I'VE BEEN LONELY, I ADMIT, WANT TO BREATHE,

WANT TO SWEAT, I CAN SLEEP WHEN I'M DEAD.

STORM REVETTE WAS always on her worst behaviour. There were many, many demonstrations of this, but for brevity's sake there are three to list. One: she liked her sleep. Two: she despised school, and work, and any kind of effort. Three: she does not care about you. Like, at all. Sorry.

It is because of these reasons that she wakes up late almost every day. It is because of these reasons she woke up late despite the buzz of her alarm clock. (She hexed her alarm with a muting spell every morning. She didn't know why it wasn't taking the hint to implode.)

Storm Revette was always on her worst behaviour. Even when she was sleeping.

"STORM! Get out of bed right now!"

It was an intrusive voice coming from the hallway of the tiny apartment. It was a voice that wilted flowers, that flooded rain, that probably made puppies gouge their ears out with knives. It sure was a shame that intrusive voice was the only thing looking after her, or else Storm would be a wanted murderer right now.

"Mother Merlin, I get it," she grumbled, stuffing her head in her pillow. "My God, it's too early for this."

Footsteps approached. "Get out of bed, Storm, I'm not kidding. Now."

Groaning, she reluctantly lugged herself out of her covers before her door could swing open. "Fine, fine!" She fussed, swallowing a yawn. The footsteps receded after Storm stretched, popping every joint in her back, and slammed her alarm clock into pieces. Wonderful start to her day.

Unfortunately, Storm always had to get on with mornings, or the night would never come. Night was the only thing Storm cared about anymore. So she set in motion step one of her infamous morning routine: get dressed. She slipped into a pair of ratty black jeans, tucking in a yellow printed t-shirt buried at the bottom of her drawer. It wasn't much, but she didn't care. As long as it brought her closer to the moon.

"Morning, Pickles," she tapped on her snake's cage as she dropped his breakfast down beside him. He hissed something back that Storm assumed was Good Morning. He was curled around a log that stretched the length of his cage—the Great Lazy Green-And-Yellow snake. If she had to invent a new species for him, that is definitely what she would call it.

She watched as Pickles slowly unravelled himself from his log and inched towards his food. He looked especially hungry this morning. "Don't kill Meg today," Storm warned.

His beady little eyes looked back up at her and another hiss emerged. No promises!

Next: bathroom.

Between rooms, she sent a quick text to her boyfriend, asking if he was picking her up. By the time that was sent, step two had already begun.

She dunked her head in the sink of her tiny, cramped bathroom. Washes and creams that didn't belong to her were strewn on the porcelain ledge. Storm cleared them with a sweep of her hand, watching morbidly as their caps shot off when they hit the floor. Meg wouldn't like that. Meg wouldn't like much of anything. Fuck you, Meg.

Cool water splashed over her pallid face, sliding down the divots of her skin. The sting woke her up. It was nice to feel something after a hollow sleep. She brushed her teeth, swished some mouthwash, did all the boring things she needed to do to adhere to this new life she led. Her grey, vacant eyes settled on her empty reflection.

The dusty mirror made her look less than appealing, which ticked her off because she thought she could actually be kind of pretty. She wasn't, but she was sure she had been at one point in time. Despite living in Arcadia for as long as she could remember (evidently not long), she still looked like she was stuck somewhere else. Her face was pale, stretched thin, like a girl already dead to the world. Cobalt eyes were wedged into her skull, void of memory and colour. She had choppy hair she cut herself. It was so platinum it was almost white. So close to pretty, but so far from human.

The first thing that gave it away, though, were the marks under her eyes.

She raised the pad of her finger to press against the mark beneath her right eye. Her left had the same one. They began on her lower lid, at the outer crease of her top and bottom lashes, and stopped right before her pupil. The black streaks curved inwards, thinning as they went down. They stretched past the apple of her cheeks and came in line with her nose. The tip of the marks were pointed like knives. Ready to kill.

Storm thought they looked like two thick tear tracks. Or the arch of the blades she used. They were a brand, Meg said. A brand of the magic Storm had used only once—the blackest magic that sheltered in the valleys of her soul.

