#THE SHEER SIZE OF THE CRAB BUCKET THESE THREE ARE IN. TLDR THE CRABS SURE CAN BUCKET

[crimeronan]

wow more of you are interested in and/or indulging me than i expected thank u i love u.

this got long enough to need a readmore but should scan p easily regardless. short paragraphs and lots of quick bullet lists.

i'm playing fast and loose with the canon timeline (obviously, since luz is 16 and the day of unity hasn't happened) and this AU isn't fully fleshed out so. don't ask me what anyone else is up to. BUT

the og premise:

luz wandered into the isles as like a preschooler and belos abandoned the grimwalker obsession in favor of raising a truly human successor who could carry on his work if he eventually returned to the human realm.

hunter unfortunately did exist already. so he grew up alongside luz n became captain of her guard on top of being emperor's coven. luz has no coven ~*~because she's royalty~*~ (you all know exactly why she Actually has no coven sigil).

luz and hunter are codependent freaks and literally everyone in the castle knows it.

SO. AMITY

oooh god. ough god.

you know my girl's gotta be EC right.

like. this is a timeline where she remained lilith's apprentice and kept following her parents' ambitions/pressure and didn't reconcile with her friends, she is ABSOLUTELY in the emperor's coven now.

she's probably the youngest member? but was older upon joining than hunter was when he did. it's an unspoken understanding that she'll take over the EC if lilith dies or retires

amity is actually Much Less Miserable in the emperor's coven than she was at home bc now she doesn't have to deal with odalia very often

basically she's decided lilith is her mom now; lilith also has yet to defect (i'm still figuring out eda's deal but just like. assume nothing significant from s1 has happened). lilith has all the emotional distance that amity expects from a maternal figure but she's also a good teacher and offers sparing praise/validation so. hell yeah!

luz thinks that amity is Unbelievably Fucking Cool and is completely fucking starstruck by her. luz believes this is a normal reaction to meeting a same-aged peer who isn't hunter for the first time. and in some ways it is, bc luz is severely socially isolated and lonely and would think ANYONE her age is unbelievably cool

but it's also. u know.

arrested development narrator voice the feeling was a crush but neither of them had ever experienced it before

however. despite (or because of) thinking she's cool, luz is Far too nervous to be herself around amity. she kind of views amity as the ideal of what a princess Should Be. n also as an illustration of all the qualities that luz herself lacks.

so she does a lot of neurodivergence masking trying to play a super refined smart poised princess who is Good Enough to be here, even tho she feels like an inadequate nepotism baby. she is frequently unsuccessful in her attempts to be aloof and poised and graceful bc she has a Much harder time masking than hunter.

amity really Really likes the luz she's seen every time luz slips up, but. the issue is. uh

despite being low-contact, odalia is still managing to put an ENORMOUS amount of pressure on amity to like. catch the princess's attention. and make her fall in love. bc what does heading the EC matter if you could be a queen?? cmon amity step 👏 it 👏 up

this has freaked amity right the fuck out.

she doesn't trust herself to maintain a ruse like that for a week, let alone decades

she's afraid of odalia somehow managing to get lilith or belos in on this Plan (TM)

and she does not want to be a commodity.

it feels like nothing she ever does will be good enough for odalia

she's up to her ears in both work and political drama WITHOUT the added stress

she resents the concept of being a trophy wife

she's Acutely aware that she is technically not allowed to ever ever ever say no to luz. about anything.

so if luz does decide that she wants amity then amity can kiss her autonomy Good-Fucking-Bye

(or at least, yknow. the autonomy that still remains for a soldier working for a fascist govt.)

as for amity and hunter... 😏😎🥰

there are a lot of AU premises where hunter and amity become instant friends due to shared trauma and similar bitchiness, bc they are The Same Fucking Person and would get along great in most situations.

tragically (well. delightfully for me).... this is not one of them.

amity's obsession with Being The Best and defining her self-worth by Being The Best has not ceased at all here. hunter Immediately makes her feel threatened because

he's ALSO a talented witch who's proven himself

he ALSO joined the EC young

he's a yearish older, so he has an advantage

he's condescending

and controlling

and passive-aggressive

and anal-retentive

and when amity first arrived at the castle n introduced herself to him in a very friendly way, he was hostile and rude for No Fucking Reason

so he is on her shitlist.

amity also has some strange and unpleasant feelings regarding hunter's relationship with luz. as the author i can tell u that these feelings are rooted in jealousy. but she's incapable of recognizing this bc it's like

like. it is a complicated jealousy. made more complicated still by how amity is Fucking Terrified Of Wanting Luz. Or Being Noticed By Luz.

