Archive of Our Own

They were stood up at grom.

One of them would have been bad enough, but both of them? They hoped that the universe would give them a semblance of peace, but no. The one night they’d been looking forward to for so long was ruined because they're stupid dates had decided that they weren’t worth they’re time.

And annoyingly, Mittens seemed to have had quite the successful night.

Edric was of course proud of his sister, how could he not be? Becoming grom queen was no easy feat and doing it with her crush, (Both of the twins knew about that. Amity wasn't exactly being subtle) made her even happier.

But as Amity flocked around with Luz, the twins had wordlessly sat on the bleachers, eyes darting to the door every two seconds, hoping their dates would miraculously arrive at any moment.

They never came. 

This seriously sucked.

Edric’s jacket draped over Emira’s shoulders, they’d moved outside to the stairs of the school, looking into the forest nearby sulking about how shitty their situation was. Though Edric was primarily pissed off, Emira had tears in her eyes and had curled up in a ball as she sat by his side.

“Did we do something?”

“Don’t think so. They’re probably just jerks.” Edric scoffed.

Emira sighed, burying her face in her legs, “But she seemed so nice! If she didn’t want to go out with me she could have just said no…” 

“Yeah…” Edric said, keeping his eyes glued on the forest, “I suppose it could have ended up worse. Imagine if one of our dates would have shown up and not the other. Now that would have been uncomfortable.”

He meant that. If his date had showed up and Emira’s hadn't he’d probably spent more time with her than him. He would of course try his best to make a good impression, but making sure Emira was okay was more important to him.

But instead of Emira smiling, she looked up and shot him a glare, “I’d prefer her to have shown up and yours to not have rather than this. Instead it's just us again. Just like always.” 

Her tone was bitter and Edric couldn't help but feel a bit hurt at her words. He remembered when they were younger and he used to think of life as him and Emira versus the world and that they'd be twins together forever. And even if Edric still wanted that, Emira seemed to be trying to distance herself from that idea.

She wasn’t distancing herself from him per say, but Edric had noticed her actively trying to befriend more people without him.

He knew it was selfish, but Edric didn’t want things to change. He wanted the two of them to keep sharing. Friends, clothes, hobbies, their lives.

But seeing Emira glaring at him, he couldn't tell her that. And besides, he suspected she already knew.

“Ah, well, personally, I like us.” he chuckled, standing up “C’mon, we should probably get going. Mittens is going to be very full of herself when we get back, so a bit of teasing would be fun, don’t you think?” offering her his hand, Emira reluctantly took it, pulling herself to her feet with a huff.

Before the two of them could even start walking, a faint rustling sound could be heard from the bushes. Then a louder one. And then a crash. The wind hurling around could be heard as a griffin flew through the trees, knocking many out of the way and branches and leaves flying everywhere.

The twins hardly had time to process what had just happened as the griffin came to a screeching halt in front of them and a person riding it jumped of it’s back and ran over, panic written all over her face.

Edric immediately recognized her as Viney, Emira’s absentee date.

“Omygosh, I’m so sorry!” She said, brushing stray branches out of her brown hair in a hurry, “Puddles got distracted on the way and got real hurt and then he freaked out and I had to heal him but he was still so disoriented and I just couldn't control him and-”  the girls rambling was cut short as she began frantically looking between the twins and the scenery.

“Did I… miss grom?” she said slowly, lowering her hands from her hair.

Edric found his stomach clenching up as he looked between the two girls. Emira hadn't been stood up. Her grom date had just been late. Granted, late enough to have missed the whole thing, but she still managed to arrive.

And then there was Edric, dateless and watching his sister's face light up as Viney’s expression morphed in embarrassment.

“Oh no, I did, didn't I!” Viney said, burying her face in her arms, “I’m so sorry! Oh wow, I’m a horrible person!” 

Emira laughed as she casually handed Edric his jacked back, “Hey, don't worry! Grom may be over, but this night sure isn't. Are you willing to make it up to me?” 

Viney’s cheeks flushed red as Emira picked a stray branch from the other girl’s hair, “I- Yeah, of course! But, wow… I really screwed up there...” 

