbled, which almost caused Hunter to sit up, but after flinching, he thought again and settled back down, not wanting to jostle Willow or Gus, or startle Amity awake. He was about sixty percent sure she would immediately attack him, should he threaten Luz in any way.
“That was no ignorance. You just didn’t know, and Belos deceived you. If you had known who he would turn out to be, you would have done everything to stop him.”, his whispers got a bit more aggressive, though he didn’t raise his voice.
Luz pouted at him trying to reason with her, scrunching her eyebrows, before looking down.
She had been deceived. She hadn’t known.
Still, it did little to alleviate the pressure on her chest, nor did it help her get rid of the blame she felt. Not only for helping him but also for ditching her friends once the Owl House had gone into hiding, for getting herself captured by Kikimora, disguised as Hunter, to be taken to Belos. For trying to fight him alone, for almost getting herself petrified, for being so useless in their fight against him, for-
It took a few attempts for Hunter’s voice to get through to her.
She had in no way intended to ignore him, but her panic had gotten the better of her. So much so that Hunter had in the end sat up to scoot closer to the couch, uncertainly patting her shoulder.
Luz’s eyes finally focused on him, if only to blur over immediately while she tried her hardest to contain herself, then Hunter leaned forward to cradle her head and let her bury her face in his chest.
Amity snuffled and pressed herself tighter into Luz’s back, unwilling to give up even an inch of her girlfriend in her sleep, but Luz was grateful for Hunter’s hug.
It allowed her to stifle her sobs, and muffle whatever she couldn’t suppress.
A moment later, when she had finally managed to match her breathing with his deep, calm breaths, she felt him leaning back and Amity pulling her back into their embrace again. A glance over her shoulder reassured her that her girlfriend was still tightly sleeping, and another over Hunter’s shoulder revealed that neither Willow nor Gus had woken up either.
She breathed through, then she watched as Hunter sat back and pulled his blanket around his shoulders, watching her again as she brought Amity’s hand up to her face to softly kiss her palm. The girl spooning her immediately relaxed at that with the most adorable little huff Luz had ever heard.
Blinking slowly, she settled back into the pillow and looked at Hunter who was still watching her as the first few droplets of rain began tapping against her window once more.
Luz breathed through and tried to focus, nodding to herself. She had to tell someone and Hunter would probably understand the best.
“… You-… You’ve seen his… Appearance.”, she tested the waters and Hunter slowly nodded, his own memories flashing across his face. It was obvious he had seen Belos like this more than once, and it was possible he kind of knew what Belos had done to himself, “He was able to do magic without the staff.”
Hunter nodded again and Luz gulped, worrying her lip before continuing.
“When-… When I fought him alone, he outmatched me by far. I didn’t have a chance… So he, uhm, captured me.”, she mumbled and Hunter sat closer, putting his elbow up on the couch beside Luz’s head. She was glad for the close proximity, the quieter she could say it, the less chance any of her friends had to listen in on them, should they pretend to sleep.
“He wanted to make a deal. That I come home with him, to the human realm, because he didn’t want me-… Staying in the demon realm.”
Hunter slightly recoiled at that, his eyes narrowed in suspicion.
“Why? Why did he care about you?”, he asked and Luz felt her heart being squeezed by the hurt look on his face. As much as Belos had betrayed him and as much as Hunter had learned in the past few weeks, she figured it would still hurt for him to hear his uncle, as he had thought his entire life, would care for her, who had just been on the Isles for a few months.
“… I’m human… He didn’t want another human hurt by the Isles… It was about his ideology. He’s-… He didn’t care for me. I guess he was just projecting.”, she explained and Hunter visibly relaxed. She couldn’t blame him.
“And I guess you said no?”, he asked with a deadpan after a while, the rain was by now audibly splattering on the window and getting so loud it even droned out Willow’s and Gus’ breathing.
“… I kind of… Maybe… Insulted him instead.”, Luz grimaced and Hunter had to groan at that. She really had no common sense for any safety.
