Fanfic / The Seventh Son

The Seventh Son Cover Picture

The Seventh Son is an The Owl House fanfic by Cowboy Alchemist.

Luz Noceda is joined in her adventure to the Owl House by Booker Bridges, an orphaned kid wanting to escape his miserable life. Together, under the apprenticeship of Eda the Owl Lady, Booker and Luz find companionship and self-improvement.

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This fanfic features examples of:

• A Birthday, Not a Break: Booker lost his family on his birthday to a fire that burned down his home.
• Absurd Phobia: Some of Booker's cousins have some questional ones; Jason fears monkeys, Roswell hates figure skaters due to how they spin, and Felix has something against a hairy mailman he believes is a werewolf.
• Adaptational Angst Upgrade: Amity's time as grudgby captain has some more angst added on to it as she not only got her teammates hurt using the Thorn Vault: she caused Bo to lose all vision in one of her eyes. Had she not fallen in love with Skara, Amity fears Bo would've committed suicide.
• Adaptational Badass: Emira shows herself to be far more powerful that she had been in canon, able to make a giant illusion hand that can catch the fist of a stone giant construct about to kill her crush before it forms into an entire copy of her upper body and destroys the stone giant with a karate chop.
• Adaptational Early Appearance: While Emperor Belos was introduced in the last two episodes of Season 1, here he appears in the fifth chapter of the story, where he is informed about Booker's existence.
• Adaptational Karma:
  • Boscha gets an even poignant fall from grace when she loses to the Hexsquad in their grudgby match, then is strong-armed into taking the loss by Willow when she threatens to get Booker arrested. Beforehand, she gets slammed through a wall by Booker for messing with Willow and threatening them both.
  • Lilith takes a direct magic blast from Booker after he learns that she cursed Eda, which sends her into a wall as well.
• Adaptational Sexuality:
  • While she is a lesbian in the canon series, Amity is bisexual in this story, meaning she becomes attracted to not just Luz, but also Booker.
  • In the show, Skara had the unnamed bat student as her Grom date. Here, she is in a romantic relationship with Bo, who is a background character in the show.
  • Edric falls in this as well. While he was Ambiguously Bi in the show, he becomes attracted to Booker's male cousin Roswell.
  • The same applies to Lilith here. While canonically aroace, the story depicts Lilith as being romantically attracted to Booker's father, Malcolm. Not only that, but she was also in a Love Triangle against her sister Eda.
• Adaptational Villainy:
  • In the canon show, Boscha was just a bully who targeted Luz and co. for petty reasons. Here, she is straight-up vile and controlling of her friends, such as Skara. In fact, she tries to kill Booker during their Grudgby match, only for Skara to step in.
  • Hunter falls into this during the Season 1 finale, when he knocks out Luz and throws her into the cage containing Eda, King, and Lilith so she'll be peteified alongside them.
• Adapted Out:
  • Due to Warden Wrath's Death by Adaptation here, Braxas is excluded and replaced with a mantis girl named Mandy.
  • The events of "Once Upon a Swap", "Sense and Insenseitivity", and "Really Small Problems" are skipped over to keep the plot moving.
• Adoptive Name Change: To protect Booker from Belos, he's told to change his name since being a Bridges puts him in danger. Eda would later come up with the perfect name: Booker Clawthorne, which would be officialized once he signed the adoption papers Eda had written to adopt Booker as her son.
• Alliterative Name: Booker Bridges.
• All of the Other Reindeer: Booker is disliked by the kids at school, the kids at the orphanage, and the nuns as well due to his tempermental nature and the fact that he's friends with Luz, who's always been considered an outcast in Gravesfield.
• Ascended Extra:
  • Zigzagged with Amity. While she was already a major character in the show, Amity is given a bigger role in the rewrites of the Season 1 episodes, such as "Something Ventured, Someone Framed" and "The First Day". In fact, Amity gets to go on the field trip to Emperor Belos' castle instead of staying home in the rewrite of "Agony of a Witch".
  • Skara gets this treatment as well. While she was mostly a background character, she is featured more in the story, where she is Booker's cousin, therefore making her a Bridges. In fact, she plays a major part in the rewrite of "Wing It Like Witches".
  • The same goes for Bo. Originally a background character as well, here she's Skara's girlfriend and has more screentime at times when the bard appears.
• Break the Haughty: In Chapter 5, Amity's smug attitude comes crashing down during her witch's duel against Booker, when after she crushes him with her abomination's foot, he loses control of his powers and effortlessly knocks away any Emperor's Coven worker including Lilith, nearly attacking Amity until Luz stops him.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall:
  • Booker outright does this in Chapter 13 when he asks where Gus had been for the last few chapters after his friends show concern over his lack of knowledge regarding Grom.
  • The following chapter, Eda and Booker lampshade how weird it was for someone else (Emira) to have an adventure besides them, but know things will return to normal by the next adventure.
• Clothing Damage: In Chapter 17, Booker's lizard hoodie gets burned when he uses his powers during his fight with Belos.
• Cool Sword: Booker wields a sword called Dragon's Bite, which belonged to his family before him. The sword is made of anti-magic material which can repel any magic and can be called to Booker or any member of the Bridges family such as his uncle or cousin.
• A Day in the Limelight: Chapter 14 shifts focus to Emira and her crush Warrick Riley, a bat witch inventor in the Construction track who hopes to impress his idol, Holmes.
• Death by Adaptation: In the show, Warden Wrath reappeared in the Season 1 finale and was shown in Season 2. Here, he gets his head chopped off by Booker in the first chapter.