All of Emira’s past complaint’s seemed to be lost as she slung her arm over Viney’s shoulder and grinned, “I’d love a ride from a griffin.”

A reluctant expression overtook Viney’s face for a moment before shrugging, “You know what, sure! But I will have to stop in between though. Puddles is a bit tired from rushing over here.” 

Emira grinned as Viney helped her climb up onto the griffin before following her.

“Hey, Ed,” his sister said, turning to him, “You can head home. I’ll be out the rest of the night! And like you said, someone’s gonna have to tease Amity.”

And with that, she rested her head on the back of Viney’s neck as the griffin's wings spread, soaring into the night sky.

Edric didn’t know how to feel.

He was jealous of his sisters. Amity’s night seemed to be near perfect and even though Emira’s had a rocky start, it seemed to be heading in all the right directions.

And where did that leave him?

He gritted his teeth in frustration as his eyes once again found their way to the forest. 

The shortest way to Blight manner was to just walk the normal road. It was the route the siblings took every day before school. But for some reason, Edric didn't feel like going that way.

Instead, he made his way to the forest, entering it through the large hole Puddles had opened up.

He’d been in there before, obviously, but never when it was this dark. Him and Emira occasionally snuck out during night time, but they tended to stick to the city when they caused mischief. The forest could be legitimately dangerous.

But Edric wasn't feeling all too concerned for his safety at the moment. Heck, he’d welcome some danger right about now. At least that could make him forget about this stupid Grom thing.

Looking back, he couldn't see the school in the distance anymore, the darkness having enveloped him.

He knew that since it was close to the building, this part of the forest was relatively safe, so Edric wasn’t scared.

At least, that's what he told himself.

He was seriously starting to regret his decision when the trees had almost fully enveloped the sky. He’d hoped for the moonlight to guide him to the manor but if this continued, he’d get lost for sure.

An illusion would probably be the best right now. He could conjure a lamp or something.

Stopping to cast the spell, Edric froze in his tracks as he heard rustling coming from somewhere near him. 

Turning around to investigate the noise, he suddenly found himself getting swept off his feet and pushed harshly to the ground. He didn’t even have time to scream as he felt a single foot standing down on his chest to keep him in place and a blinding red light enveloping his vision.

Blinking a couple of times to adjust his sight, he saw the faint silhouette of his attacker above him.

His face was obscured by his cloak but Edric could confidently guess that he was taller than this guy. He was also fairly certain that what was being pointed at him was a magic staff of some kind.

Edric should probably have panicked. He was pinned down and being held completely at the mercy of this stranger, but before he could stop himself, he let out a small chuckle, “Oh wow. Looks like I’ve fallen for you.”

Sure, that was definitely not the right thing to say, but damn if he was going to waste such a perfect opportunity to use that pickup line. 

The person above him seemed to be caught off guard as they stiffened up, the red light diminishing a little. “You-” he started, voice confused before cutting himself off. That was definitely a male voice. 

He seemed to regain his composure however, when Edric felt him putting more pressure on his chest. “This is no time for playing around. Why were you following me?” he asked Edric, his tone serious. 

“Following you…? I was just walking home!” Edric defensively. He wanted to make the most of this situation, but if he pissed the stranger off, there was no way of knowing how merciful he would be.

That said, Edric knew his fair share of illusion magic, so if it came down to it, he could create quite the show that could give him a chance to run away. 

But honestly, Edric didn’t want to. This night had been nothing but disappointing so maybe he could try to have some fun with this.

The stranger stayed quiet for some time, seeming to ponder what to do now. Edric was sure at least a few minutes had passed before he made a move, carefully stepping off Edric’s chest. It only now occurred to him that the other boy’s shoes seemed quite muddy.

Great. He’d just gotten this suit and it was already ruined. He didn’t even want to think about the state of his back and hair after laying on the forest ground.

The other boy seemed oblivious to Edric’s current fashion conundrum as he took a step back before laying his eyes on Edric, “You seem harmless enough I suppose. This appears to have just been a case of misunderstanding.”