But as she grew quiet again, listening to the soft pattering of the rain, Hunter leaned in again. Luz turned her head back to the pillow, as if attempting to hide, then she sighed into the fabric. He moved his other hand to rest on her shoulder and encouraged her to speak up about it.
“I-… I got him so mad that he-… He wanted to put me out of my misery instead.”, she gulped as Hunter furrowed his eyebrows at that, his grip on her shoulder tightening, “And-… When-…”
Her voice failing, she felt tears welling up in her eyes again and her feet felt as heavy as they had when Belos had raised his hand and made a fist. It felt exactly like that again, the unforgiving cold and stiffness creeping up her legs again.
Rubbing her feet together, she made herself feel that they were not actually turning to stone again but the dread was still pooling in her stomach.
“… What happened then?”, Hunter asked and Luz sniffled, pulling Amity’s hand up to her face again, keeping her gaze down to avoid his looking at him. Her girlfriend gave another little huff and tightened her hug before she could answer.
“… He petrified me.”
The silence that stretched after she had said it grew louder by the second.
The rain and wind from the outside were suddenly droned out at the deafening absence of words, just the rush of blood in her ears was still there. Slowly, Luz looked up and grimaced at the expression on Hunter’s face.
He looked downright furious.
Breathing through his clenched teeth, he stared at the backrest of the couch, trying to contain his rage as he worked through the first few seconds of understanding the horror Luz had gone through.
Gulping, she looked down again, waiting for his response.
Only now that she had said it, told someone else what had happened, it seemed real. Before that, it had happened between Belos and her, and before he had gone berserk when she had branded him.
Now that it was out there, now that Hunter had heard it and now that she would have to tell her girlfriend, her mom, and her friends, it seemed a lot more real.
Breathing faster, she squeezed Amity’s hand and tried breathing through.
When the stone had crept up her legs, when she had understood that she could die right there, with the portal open next to her, with her mom not knowing what had happened, with Eda and Raine and the rebellion so far away. With her friends on the way, only that she hadn’t known that.
Hot tears welled up in her eyes again and she rubbed her feet together to feel them alive and not made of stone. Finally, her tears spilled. Once again, she buried her face in the pillow, and once again, she felt Hunter leaning in and comforting her.
The realization set in now. The shock faded. The feeling that it was a dream, that it had never happened, was gone. The comfort, maybe delusion, that she had dreamed it all up, was gone.
Suddenly, she knew it was real.
How her joints had started working, how Belos had thrown her across the room, how she had watched her legs turning cold and unmoving, how she had already pictured moss spreading on her statue. How it had moved up her body, her hips, how hard it had been to move then. How her hand on the floor, desperately grasping the branding glove, had turned cold, unmoving. How her own arm had started feeling like a cane or a branch merely supporting her chest, how she hadn’t been able to move away or do anything about it. All the while her brain raced a thousand miles an hour, trying to find the right words to persuade Belos, how she had hated to say his name to his face and the smug smirk that had spread on his lips then.
How the stone had moved up her chest, how she had felt her lungs turning, how breathing had gotten hard. How she had spoken the last words on her last breath before her mouth and nose had turned to stone as well. How suffocating it had felt, that her throat had hardened and finally, her breathing had cut out. She had heard her last breath. How scary that had been, how the tears had soaked the stone that her cheeks had turned.
Gasping, she curled up even tighter, not even realizing how she had started curling, around the void that started filling her middle. How the pain had started spreading from her ribcage, how her heart was being squeezed and how she had started breathing faster, tucking her legs in.
Her knees were up to her throat when Hunter’s voice finally broke through to her. He told her to breathe, to open her eyes, and to look at him, otherwise, he’d wake Amity.
She couldn’t say it again. She couldn’t have Hunter tell her girlfriend.
Forcing herself to breathe in through her nose, Luz tried hard to fill her lungs with air to help with the lightheadedness, but it was harder than she thought.
The feeling of her body hardening, of herself turning to a statue, of the pain she had worked around just to keep talking, bargaining, dealing with Belos. Her begs rang in her ear, louder than she had probably spoken.
The cold, unforgiving, unmoving, hard stone reached her head, locking her jaw, working up to her ear, her eye, her brain just before Belos had stopped it.
