Luz stepped into a small cave near the edge of the island, hidden by vines. It wasn't perfect, but it'd work for a way to secretly do magic and talk with Belos without anyone catching her.
"Alright, so what are we going to do first?" Luz excitedly asked.
"Well, think of magic like a muscle and doing magic like a workout. You always have to warm up before you do the workout."
"What! But I basically just did a warm up with Eda!" Luz protested, "Come on, let me do some cooler spells!"
"Fine, go on ahead and try doing magic without my advice. Go ahead and do the light spell."
"Okay, easy."
Luz confidently made a spell circle and made a ball of light.
"Now, do a fire spell. You've done it once before, so surely you won't need my help or instruction."
Luz was a bit annoyed at how sarcastic he was being, but just brushed him off.
She took a deep breath and made a small ball of fire that hovered just above her hand.
"Ha! See? I don't need a warm up. I can do perfectly fine on my-"
Luz moved the hand that held the fireball, and it suddenly dropped instantly burning into her hand. She screamed in pain and her mind raced to think of a way to stop it. For a moment she thought of dunking it in the water just off the beach, before remembering the water was boiling and would only make it worse. With no other ideas, Luz drew a spell circle and created a block of ice with a slot to stick her hand inside. The moment her hand was surrounded by the ice, the fire went out and the burning stopped. She took a few deep breaths, letting the cool work around her hand. When she removed her hand from the ice, her palm was streaked with the burn.
Luz felt her breathing froze as she stared at the burn on her hand as she was reminded of her dream, seeing Amity's face scared with fire.
"Luz, breathe. In and out. In and out. In for four, hold for four, out for four. Just breathe."
Luz followed Belos' instructions and, after taking a bit to breathe, sat on the ground. She held her knees to her chest as she stared at her hand. A few tears started to slowly fall down her face.
"This was a mistake. This was a horrible, horrible mistake." Luz whispered, voice shaking.
"And why is that, Little Light?" Belos asked, his calm tone helping soothe Luz.
"Stop saying that you-just, stop calling me that. It was a mistake to not tell Eda about you right away. Magic is way too dangerous for me to try alone."
"But you aren't alone, Luz. The Owl Lady can only teach you so much. As I have said, I too am a human who lived without magic only to gain its power. Nobody else can say that."
"Not even your brother?"
Belos went silent at Luz's comment. She even could have sworn she heard him sadly sigh. A pang of regret hit her. If he was hurt by her comment, he actually has feelings and maybe, maybe he is changing for the better.
Luz felt Belos move from behind her ear, down her neck and arm, and wrap around her hand. He seemed to grow and left a thick green film over the scar as he moved back to his perch behind her ear.
"I shouldn't have let you try to do that spell just because you annoyed me. I'm sorry. If you want to be done for today, that makes sense. However, I know you can do so much, if you'd give me a chance at showing you."
Luz stared at her hand as the green film soaked into her skin. When it was gone, her scar had healed and it looked as if she never got hurt.
"Can we try a different spell? I think we should wait on trying that fire spell again."
"Of course, Luz. We could see if learning your spells in the order you learned them as glyphs will have better results. You did great with that ice spell to cool your hand. Maybe you can see if you can do something else with it? Maybe a simple platform?"
Luz nodded, drew a spell circle and made a platform of ice rise up from the ground. She smiled wide and made another, one slightly bigger. Giddily, she began adding things on top of the platforms, slowly getting more complex. Belos affectionately chuckled at her enthusiasm, which only encouraged Luz more. It wasn't long before she created a whole dining room setup made entirely of ice, including ice food, cutlery, and a vase.
"Your skill, how fast you're able to improve, it's incredible." Belos gasped, "It's a great thing you hadn't yet fully developed your bile sack when we fought during the Day of Unity, or you might have accidentally killed me."
"It's also a great thing you decided not to petrify me, or you would probably be dead or recaptured right now." Luz shrugged, adjusting the plates.
"You have me there Little-I mean-Luz."
Luz smiled at Belos respecting her wishes to stop calling her that nickname. She stepped back and looked at her work. She had a feeling there was something missing.
"Maybe it could use some color?" Belos suggested as if he could read her thoughts.
"Yeah. It could. What do you think it needs?"
"Well, you did make that vase. Maybe you could practice your plant spells? It was the one you learned after ice. Start off simple, practice with some vines, then move to flowers, and after that you can try thorned vines."
Luz was practically giddy with excitement of being able to advance so much faster than she was with Eda. She walked over to the vines covering the cave entrance. She drew a spell circle and made the vines grow. She made them braid together. Then, she made another spell circle that caused flowers to sprout from the vines. She knelt down and made a bouquet of lavender flowers sprout up. She pulled them from the ground and put them in the ice vase on the table.