With the glow from his staff lighting up the strangers face, Edric could finally see it properly. And holy hell had Edric not been prepared.

The stranger was wearing a mask, which would explain why Edric had such a hard time seeing it (Not because he needed glasses. Edric Blight did not need glasses.).

But what really threw him off was that he recognized this mask. Practically everyone did.

“Wait- The golden guard??? ” he cried as soon as he got over his initial shock.

The guard seemed amused at his reaction, placing a hand on his hip and tilting his head, “Of course you’d recognize me. And you must now realize that as the emperor's right hand man I suggest you do as I say.”

Now, there were many emotions that Edric could have felt in this situation. Fear, panic, reservation. But for some reason, he was excited 

The golden guard? Genius teen prodigy. He’d heard his name come up at dinner quite often when his parents were discussing the emperor's coven. Dinner had a ‘speak only when spoken to’ rule, so Edric tended to listen in on his parents' conversations quite a bit. He was glad that he did because otherwise he would definitely not have recognized the boy in front of him.

But the important thing to Edric was that he was still salty that both of his sisters got to have their perfect little date while he sulked alone. So a boy around his age showing up out of nowhere? Who cares if he was part of the emperor's coven, Edric was taking his chance.

Getting over his initial shock, a mischievous grin spread across Edrics face, “Oh? And what is it that you want me to do?”

The guard didn’t seem to have completely thought his threat through as he put his hand to his chin, looking down in consideration, “Leave, I suppose? I’m on my way to the back from a mission and I don’t want you following me.” he said, turning around and starting to walk away.

Oh, hell no. One little thing about Edric Blight. When he had a plan, no matter how stupid, he intended to follow through with it.

“Oh,” Edric tilted his head, “Well that’s a shame. Because you look like you need some company! And I would be honored to join the emperor's right hand man for a late night stroll.”

That seemed to catch the other boy off guard as he halted, turning around to look at Edric again, “What? No. I quite literally just said that I didn't want you following me.”

“Well too bad! Because you just earned yourself a travel buddy!” Edric said as he strolled over to the unmoving guard, lifting his arm to playfully to elbow him only for the boy in question to violently jerk away and point his staff at Edric again, “What are you doing?!”

Edric blinked, “I was just going to elbow you?”

The guard lowered his staff, keeping his eyes locked on Edric, “Elbow me? What do you mean by that?”

“Ah, It's like a playful gesture, you know? You upset me but like… not that badly and then I elbow you as a joke!” He said, “I do it to my sister all the time. Well, her more than me, but still.”

The guard’s stiff posture loosened up slightly, being replaced by a more grumpy stance, “I don’t have time for this.” he said, trailing away for the third time, quickening his pace this time.

Edric jogged to keep up with him, prompting the guard to send him a nasty look, (Edric at least assumed it was a nasty look. He couldn't really see anything under that mask.) but not telling him to leave.

At the least, he had that going for him. 

“Name's Edric Blight.” He extended a hand that was promptly ignored.

***

Hunter didn’t have friends.

It wasn’t so much that he avoided making them, he simply didn’t have the time to. He was working 24\7 and all his free time was devoted to either sleeping or trying to find some way to cure the emperor's condition. Usually the latter.

The only person he’d ever been close to was his uncle and he didn’t have any plans on changing that.

So the situation he found himself in was an oddity to say the least.

Edric Blight seemed quite keen on being Hunter’s friend. At least, that’s what Hunter assumed he wanted, as he could see no other reason for the boy’s sudden interest in him. Unless he was trying to lower Hunter's guard and then attack and\or try to get info out of him. 

He could never fully relax around anyone. As a high-ranking coven official, people would try to use him to gain information on the Emperor's coven. With the added bonus of Kikimora's weekly assassination attempts, Hunter had learned to never trust people he didn't know.

Which was mainly what confused Hunter about Edric. They'd been walking for at least half an hour at this point and all the questions that Edric had asked seemed so innocent.

“What’s your favorite color?”

“Why is your name the golden guard? ”

“Why do you wear that mask?”