Functioning, executing her plan, after almost ending up as a statue. And telling nobody about it.
It all came back now.
How horrifying the past few weeks had been, between the anniversary of her father’s passing and her ending up back in the human realm. How she and Hunter had discovered he was a grimwalker, how she had gone into hiding, how helpless and desperate Eda and Lilith had been to keep her and King safe, how they had discovered everything about King’s true heritage, the Titan Trappers, the Day of Unity starting, her friends, her family, the rebellion-
Suddenly, a female voice talked to her.
The hand she had so tightly clasped in hers had disappeared from her grip and when she was turned over and opened her eyes, she was looking into Amity’s golden ones. Hunter was still there as well, talking fast to her girlfriend while she only curled up tighter, struggling to breathe.
She still didn’t know what had happened to Eda. She still didn’t know what happened to King. How the Isles were. If the collector had left with King or if they had decided to enslave the entire population of the Isles into some sick, twisted game to play with him.
Raine, Darius, Eberwolf, she had heard of none of them. All that she had to go by was that Hunter’s sigil hadn’t killed him. But what of Eda’s curse?
Had it harmed her?
Was King safe?
What about everyone who didn’t have a sigil? Were they okay?
Luz tried to breathe, she really did, but she could only squint her eyes more and try not to let the pain inside her chest eat her up alive.
A hand cupped her cheek and Luz opened her eyes back up, looking up to Amity once again. Once her vision stopped being blurred, she could see how disheveled her girlfriend looked. Hunter had probably woken her up while panicking about her state, and Amity had immediately entered the adrenaline rush over her girlfriend not being okay.
Amity was leaning over her, propping herself up above her, so she could look at Luz properly.
She was saying something, but Luz couldn’t hear her. Her own shallow breathing was too loud, the rushing in her ears, the tumult in her head, the concern and worries and everything was getting too much and she couldn’t focus, damnit-
Until a comfortable weight settled on top of her. And the weight was breathing. She only belatedly realized Amity had climbed atop of her and was showing her hand, slowly counting up to four and down again, doing the same movements with her lips as Willow’s breathing technique required.
With the help of being engulfed completely by her girlfriend and the breathing on top of her that she could feel and didn’t have to hear, she slowly managed to get her oxygen intake back under control.
They breathed together until Luz could feel stuff around her again. Hunter’s hand on top of her head, Amity’s hand in her hair, the blanket still draped around them.
Somewhere in between, Amity’s head had dropped next to hers, snuggling into her neck and continuing to breathe slowly as Luz’s vision stabilized and she could slowly find back to herself.
Amity continued breathing on top of her and Hunter still held up his fingers, counting to four and back so Luz wouldn’t forget to breathe.
When she had calmed down enough to talk, Amity leaned back again, looking down at her skeptically.
“… Did you sleep at all?”, she asked and Luz sheepishly shook her head, looking around as she felt Hunter’s hand leaving her hair to discover he was only fetching a glass of water for her. Amity obviously disapproved, but looked understanding. She probably knew why Luz had trouble sleeping.
After allowing Luz to sit up to accept Hunter’s glass of water, Amity slipped from her lap and she gratefully took the glass of water, taking a sip before her girlfriend nudged her.
At her nod, Luz drank half the glass and looked for her approval.
They settled back down on the couch and Amity draped the blanket back over them both, now having switched places after Hunter bid them goodnight, and looked at her.
Luz felt the comforting pressure of the backrest along her body and had her hands linked with Amity’s, resting between them. She smiled at her girlfriend, but Amity was having none of it.
“Luz, what just happened?”, she whispered, just loud enough for her to hear since they were practically nose to nose, so Amity would still have some room on the couch. Luz squinted her eyes and buried her face in the pillow before Amity reached over and brushed some strands of hair out of her face and behind her ear. She would really have to get a haircut.
“… Some… Stuff happened before you guys arrived in the skull…”, she admitted. Her girlfriend merely nodded, leaning in closer and pressing a soft kiss to her cheek, keeping close and parting their fingers so she could hug her.