Whoever Storm had been before these marks, whatever life she had lived, had been lost to her own mistake. She didn't think about it much, and it wasn't like Meg was a reliable source of information. The blankness of her mind was home to her now. Whoever, wherever she was before Arcadia was something she would never reach. And Storm was very lazy, so reaching was out of the question anyways. Being who she was now was fine. Pretending to be normal was the greatest gift she could ever ask for. It was less painful than being lost. The gap in her memory was so massive that if she ever tried to make sense of it, she'd be trapped in there forever.

Lucky for her, she didn't need to swim in that loss of time to remember her magic. It was second nature to her. A part of her. People can't explain how they know their mouth is used for talking, how they understand and remember every intricacy of the language they were raised on. People can't remember when the words to their favourite song were burned on their tongues, it just sort of . . . happened.

Storm's life was sort of . . . happening. Days came and days went and she sat through all of them in total boredom. She did things she liked—played records, lit garbage cans on fire, graffitied the side of Mrs. Janeth's car—and they helped her enjoy the new life she lived, but there was still something inside her bones that refused to mould to who she was. There was a part of her that belonged to a girl Storm had long forgotten. Maybe that was what made everything feel so fundamentally wrong. Because in truth, these bones were not her own.

Clearing her throat, she pressed her fingertips to the mark on her left, mirroring the hand on the other side of her face. She felt her voice grow thick and lengthy as it curled off her tongue. "Jashi sia boja, duulo ve," she chanted, letting her eyes shut. The words had lost their meaning to her now, but they worked, and that was enough. The skin beneath her eyes started to fizzle with pins and needles, like the tingling she got in her foot when it started falling asleep. The feeling spread in cracks across her cheeks. Her mouth went numb as her marks burned on the outside.

If it wasn't for the fact that she did this every day, the spell would be feeling incredibly weird right now. It was a few seconds of strange, unexplainable discomfort, and then it smoothed over her skin and buried her marks beneath it. Left in its wake was a new slate of pale, normal skin. She looked as human as she could get. A grin rose at the corner of her mouth. "Hey, hot stuff."

She picked up a couple of Meg's bottles she'd knocked over and put them back on the sink. For a moment, her stomach weighed a thousand pounds. For a moment, she felt guilty.

Then she threw them all to the floor again and slunk out the door.

She was silent as she entered the cramped kitchenette in her apartment, about five steps away from the bathroom. Meg was at the table, filing her nails and nibbling on a bland piece of toast.

Storm didn't know why she'd woken up so irritated today. Why she'd left all those bottles on the floor even though it would ruin her evening later. Today was definitively a bad day, and everyone would just have to deal with it. Especially herself.

Third step of Storm's morning routine: piss off the only adult in your life that isn't so much an adult as much as a mean girl she-demon come to life. And she has come to life very poorly, because there is no soul inside her and she has about as much human feeling as a bottle of expensive eye cream. Oh, Meg loved expensive eye cream. And hated this apartment, apparently, because she never spent any money to fucking fix it. Did Storm mention that they were financially struggling and constantly on the brink of losing their record store? No? Great, because Meg didn't remember it either.

"What's for breakfast?" She asked carelessly—a question that set Meg off like a fuse. She tried to hide her smile when Meg snapped up to look at her, at the ready to bite back.

"You don't get breakfast. You woke up late."

For Storm, Meg was revolting to look at. For everyone else, she was beautiful. She had pale, golden skin, a perfect heart-shaped face, and long tresses of ivory hair. She looked young but not too young, wise but not full of herself, elegant but not pompous. She was everything you'd want in a woman at first glance. But then she opened her mouth and it was like dirt pouring out of every syllable, and repulsion at every pause, and her elaborate gowns and belts unraveled to reveal her ugliness like a old, rotten banana.

Storm was not a good child to look after. It wasn't because she was horrible to her core, or unfeeling down to the bone—it was because the person looking after her was worse. And there was nothing quite like giving a worse person a taste of the very worst medicine: their own.

