Back in the living room, the storm continued outside with a steady mutter against the force field, but the house had settled into a quieter rhythm now that Eda was asleep upstairs. King had reclaimed a patch of floor for himself and was bent over his notepad, redrawing one of his demons with several mouths crowded across its face. When he finished adding the last set of teeth, he leaned back to admire the result and lifted the page with satisfaction.
"Yeah, yeah."
A few feet away, Luz was having considerably less success. She sat with one hand raised in front of her, trying to reproduce the motion Eda had demonstrated. Her finger circled through the air again and again, but nothing followed it except space. After another failed attempt, she let out a frustrated groan.
"This is all she does. Why you gotta be so cryptic, Owl Lady?"
She picked up her phone and replayed the recording from earlier. Eda appeared on the screen, already looking exhausted as she began the demonstration.
"Now, you see, the spell circle is really..."
Before the recording could continue, King leaned over and lowered his notepad directly in front of the screen.
"Hey, you know what's really cryptish? Let me tell you about the most spine‐chilling demon."
He flipped the page around to reveal a fish-like creature whose appearance was far less intimidating than his delivery suggested.
"Smoochy‐pie the Sweetie Baby! He's... Well, he's a lot more threatening than his name implies."
Luz gently pushed the notepad aside so she could see her phone again. "N-Not now, King. I want to figure out this spell. But if I don't have a magic sac, what's the point? I'll just be twirling my fingers around un-magically forever."
King's enthusiasm faded at once. He lowered the notepad into his lap while Luz stared at her own hand, turning it over as though some hidden answer might appear in her palm if she looked long enough. Then another possibility occurred to her, and she turned toward Sora.
"Oh yeah, Sora!"
He looked over. "Hm?"
"You use magic, right?!"
"Yeah."
Luz shifted toward him with renewed interest. "How do you do it?"
Sora thought about how best to explain something he normally did without thinking much about it. "The magic itself comes from me. My Keyblade helps me focus and channel it, so casting spells with it is a lot easier. Merlin helped teach me how to control magic better."
Luz's interest immediately sharpened. "But can you use magic without your Keyblade?"
"Yeah. I can still cast without it, but it's slightly weaker." Sora glanced toward the place where Eda had drawn her circles earlier. "And my magic doesn't work like witch magic. I don't need a bile sac, and I've never had to draw spell circles, so if you're asking me to teach you, sorry. I wouldn't know where to start."
Luz's shoulders dropped. "Awww."
King, still holding the notepad against his stomach, studied her with a small frown. "Why do you want to learn magic so bad, anyway?"
The question took some of the frustration out of Luz's face. She lowered her hand and sat down more fully, her phone resting beside her as the glow from its screen dimmed.
"I was a nobody back home. But becoming a witch is my chance to be someone. Do you know what it's like to have no one take you seriously?"
Sora's expression softened. He understood at least part of what she meant. Back in his own world, his friends had sometimes teased him and brushed him off in ways that had left him feeling smaller than he wanted to admit, and although the circumstances were not the same, the feeling behind Luz's words was familiar enough that he recognized it immediately.
King let out a small sigh as another low roll of thunder moved somewhere beyond the walls. The storm had settled into a constant presence around the Owl House now, distant enough to seem almost calm from inside but never truly gone. Luz remained seated near the floor with her phone in hand, while Sora stayed nearby and King stared down at his abandoned demon drawings.
"If I help you learn that spell, could we finish our lesson?"
Luz immediately put her phone away. "Oh, yes, yes. You can teach me about demons all week if you help me learn this spell."
That was enough to restore some of King's interest. He gathered his notepad closer and thought back over what Eda had said before collapsing. "Well, she said witches used to do magic differently, so there has to be a way, right?"
Luz leaned forward as King began drawing. His pencil moved quickly across the page, filling it with a rough little diagram before he turned the notepad around and held it up for her.
"And I have a theory. Every day I notice Eda sneaking drinks of this special elixir, see? Then she always gets a boost of energy, see? I think that's where she gets her powers. And I know where to get some."