amity instead interprets it as judgy resentment bc hunter clearly got a position he was underqualified / too young for just by wooing the princess. exactly like amity is Supposed to do. why is he better than her at keeping luz's attention, why does she even Care, why can't she be the best at everything ever including this, why does luz like him in the first place, why does HUNTER get to skate by on royal favors while amity has to bust her ass to constantly prove her worth, etc

hunter and luz aren't even romantically involved. they'd technically be cousins here but grew up similarly to siblings and i write them as qp weirdos (affectionate).

unfortunately knowing that they're not romantically involved would still not solve the jealousy. like at all. it is WAY more complex than just, like, "what if i wanna kiss her but HE'S kissing her instead. wah i'm sad and alone"

meanwhile!

hunter has never resented luz even a little bit for being belos's favorite. reasons for this include:

he WANTS her to be the favorite bc it's easier to protect her that way

luz acknowledges the favoritism and will ask belos for stuff hunter wants that hunter can't ask for himself, without him even asking her to do that, so it's hard to view her as spoiled

hunter assumes that he's just naturally more irritating than luz and therefore deserves it

belos has been telling him for his entire life that he loses his temper with hunter bc he Can't lose his temper with luz. because she is more fragile than hunter. & belos knows that hunter is strong enough to weather the physical abuse whereas luz isn't.

(god belos is so fucking awful it is fucking unreal.)

hunter loves luz so much that it's impossible for him to harbor resentment or any other negative feelings towards her for more than like 5 minutes

which is terrible for general boundaries but, like. These Kids Are Doing Their Best. Do You Fucking See These Circumstances Holy Shit

so. to LUZ, hunter seems incredibly friendly and well-adjusted and nice to be around, because hunter has been hiding belos's abuse from her for well over a decade & he lets his guard down around her when he doesn't around anyone else & he really likes getting to be flappy and autistic and sweet.

hunter is Also very good at compartmentalizing. and masking. and Knowing How To Do His Job.

and on a worse note, hunter has internalized from the whole belos dynamic that it's kind of.... uh.... fine to lash out at people n treat them poorly as long as that's helping you stay calm around the people who Actually Matter.

and hunter is under an enormous amount of stress all the time.

so all of this already creates a cocktail of pressure that explains why he acts so differently around amity compared to luz. he is kind of a hardass stickler for the rules with everyone. (except luz. with whom he privately breaks all the rules all the time)

there's something else at play with amity specifically though. which is. hunter has never been able to keep lilith's attention or win her approval and the more he tried as a kid the colder she became, so he figured it's bc he's annoying & gave up

but now lilith has taken on an apprentice.

and it's some girl who's not even from the CASTLE. she's not even IMPORTANT. she's not even GOOD AT NON-ABOMINATION MAGIC ❗️❗️❗️

hunter Cannot understand why lilith is so impressed by and praises amity for doing the same exact fucking things that he himself was doing even younger than she is.

he doesn't even Want to lead the EC here because luz protection is a full time job & one he likes Much Better than he'd like leading the EC, but. it's the principle of the thing!!

so basically all of the resentment he's never felt toward luz has combined with all of the resentment he's currently feeling about lilith. leaving him essentially feeling like the Perpetual Unfavorite

and he has funneled all of this resentment and anger into hating amity's fucking Guts. disproportionately. considering she has done literally nothing to deserve this

he's not trying to kill her or actively sabotage her or anything (arguably bc it's too much work for too little concrete reward), but he is Constantly questioning amity's place in the coven And criticizing her magic And correcting her And challenging her to spar n being a smug asshole when he wins And just generally being a huge bitch.

and god bless amity's heart, she is trying so fucking hard. but she's been in a toxic feedback loop for ages and is lonely and is stressed out and has no reason not to pick fights with someone who so obviously wants to fight all the time

so you KNOW she's pulling out "at least i'm not a half-a-witch."

and also that she's trying to sabotage hunter at least a LITTLE, probably by stealing/breaking/disabling his staff. which feels like proportional retribution.

so like. hoo god. oh boy oh my god what a fucking mess. what a mess. the three of them are A Fucking Mess,

STRONGLY considering injecting amity into the princess luz AU bc i know Exactly where she'd fit but the problem is that if i do that then i KNOW i'll fall down a fucked-up hyperfixation rabbit hole that only interests like six people at best. bc the amity-luz-hunter dynamic remains my kryptonite. i'm diseased about it. oooooh god oooh my god. oh my god. i have. Thoughts.