Luz walked over to the cave entrance and drew one more spell circle, trying to create spiked vines as a defense mechanism. However, when she did, the thorns were small and dull. She tried again, only to get limp vines.
"Why won't it work?" She asked out loud, kicking the limp vine in frustration.
"Luz, feel your forehead." Belos instructed.
Begrudgingly, she did. When she felt it, her hand immediately touched a thin veil of sweat. She pulled up her jacket to wipe her face off, and found it damp.
"Like I said before, using magic is like exercise. And you just did a massive workout. You need rest."
"But I've watched people do plant magic enough I should be able to do the types of things Willow can!"
"Willow Park is a prodigy. If she was a decade or two older, she'd easily be able to replace Terra."
"Except that she isn't a fan of the coven system."
"As I have noticed with your little posse. It's as if everyone you meet gets infected with your free spirit. It's of no consequence to me, of course. As I told you before, I just want to regain my physical form and go back to the human realm. Genocide was, admittedly, extreme. If I could undo the pain and suffering I've caused, I would."
Luz thought for a moment, thinking about what he said. If the others heard what he was telling her, would they believe him? Would they believe her? Is there a way she could prove he's changed?
With that last question, the perfect idea of what she can do to help that would also prove Belos' good intentions hit her.
"Hey Belos, is there any way to take off the sigils?" She asked, messing with the curtain of braided vines she made.
"If you were able to find a branding glove, with my instruction we should be able to find a way to reverse engineer a way to modify the glove to remove sigils."
"And we can save everyone! Emira said that if the sigils get removed, they'll get out of their comas!" Luz excitedly said.
"If you can just find a branding glove, I'll gladly help you. You need all the help you can get to defeat the Collector and with the coven heads being comatose, you don't stand a chance."
Luz paused, staring at the ground.
"Do you regret what you did, Belos?" She quietly asked.
"Yes...and no. It's complicated. Everything I did was because of my beliefs in what is best for humanity. I still believe in that. But how I was raised, that culture I was taught, was closed minded. I know if the draining spell succeeded, I wouldn't have been satisfied. I would never be satisfied. Losing, dying, being reduced to this form...it humbled me. Seeing the human realm once again showed me how archaic my ideals were. But at the same time, my actions helped me meet you. And I wouldn't change anything if it meant I would never have met you. Even if it meant the death of countless witches."
Luz thought about what he said, but didn't respond. Instead, she left the cave and began walking back to the tower so she could rest so she'd have plenty of energy to practice the next day.
As Luz approached the tower, she saw Eda standing in the entrance, arms crossed, and worried looking. She slowly walked over, and braced for the incoming lecture. She glanced at her hand, making sure there was no sign of the burn. Thankfully, whatever Belos did worked great and there was no way to tell she burnt her hand attempting to do a fire spell on her own.
"Luz, where were you?" Eda asked, her stern tone with a slight softness to it.
"I was out on a walk. Everything got kinda stressful, so I thought it'd be a good idea."
Luz expected Eda to start lecturing her, but instead, she pulled her into a tight hug.
"I'm sorry Luz. Not just for how your lesson went, but for yelling at you when you arrived. I've been going through a lot and...you have too. And at times I forget how your way of handling stress looks different than mine. So when I don't see you on edge, I assume you're fine. But clearly I haven't been noticing how you're feeling, and that's probably bad since I'm your caretaker."
Eda pulled back and smiled at Luz. She gently moved a piece of Luz's hair hanging in her face behind her ear.
"I have no idea what I'm doing. I never had to be a teacher. You were always so self sufficient, like Lily. And like my mom, I saw your self sufficiency as a sign you didn't need help. But no matter how much you've done, you're still a kid." Eda paused and chuckled slightly, "So, I'm not going to teach you the way I learned. I'm going to teach you the way that will be most helpful to you, Luz Noceda the human witch."
"No more hour long sessions of just doing one spell?" Luz asked with a small smile.
"Nope! I can't do magic, but I've had it down for decades, so helping you through the ropes shouldn't be too hard. We aren't going to go as fast as you might want, still want you to be safe, but we will go at the pace you can handle. You're a smart kid, kid. I'm sorry for sticking with the same spell over and over. Hey, I just realized, your name means light in Spanish, right? Kinda funny that light was the first spell you learned. Maybe I should start calling you little light or something."
Luz immediately tensed up at the nickname. Eda quickly noticed that she looked uncomfortable and her expression immediately changed from casual to apologetic.
"Kid, is something wrong?" She asked, concerned.
"It's just...that nickname...the only people that call me that are-"
"Hey, hey, it's okay. You don't have to explain yourself. Sorry about that. I had no idea."
Luz gave her a small smile and they walked inside, Eda wrapping an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close.