Luz's eyes widened. "Really?"
"Sí."
Her face brightened at once. "Thank you so much. You're a prince."
King drew himself up with offended dignity. "King. I'm King."
"Right."
Upstairs, Eda's room remained dark except for the irregular flashes of lightning beyond the window. Each burst of pale light briefly outlined the great nest where she slept before leaving the room dim again. Eda lay buried among blankets and cushions, snoring deeply enough that the storm seemed unlikely to disturb her.
The bedroom door opened with a faint squeak.
King slipped through the gap and paused just inside, his ears lifting as he scanned the room. "Now, where could it be..."
Another flash of lightning crossed the walls, and something orange caught his attention. A bright potion bottle sat on the small table beside Eda's nest, its contents glowing warmly against the surrounding gloom. King immediately began creeping toward it, placing each paw carefully against the floor.
A metallic clang sounded beneath him.
King stopped and looked down with a gasp, narrowly avoiding the trap that had sprung near his foot. His surprise vanished into smug satisfaction. "Ha! Nice try."
The little metal trap seemed almost embarrassed by its failure. "Nah, my heart wasn't in it."
It shuffled away and disappeared from the room.
King watched it go for a second, then resumed his mission. The potion was too high for him to reach from the floor, so he scrambled up the nearby curtain, claws catching the fabric until he hauled himself level with the tabletop. Once there, he approached the bottle and noticed a tag tied around its neck.
He leaned closer and read it aloud. "An elixir a day." His expression tightened with suspicion. "Cryptic."
King tore the tag free with a quick jerk. "Nyeh."
He tucked it beneath his collar, then wrapped both paws around the potion and carefully hopped down to the floor. The bottle remained bright in his hands, illuminating the lower part of his face as he turned back toward the nest.
Eda had not moved.
King looked from her to the potion and back again. His earlier confidence wavered for a moment, and several small nervous sounds escaped him as he held the bottle against his chest. Whatever mischievous excitement he had felt about helping Luz had become harder to maintain while standing in Eda's room with something that very obviously belonged to her.
"Nah," King said, turning away and slipping back through the doorway.
The kitchen had become Luz's makeshift laboratory by the time King returned. She was waiting near the counter in an apron, practically vibrating with anticipation, while Sora stood a short distance away with a much less confident expression. The storm continued outside, its low rumble passing through the house in uneven intervals as the lamps cast a warm light over the counters and floor.
King hurried in with the bottle held proudly in both paws. "Got it!"
Luz took the potion from him at once and pulled the stopper free. The orange liquid inside caught the kitchen light, and she stared down at it with open excitement.
"Wow. I can't believe I'm about to learn magic. Real magic. This is historic."
Sora watched the bottle rather than Luz. The fact that Eda drank it regularly did not make him feel any better about what it might actually contain, and as Luz began raising it, he stepped forward slightly.
"Wait a sec. Are you two sure this is a good idea? We don't exactly know what's in that potion."
King waved away the concern with complete confidence. "I'm sure it's fine. Since Eda has it all the time, it must be a good thing."
Sora turned toward him with a doubtful look. "King, I don't think that's how that works."
While the two of them were still talking, Luz slowly lifted the potion toward her mouth. She had nearly brought it to her lips when a sudden clap of thunder cracked over the house. Her whole body jolted, the bottle slipped from her hands, and she fumbled for it too late.
The glass struck the floor and shattered.
Orange liquid spread across the tiles in a bright puddle between scattered pieces of glass.
Luz stared down at it in horror. "Golden elixir. Gone! This is awful."
Sora looked at the mess and quietly felt some of the tension leave his shoulders. He was not happy that Eda's potion had been wasted, but he was considerably less worried now that Luz was no longer about to drink something none of them understood.
King looked around the kitchen as though searching for an easier solution to the problem. "Who even needs a light spell when we have tons of lamps?"
Every lamp in the room flared brightly at once.
Then they all went dark.
The kitchen fell into near-blackness except for the intermittent flashes of lightning outside. Luz and Sora slowly turned their heads toward King, both wearing the same deeply unimpressed expression.