“Could you take the mask off?”

“Do you have a special someone?”

To all of those questions, Hunter had given a half-baked answer, not wanting to disclose any info.

“Red.”

“I didn’t pick it myself.”

“To stay undercover.”

“No.”

“I don’t have time for things like that.”

Edric’s grin seemed to have doubled at the last answer.

He had half the mind to tell Edric to buzz off, but for some reason, he didn’t. The boy seemed genuinely interested in him, which was something Hunter had never experienced before. So call it curiosity that he kept Edric around. It’s not like he’d ever see him again.

He’d just arrived from a pretty standard mission. To stand guard near the forest if the Grom ceremony at Hexide went south. The emperor had made it clear that stepping in to intervene was an absolute last resort, so Hunter hadn’t been paying too much attention.

What he had found strange however was that the ceremony seemed to also have been a school dance of sorts. Why the school would host a dance for defeating a creature that personifies your biggest fear was beyond Hunter.

It was clear that Edric just came from that dance as he was wearing a neat suit. Well, it wasn't really neat anymore as there was a foot-shaped blob of mud where Hunter had stepped on top of him.

Yeah, Hunter may have overreacted a bit there, but could you blame him? There usually aren't people wandering around in forests in the middle of the night.

After a few more rounds of pointless questioning Edric had gone silent. It unnerved Hunter a bit since before that, the boy seemed to be going at it non-stop with the questioning. Hunter tried to enjoy the most likely temporary silence for a few seconds before sighing and looking over at Edric.

The boy had a thoughtful pout on his face as he looked around the forest. Noticing Hunter's staring, he plastered a smile back on his face and gave a light chuckle, “You like what you see?”

“I- What?”

“Oh nothing. I was just wondering where we were.” Edric said as he shrugged. 

Hunter stopped dead in his tracks and looked around. He didn’t recognize this place one bit. 

They were lost.

Hunter could feel the anger creeping up on him. He’d gotten distracted by Edric’s stupid questioning and had stopped paying attention to where he was going. The trees here were much thicker, obscuring the sky completely so the only light they had was Hunter’s staff.

Edric seemed to have noticed the shift in the other boy’s mood and took a step back, “You… actually don’t know where we are?”

“I would have if you hadn’t been blabbering the whole time!” Hunter snapped.

“What? How is this my fault!? I was following you!”

“And because of you I got distracted!” 

Edric’s face warped with worry, but Hunter didn’t pick up on a trace of guilt. Great. This was just fantastic. He’d promised emperor Belos to be back as soon as possible if everything went well. But who knows what this part of the forest was like. 

Ignoring Edric’s gaze, Hunter turned and started briskly walking away. He knew the other boy would follow him whether he liked it or not, so he didn’t bother telling him off. But Hunter’s number one priority now was finding a way back. 

Taking a deep breath he tried to recall the way he came from. He was prepared for situations like this. Many of his field missions included going to places he’d never been to before. The emperor usually gave him some sort of map for them but there were occasions where Hunter couldn’t rely on them.

Lifting his staff, Hunter quickly cast a spell, illuminating the area fully, engulfing it in red light. There was nothing noteworthy at first glance, but upon closer inspection, Hunter noticed faint markings in the dirt, crouching down on one knee, he noticed Edric following his example and staring intently at the ground. 

“It’s a footprint… right? From some animal?” He noted, stroking his hand over the print. Hunter watched him closely, every move as he lifted his hand and stared at the dirt on his fingertips for just a few seconds. Then he shrugged, “I got nothing. Will this help us get back somehow?”

Hunter shook his head, reluctantly tearing his gaze away from the other boy, “No. I was just checking something. This print seems very fresh, right?”

Edric took a few seconds to process Hunter’s words but when he did it was like a lightbulb went off in his head, “Oh! You mean… whatever this is might be close, right?” he looked around uneasily, “But hey! You're like… super powerful, yeah! If it finds us, I’m sure we'll be fine!”

“Well, yeah, of course. But it’s good to be on guard if there’s any danger. But just so you know, if it comes down to it, you're on your own.”