She clicked her tongue in spite, looping her thumbs through the belt loops of her pants. "Man, that sucks. I am so upset right now. Really. I am, for lack of a better word, devastated."

Meg was focused back on her nails again. Her jaw twitched. "Get to school. You're going to be late."

"Your mom's going to be late."

"Storm, if you don't get out of the house in the next two minutes, so help me Merlin, I will double your shifts for the next week." She was seething, her voice was rising, her fist was curled on the table. Again, if this wasn't an everyday thing, Storm could've been scared. But once you know the rotten banana underneath all that glamour, it's pretty hard to be scared of some washed-out old fruit.

"Your mom's going to double your shifts for the next—"

"My God, get out!"

She leapt from the table and flung her nail file across the room, whizzing it straight past Storm's ear. She made a noise that sounded a lot like a strangled hyena. Adrenaline hiked up as Meg began the daily chase around the house. It was short, since Storm had mastered the art of ruining Meg's day in record time. She managed to check for her phone, earbuds, and keys in her pocket—swerve to the right, avoid her hands. Then, circle around the table. She watches you like a ravenous vulture. Tries to lunge, but too far off. Other side of the table now. All good.

Today Storm was feeling extra mean. Eyeing her shoes and her backpack set up right by the door, she figured she could get away with it. Testing Meg's eyesight as they stared each other down, she realized it was as good a morning as any.

Without losing Meg's gaze (really, an act of suffering in and of itself), Storm plucked Meg's toast from her plate and took a fat bite.

Meg screeched. She lunged to the other side of the table. "Bye, bye bye bye!" Storm waved, running to slip on her shoes and launching her backpack over her head. "See you! Have a great day!"

Meg was still yelling. It wasn't important to pay attention to her at this part—she was coming for Storm at the door, freshly filed nails sharp enough to pluck an eyeball straight out of its skull, but it didn't matter because Storm was all set and halfway out the door. She was very thankful Meg's last view of her was a huge, shit-eating grin when she shut the door in her face as she said, "Great toast, thanks! Bye!"

The door slammed. The lock turned. She was laughing to herself as she ran to the door at the end of the hall. Her laces were undone and she tripped right to the floor.

Her stomach weighed a thousand pounds again.

Step four of the morning routine is the step all the other steps amount to: the ruining of your own day.

She hissed, her cheek stinging from impact, but she was fine. Her eyes were watery. That was fine, too. When a tear trailed out of her right eye, that was okay. That was all right. That was good. Every morning, right in this spot outside her apartment, Storm felt the bitter aftertaste of sunlight. Not a day went by where her mouth didn't grow sour at the thought of morning, and Meg's words always curdled her mood long after she was gone.

And that, like everything else in Storm's new life, was just . . . happening.

She pushed the inside of her wrist up and over her cheekbone, and her face was dry again. Something was stuck in her throat. She let it stay there. Her body took a deep breath as her fingers strung the laces on her purple converse—a colour that reminded her of home and horror all at once. She dusted herself off, adjusted her backpack, and the morning routine had officially come to a close. Monotonous and annoying, as always.

As she pushed the door out of the way, her phone pinged. Fishing it out of her pocket, she started to make her way down the stairs.

from: steve
Got you a muffin babe
from: steve
Already outside😎
from: steve
But hurry because school starts
in like 3 minutes and I need to
fix my hair before class

Bless you, Steve, Storm thought to herself as she bustled down the steps (although she always cringed when he used that stupid sunglasses emoji). The elevator at her apartment was constantly out of order so stairs were her only option. She'd have to make her way through the shop to get outside.

Meg and Storm lived above a record shop they owned in the thick of town. Zimoc Records was small, a little dirty, but packed to the brim with every record and CD you could possibly want. It was spray-painted top to bottom with thick, neon strokes. And despite its eclectic appearance, it was the most popular record store (only record store) in Arcadia Oaks, and it was enough to keep her home afloat. She spent many nights rummaging around in there, trying to find things that piqued her interest. That's where she discovered all the music she loved. And where she discovered her only real friend, Zoe. (Who also happened to have a knack for magic herself.) She was a pink-haired employee that worked at Zimoc sometimes and they shared an affinity for invisibility spells, whoopee cushions, and graffiti. She was the only witch Storm had ever met in Arcadia, but one was more than enough.

