Chapter Text
"Autumn… the year's last, loveliest smile." – William Cullen Bryant
Autumn swept across the Boiling Isles like the creeping leafage of moss. It inched into the air a little at a time. Crisped the sky and colored the leaves that drifted off the branches with each gust of wind. Willow remembered to pull her scarf off its hook before she left for school. The soft wool grazed her cheek as a brisk whisk of wind made her hair whirl into her face. Leaves crunched under her feet as the teenage plant witch made her way to school. The soft staccato gave way to the harsher clack of pavement as she reached the school gates.
Excited buzzing filled Willow’s ears, students chattered like the birds in spring about that night’s harvest moon. It’s no Moonlight Conjuring, but autumn always brought the Harvest Festival to Bonesborough. What young witch didn’t enjoy goofing off at bad carnival games and stuffing their faces with candy? Plus all the bright lights and noise kept all the demons coming out of their summer hibernation away. Willow traditionally spent her harvest moon… harvesting. Specifically, gathering the seeds of all the rare plants that reach their magical potency during the harvest moon. During Luz’s first festival, Willow and Gus dragged the wide-eyed human through all the splendor. The year after the group met, Willow took a gamble and tricked Luz and Amity into going together in a desperate attempt to get just one of them to confess. That year, their last year at Hexside, Luz insisted on them all going as a group and Willow couldn’t wriggle out of it.
“Morning, Willow!” Luz cheered.
Her loud greeting drew a few more from the mouths of other students. Willow returned them with small waves and smiles. Amity offered a nod, the brunette’s arms loaded with a cauldron of abomination goop.
“Ready for tonight?” Luz asked excitedly, her and Amity’s bags strewn over her shoulders. The large satchels almost toppled her over as the human bounced about and Willow watched Amity bite her lip in concern as the goop in her arms solidified to grab onto one of the bags and pulled the human up. “I’m trying to convince Ami to play in the grudgby game they’re setting up.”
“I don’t have a team, Luz,” Amity interjected and met Willow’s eyes. The two shared matching grins before she continued. “Besides, Eda’s setting it up. It’ll be a death trap.”
“But you’re so good at it Ami!”
Amity’s cheeks flushed red and she jerked her head down toward the cauldron to save her dignity from the peering eyes that were drawn by Luz’s loud voice. Her brown hair barely covered any of the blush that painted her face as the witch cleared her throat and looked away from her girlfriend.
“M-maybe if I can get a team together.”
“Willow!”
“Oh no,” the plant witch denied with a shake of her head. “That one time was plenty for me.”
Luz whined pitifully and Willow snickered at the pout she was given. She left Amity to deal with her girlfriend. A flash of orange had caught her attention anyway.
“Morning Boscha.”
The pink witch jerked, arms tightened around the pot that contained an overflowing vampire pumpkin. Hollow’s leaves curled in at the motion, the fangs on the magic pumpkin snapped instinctually and Boscha hissed as she pried her sleeve out of the plant’s mouth. Willow smothered the chuckle that had threatened to slip past her lips. Boscha’s fangs may have dulled in the months since she bared her soul to Willow in that empty room, but her tongue still lashed like a whip at anyone daft enough to test her. Besides, Willow had no desire to give the witch a reason to snap and scowl all day (and burn in her guilt afterwards).
Boscha regained her composure, Hollow sagged her arms down due to its ever-increasing size. Pink hair flew as the witch tossed it out of the way and looked at Willow apprehensively.
“Hey…”
Willow waited to see if the grudgby captain would add anything else. After a moment had passed with only Hollow’s insistent snapping at the fabric of Boscha’s sleeve to fill the void, the plant witch moved forward.
“How are you?” Willow asked as Boscha hefted the plant up.
“Fine,” Boscha mumbled and kept her eyes locked on her pumpkin. Her eyes peeked Willow’s downturned lips and she huffed, “Or I will be.”
Boscha curled around her plant, letting Hollow’s billowing leaves hide her face away. Willow kept the disappointed huff of air quiet and drew in the chilled autumn morning. With a patient smile, the plant witch ran a magic laced hand over the surface of Hollow’s gourd. She gave the pumpkin a satisfied pat and a small scattering of magic plumped up the leaves.
“They’re getting too damn big,” Boscha supplied when Willow pulled away and hefted the plant up once more. “And they won’t eat anymore… Tany said that it’s time-”
“Time for a re-pot,” Willow agreed with a nod. “Would… would you like me to help?” she asked quietly and waited. Waited for the snapping fangs or the blustered denials. But Boscha simply nodded and hugged her plant closer to her. Willow smothered the happy smile that tried to spread across her face- she knew it’d send Boscha scrambling away.