Edric shrugged, “I can handle myself. But right now, I’m hoping for you to find a way back.”

“Way back where?” Hunter groaned “I’m heading to the Emperors castle, but I have no reason to believe that you're going there too.”

Edric quickly stood up, prompting Hunter to do the same, “I can find my way back from there. Blight manor isn’t too far away.” He brushed off, “Now, I am going to have to be home by 8 or my mom’s going to kill me. So you should probably start leading the way back.”

“I’m not your guide and I don’t care about your mom.” Hunter snapped, “But yes, I’ll cast a spell that’ll reveal the path we took.”

Raising his staff to cast it, Hunter hesitated. His attention was drawn to a nearby tree. It’s rustling seemed to have increased significantly compared to the others.

Redirecting his staff closer to the tree, Hunter was vaguely aware of Edric’s confused look directed at him. 

Peering his eyes to get a better view of the darkness behind the trees, Hunter’s vision was cut off by a sudden flash of movement as he was shoved by a strong force. He rolled through the dirt scraping his hands and feet as he did and landing harshly up against a tree. 

Looking up, he could see his attacker standing closely. A bearlike blue beast demon, growling loudly, like it just stumbled upon a five star meal.

Hunter noticed Edric freeze up as he stood right within leaping range for the beast.

Rushing quickly back up to his feet, Hunter reached for his staff to seize the beast upon realizing with horror that his staff had rolled away to the other side of the clearing when he had been thrown.

The newfound darkness obscured Hunter from the view of the beast, but the staff's light seemed to be doing a great job illuminating Edric, giving the beast a grade-A view of him.

Edric seems unsure of what to do, holding up his hand, prepared to cast a spell. The beast was approaching slowly, eyeing Edric up and down, seemingly trying to decide if he was a worthy meal or not. 

Edric glanced over to Hunter, “Hey, golden guard, could you-WOAH!” he was cut off mid-sentence as the beast pounced, claws out, clearly aiming to kill. Edric made a desperate escape attempt, throwing himself in Hunter's direction as quickly as he could. 

He wasn’t quick enough.

The beast's claws grazed his ankle and Hunter could see the blood immediately. Edric gave a pained cry as he landed on the ground, head-first, curling up into a ball as he grabbed ahold of his leg.

Hunter sprung into action as soon as he saw the beast turn back to Edric, ready to deal the final blow. He may not have any magic, but he wasn’t going to let Edric die on him today.

Funny. A few hours ago Hunter would have gladly sacrificed Edric’s life to save his own. He supposes that Edric’s impression might have been stronger than he initially had thought.

Whatever it was, Hunter ran across the clearing shielding Edric from the blow. He had no plans on dying himself, of course, but he had armor and Edric didn’t. 

Feeling the beast's claws graze across his mask, Hunter knew he'd vastly underestimated its strength. The mask was torn with a defining screech as soon as the claws made contact and Hunter could feel the air on his face, the claws moving a millimeter from touching him.

Okay. Change of plan.

The beast’s attention seemed to have entirely shifted to Hunter as he made a run for his staff. It swung again, but Hunter was prepared this time. Rolling down on the ground he leapt to his feat as it swung at the air where he’d previously been. Being powerless without it, Hunter had been trained in all sorts of combat if he ever lost his staff. He’d thought it was dumb most of the time, but it seemed to be quite practical in the situation he found himself in. 

Stretching his hand out as far as he could, he felt his fingertips brush the shaft of his staff. Grabbing a hold of it as fast as he could, Hunter whirled around and pointed it at the beast, expecting it to be right in front of him. Instead, it seemed to have it’s attention focused elsewhere, away from the two boys.

A similar beast, more wolf-like and green, stood in front of it, baring its fangs as it paced in front of the bear-like one, seemingly taunting it. 

Hunter’s eyes shot over to Edric. The boy seemed to be supporting himself with his left arm, a strained expression crossing his face. His right arm was glowing, index finger pointed at the two beasts.

‘He’s casting an illusion’ Hunter realized.