Storm drew out her keys. The entrance to Zimoc was a big black door at the bottom of the second flight of stairs. None of the other tenants had access to the door except Storm and that heathen upstairs. "Fuck," she swore, fumbling them over before hastily sticking the right one into the lock. Poor Steve was probably stress-crying by now.

She kicked the door open and hauled herself through it, swearing under her breath. The record shop felt more like her home than the apartment. It was cramped, colourful, and kind of a mess. Storm knew the ins and outs of this place in a way nobody else did. It was why she always hung out here even when she wasn't working. (And also why she could steal from the shelves unnoticed. Hey, she never said she was a good employee.)

There was no time to dwell on the shop today, though. She stepped past wayward boxes and ducked beneath lopsided shelves (a Queen CD almost slid onto her head as she passed by) in a struggle to get to the front entrance of the shop. Outside the dust-speckled windows she could see an electric-blue moped waiting outside, with a blonde boy sitting on top of it.

The door leading to the outside world was peeling with green paint. Storm grasped the golden doorknob and got outside. "Steve!" She waved, and the boy on the moped looked up. His face flooded with relief.

"Babe, let's go!" He yelled, chucking her a brown paper bag. She rushed over to the Vespa and plopped herself behind her boyfriend.

Storm took a a whiff of whatever was in the bag, and grinned. "Thank you for the muffin!" She snuck her arms around his neck and squeezed. "Now put the pedal to the metal, we're gonna be late!"

"Pedal to the medal, got it." He gulped. "But like, moderately to the medal, because my hair—"

"Just go, Steve!"

The Vespa sped off, streaking past homely Arcadian stores. Sunlit streets and wooden signs blurred together in the early morning light. Storm held on tight to Steve, letting the wind send her platinum locks flying behind her.

Steve and Storm were an odd pair. If you saw them speeding past you on the street, they looked like total opposites. One in a nice collared shirt with perfect hair, and the other with smudged eyeliner and clothes that looked like they'd just barely survived a war.

Storm met Steve when she first came back to Arcadia. She was the new mystery girl and he was the tough golden boy, so it was like a story set in stone. At first Storm wanted to strangle him every time he opened his mouth, but then he stuck around her so often that the annoyance numbed. He was pretty and she was pretty and he was popular and she was popular, so. . . well, it's an age-old story. Steve was one of the first people she'd considered a friend in Arcadia, and although she was pretty sure her feelings didn't go beyond that, it was something fun to fill up her time.

Steve was sweet to her, despite how tough he wanted to be at school. But ever since she started tolerating him, she knew that Steve wasn't so tough at all. His dad was a bit of a jackass. Most times Storm spent at Steve's house was sheltered in his basement, playing video games on his flatscreen TV, with his parents yelling upstairs.

The two of them had virtually nothing in common. Steve was an idiot and Storm was a genius, but he did better in school than she did. Steve had a heart and Storm was a hollow shell, but she was nicer to people than he was. It wasn't a relationship she was super passionate about, but the people at school ate them up, so she guessed they'd stay together and get through their boring high-school years until their bones whittled. Storm would never admit it to him, but she was glad she had Steve to lean on. He was a surprisingly reliable goofball once you got past all his bully propaganda.

She was also a little worried, though. Steve always had a particular bone to pick with a particular student that Storm was particularly aware of.

Jim Lake Junior had been absent from school for a while now, due to a mysterious illness known as Jim Lake disease. (Which, if you could imagine, did not exist.) Steve, who had been obsessed with Jim since he stood up to him at the beginning of the year, was getting suspicious. He rambled to her almost every night about how strange Claire Nuñez and Toby were acting, and how things just weren't adding up.

