Chapter Text
A pair of golden eyes peeked out from behind a tree to stare out at the foreboding structure just yards away. Amity had been hesitating at the forest’s edge in front of the Owl House for the last ten minutes. As she peered around the tree she was hiding behind, Amity steeled herself for what came next.
You’ve got this. You’ve practiced. You’re prepared for whatever happens. You won’t let it get to you. You are Amity Blight.
With a deep breath, Amity straightened her posture and broke the tree line. As she approached, her worst fears were realized. It was awake.
“Hey AMITY! How are YOU today?”
Amity had her eyes trained squarely on the doorknob of the Owl House. She had sworn to Luz and The Owl Lady that she wouldn’t harm Hooty after what happened last time. Eda had to pay quite a few snails to replace the windows after Hooty’s screams had broken them all. So much frightened screeching. Sadly, Amity was already having a hard time keeping her promise. Something about the rhythm and timbre of the demon’s voice made Amity’s skin crawl.
“Hello Hooty. I am well. Is Luz here?” she said as politely as possible. Hooty jutted out from the door, inches from Amity’s face. “Yeah, but you can hang out with ME instead! We’re buddies now right? I saved some snacks just for this occasion.”
Hooty convulsed wildly as he regurgitated several beetles and flies at her feet. Amity fell to the ground as she recoiled in disgust. She tried to kick the dead insects from her boots, but Hooty’s saliva had glued them down.
Okay . I’m done.
Amity began to draw an incredibly large spell circle. After all, the bird tube couldn’t scream if it was drowning in abomination goo. Just as she was about to cast it, the door flew open to reveal Luz and slammed Hooty into the side of the house.
“OW! Why don’t you open the door a little harder next time, HOOT HOOT!” Hooty squawked in a sarcastic tone. Luz put a hand on her hip and pointed the other at Hooty.
“Hooty, we’ve gone over this. I’ll stop slamming the door when you stop creeping out my friends.” Much to Amity’s relief, Hooty only huffed in response and slowly receded back into the door.
Luz was dressed in her casual attire with a supplementary pair of light blue rubber gloves. Her hair was slightly wet and carried a small amount of soap bubbles. Amity imagined brushing the bubbles away as she ran her hands through Luz’s dark locks. A gasp from the human brought Amity back to reality.
“Oh Amity, I’m so sorry! I can clean off your boots inside. We’ve been trying to teach Hooty that sharing is not caring.”
Amity’s demeanor shifted from furious to pleasant on a dime. “No, no, it's okay. I’ve been meaning to ask for some new shoes anyway. Besides, it looks like you’ve been doing enough cleaning already.”
Luz looked down at her covered hands and laughed sheepishly, “Yeah, sorry for the delay. We went trash slug salvaging, and King got doused in goop.”
Luz took off her gloves and threw them through the doorway. She turned back and offered her hand to help the witch up. Amity took the offer graciously. Once pulled her to her feet, Amity thought that Luz would let go, but Luz held firm as she led Amity inside. In an effort to not think about how soft Luz’s hand was, the witch busied herself with looking elsewhere in the living room.
Lilith was perched on the edge of the couch reading a purple tome with a cup of tea beside her. The book was simply titled: Curses: Placement and Removal . Lilith’s eyes left the pages briefly to widen and stare at Amity.
Amity stared daggers at her for a moment before turning away. She hadn’t spoken with her old mentor since she was tricked into cheating at the convention, and she’d like to keep it that way for as long as possible. On the opposite side of the room near the fireplace, Eda sat with her legs wrapped around a small kiddie pool. Her gloved hands moved violently in the bubbling, green water of the pool.
“Hey Luz, toss me the frog vinegar, would ya?” As Eda looked up, her smile faded. “Oh hey. It's you. Come to join the fun?” Before Amity could respond, Luz spoke.
“Actually, Amity’s gonna help me study for an abominations test. We’ll be upstairs”, Luz said quickly as she pulled Amity across the room.
“Yeah right. Studying . Don’t think you can lie to me about weaseling out of work!” Eda yelled after them. “I’m the queen of weaseling!” But they were already gone.
“Oh honestly Edalyn. Leave them alone”, Lilith scolded, returning her eyes to the book. “Studying is important for their development as young witches”, Lilith waved a finger in Eda’s direction. “And wouldn’t it be better to do that outside?”
Eda’s eyes narrowed at Lilith.
“Hey. Don’t tell me how to clean my roommates in my own house. Do you wanna be the one to help me with this furball?”
Eda brought her arms up from the water to show King in her hands coughing and still caked in a thick slime.