And sure enough, Hunter could see the wolf-beast’s frame flickering, as if it was having a hard time holding itself together. 

Hunter raised his staff, pointing it at the bear-beast, and casting a spell. Red threads emerged all around it, and before the beast could even process what was going on, entangled and pinned it to the ground. It gave a large roar as it struggled to get out of its bonds, but Hunter had no doubt that it would hold it for at least an hour.

The wolf-beast immediately disappeared into smoke and Hunter turned his attention back to Edric.

The boy was giving him a thumbs up, a big smile spread across his face.

“That was so cool dude- Ouch-” He breathed as Hunter propped him up against a tree to inspect the scope of his injuries. Edric didn’t seem delirious in any way, so his head injury clearly wasn’t bad. It would definitely leave a bump though. What Hunter was primarily focused on  were the three claw-marks, spread across his ankle, all bleeding, but one clearly bigger than the others.

“It got me good.” Edric laughed, “I don’t suppose you know any healing magic or…?”

“Hold still.” Hunter snapped. After a moment of deliberation, Hunter removed his cape, ripping it in half. He curled it up and pressed it against Edric’s leg, drawing a pained hiss from the boy. 

“This is going to hurt.”

Edric bit his lip as Hunter went to work, pressing the one half of his cape up against his leg, while wrapping the other around it as tightly as he could. 

“Good,” he said, inspecting his work, “You should put on some proper bandages when you're home. You might not be able to walk for a few day’s.”

Fishing around in his pocket, Hunter pulled out a magic enhancing sticker from the healing coven and slapped it on Edric’s leg. He could see the relief flood over the boy's face immediately.

“Couldn't you have done that before patching me up? It would have hurt way less, you know.”

“You can’t let magic interfere with first aid until the bandages are fully in place. That’s basic stuff.” Hunter said, glaring at Edric, “And besides, I had to put the sticker on top of my bandaging job.”

“Yeah, um… thanks, by the way.” Edric said, letting out a small chuckle. He reached for Hunter’s face and playfully flicked his stray strand of hair. Hunter slapped his hand away, “What are you doing?”

“Your face is cute. Rude of you to hide it for so long.”

Hunter stood up, turning away from Edric to hide the faint flush painting his cheeks. The act was probably unnecessary since their only source of light was bright red, but Hunter didn't care.

He’d been surprised at how… worried he’d been when Edric got hurt. He hadn’t particularly cared for the boy during they’re walk, but seeing him get injured made his blood boil.

Looking back on it, no one had really tryin getting to know Hunter as anything more than their superior in the coven. There was of course his uncle, but he was family. He was supposed to know Hunter.

But Edric had been the first person who seemed genuinely interested in befriending him.

Letting out a deep, almost exaggerated sigh, he turned around and draped Edric’s hand over his shoulder, not noticing the boy’s surprise at the act. “I’ll carry you home, okay.”

His staff in Hunter’s left hand, he quickly casted a spell, revealing they're previous footsteps in glowing red light. It was a spell he tried his best to avoid using as it could easily let people follow him, but Hunter thought the situation was dire enough to justify its use.

 Edric snickered, “Wow, so you're my knight in shining armor now, huh. Carrying me home and all.”

“I’m not a knight, I’m a guard. And no, this is nothing like that. I’m just helping you out because I don’t want you dying out here alone.”

Sparing a quick glance at the beast, he noticed it still thrashing around in it’s bonds. Hunter wasn’t sure if animals could glare, but if they could, the beast was giving Hunter the major stink-eye right now.

“Thanks… for earlier… I guess.” he said.

Edric gave him a confused look, “For what?”

“Earlier… you distracted the beast-demon. I probably wouldn't have gotten to my staff in time if you didn’t”

“Oh, that.” Edric said, winching slightly as Hunter started walking, following the illuminated footsteps, “That was just some basic illusion magic. I usually don’t panic like that.”

Hunter raised an eyebrow, “Then why did you panic now.”