It was Storm's worst nightmare. Not because it was annoying, but because . . . well . . . things had happened that she wasn't supposed to talk about. Involving Jim. And involving her. And some other people. Although nobody knew these things involved her, but if Steve found out about the things he'd figure out she was involved in them and then Jim would know she was involved in them and the things would happen all over again.

Her own stupid boyfriend was trying to dig up the truth about Jim and that would lead to truth about her. Which meant she had to try extra hard to help keep up Jim's facade from a distance and gaslight Steve as much as humanly possible until he dropped it. It was no easy task. Steve may be stupid, but he was persistent.

The moped roamed into school territory, slowing near the steps of Arcadia Oaks High. Classmates milling around turned to stare like they always did. Storm Revette and Steve Palchuk, arriving in style and in charge. She pressed her face into the back of Steve's shirt as he dismounted. Eyes on her were never a thing she favoured. She liked attention, sure, but she was labeled the Cool Girl at school, that girl, and something about that made her feel hollow. She was not a cool girl, she was not that girl, she was just pretending to be one. But if being Cool Girl meant she wouldn't be Giant Wizard Amnesia Mistake than she'd take it.

"Thanks," she said as Steve helped her off the bike. She kissed his cheek and he gave her a little smile before he dashed off to the bathroom to fix his hair and put on that stupid Spring Fling crown. Sweet Steve was dead. At school, Douche Steve was behind the wheel.

Shoving the muffin in her mouth, Storm stuck her hands into her pockets and mentally prepared herself to be drained by these social freaks until there was nothing left but bones.

She got about five good seconds of peace before Mary Wang barged into her and shook her by the shoulders. "Ohmigosh, Storm! You look sooo cute today! I love the, um . . . the shirt!"

Storm looked down at the wrinkled tee she wrangled on this morning. It wasn't exactly brand-new. "Thanks," she said dryly, patience already running thin. Mary Wang was the absolute worst person to talk to—mainly because you didn't do any of the talking.

"Anyways I just wanted to tell you that I went out with Tight-Jeans Hank again last night and I know you said he looked like a degenerate skunk and he'll probably treat me horribly but we went to the movies and he offered to drive me home after! Isn't that sweet! I mean, his car did break down and he left me at the side of the road when his dad came to pick him up but still, he drove me a quarter-way home! Isn't that romantic?!"

Storm fantasized about clawing out her ears. "Sure."

"Yeah, right! I just want to know, like, how did you manage to get Steve? I mean I'm just like, curious, how did that all go—"

"I'll see you later, Mary," Storm said through gritted teeth. You should talk less.

Mary's cheeks went pink, and Storm didn't bother to hear her reply before walking away from her. Great. Now she was in a horrible mood and it wasn't even eight-thirty yet.

Plugging in her earbuds, she let the music drown out her frustration. God, she hated so many things. She hated waking up in a disheveled room to someone screaming at her in the hallway. She hated that she couldn't bring Pickles to school. She hated that she had to talk to Mary Wang.

Although recently, her largest, most hated hate, was the obligation she felt to protect Jim Lake and his friends. No matter the weather, no matter the excuses she told herself, she just had to follow them to the ends of the earth and she had to interfere every three seconds even when it probably wasn't necessary. She couldn't help it. She hated it. They got to be hidden behind the curtain, united, and she was the one holding the curtain shut. Her arms were tired and she was alone and it was nobody's fault but her own.

Truthfully, Storm had never felt this close to people before. She knew everything about them. When you see people in their most anxious, bravest moments, you see everything. Storm thought she might know things they didn't even know about each other. She knew their patterns, their mannerisms, their combat style and their attitudes. She knew their relationships and their grievances, their goals, their enemies. Storm knew everything about Arcadia's current situation. About the war brewing under her feet.

Jim was lost in the Darklands and his friends were trying to get him back. So was she. Just from afar. Cool Girl Storm had to live over Amnesiac Witch Storm every single time. Even though it was getting increasingly hard to manage (especially with Steve catching onto things).

This was the furthest she'd ever strayed from her new, normal life. And still, still, she basically didn't exist.

So for now, she'd stick to slipping into shadows and tampering to her heart's content. Nothing personal. She was doing this strictly for the moral good and the thrill.