King groaned. "Hooty controls the house lights. He probably just fell asleep."
A violent crash tore through the house before any of them could say more.
"Hoot! Hoot!"
Luz spun toward the sound. "Hooty!"
She tore off the apron and ran from the kitchen, with Sora and King close behind. Hooty's voice continued from the front of the house, strained and frantic beneath the noise of the storm.
"Hoot, oh, hoot!"
They reached the living room and stopped short at the destruction awaiting them. The front door had been knocked completely from its hinges, and part of the wall surrounding it had been torn apart, leaving broken boards and plaster scattered across the floor while boiling rain hissed against the force field beyond the opening. Deep claw marks had been raked into the wall beside Hooty, and amid the wreckage stood a small creature unlike anything Luz or King had seen on the Isles.
Its body was almost entirely black, clothed in loose, ragged shapes that seemed to blur into the darkness around it. A crooked cap rose from its head into a narrow, curling point, and beneath the shadowed brim, two round yellow eyes glowed without pupils or expression. Its arms ended in oversized hands with long fingers stained a dark reddish color toward their tips, giving the impression that its claws had been dipped in crimson. A red emblem resembling a fractured heart crossed its chest. It turned toward them with an unnatural looseness in its movements, but its glowing gaze passed over Luz and King and settled immediately upon Sora.
[Play Apprehension - Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 Remix OST Extended]
"What is that thing?!" Luz shouted.
"I don't know!" King answered, all of his earlier confidence gone.
Sora recognized the creature immediately. "Heartless!"
Luz and King looked at him together. "What?!"
The Heartless lunged before either of them could ask anything else. Sora summoned his Keyblade at once and moved between it and the others, meeting its reaching claws with a single clean sweep. The creature split apart under the strike and dissolved into streams of black vapor, leaving a glowing heart suspended where its body had been. The heart rose through the ruined doorway and disappeared into the storm-dark air.
There was no time to explain what they had witnessed. Luz, Sora, and King hurried to Hooty, whose face hung limp beside the damaged entrance. Luz crouched beside him, tapped his beak several times, and leaned close enough to examine one of his unfocused eyes.
"Hooty! Are you in there?"
He gave no immediate response. Luz looked over the gouges torn into the wall and the scattered pieces of the door, her worry sharpening as she followed the marks back toward the place where the creature had stood.
"That... thing must've done this."
King studied the damage with wide eyes. "Oh man, I've never seen a demon like that before!"
Luz turned toward Sora. "Sora, you called that thing 'Heartless,' right?"
"Yeah."
"What exactly is a "Heartless"?"
Sora opened his mouth. "Basically, they're-"
A deep growl rolled in from outside and cut him off.
The three turned toward the ruined doorway. Beyond the glowing protection of Eda's force field, several more of the creatures had gathered beneath the boiling rain. Most resembled the Heartless Sora had just destroyed, their dark bodies hunching beneath crooked caps while yellow eyes shone through the gloom and red-tipped fingers flexed at the ends of their long arms. One, however, stood apart from the others. It was lower and more predatory in its posture, with a wider hooded head and the same empty yellow eyes, but its hands ended in long, brilliant yellow claws that curved outward like talons. Dark legs stretched behind it into narrow hooked feet, and the creature kept slightly ahead of the others as they moved, giving it the unmistakable appearance of leading the small pack.
Luz drew in a sharp breath. "There's more of them!?"
King yelped and edged closer to the others.
Sora narrowed his eyes. "Wait. Look!"
Something much larger moved through the rain.
It came upon the Heartless with enough force to scatter them before they could properly react. One of the red-fingered creatures was struck aside and dissolved into darkness; another tried to leap away only to be caught and torn through, releasing a glowing heart that climbed briefly through the rain before vanishing. The remaining Heartless swarmed around their attacker, but the larger creature moved through them with startling ease, scattering their dark bodies across the soaked ground.