"You know, there's something you could do that'd be real helpful." Eda said and she led them down a hall Luz hadn't looked around.
"Really, what?" Luz asked, perking up.
Eda chuckled at how excited she was. She pressed her hand against a panel by a door, making it unlock. It clicked open and Eda took Luz inside. When the door shut, Eda turned on the lights. As the light lit up the room, Luz finally took the time to notice that the survivors figured out electric lighting with chains of glyphs and various glyph combos.
Moving on from the lights, Luz looked around the room. Strewn about were maps, lists, charts, and other things. All the maps were covered in pins and notes like "Titan trappers?" or "Check for survivors again?" and such. Eda sat down at a desk and kicked her legs up on the table.
"Welcome to my office." She said with a proud smirk.
Luz walked around, getting closer looks at everything. Even though she was only gone for a few months, Eda had managed to get a lot done in her absence. Eventually, she got over to the desk and saw a massive book. She opened it and, as she flipped through the pages, she realized it was a list.
Every single person at the base, the date of their arrival, who found them, and what condition they were in were all written down. As she looked through the pages, the dates got further and further apart. When Luz saw her own name, it had been two weeks since the last person had been found. She remembered back in the Collector's hideout, seeing all those people. She found them, but didn't, no, couldn't, save them. Then she remembered the request of one of Boscha's moms, Lynn. She looked back through the registry for Boscha or her other mom Jen, but nothing. With a sigh, she closed the book and looked up at Eda, who was now sitting properly at the desk and had an empathetic look on her face.
"Why did you bring me here?" Luz asked quietly.
"Because I need to stop lying to you. I promised I'd stop keeping secrets, and I'm staying true to that. Luz, things aren't going great. Yeah, this hideout has been working wonders and there are no major problems with it, but I'm scared. I've been being looked up to for the first time in my life and I don't know what to do. You were always my moral compass and, in some ways, like a guiding light, leading me to the person I could be. And for 7 months, I was left in the dark. I thought you were dead. Families are missing, people are scared, the Collector is unstoppable, and my friends are in comas.
"You are an amazing, strong, impressive kid that is constantly surprising me. And I'm not telling you this to make you feel guilty for being gone. If you had been here at the beginning, I don't know what I would have done with myself. You came back at a great time because things here are smooth. But kid, I'm so worried.
"We have King back from that god child and you and your friends are here too, but there are so many people who have been taken. Luz people are dying and I can't do anything about it. Not from the Collector, but from suicide, starving themselves, the draining spell, or being found just a bit too late. The draining spell drew magic out of people with sigils bile sacks until they died. So if you didn't have a lot of magic...those kids...I saw...their parents..."
Eda tailed off and began crying. Luz immediately got beside her and hugged her. Eda eventually was able to pull herself together, although Luz didn't leave her side.
"This is a lot to put on you, I know. You're just a kid. But with how things are right now it's your right to know. Golden boy knows all this too. I don't want to keep secrets from you, but I just want to keep you safe. But I can't. I couldn't keep you safe. I wasn't there with you during the day of unity. In the human realm."
"Eda if you had been in the human realm all the people in this tower would be dead." Luz said plainly, "If you were with me during the day of unity the spell wouldn't have been corrupted and would have started working sooner and everyone with a sigil would be dead. You are doing amazing, but it's okay to need help. So, you told me you wanted me to help. What do you want me to help you with?"
Eda let out a single, soft chuckle, wiped away any residual tears, grabbed a map, and rolled it out onto the desk.
"Scouting missions are lonely and after interviewing some people I've found, my flying harpy form gets mistaken for the Collector. So, I want you to help. Plus, I need someone to watch my back thanks to the Titan trappers. We're going to Bonesborough to get supplies and see if we can find anyone. And since we'll be away from people, it's the perfect time to test your magic"
"But what if we do find people? Or if the trappers see?"
"The trappers are lunatics, so who cares, and it's unlikely anyone will even be out there. This is mostly a supply run." Eda shrugged, "So, you in? We can head out tomorrow after you eat your breakfast. As the leader of this place, I don't have a schedule."
Luz looked at the map, marked with notes of people possibly being there, then to her hand, scarred by magic but covered by Belos, then to Eda. She looked so proud. After everything, Eda was always so proud of her. Treated her like a daughter. She spilled her heart to her because she didn't want to keep any secrets. She called her her light at the end of a tunnel.
How could she say no?
"Oh I'm definitely in." Luz said with a smirk.
"That's the spirit! I'll get all the details sorted out and will have a scouting pack ready for you by tomorrow. Eat something and get plenty of sleep. And..." Eda's expression turned from excited to slightly somber, "Make sure you have someone to talk to tomorrow. Seeing Bonesborough can be...hard. It's a big city and after everything, it's rough."
Luz gave Eda a reassuring smile as she walked towards the door.