“… Hunter told me as much…”, she murmured and Luz was glad she didn’t hear anything from the mattress down below. She also couldn’t hear any sort of resentment from her girlfriend, as scared as she had been of that.
Huffing, she turned her face back up and leaned the bridge of her nose against Amity’s to be as close as possible. Their breaths mingled and thankfully, Luz felt herself growing sleepy at that.
“… I-… I fought Belos and, he wanted a deal…”, she began but Amity merely shook her head, her hand wandering up Luz’s back before weaving into her hair, her fingers playing with her locks.
“… Not tonight.”, she mumbled and Luz gratefully snuggled in some more, finding herself smiling. Amity probably just didn’t want her to have another panic attack. She couldn’t express how thankful she was that she didn’t have to repeat the three words that caused her so much pain and fear.
“Okay.”, she mumbled back, snuggling into her embrace and trying not to think too much about what had happened. She had thought about that enough for today. Hunter knew now and Amity knew she had to tell her something. She would tell them all tomorrow and it would feel much better doing so after she had slept a night over it.
And they were safe. As much as it sucked to be away from the Isles and everyone else and as much as it pained Luz not to know what was happening over there, they were safe. Willow and Gus and Hunter and Amity, her girlfriend, were safe.
Before she even knew what she was doing, she had pressed a soft kiss to the corner of Amity’s lips and snuggled closer, wrapping her arms around her girlfriend. Amity gave a soft eep, before snuggling into her warm embrace and settling down again.
Sleep took her faster than her girlfriend this time. After just a few breaths, she was out cold and had quickly fallen into a deep, dreamless slumber. Here, in the arms of her girlfriend, the world on her shoulders seemed lighter, the light brighter, and the solution closer than she thought.
Just a moment later, Amity followed. The last to fall asleep was Hunter, and as much as he tossed and turned, as soon as Luz's hand dropped over the couch’s edge and Willow’s hand had found its way to his mattress as well, he calmed down.
---
When Camila entered her living room this morning, disheveled and bleary-eyed from a restless night, she found a smile growing on her lips.
She had sent Luz off to camp mainly to make some friends, not because she had wanted her to actually think inside the box. It had been her last resort to allow her daughter some kind of connection with the rest of her age class.
And now, seeing her all cuddled up with her girlfriend, holding hands with the boy she had come here with – Hunter, as she recalled – she felt that maybe, the Boiling Isles hadn’t only kept her daughter away from her.
She tiptoed past the sleeping horde of teenagers and managed to get herself a nice cup of coffee before sneaking back in and leaning over the backrest to watch her sleeping daughter. She had curled in just enough to hide her face in the crook of Amity’s neck, leaving the witch girl to bury her nose in her hair. They looked so serene, so calm and peaceful, despite what they had been through just yesterday.
Luz’s arm was draped over her girlfriend’s waist and hanging off the couch, where Hunter’s fingers were timidly laced into hers, his elbow propped up just enough to keep his arm upright, while he was softly snoring. His other hand was occupied by the girl sleeping next to him, Willow if Camila remembered her name right.
Gus was curled up on Willow’s side and huffing from time to time, his ears flicking. She suspected the youngest of the group would wake up soon.
Looking back down at her daughter, Camila couldn’t resist the smile she felt growing on her lips, or the hand to reach down and brush some of Luz’s hair out of her eyes while taking care not to wake Amity. She also reached over to brush a strand of lilac hair behind her pointy witch ears, though she wasn’t too sure if witches slept lighter than humans. She didn’t want to wake Amity up.
Without meaning to, she mustered the young witch that her daughter was so cuddled up to. She was pretty. Luz really had chosen well, even if she hadn’t believed her daughter at first when she had told her she had a girlfriend that night she saved Vee.
Chuckling to herself, Camila finally took a sip of her coffee that had cooled down a bit by now and walked back to the kitchen to sit down at the counter and have her cup of coffee to herself, without annoying the children too much.
Without her noticing, a sleepy smile spread on Amity’s lips. She hadn’t woken up, but the timid touch alone had been enough to make her feel entirely at home, with her girlfriend snuggled up to her.
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