Chapter Text
Night on the Boiling Isles isn’t exactly quiet, but if Carmen can sleep on a train across India, or in an apartment in the heart of New York City, she can sleep through anything. That is, she could if there wasn’t an immense weight on her shoulders. Seeing Tigress again set off a chain of negative thought that hasn’t ended yet, and the guilt is practically eating her alive. How could she be so thoughtless? Here she is taking a vacation in another world while VILE runs rampant. She doesn’t even know how the team is taking her absence. How could she think that life might be peaceful for once, when her family is fighting desperately to bring her back? It’s been almost a week since she’s heard from Player, and she knows better than anyone that that’s plenty of time for something horrible to happen. What if they tried a rescue mission? Did it fail? What if they all get sent through the portal? Will they ever be able to leave? What if–
A creak from the floorboards upstairs catches her attention. When she accepted the fact that she wasn’t going to sleep any time soon, Carmen made her way down to the kitchen. There she sits, watching the moon through the massive arched window when Eda arrives at the threshold of the room. Surely she didn’t wake her; Carmen has all the creaky floorboards memorized out of habit, and she’s positive she didn’t make a sound coming down. But Eda doesn’t look like she just woke up, she looks like she’s been up for hours.
“Can’t sleep, huh?”
“I thought I’d come downstairs. Not sure why though.”
“I think I can guess,” Eda says, leaning against the doorframe. “You wanna keep her close.” Carmen follows her gaze towards the basement door. It wasn’t her overt plan, but she does keep checking the lock. “I can’t say I know how you feel, I try to stay away from the people who hate me. But I do get it.”
“Can’t run forever.”
“It’s been working so far.” Eda hasn’t been very open with her past – not that Carmen is one to judge – but Carmen can tell that she and Eda have more in common than likely either one is willing to admit, and they both know what she just said isn’t true. Eda lets out a deep breath, dropping her shoulders. She makes her way to a cabinet, pulling out an opaque jug and two glasses. “How about a drink?”
“Is that apple blood?”
“Finest in the Isles.”
“I don’t get drunk when I’m working, not since Malta.”
“Bad night?”
“Great night, but I only did it because I knew my team had the situation under control.”
“Well,” Eda says, joining Carmen at the table and placing down one glass for each of them, “ Hooty has the situation under control this time. Besides, you’re not working.”
“That’s the problem,” Carmen says, slamming her hands on the heavy wooden table, “I should be working. I have people back home who depend on me! Not only am I letting them down, I’m endangering you just by being here.”
Eda laughs a little, not in mockery but understanding. “Believe me, some human in a cat costume is the least dangerous thing that’s been locked in that basement.”
Carmen fidgets with the empty glass in front of her. “Do you think it’s a bad idea? Keeping her here, I mean.”
“I think it would be worse leaving her with the Emperor’s Coven.”
She’s right. Tigress isn’t exactly loyal to anyone but herself; if she sees a better opportunity than what she has now, she’ll take it. Given that she’s potentially cut off from the human realm just like Carmen and Luz have been, that might make the Emperor her next best option. Besides, if Luz’s stories are anything to go off of, Emperor Belos is a very dangerous man. Would Tigress see if he’s manipulating her? She does work for VILE. But Eda’s right: worrying about everything won’t fix anything, she needs to clear her mind. Hooty will keep Tigress in place – unless of course she kills him, which might not even be possible.
“Maybe just one glass.”
“Atta girl!” Eda cheers, filling her glass with the bright red liquid. The name is accurate, it does look like blood. “Welcome to the Bad Girl Coven.”
She swirls the drink in her glass before taking a careful sip. It’s… sweet – surprisingly so – and tart at the same time. Carmen had been preparing for the metallic taste of blood in her mouth that she’s all too familiar with, but it’s entirely absent. It’s no wonder that Eda drinks this stuff all the time, it’s incredible .
It is however still alcoholic: a sensation Carmen isn’t quite adapted to. “Not an outsider anymore, am I?” She coughs.