“No one needs to be studying on a Sunday anyway. And plus, she’s my pupil, not yours. And if I recall properly, neither is that Blight kid.” Lilith didn’t say anything, but her nails gripped the book tighter ever so slightly. Eda let out a small chuckle and dropped King back in the pool.
“Easy on the royal fineries Eda!” King exclaimed. “You almost squashed Duke Squeakers”, King added while grabbing a red rubber duck from underneath the water.
“CAN I HELP? I won’t drink all the soap like last time,” Hooty promised. Luz had forgotten to shut the front door before leaving.
“You and I both know you're lying.”
Eda stood and closed the door. King splashed the water in front of him with his tiny hands.
“Hey! Less talky, more scruby,” He demanded giving the duck a single squeeze.
“I know I asked you to come over, but thanks for getting me out of that.”
Luz released Amity’s hand and started digging through the chest in the back of her room. Amity muttered out a ‘No problem’ as she looked down at her now free hand. Constant physical contact was to be expected if you were a friend of Luz’s, but Amity hadn’t gotten used to it yet. Amity was still thinking about the warmth of Luz’s hand when Luz turned and offered her a handkerchief.
“Are you okay? Did Hooty get it on your hands too?” Luz asked as she tilted her head with a frown.
“No, it’s not that,” Amity mumbled. “I was just… worried about, Lilith.”
Smooth move.
Luz closed the chest and stood from where she was kneeling.
“No I totally get that. It took me a while to trust her too, but she’s not so bad if you give her a chance.”
“Yeah, well.” Amity sat on the windowsill and began wiping the filth from her shoes. Most of it was coming off, but there were still visible stains on the material. “She still put you in danger multiple times with all the stuff she’s pulled.”
Luz smirked.
“Weren’t you a willing participant one of those times, Blight?”
Luz’s tone was playful, but Amity couldn’t help but remember how fine she was with possibly hurting Luz in the duel if it meant she could win. It seemed so long ago that Luz was some annoying troublemaker to Amity. She must not have been concealing her feelings well considering the frown on Luz’s face. The human sat down next to her at the window.
“Hey, I didn’t actually mean that. Don’t worry about that stuff anymore. Things are different now.” Luz placed her hand gently on Amity’s shoulder. “I'm gonna go get something to drink. Do you want anything?”
Amity tried to hide the shiver that went down her spine. Her face grew warm.
“W-water please.”
“Coming right up!” With that and a quick peace sign, Luz dashed out of the room. Amity could hear her loud footfalls as Luz descended the stairs. Amity felt a small giggle rising in her at her friend’s antics, but it died in her throat.
Things were different now. The mixed bag of emotions Amity felt as she watched through her crystal ball came rushing back — the shock at the news of the Owl Lady’s capture — the furor that Willow and Gus had inspired in the crowd — the panic and awe of Luz rescuing Eda (and Co.) in her enticing new cowl. Amity shut her eyes and shook the jumbled thoughts from her head. Two weeks later and it was still a lot to process.
Upon her return to Hexside, Luz had relayed the events of The Owl Lady’s near-petrification in full to Willow, Augustus and Amity. The three witches had tried to get details sooner, but Luz had called ahead and told them not to visit.
“It may not be safe for you guys to come over yet, but I promise to tell you everything. All you need to know for now is that we’re all okay!”
Luz continued to put up a convincing front, but Amity could tell she was troubled. Amity could easily understand why. Not only had Luz publicly defied the emperor’s forces, she personally fought with the emperor and destroyed her only way home.
Luz didn’t seem ready to talk about the reality of her situation at length with anyone yet. Any mention of her home would warrant a dismissive comment or a quick subject change. Willow suggested that they wait for Luz to come to them instead of prying any further. Amity felt incredibly sorry for her, but she knew ‘sorry’s wouldn’t bring the portal back.
Amity scowled down at her now healed foot. Edric and Emira had stopped her from hobbling her way to the petrification despite their shared worry. Amity wasn’t even certain of what she would have done if she was there. Would she throw her crutches at the coven officers that had sworn to protect and govern the Boiling Isles? Her parents would not tolerate that sort of behavior. It would bring shame to the Blight name, and cast doubt on her family’s loyalty to the emperor.
Amity had tried not to think about how maintaining her new social group would make things more difficult in the future or even now. Emperor Belos may have “pardoned” Eda, but the circumstances were dire for all of the occupants of the Owl House and possibly for any of their accomplices. Amity had come over to study with someone who for all intents and purposes was a criminal. Luz would carry around a chip of Emperor Belos’s mask just to gloat for crying out loud!
The implications that Luz’s escapade had on Amity’s future coven plans were also very troubling to say the least. If everything Luz said was true, the emperor’s coven didn’t seem to be the perfect career she had always dreamt of anymore.