“Can you… during lunch?” Boscha asked and kept her gaze focused on the pointed fangs of her plant. “I- Dad wants me to see Lissa today.”
“No problem. Meet me in the plant homeroom. I can take Hollow there if you want,” Willow offered and opened her arms to take the heavy vampire pumpkin. Her arms dropped when Boscha took a harsh step back.
“No. It’s fine. I’ll see you later, Petals,”
“Wait we could… walk to history,” Willow trailed off as Boscha pushed past her. She watched as the grudgby player barreled through the other students. Luz popped up beside the plant witch, Amity not far behind, and the three watched Boscha almost slam a freshman in the face as she magiced the door open.
Boscha was face down on the desk when Willow entered their shared history class. Hollow rested at the witch’s feet and, as Willow sat down, she noticed that Boscha would rub at the large flat leaves. Each breath that Boscha took was measured and held before it was released and Willow feels her heart leaden at the sight.
It was a bad day.
“Boscha?” Willow asked gently and tapped the table to draw her attention.
The plant witch wanted to hug her, but touching Boscha when she felt so raw was the equivalent of running out into boiling rain. She tried once, in the days following that quick kiss on the bench when the potions witch looked ready to let Hollow swallow her, and received spit on her glasses from the hissing and an angry witch seconds away from burning away her cowl. Boscha apologized (it took three attempts around the voice cracking with frustrated tears). Apologized and scratched at her blistering skin, raw from the chaos in her head. Willow just smiled and said she’d ask to touch her first next time.
“Boscha?” Willow started again. “I’ll let you borrow my notes after class if you’d like?”
Boscha nodded and her weary eyes blinked at Willow. Her cheeks darkened at the gentle smile and she swirled to face the other direction. Willow bit back her amused huff of air.
Willow waved Boscha into the plant homeroom as the lunch bell yelled around them. The few stragglers in the room tensed like prey watching a predator pass by. Willow understood why, calmed or not, Boscha was still one of the harshest witches that ever prowled Hexside. That reputation followed her like a shadow and stretched over her on her bad days. Towered over the school and did not let anyone forget that Boscha had been the hungriest of devourers that craved to tear into hearts. There were times in the past, usually after Willow helped Luz clean the marker off her face or fix the tears in her own uniform, that Willow wondered why Boscha never transferred to Glandus where she would’ve been free to tear out throats. By their last year at Hexside, as Willow watched Boscha gently pet the leaves of the vampire pumpkin she meticulously cared for, Willow had discovered that the ferocious mauling she did to others was her attempt to feed the festering parasite in her head. Realized that the pink girl’s fangs really had just been thorns trying to keep all the bad at bay and that the pricks had overgrown to the point that they pierced Boscha’s own flesh.
Boscha’s pruning skills had improved over that past year, the time between her nervous returning of Willow's jackal ladder and that year's Harvest Moon. She had cut through the overgrowth- pruned away the festering in her soul to help the new growth sprout. Willow knew that there were times Boscha couldn’t prune enough- that despite her efforts, the bad things overgrew and tried to strangle all the growth she’s managed. The days where Boscha growled and bit at anyone who came too close and then tore herself to shreds because she just couldn't stop herself. Days where she glazed over and moved stiffly or not at all as the weight of everything burdened her. But no one dared to call Boscha the type of witch to roll over, and with Lissa’s words to guide her, she pruned back the illness that invaded her head.
“We doing this Petals?” Boscha asked, snappy as ever and the tone scared the last few curious students out of the room.
“Yup!” Willow chirped and shook the thoughts of growth and how Hollow’s green leaves framed the pink witch so nicely out of her head. “I found a new pot but…” the witch looked between the overflowing pumpkin and the new pot she set aside on the ground. “I don’t know how you’re going to bring them home.”
“Don’t insult me,” Boscha snarked but the words had no bite as she accepted the trowel handed to her. “If I can carry a teammate under each arm, I can get Hollow home.”
They managed to transfer Hollow and their entire root system to the new pot. The movements were gentle, gentle hands pulled and gentle touches patted down dirt. Boscha rolled her eyes when Willow revealed some paints but grabbed at them when the plant witch feigned putting them away. They spent the lunch hour nibbling on sandwiches and decorating Hollow’s new house with bright colored shapes and Boscha let Willow paint little hearts around the rim.