The yellow-clawed Heartless held back just long enough to see the others fall. When the larger creature turned toward it, the Heartless dropped abruptly into the ground. Darkness pooled beneath its feet and swallowed its body as though the earth had become liquid shadow. The creature disappeared completely just before the larger attacker's claws passed through the place where it had been, escaping through the shadowy portal while the last of the red-fingered Heartless were destroyed around it.
[End Apprehension - Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 Remix OST Extended]
With the immediate threat gone, the larger creature turned toward the Owl House. It seemed to notice Luz, Sora, and King watching through the ruined entrance, and whatever interest it might have had in them lasted only a moment before it wheeled around and ran through the boiling rain.
Luz stared after it. "Whoa! Whatever THAT thing was got rid of those heartless and escaped into the rain. What could survive that?"
King's fear shifted almost instantly into recognition. "Oh my gosh. The Snaggleback! It feeds during the rains. It must have stumbled across our house and seen us inside and them."
A sudden howl rang out across the property, carrying through the storm.
Luz, Sora, and King hurried beneath the protection of the force field and looked upward in time to see the large creature leap against the side of the house and disappear through an upper-floor window.
"This is terrifying!" Luz said.
She turned toward King and stopped when she saw him giggling.
"And why do you look so happy?"
King practically squealed with excitement. "Because this could be a lesson. This would be a great way for you to see a wild demon up close and personal."
"You want to go toward those creepy sounds? No way!"
King looked toward the upper floor. "What if Eda gets eaten? She's upstairs and defenseless because you knocked her out."
Luz groaned, but the point landed. The sounds above them had placed Eda directly in whatever path the creature was taking through the house, and none of them could reasonably leave her sleeping there.
They prepared themselves with whatever was available. Luz pulled on a pair of rubber gloves, fixed bandages beneath her eyes like eye black, and took up a hockey stick with both hands. King taped a pillow across his chest as improvised armor, ignored several objects that might actually have served as weapons, and instead hurried over to collect Francois. Sora needed considerably less preparation; he summoned his Keyblade once more and held it ready at his side.
[Play Strange Whispers - Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 Remix OST Extended]
Luz led the way toward the staircase with the flashlight on her phone turned on, its narrow beam sliding over the crooked steps and walls while Sora and King followed close behind. The house had grown unnaturally quiet beneath the storm, every creak of the floorboards sounding sharper than before as they climbed. In the upper hallway, they stopped when the door to Eda's room shifted inward with a slow creak, and after a brief exchange of nervous looks, Luz raised the phone higher and pushed it the rest of the way open. The light swept across the room to reveal Eda's nest empty and one of the windows shattered, broken glass scattered beneath it while a flash of lightning briefly washed the room in white.
"Oh my gosh. Eda!"
Luz hurried to the nest and began pulling through the disturbed bedding while Sora checked the window and surrounding floor for signs of what had happened. King stared at the empty nest with growing alarm. "She got snaggle‐backed!"
"Eda?" Luz lifted a damaged pillow from the bedding, its fabric torn open by several long slashes and stuffing hanging loose from the cuts. "No! Slash marks. Sora! Do you think there are more Heartless?"
Sora studied the damage, remembering the group outside and the yellow-clawed Heartless that had escaped through the shadows. "Yeah, they always travel in groups."
Luz looked toward the hallway and then back to King. "And if it's not them... King! You're the demon expert. I need your help."
King straightened immediately. "I'll go get my demon book."
He hurried from the room while Luz and Sora continued searching. A moment later, he returned carrying two books against his chest, still trying to decide which one would be more useful. "Wait, wait. First edition or second? gasp Luz? Sora?"
The room was empty.
King dropped the books. "The Snaggleback or the Heartless got them!"
[End Strange Whispers - Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 Remix OST Extended]
A shadow crossed the wall behind him with a low snarl, and King spun in time to see it disappear around the corner. Fear gave way to outrage as he charged after it. "You craven beast, give me back my boo‐boo buddy! And my best soldier buddy!"
He rounded the corner and stopped when he found a door easing shut with one of Luz's shoes lying upside down in front of it. "Luz?" King picked up the shoe and held it in front of himself like a weapon before opening the door and stepping into the closet. Clothes hung densely around him, obscuring most of the space, but a dark shape moved behind them. King narrowed his eyes and pushed the garments aside. "There's nowhere for you to run!"