Amity sighed and stopped fiddling with the hem of her shirt. She stood as her eyes wandered over the piles of clutter spread about the messy room. There was at least a method to Luz’s organizational madness as each pile of Luz’s possessions had its own theme.
There was a paper supply pile which consisted of mainly blank notepads and pencils. Amity had given Luz a few old notebooks for spell paper two days ago at her request. Apparently Eda had been running low ever since Luz arrived.
In the back corner of the room sat a mound of blankets, sheets and multi-colored fabrics. Some clearly handmade sock puppets laid on the pile’s edge; two that were of note depicted Eda and Lilith with different colored buttons for eyes.
Lastly, there was an assortment of half folded clothes next to an empty black backpack that Amity had never seen before. A colorful rectangle that was haphazardly stitched to the one side of the bag caught Amity’s eye. She walked over and grabbed it for a closer look. She had seen this pattern somewhere before.
Amity had attended a few Human Appreciation Society meetings whenever she could fit it into her schedule. Apparently, humans have a weird societal concept called sexuality where sometimes they would only fall in love with other humans of a certain gender. These sorts of situations happened on the Boiling Isles too, but it wasn’t given a name. The president of the HAS, Mattholomule, said that humans even have a complex labeling system with symbols and flags for each sexuality.
Amity ran her thumb over the patch — pink, purple and blue ran from top to bottom. If Amity was remembering this correctly from the meeting, then this color combination designated that the human was interested in at least boys and girls. Which meant…
Overcome with giddiness, Amity spun on her heels as she closed her eyes and held the bookbag close to her chest. She could never be certain with their cultures being so different and not wanting to ask directly, but now she knew.
I actually have a chance.
It wasn’t until seconds later that Amity noticed Luz in the doorway, two cups of water in hand. Amity dropped the incriminating evidence back on the floor and wiped away imaginary dust from her hands and arms.
Luz entered the room. “You like my new bag? We found it in the trash slug too. I just got the acid smell out.” She offered a cup to Amity. The witch accepted it and quickly downed half of the liquid inside.
“Y-yeah!” Amity managed to cough out. “It’s cute. Nice patch.”
Luz set her drink down on a small stool and turned back towards Amity.
“Thanks! I applied it myself.”
Luz paused.
“Oh wait you guys have stuff like that here? I thought it was just a human thing.”
Amity’s eyes lit up. She could use some lingo she learned at the HAS to connect with Luz! After putting up with the tiresome president for so many meetings, she could finally impress Luz.
“Psh, no way! I know all about being hetero.”
Luz stopped in her tracks and stared at Amity.
Oh no. What do I do? Is it rude to say that? Shoot, she’s gonna hate me-
Amity’s worries were interrupted by Luz’s loud fit of laughter. If Amity’s face wasn’t red before, it was a complete tomato now.
“What’s so funny? What am I missing here?!” Amity said with a twinge of irritation in her voice. Luz was unable to respond for a few seconds longer much to Amity’s embarrassment.
“Did Gus tell you to say that?” Luz questioned, still wiping tears from her eyes. The witchling across from her crossed her arms indignantly.
“No I uh-”
Amity didn’t want to admit to visiting the Human Appreciation Society after apparently being so incredibly wrong.
“-read it somewhere.”
“Well, your book or whatever needs the ol’ human fact check ’cause that’s definitely not a heterosexual pride flag.”
Both girls sat on the wooden floor while Luz gave a brief crash course of human sexualities.
“... So that flag on my bag is a bisexual flag. I put it on there since I like girls and boys. What you said was when girls only like boys and boys only like girls.”
“I see.” Amity said quietly. At least she had gotten the concept of bisexuality correctly. Amity would have to remember to throttle Mattholomule when she saw him next for being the root of this miscommunication.
What Luz had explained was intriguing to Amity. Taking such pride in what seemed like a normal part of life was strange but sort of comforting. Amity hadn’t ever really had to think about her preference in romantic partners until recently. Amity never really developed any interest in boys in spite of the occasional suitor her parents would send her way. Without thinking further, Amity asked, “Is there one for when a girl likes another girl?”
When Luz looked to Amity, she had a look on her face that Amity couldn’t place at first. It was a sort of knowing smile that a parent might make at their child who was caught in a harmless lie.
Oh wait. Shoot!
Amity’s hands shot up from her sides to wave dismissively in front of her. “Not that I’m whatever it is! Ijustwantedtoknowforresear-”
“Amity, It’s okay!” Luz’s eyes were soft as she continued, “You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to. A person like that would be a ‘lesbian’. But if you wanted to be more general, you could just say someone is ‘gay’ or a ‘homosexual’ to mean that they were interested in people of the same gender.” Luz spoke as if she was giving a seminar. “Also, sometimes people use gay as an umbrella term for not cisgender and/or straight.”