The harvest moon glowed like another sun in the night sky that night. It cast the entire festival in blues, swallowing up even the glow of the candles. Willow played the third wheel after Gus got called to help his father. She nibbled at candied apples and even its sweetness couldn’t compare to Amity and Luz competing to get the other the bigger stuffed animal.
“Hey, Petals!”
Willow’s ears twitched at the sound, confused as it wasn’t called in the normal voice. The entire group turned to see Skara with a mad grin spread across her face. The bard witch had one hand twisted in Boscha’s grudgby jacket- the grip the only thing that held the potion’s witch in place. The first thing Willow noticed about Boscha was the dark face paint that accented her eyes. The second was the small jackal’s ladder clutched in the girl’s hands.
“You have your jackal.”
Boscha straightened up like lightning struck her and the tawny yellow petals of the small bloom in her hands seemed to saturate just enough to draw the eyes of the others. Skara snickered quietly and dodged Boscha’s attempt to step on her foot.
“ Every game,” Skara revealed with a wink. “It’s like her good luck charm. Anyway, want to join the team? One of the girls threw up on the molar coaster and is still hurling chunks.”
“We didn’t come for Petals!” Boscha hissed, “We came for Blight.”
“But Willow’s really good, don’t you remember?”
“I don’t play, really,” Willow stated to soothe the growls that had started to escape Boscha as her friend pushed all her buttons.
Amity relented and filled up the missing spot on Boscha’s roster after Luz’s pleas finally chipped away at her reluctance. The Blight ignored how King begrudgingly handed Eda a handful of snails when she took the field. Willow and Luz settled into the bleachers and Gus rejoined them, bemoaning his father making him work on his night off.
Grudgby is a place where Boscha’s new growth bloomed beautifully if you asked Willow, and anyone who disagreed could go stand in boiling rain for all the plant witch cared. You saw it in the way Boscha carried herself, not biting at the bit to tear into the enemy but with an excited bounce to her feet as she tossed the ball between her hands and a serene grin that pulled at her lips. Her team was fluid instead of stiff, moved around each other easily even when Amity disturbed their normalcy. Boscha no longer barked orders at her teammates, she guided them into position and knew when to pull herself back if it meant pushing the team forward.
Luz shouted in glee when Boscha propelled Amity forward with a plant spell (one that Willow taught her) and the Blight swung the ball into the goal as the timer buzzed. Hooty was pushed aside as the three made it to the victorious team and Gus and Willow groaned in unison when Luz launched onto Amity’s back. Skara handed Boscha her jackal’s ladder, the tawny petals a bright gold and the iridescent stamen reflected the moonlight onto the witch’s face. Willow paused at the sight, her heart leaped into her throat as the captain is dogpiled by her teammates, but they're all careful of the pot in Boscha's hands. When Boscha denied the trophy, arms already full, and Skara held it up for the team instead, Willow pulled out her scroll.
“Guys, look over here!”
Willow happily posted the picture to her Penstagram as Skara offered to buy everyone a celebratory round of apple blood. Her glass of apple blood swirled in its container as she watched Boscha push Skara off her and, when she met eyes with the victorious grudgby player, she smiled at the flush that spread across Boscha’s cheeks.
“Hey Willow,” Skara called out with a giggle and ignored Boscha’s demand to ‘shut the fuck up’. The bard witch smiled over the rim of her (spiked) apple blood. “What do you think about rewarding our lovely captain? She really likes those flowers in your hair.”
“I told you not to give her any. Skara’s a fucking lightweight,” Boscha scolded Eda and snarled when the old witch just shrugged in amusement. With an embarrassed grunt, she looked back at Willow, “Ignore this dumbass.”
Willow took one of the purple lilacs twisted into her hair and offered it to Boscha with a sweet smile, “You know I have better ones at my family’s gardens. I’ll take you when we’re both free. These don’t match your eyes enough.”
Boscha hissed at Skara’s obnoxious cooing, but her jackal’s ladder shined a little brighter and spread little rainbows across her face.
Boscha powers down her scroll. The lack of light makes her blink her eyes to readjust, but she expertly places it into its spot on the table next to Hollow. The jackal ladder next to the pumpkin shines in the moonlight, its pot surrounded by a tower of plant books. With a tired yawn, eyes sore from staring at endless streams of photos, the witch slips into the warm bed and smiles as the lights turn off.