A Heartless stared back at him from the shadows.
[Play Face It! - Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories Extended Soundtrack]
King froze as the creature advanced, its yellow eyes fixed on him while its red-tipped fingers flexed. He backed into the wall with a yelp. "Oh my-"
The Heartless raised one claw, but before it could strike, the larger creature from outside burst through the hanging clothes and slashed through it. Darkness scattered through the closet as the Heartless dissolved, its released heart rising briefly before disappearing. The larger beast then turned toward King and lifted one arm.
King pressed himself against the wall. "Stay back. Hey, hey. I am the King of Demons, okay? And as such, I demand you to barf my friends back up!"
The creature swung. King screamed and ducked, and the claws tore across the wall where his head had been a moment earlier. He darted beneath the creature's reach and ran into the hallway, using his smaller size to cut around corners while the beast struggled to follow. It slammed into walls and doorframes whenever it tried to turn too sharply, filling the upstairs with crashes, snarls, and King's frightened yelps.
[End Face It! - Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories Extended Soundtrack]
When King rounded another corner, an arm reached from a nearby doorway and pulled him inside before the door closed with a soft squeak. The creature entered the hallway moments later and slowed, its heavy footsteps and breathing passing just outside while its shadow moved across the door. Inside Eda's room, Luz held King against her chest until the footsteps shifted farther away. Sora stood nearby with his Keyblade ready, watching the door.
King looked between them in disbelief. "Luz? Sora?"
Luz loosened her grip. "King! Oh, I'm so glad you're safe."
"Where did you two go?"
"We were checking on Eda, and she was gone, and then you were gone. I also tripped and lost my shoe. Oh, hey, you found it."
King looked down at the shoe still in his paws, and Luz took it from him. "I‐"
She lifted her foot to put it on, revealing a small piece of paper stuck to the bottom. King noticed it first. "What's that?"
He peeled the paper free and read it. "'Keeps the curse at bay.'"
[Play Disquieting - Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories Extended Soundtrack]
The words caught his attention immediately. He reached beneath his collar, pulled out the tag from Eda's potion bottle, and held the two pieces together. "'An elixir a day keeps the curse at bay.'"
Luz stared at him. "Curse? Wait, what are you trying to say?"
King looked toward the damaged door as the meaning finally came together. "I was wrong the whole time. That's no Snaggleback. That creature is..."
Before he could finish, a clawed hand burst through the door and tore through the wood. Luz, Sora, and King screamed as the creature forced the rest of its body through the opening, growling as it turned toward them. Once its face came into view, Luz and Sora recognized it at the same time.
"Eda?!"
Eda answered them with a low snarl and began stalking across the room, her transformed body filling the doorway as she raised one claw. Luz screamed and braced herself while Sora stepped forward with his Keyblade ready to catch the blow. Before Eda could bring her arm down, Luz's phone slipped from her pocket and struck the floor. The camera flashed as it landed, filling the room with a burst of white light that made Eda recoil with a scream, her claws flying toward her face.
Luz seized the opening at once, grabbing King and hurrying toward the balcony while Sora followed close behind. They ducked behind the wall there as Eda's scream echoed through the upper floor, and Sora positioned himself beside them with the Keyblade held tight in both hands. Eda's breathing remained audible from the room beyond, accompanied by the scrape of claws and the slow sound of sniffing as she searched for them. Luz covered her mouth to keep herself quiet, King held both paws over his head, and Sora stayed low beside them, listening while Eda followed their scent toward the balcony.
Her growling came closer until Luz searched the floor beside her and found a loose can. She threw it across the room, and it struck the opposite wall with a sharp clatter. Eda immediately turned toward the noise and charged after it, giving the three of them enough room to speak again.
[End Disquieting - Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories Extended Soundtrack]
Luz lowered her hands and whispered, "Oh, man. Did you see her eyes? They were like- (snarls) What happened to her?"
