Reunion

 Millie and Amaia had reached the quarantine area again, Millie nodding to Hecate as they both arrived. The goddess nodded back.

“Got the clearance to leave,” the witch said, going in to grab Final Draft and her hat. “And the plan is to avenge you guys.”

Valentina gave a thumbs-up, but still looked quite bored. If there were some way she could reunite her head and body, she’d have gone for that too. But she’d have to settle for avenging the fallen, instead.

“Avenging sounds good to me,” said Amon with a smile. “Pretty sure you’ve been wanting to for a bit, right, Amaia?”

The younger dullahan couldn’t help but stare. Millie could see the tears forming in their eyes at seeing their brother again, and she stepped aside so they could run up and hug him. The siblings embraced, Amon not wanting to let go anytime soon.

“I’ve missed you…” Amon said.

“Same here. You been okay down here?” Amaia asked.

“Yeah. Though it does get a bit weird when a soul disappears and shows up again.”

Amaia glanced around the tent, chewing their lip at the thought. “How often does that happen?”

“Sometimes days go without that. Others, it’s most of us. There were actually way more of us here earlier…”

Millie looked a bit confused; Amaia would fill her in later. The pair needed to get back to their normal realm as soon as possible. But for now, she let the siblings’ reunion play out.

“Been keeping good care of Sir Doom for me?” Amon asked.

“We’ve been through this...’Vertiwhip’ fits it more.”

The pair kept up the teasing, before Amon ruffled Amaia’s hair. “Now go find your target and give him hell,” he said.

“Of course,” the younger dullahan told their brother.

They took one last glance at Valentina’s body, heaved a sigh, and left the tent with Millie. The witch had draped Final Draft over her shoulders, practically skipping along. And her companion couldn’t help but smirk a bit, their head floating alongside the pair.

“That excited about getting revenge, hm?” they asked.

“The guy that’s in charge of the Soul Stealers? Um, yeah!” she replied.

“’Soul Stealers’?”

“Yeah, one of the others in quarantine started calling them that and I kinda liked it.”

“Hm. Good term for ‘em,” they replied.

The pair were headed to see Hades about that return to the surface, neither quite sure how to trigger that, themselves. Amaia was able to figure their way into the Underworld, but had spaced on the getting out part.

Persephone had met them outside of Hades’ throne room, having already informed him of the verdict. It wasn’t like any of them were entirely shocked about this, but it was still good to have that confirmation.

The pair were allowed in (though the witch had taken a moment to give Cerberus some pets, much to his confusion). Millie looked somewhat awestruck at seeing the god of the Underworld in person. Right there in front of her was one of her favoiite mythological figures. Amaia would have to remember to tease her over being a massive nerd later.

Hades stood, approaching the pair. “So, the portal will appear where body and soul separated,” he told Amaia. “And she’ll just show up again in her old body.”

Part of Millie wondered if this was just how it always worked, or if there was an express program for situations like theirs. She also found it sort of funny that she’d been summoned for a quest, died during said quest, and then received another quest after dying on the first one, and it wasn’t even a side quest because it aligned directly with why she was there in the first place.

Hades had started to create the portal, holding a pale, wiry arm aloft. He brought his palm down, a black glow surrounding it. His eyes glowed red, and a sigil of some kind appeared on the floor, below his palm. He stepped on the sigil, causing it to glow and the portal in question to open up.

Amaia took one last glance at Millie. “So, I’ll see you back there, yeah?” they said.

“You know it,” she said, watching as they stepped into the portal.

She soon found herself fading from the Underworld, closing her eyes.

When she returned to her body, the first thing she noticed was that everything hurt and she felt a lot more faint than she had a few minutes ago. Shakily, she pushed herself up to her knees, before feeling around for her hat. Finding that, she put it back on.

“Ugh...how much blood did I lose…?” she groaned, not noticing the beam of red and black light that appeared to her left.

A slender hand reached down to help her to her feet. “Figures…” they said. “He didn’t say a thing about what condition your body would be in when you got back to it. You good?”

Millie nodded, glancing around. None of the others seemed to have noticed that the two had returned just yet, but they were also still visible from a distance. Nibbles had been barking at something, at any rate.

Millie started to walk in the direction of the barking, stumbling a bit, as Amaia rushed to help her along and put one of her arms over their shoulder.

“It might take a little time for you to fully recover,” they said.

Hopefully not too long, of course, because they had a deadline to deal with. But she had lost a fair amount of blood.

Sara was the first to notice the pair approaching, letting out a squeal before calling out to the others. “HEY, they’re back!” she called, both Millie and Amaia flinching at the sheer volume of her scream.

Millie wondered if there was such a thing as a post-blood-loss hangover, and Amaia just wasn’t great with loud enough noises. But even with that assault on their ears, they were glad to see the drider’s familiar face. The witch was somewhat relieved that the group hadn’t left without them. She wasn’t sure if that meant they were waiting for her to be back or not, but she was glad to see it all the same.

Talia was the next to see that they were both back, jogging over to see them and whistling for Nibbles to come over. The werewolf came bounding over, eyes big and entire lower body wiggling at what had to be well over ninety miles per hour. She sniffed her human, giving a happy growl, but raising an eyebrow.

“I smell another dog…”

Millie smiled at the werewolf. “Don’t worry, I just gave him a few pets, is all...I mean, what other chance would I have had to pet freaking Cerberus?”

“So, how’d it go?” Talia asked Amaia.

The dullahan shrugged. “We have a week to find the guy and send him back for Hades to deal with, or we both get dragged down to the Underworld. Not that she seemed to mind it down there.”

“In my defense, I’ve read a lot of Greek mythology and to see parts of it in real life was just really cool, okay?”

Amaia would have to teach her a bit of Celtic mythology sometime, if she wasn’t already an avid consumer of that, too. But that could wait for later.

“Any idea how we’re supposed to find the guy, though?” Millie asked. “Because that feels like it might be kinda hard…”

Talia smiled. “Well, we do have an idea for how we might track him. The plan is to catch one of those spy birds...what did you call them again, Nibbles?”

“Hell-birds.”

“Yes, Hell-birds. Anyway, the plan is to catch one of those, study it, and see if we can figure out where it was sent from and go from there.”

That sounded like a solid plan to them. Nibbles would resume sniffing around for one soon, though. Right now, she was in the process of picking up her witch and hugging her tightly, apologizing over and over and over again for the earlier attack. Millie just hugged Nibbles right back, overjoyed to see her pup again.

“I’m not mad at you, my sweet pup-pup…” she said.

“Hey, I got one!” called Shay from nearby.

She and Nibbles had both been looking, but given that Shay was the one that could actually fly, it was a bit easier for her to catch it.

Anton had already used his magic and fashioned a cate for the bird, whenever it was they caught the thing. He held it open for his gargoyle wife to toss her prey inside, locking the door once the ten-eyed creature was in there.