Eda gives her another one of those motherly glances that Carmen is frequently on the receiving end of. “You never were.”
“I was at first,” Carmen says, taking another sip. “When you first saw me it looked like you were going to attack me.”
“Oh that?” She waves her hands dismissively, “Luz is a smart kid, but she doesn’t always think things through, and the creatures here can be nasty. I thought you might’ve been a fake.”
Wouldn’t be the first time.
“How did you know I wasn’t?”
“Your smell.” Eda says, as if it’s obvious, “You smell like vanilla. That’s a human thing, nobody on all the Isles smells like that.”
“Or at least you did!” she adds, elbowing Carmen, “Now you blend right in.”
Oh.
Is that all it takes? Not even two weeks in the demon realm, and it’s enough to take part of her humanity away. As dramatic as it sounds, Eda instantly clocked Carmen as an authentic human, but would she be able to now?
You’re spiraling again.
Maybe it’s the apple blood, maybe it’s literally everything else, but either way it’s nothing new; being raised by a bunch of criminal masterminds at a school for thieves doesn’t exactly teach emotional stability. No matter how much Eda denies it, Carmen is a burden – and that’s unacceptable.
“So,” she says, not looking up from her glass, “this Emperor’s Coven .”
“ Total dweebs. Ever since Lilith left they’ve been completely irredeemable. I tried robbing one of their ships once, but that kid Hunter caught me.”
“Yeah I’ve met him,” she mumbles. Met is a light way to put it, it’s more like she kicked his ass – up until all the magic started happening anyway. Not like he didn’t deserve it, not after how he’s treated Luz. If Carmen’s a part of the Owl House now, their fights are her fights. “Tell me about your heist.”
“Not much to tell, really. There was a Coven ship set out to hunt a Selkidomus with a huge bounty on board. I stowed away, grabbed the snails, and would’ve made a daring escape if Luz wasn’t there.”
“She messed it up?”
“She’s the one that caught me! Neither of us knew the other was there, it was just a crazy coincidence.” Eda sighs, “That kid’s a pain in my side, but her heart’s in the right place.”
“Well, say you were going to hit them again… How would two ladies with our skills do it?”
A devious smirk creeps onto Eda’s face. “I’m so glad you asked,” she says, pulling several rolled sheets of paper out from her gray mass of hair. “I already have it planned out. It was originally a one-person job, but two only makes it easier.” She flattens the paper out on the table between them, and Carmen can see that they’re schematics of some large building that resembles a prison. There are notes scribbled all over the paper, as well as several stains – likely apple blood.
“You’ve been busy.”
“Sister, you don’t know the half of it. This is the Conformatorium, I’m sure you’ve heard of it. It’s a high security prison – one of the highest on the Isles – and it’s the first step of my master plan.”
“What could you possibly steal from a prison?”
Eda not-so-gently taps Carmen’s forehead with her index finger. “ Information . They don’t just lock witches up in there, they also keep secrets. Secrets I need if we’re going to make it to stage 2.”
“Which is?”
“The Treasury. The Emperor’s royal treasury is where all the local taxes get collected and counted. We’re going to… liberate the tax money and bring it back to the people. And us, of course. But I can’t do that without the key to the vault, which is why the Conformatorium is the first stop.”
That’s… somewhat moral. At least Eda’s plan doesn’t just involve stealing from others solely for personal gain. Still, while the reasoning behind the plan is solid, the logic doesn’t check out. Why would the key to a vault in an entirely separate building be kept in a high-security prison? Nothing on the Boiling Isles makes sense...
“We’ll be like Robin Hood.”
“Oh we’ll be robbing them right from under their hoods alright,” Eda responds, clearly not understanding the reference.
It’s settled, then. The Red Rogue is going to make it up to Eda, and the Emperor’s Coven won’t stand a chance… right ? Carmen finishes her apple blood and takes a deep breath.
Time to dust off the old coat and hat.