"Attention students and faculty, the 'Save Jim' bake sale was a massive success! Together, we will find a cure for this rare, and . . . sudden disease." Senior Uhl's voice filtered through the PA system. He sounded gravely serious and it made her snort into her hand. The whole school was in a frenzy about Jim's current condition—his disappearance had suddenly become important, which was strange considering Jim used to be as noticeable as a speck of dust.

She passed Eli rattling a tin can, urging people to donate. She pursed her lips to hide a smile. Great intentions, Eli, but so far off. So far off.

His can full of mostly air was knocked to the ground. Steve was out of the washroom, a dumb crown on his head and his Spring Fling "trident" in his hand, which was just a glorified pointer covered in gold paint.

Ah, Douche Steve. He strikes again.

"Donate my butt!" He chortled, and Storm moved away from him so she wouldn't be associated with whatever was coming. Steve had turned into less of a bully and more of a laughingstock as of late. She couldn't say he didn't deserve it.

Her eyes followed him carefully as he made his way over to Toby, hunched in front of his bright blue locker. A knot formed in her stomach.

Steve kicked Toby in the butt. When he turned around, Steve snarled, "Save Jim? What a load of crock!" He pulled Toby up by the straps of his backpack, and Storm really wanted to shove him aside so he would leave people alone. But doing that would send Steve off the rails and potentially draw suspicion. "Admit it, Dumbzalski, he's not sick. He's just faking this because I won Spring Fling, and he's just trying to steal my thunder!"

Storm crossed her arms around her chest, shrinking herself into the crowd. This was so embarrassing for him. Not only was he harassing Toby about his sick friend, but the conclusion he'd come to was wrong. Sure, if Steve thought Jim was ill with shame, Storm would play it up for all it was worth, but she didn't want him harassing people about it.

She watched as Toby tried to wriggle out of Steve's grip. Steve kept taunting him. He was so awful sometimes, really. A strange sense of anxiety bubbled in her chest, observing Steve shaking someone who'd been saving the town he lived in for months without thanks. It wasn't fair. For a split second, Storm thought she would plow through and push Steve off. That she would disrupt the order of her life, and start existing after all.

She watched Toby's fists curl and uncurl before Claire approached and told Steve off herself.

Bless you, Storm thought, because as much as she hated it, she'd developed a sort of attachment to Toby and Claire. After following them around for so long it was hard not to notice the good parts of them. Toby was brave and intelligent, and Claire was perceptive and resourceful. She also had very nice band tees. The two of them balanced out nice. Even with Jim gone, they were a force to be reckoned with.

"Let him go, Steve. Go back to the 80's, where bullies belong. Besides no one cares about your stupid dance crown." Claire was always cool, always honest, wether she was telling off a bully at her locker or decapitating a goblin with a stick. Storm liked Claire a lot. She wondered why they hadn't been friends before all this.

Why they weren't friends now was a completely different question though, and it was because the answer was in plain sight: she'd made herself impersonal. She'd separated herself on purpose from the lives of these idiots. It was her doing, and she was extremely stubborn, so she stuck to it because it was deserved. Storm was not one to go back on her word. Or in this case, her lack of words.

Steve looked horrified. "What? Everybody bows to the king!"

Oh, right. Another reason they weren't friends? Steve.

She was honestly getting fed up at this point so she coughed a couple times into her fist, getting her old voice out and muttering under her breath to make it sound different. She did this a lot—pretending to be someone else in a crowd. It was fun and a little bit mean. "No we don't, and your hat's dumb!" She heckled in her new voice.

"Shut up! Who said that!"

Me, she wanted to say, grinning ear to ear. Instead she coughed a couple more times and felt her vocal chords reform. She should tick Steve off like this more often.

He kept speaking to a courtyard that had long lost interest in him, about how Jim Lake disease wasn't real, and Claire entertained him briefly before slamming her locker and dragging Toby away. Storm prayed he wouldn't come to her and thank Merlin, she must've been too far away or too blended in because he scuttled off to the bathroom.