“Cisgender? Should I be writing all of this down?” Amity asked. Maybe this concept was more important in human society than she initially thought.
“Don’t worry about it. A lot of people don’t even like to use any hard labels,” Luz laughed. “If you have any questions, just ask.”
“Okay… Sorry for yelling.”
“Haha, it's fine.”
At this point, Amity had resigned herself to keeping her mouth shut despite the awkward silence that now hung in the air between the two. There was no need to dig her grave any deeper.
“So why were you so excited to find that out anyway? Was someone asking about me?” Luz wiggled her eyebrows rapidly in a suggestive manner.
Amity cursed herself for not being more aware of her surroundings earlier. She turned her head away to hide her flushed face, but it was too late.
Luz slapped her hands down her lap. “Wait, was someone actually asking??”
Here was another opportunity. This was a chance to make good on all the promises that Amity had made to herself in the mirror. Now was the time to be more forward. To do something despite the consequences to her status. To not care about what her parents would say. To be maybe more than just friends.
But there was a reason that Grometheus chose to prey on the fear that it did.
“I guess you could sort of say that-“
“Oh my gosh! Amity, you gotta tell me who! No wait! I can figure this out.”
Taken aback by Luz’s explosive response, Amity only stared intently as Luz rubbed her temples with her eyes closed.
“Mmmm…” Luz‘s eyes shot open and she extended her arm to point at Amity. “Jerbo? From abominations?”
Amity could only shake her head. She was thankful that Luz seemed to be too caught up in the moment to comment on her ambiguous word choice.
Luz tilted her head. “That one kid who sits behind you at lunch? Harriet, I think?”
“N-no. Luz-“
Luz’s eyes widened in horror.
“Boscha?”
“No!” Amity pinched the bridge of her nose. “Look, I can’t just tell you who it is. That wouldn’t be fair to her.”
At a much lower volume, Luz said “Sorry Amity. I’m just kind of excited.” She looked down at her hands as she twiddled her thumbs in her lap. “No one ever like-liked me in school back home. It’s nice to feel wanted y’know?”
When Amity’s expression saddened, Luz gave a small chuckle.
“That came out sadder then I intended. It’s not that big of a deal… Do you know why she’s interested in me specifically? You did say ‘her’ right?”
Amity was swimming in dangerous waters. She didn’t want to lie, but she couldn’t exactly say everything without exposing herself. She needed to phrase her words carefully. After thinking for a moment, Amity nodded and spoke slowly.
“Well aside from seeing you at school, my guess would be all that stuff that happened with the emperor’s coven recently.”
One of Luz’s eyebrows rose in disbelief. “Really?”
Amity shrugged. “Sure. What did you expect after pulling that stunt on the broadcast? If they didn’t see it live, then everyone at school heard about it over Penstagram.”
Luz reclined against the back wall and looked up towards the ceiling in amazement. “Huh. I kinda thought that would make me seem even more weird or unstable or whatever.”
“Who doesn’t like a bad girl?”
It was Amity. Amity likes a bad girl.
Luz grinned widely. “Heck yeah! I’m a threat to society!” Luz stuck her tongue out while her pinkies and index fingers stuck out from her hands. Amity giggled. It was sometimes hard to believe that this was the same person that attacked Emperor Belos when she acted this adorable.
The awkward silence had returned. This time Amity wanted to be the one to break it, though she hesitated. She knew what question she needed to ask next, but she was scared for what answer she would get.
“So what are you gonna do?” Every second that Luz thought about her response made Amity’s heart beat harder in her chest.
“Well, I don’t know if there’s much I can do. I’d like to get to know them first before anything would happen. You should tell them to bite the bullet and confess their undying love for me.”
Amity made a very clearly strained laugh. She was in trouble. “Will do.”
“And hey, If you tell me who your crush is, we can help each other out! We could be secret matchmakers!” Luz exclaimed with enthusiasm. “But you don't have to if you don’t want to.”
Amity’s heart dropped into her stomach. Even though the comment stung, it at least proved that Luz had bought into Amity’s deceit.
“Haha maybe… I don’t know if I wanna share that with anyone yet…”
Luz suddenly clapped her hands together and grabbed a textbook at her side. “Alright alright, enough about love, Ms. Romance Section. We’ve got an abominations test to pass.”
Amity rolled her eyes at her new terrible nickname and grabbed a pencil from the paper supply pile. Luz was right. For now, she could shove her conflicting feelings away and focus on the schoolwork. At least until Luz smiled at her too brightly or accidentally brushed her arm against hers while they worked.