"I'll be fine. I've literally fought a hallucination demon, a badass woman with a curse twice, a bully, a badass woman without a curse, a puritanical cursed dude twice, a child soldier, a gremlin woman with a hand dragon, a cult, and a god and have yet to die. In fact, I befriended, like, four of those people." Luz realized what she said, and quickly went to correct herself without seeming weird, "Wait, no, just three. King mentioned Kiki helping him out as we flew back but I never got close to her."
Eda laughed slightly and shook her head.
"Go on kid, get some food and sleep."
Luz smiled and walked out. She walked through the hideout, heading towards the cafeteria.
"Am I the fourth person?" Belos curiously whispered in her ear.
"Yeah, of course." She whispered back, genuine but slightly annoyed he was talking to her in public.
"I'm happy that you consider me a friend. Thank you."
Luz just smiled instead of replying and continued towards the cafeteria. As she neared it, she saw Hunter. She went over to greet him, but before she could say anything, he took her by the arm and pulled her into an empty corridor.
"Hunter, what's going on? Are you okay?" She asked, concerned by how serious he seemed.
"Are you?" He asked bluntly.
"What? Of course I am. Tired, sure, but overall I'm doing great!"
"Luz, in training today, when you yelled...I was scared."
"I kinda noticed. I'm sorry. I know you have, like, PTSD from Belos. I had no idea yelling was a trigger."
"No. It's not the yelling that scared me. When you yelled, I could have sworn your eyes flashed blue for a split second. Just like his did whenever he got mad. And your voice. It sounded almost...distorted. I might just be being paranoid but is there a chance that somehow he's back, like maybe stuck in that goo form, and got inside you and is corrupting you."
Luz sharply inhaled hearing what he said. Did that really happen? How was he able to guess it so well?
Lie. Lie to him now. If he discovers what you're doing it'll all be over. The voice in her head said.
Luz paused for a moment before just laughing. Not a giggle or a chuckle, but full on laughing.
"You think that Belos is back? And he's controlling me! Hah! Oh man, that's insane. For one, he's dead. And for another, how would he even do that? Besides, wouldn't I, I don't know, notice if he had?"
Hunter looked at the ground, his face flushed with embarrassment. Someone laughing at him wasn't too weird, but the fact that it was Luz of all people really got to him. Luz noticed he seemed genuinely hurt and quickly stopped laughing, realizing she went too far.
"Hey, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have laughed." She apologized, tone becoming genuine, "You're concerned and that's okay. Fair even, considering what he did to you. I'll tell you if I notice anything. And hey, I'll make sure that creep doesn't hurt you if he does some back. He won't lay a slimy finger on you."
Luz playfully punched Hunter's unwounded shoulder, getting a smile from him. This was the Luz he knew.
"Thank you, Luz. Always so positive. You're like a constant source of light. You're a great little sister."
Hunter raised his hand as a goodbye and walked off, leaving a surprised Luz in the corridor.
"A creep and slimy? I'm hurt." Belos said once Hunter was far enough away, knowingly being a drama queen.
"Look, I had to cover. I care about Hunter, unlike you. I know you probably only see him as a failed experiment, but to me, I agree with him in his belief we're like family."
"You're right. And I won't try to drive you apart. I'm only here to help you learn magic and get my body back. And thanks to your little mission with the Owl Lady, you can find a branding glove so we can get the sigils off the coven heads and get them out of their comas."
Luz stood for a moment, then looked down at the stone floor.
"I hate lying to him." She mumbled.
"You're doing the right thing. You saw how he acted. How do you think he'd react to me being back and you siding with me? He'd tell the others and they'd hate you." Belos said matter-of-factly.
"You don't think they'd actually hate me, right?" Luz chuckled.
"After everything I've done? Luz, you are a kind and forgiving person. I'm lucky you're giving me another chance. But I know your friends aren't as forgiving. And they might not be any more forgiving to you."
"W-what do you think they'd do if they found out?" She asked quietly.
This time, Belos gave no response. She reassured herself they wouldn't hate her and went on to the cafeteria. After eating, she went back to the dorms and pulled on her night clothes. As she was about to go to bed, she looked at her hand. It was barely noticeable, but there was a slight green tinge over where the scar was, likely a side effect of the Belos slime in her skin. After looking through the spare clothes bin, Luz grabbed not only a new outfit, but a pair of blue fingerless gloves. Satisfied, she went to sleep.
In the morning, for some reason she felt extremely tired, despite getting plenty of sleep. She got dressed, went to get breakfast, and tried to hold a conversation with her friends, but could only do the bare minimum. When she finished eating, she headed down to the entrance. She immediately perked up when she saw Eda holding her staff, two backpacks, and a brand new witches wool cloak.
"Hey kid, ready for your first mission?"