Edric seemed to hesitate to answer, tearing his gaze away from Hunter, “I was alone… well, you were there too of course, but… It’s always me and Emira, you know. She’s my twin sister, by the way. We always do stuff together. Especially stuff like this. But since she wasn’t there tonight, I, well...” the boy trailed off, leaving his last words up in the open.

“You sound close.” Hunter huffed.

“Oh, yes. Very. But recently… Like today at grom! I suggested going together as twins, but Emira insisted on getting separate dates. I was excited of course, but then both of us got stood up and I thought ‘Oh, at least we got stood up together,’ but then her date showed up at the last minute and I got a bit annoyed so I decided to walk home through the woods and then I ran… Okay I guess saying you ran into me would be more accurate, and I thought, hey, here’s my chance to get...” 

Hunter almost tripped out of shock.

“You were trying to get a date out of me?!”

Edric stayed quiet for a few seconds before mumbling a quick “Maybe” he looked Hunter in the eye, “But if you don’t want that, that’s fine! I’m just happy I managed to befriend the golden guard himself!”

“Who said we were-” Hunter cut himself off.  Edric seemed sincere in his confession. That despite Hunter’s best efforts of brushing off the boy’s curiosity, he considered him a friend after only a few hours? To be fair, Edric seemed like the kind of guy who befriended people easily, but that didn’t change the facts for Hunter.

What would happen if he acknowledged Edric as a friend? Would he have to spend time with him? See him after missions? See him ON missions? Hunter had no clue how this thing worked.

Sighing, he decided to just go along with it and see how things played out. “Yeah. I guess you’d think that’d be cool.”

Edric’s gaze lingered on Hunter as he trudged through the forest. Edric occasionally helped support himself with his other leg. He could feel Edric winching in pain from now and then and leaning closer to Hunter.

Hunter tried not to think about how it made him feel.

The small talk was nice. Hunter was surprised that Edric hadn't even brought up his position in the emperor's coven or anything relating to it. Instead of asking questions, he mostly talked about himself. His siblings, parents, school life. Hunter occasionally piped in with questions that Edric had seemed eager to answer. Hunter suspected that Edric was talking this much to distract himself from the pain. Not that Hunter minded. He was actually enjoying the conversation.

There were a few moments where Hunter got ahead of himself and started rambling in response to whatever it was that Edric said, cutting himself off every time when he realized what he was doing. Edric would laugh at him like he was some sort of cute animal doing a trick, but for some odd reason, Hunter wasn’t offended.

As soon as Hunter recognized the area they were in, he turned off the spell. It was quite risky to have it cast for so long. Edric called him paranoid. Hunter called him an idiot.

The boy pointed him towards their house, leading Hunter the right way every time there was a turn. 

In time, he could see Blight manor looming over them in the distance.

Edric had gone silent as Hunter trudged uphill. Stopping by the doorframe, Hunter propped him up by the door, close enough so he’d be able to knock without much issue. 

“So…” he said, “Just… make sure to change the bandages too, well, actual bandages. I need to leave now. Can’t keep the coven waiting.”

“Wait.” Hunter felt Edric grab his hand before he could run off, “I know I have a pen on me somewhere.” He used his free arm to pat himself down until eventually pulling out a blue ben from his jacket pocket.

Lifting up Hunter’s sleeve, he quickly scribbled something down on his arm. Hunter looked at it hesitantly, “What is this?”

“The number to my crystal ball! If you’d be willing to call me when you're not working to hang out or something… you know. Maybe I could convince you to go on that date.” Edric said smugly and Hunter could feel the blush creeping up on him again. 

“Maybe.”

“Maybe is better than a no! So,” Edric said, “call me, okay.”

Hunter thought it over for a minute. He had minimal free time, but that didn’t mean he had none. Maybe he could spare some for Edric?

“Okay then.” he said, “But I'll have to go. I don’t want anyone seeing me unmasked. Especially not your parents.” 

The other boy looked at him, pouting curiously, “Actually… I never caught your name?”

“...It’s Hunter,” he said quickly.

And before Edric could say any more he sat down on his staff, flying back towards the emperor's castle sparing the number on his wrist a glance, every few seconds.