Her ears twitched. Another trick she had up her sleeve was a spell she'd stolen from Meg's books years ago—better, more precise hearing. It didn't work well most of the time but if you were close, you could single out a conversation. She muttered under her breath again and Toby and Claire's voices a few feet away were clear.

Claire had her phone pressed to her ear. "It's NotEnrique! The bridge pieces!"

NotEnrique was the changeling that had taken Claire's little brother's place when he was kidnapped to the darklands. He had an affinity for wet socks, cheeseburgers, and farting really loud. Storm wasn't a big fan. Whenever he was around she was scared he'd suddenly come out of the shadows behind her and expose her spying. And then fart on her immediately after.

Still, this news gave her hope. They'd been searching for the bridge pieces for weeks! It was the only way to get Jim out of the Darklands. If this was their big break, Storm was going to put her secret helping skills into overtime. Heaven knows they needed it.

"Hold tight, we have to find a secluded spot," Claire said, grabbing Toby and skirting away from her lockers. "Come on!"

"What about school?" Toby swallowed.

"What about Jim?" Claire countered, and that was enough to shut him up as the bell rang and they left the courtyard.

Storm considered following them. It was insatiable, this new information. If they found the bridge again it would be fucking awesome! It would mean everything could be fixed and Jim would come back and Steve would stop nagging her and—oh, never mind, she couldn't leave. Steve was back. Guess he hadn't gone to the bathroom after all.

"Babe, guess what I just heard!" There was a crazy look in his eyes. "Guess, guess! You're never gonna guess. Guess!"

She sighed, rolling her eyes. "Was it—"

"Those plebes said something about Jim! And a bridge! Did you see them just like, leave!" He was so eager that it was nauseating. "Ooh, I knew they were lying! We've gotta catch them!"

"We?" Storm blurted, and then instantly went, "I mean, we!" If she led Steve on she could keep tabs on him and derail him. Toby and Claire would be safe. If she left him alone, she'd have no idea what he was doing and then it'd be too late to stop him. The image of Steve finding out about this strange double-life beneath Arcadia's surface that she was tied to almost made her feel anxious again. She didn't get anxious easily.

"We should go get them now, we've gotta follow them!" He was hitting her arm, smiling haughtily like a toddler.

The lie slipped out of her without effort. She knew this was coming. "No, they'll know. It's too bright out. We'll go when it's dark."

Steve thought for a moment. "Oh yeah, I guess that makes sense! You're so smart, babe."

She patted his cheek, "I know."

Merlin help her.

✧ A/N

✧ storm's your mom jokes 🤝 steve's your butt jokes. match made in heaven

✧ storm listens to bad behaviour by remi wolf in the mornings. it's her song. i don't make the rules. this chapter is So long but it's basically all the exposition on storm's life!! we'll find out more about her lovely amnesia situation as time goes on but for now all we know is that she's just kind of. fine with it. she's learned to accept it. good for her!! that will not last long enjoy it while you can

✧ meg is the worst person in the world. i detest her. like i said in the intro, this book does deal with an extremely harmful guardian, and meg does not get much better from here lol. she sucks and i hope pickles eats her (he is the real mvp of this book just you wait)

✧ STORM HAS NOT MET DOUXIE YET if you haven't noticed she and steve are together and thriving and i love them. genuinely i think my favourite friendship to write in this whole fic. you will fall head over heels for them i could literally write an essay on why they balance each other out. we've skipped season one because no way we're doing a whole season of storm being a background character and peeking around corners. she knows jim is the trollhunter, she knows who blinky and aaarghhh are, she knows basically everything the audience knows!! she's a woman of the people!! a silent observer!!

✧ i hope you all enjoyed this chapter & i'm so excited to get into her interactions with the trollhunters & the trolls and of course douxie himself. i think i'm normal about this book and then i remember douxie is the same guy who played captain hook in once upon a time and i go feral. like how could you not.

✧ please comment and vote on this chapter if you liked it! ghost readers i will find you! i appreciate all of you reading and commenting so far & it really encourages me to keep this book going :) see you soon!

—perrie