King's excitement from earlier had disappeared completely, and he looked down at the floor with his shoulders drooping beneath the pillow still strapped around him. "Don't you see? The elixir I gave you doesn't give Eda powers; it prevents her from turning into that thing! She's turned into a nightmare, and it's all my fault! I'm so sorry, Luz. I‐I just wanted you to be into demons like you're into magic. I don't have many friends, and no one even pays that much attention to me. I thought maybe if I taught you, finally, someone would care about creatures like me."
Luz watched him for a moment, then reached into her pocket and held out the pen. "Well... let's finish the lesson."
King looked up at her. "Huh?"
"Eda's turned into some kind of demon, and we need to save her. So who knows more about demons than the best teacher in the world?"
King's expression brightened as he pointed to himself, and when Luz nodded, he took the pen from her, giggled, and hugged her tightly. He then dropped back to the floor, gathered several leaves that had blown in through the broken window, and slapped them down in front of himself with renewed purpose.
"Let's see."
[Play Scent of Silence - Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories Extended Soundtrack]
Using the pen, King began sketching across the leaves while Luz and Sora crouched beside him. "She was bigger, covered in feathers, and had giant black eyes. Demons with black eyes are usually sensitive to light."
His gaze shifted toward Luz's damaged phone. "That's it. Light! Luz, use your human wonder rectangle."
Luz picked it up and inspected the cracked screen. "I can't. My camera's all blasted."
"Then... what about that light spell?"
Luz let out a tired breath and looked at her own hand. "You saw me. I can't draw circles in the air. I'm not like Eda."
Sora looked toward the room where Eda still prowled somewhere beyond the wall. "I can do a light spell. And a powerful one too."
King turned toward him immediately. "Perfect."
Luz brought up the recording from earlier and pressed play. Eda's tired voice came through the damaged speaker. "...spell circle is really key..."
[End Scent of Silence - Kingdom Hearts Re:Chain of Memories Extended Soundtrack]
The video glitched around the motion of Eda's hand, and Luz leaned closer to the screen as something in the frozen image caught her attention, and she gasped. "Guys, there's a pattern in the spell circle."
Sora and King moved nearer so they could see. Sora studied the image. "She's right. I see it too."
King squinted at the screen. "What? Where?"
Luz grabbed one of the leaves and took the pen from him. "It looks like this."
She copied the shape she had noticed, tracing the pattern carefully across the surface of the leaf until the lines connected. "There."
[Play Link to All HD Disc 3 - 09 - Kingdom Hearts 3D Dream Drop Distance OST]
When she tapped the pattern with the tip of the pen, the drawing began to glow. Luz gasped as the leaf folded inward on itself, its edges curling toward the center while the light intensified. Within seconds, it had become a small floating orb, bright enough to illuminate their faces, and Luz cupped her hands around it carefully as she lifted it to eye level.
"It's beautiful."
Sora watched the light hovering between her palms. "Wow."
Thunder rolled over the house, and boiling rain hissed against Eda's force field outside, but Luz barely seemed to notice. Her eyes remained fixed on the little sphere as realization settled over her face. "Oh my gosh. I just did magic."
She stood, holding the light in front of her with both hands as excitement overtook her. "I just did magic! I just did magic!"
Sora smiled. "Congrats, Luz!"
King quickly raised a paw. "Shh! We're not going to stop anything with something that small."
A distant screech traveled through the house, and Luz and King both ducked at the sound before looking toward the hallway again.
King lowered his voice. "What do we do now?"
Luz steadied herself and looked back at him. "I think I know how to get Eda back. Will you help me, boo‐boo buddy?"
King considered the name for a moment. "Hm, I'm kind of over that nickname. But okay."
Another thought struck Luz, and she turned toward Sora with sudden excitement. "Sora. I just got an even bigger idea. You in?"
Sora tightened his grip on the Keyblade and smiled. "You bet."
The three brought their fists together in the middle and bumped them once.
[End Link to All HD Disc 3 - 09 - Kingdom Hearts 3D Dream Drop Distance OST]