A Valeween Night To Remember

Selfish

''When a Witch is affected by a Cherubim Ray, there will be no signs of the Witch being affected until they begin to talk - If the affected Witch is revealing something they wish to hide, their eyes will glow a bright blue colour. Why this is the case isn't known.'
- Valeween for Witchlings, Chapter 3, Page 24

"So you guys just... Have an entire holiday where you try to freak each other out?" Willow questioned, her head tilting.

"That's right!"

"And you do this by dressing up in costumes?"

"Yep!"

"And if you're scarier, you get more free candy?" Gus asked as he wrote down all the new information, a plan for some kind of Human Appreciation Society lecture already formulating in his mind.

"That's the idea." Luz nodded. "Doesn't always work out that way though. Sometimes cuter costumes get more."

"...Have you used the otter costume?" Amity asked, eyebrow raised. "For some reason I feel like you'd use whatever chance you got to wear that thing in public."

"I have used the otter costume." Luz smirked back. "I got so much candy, you have no idea."

"I see..." Gus nodded as he wrote along. "And, what's the purpose of all of this Tricky Treating?"

"Trick or Treating." Luz corrected, before her eyebrow raised. "Wait, what do you mean?"

"What ritual does it all contribute to? As in, why do you do it in the first place?"

"There... Isn't really a reason for it." She answered. "I mean, it used to be to scare off what people thought were spirits like, two hundred years ago, but now we just do it for fun."

Holidays between the Boiling Isles and Earth were yet another cultural difference, Luz had discovered. Where celebrations on Earth tended to come from tradition or to celebrate important historical events, the holidays on the Isles came out of necessity - A ritual, a threat, or some kind of rare event that came regardless of the will of the residents of the Isles.

Earth tended to focus on celebration and just having a good time, whereas the Boiling Isles tended to be focused on ritual and necessity. Even calling them celebrations was a bit of a stretch - Any celebrations seemed to come after the fact, when the danger of the situation ended. The best example Luz could think of to highlight this was still Grom - Grom would come around annually regardless of if people liked it or not, and the celebrations surrounding it were based on the almost ritualistic, traditional defeat of the monster.

Her answer made the three Witches she was explaining the concept to all quirk their expressions. Their own conceptualization of these sorts of events seemed almost at odds with how Humans celebrated. Birthdays seemed to be closest to a celebration solely for fun on the Isles.

And even then.

"I guess I just don't see what would be fun about trying to scare everyone you run into." Willow said. Not that she was above the occasional practical joke - Their Moonlight Conjuring came to mind - but the idea of an entire celebration surrounding the idea of trying to spook and prank people didn't make any sense to her.

For her part, Amity just shrugged. "Sounds like something Edric and Emira would spend weeks planning for."

"Oh my God, they would love it so much." Luz said quickly and nodded, just imagining what the Blight Twins would get up to if they ever got the chance.

Earth would never know what had hit it.

The break had been prompted by Gus asking Luz clarifying questions about the Human holiday that she had mentioned to him the day before. Luz had begun to explain the concept behind Halloween, and how it was celebrated back on Earth. Willow and Amity also took an interest, and the four of them ended up taking a break from what had thus far been another full day of training and preparation for the invasion that was to come.