• Death Glare:
  • Every time Booker loses control of his powers, he shoots one of these at anyone stupid enough to challenge him in that state of being.
  • Eda shoots one at Lilith to get to to answer whether or not Lilith was there when Belos murdered most of the Bridges family the night Booker was born. She was, but not for the reason Eda thinks.
• Dies Differently In The Adaptation: While Adegast was eaten by Eda in the show, he gets stabbed in the head by Booker and falls to his death.
• Disappointed by the Motive: Booker is extremely unamused with Eda for forcing him to risk his life for a paper crown, even attacking Eda over it.
• Everyone Can See It: It's not hard for Luz and Booker's friends to tell that they have feelings for each other. The fact that Luz kissed Booker on the cheek before his duel with Amity and deny that it meant anything to a nearby Eda when she didn't actually question it doesn't help, Willow actually has to fill in Gus about their attraction when he shows that he didn't suspect it at all, and Principal Bump outright calls Booker Luz's boyfriend. Even Amity, who has feelings for both of them, sees how close they are and doubts either of them would like her as a result.
  • All of the Blight siblings know each other's love interests (Amity with Booker and Luz, Edric and Roswell, Emira and Warrick) and make a pact to never let their mother know about them since she wouldn't approve of any of them.
• Evil Overlooker: Emperor Belos is shown transparently looming over the main characters in the cover picture above.
• Expy: Holmes, the inventor hero of Warrick, is one of Gilderoy Lockheart in the case that he turns out to be a fraud who's stolen the credit of other witches to make himself famous. Holmes takes it further by being a Corrupted Character Copy, as he would kill the people he stole credit from instead of erasing their memories.
• Failure Is the Only Option: Boscha refuses to accept defeat when Willow's team beats her in grudgby and decides to renege on her deal with Booker to not turn him in to the Emeror's Coven out of spite. Willow then threatens her to take the loss when she points out that doing so would mean admitting that she knows the Seventh Son's identity because she lost a grudgby match to him, which would ruin her reputation. Add to that Amelia and Cat offering to support Willow's claims, and Boscha agrees to accept her defeat and leave Willow and her friends alone.
• Foil: Both Luz and Booker are social outcasts, but both differ in their response to it. While Luz prefers to Turn the Other Cheek and deals with her problems by laughing them off, Booker fights back with fisticuffs and aggressively clobbers anyone and everyone who wrongs him.
• Foreshadowing: In Chapter 17, during his fight with Booker, Belos remarks that the boy doesn't remember him, to which Booker replies that he doesn't.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: Booker reacts violently to any slight, causing him to be sent to the principal's office. He especially hates whenever people call attention to his height.
• Happily Adopted: Since the death of his family, Eda starts thinking of Booker as the son she never had. By Chapter 17, she officially adopts him as her son.
• Height Angst: Booker, naturally. He eventually gains a magical growth spurt in Chapter 18 as a result of himself and Luz staying in the Demon Realm.
• Honorary Aunt: Throughout the first half of the story, Booker refers to Eda as "Aunt Eda". In Chapter 17, she officially becomes his adoptive mother, all while earning the nickname "Mama Eda".
• Human Alien Discovery: Booker is stunned to learn that his family are not humans, but are descended from the Boiling Isles.
• Internal Reveal:
  • Luz learns about Amity's crush on Booker in "Face Your Fears", and since Amity calls her out on her own feelings for Booker, Luz confirms hers, too. Two chapters later, they learn that he has feelings for both of them, thanks to Gus blurting it out.
  • Chapter 15 has Booker introduce Luz, Willow, Gus, and Amity to his uncle York and aunt Sarah when they visit Eda at the Owl House.
  • In Chapter 16, Booker discovers Luz and Amity's feelings for him due to Willow blurting it out while he's invisible.
• It's All My Fault: At the end of Chapter 12, once Booker asks to see his memory from his birthday, which was the day his family died, he sees a photo of himself summoning the fire spell, which consequently leads to him reaching the conclusion that it was his spell that started the fire that killed his family. This immediately causes him to break down in tears, and he starts blaming himself for his family's death. Eda comforts him by hugging him and tells him what happened wasn't his fault.
• I Want Grandkids: Played for Drama in Chapter 16 when Eda tells Booker to confess his love to Luz and Amity and have kids before she runs out of magic and gets captured by Lilith.
• Loyal Phlebotinum: Booker's sword, Dragon's Bite, can be called only to any member of the Bridges family.
• Magical Seventh Son: True to the title, Booker himself is the seventh son of his father Malcolm, who is the seventh son of Tom Bridges.
• The Man in the Mirror Talks Back: Throughout "Agony of the Witch", Lilith is haunted by an image of herself as a teenager in numerous reflections that represents her suppressed guilt in wanting to cure Eda when she's the one who cursed her in the first place...
• The Mirror Shows Your True Self: And when she does capture Eda and is told by Belos to destroy the Dragon's Bite, she looks into the reflection of the blade expecting to see her younger self. In in averted case of this trope, she only sees her bruised, burned present day self, the monster she had become.
• My God, What Have I Done?: While training in grudgby, Luz uses the Thorn Vault and injures Booker as a result. She then gets an earful from Booker about how she always gets her friends into trouble, him especially, and never seems to learn from her mistakes. After thinking about it, she comes to see that he's right and apologizes to both Booker and Willow for not taking their feelings into consideration.
• Named by the Adaptation:
  • The snot-nosed toddler from "Escape of the Palisman" is named Gray in this story.
  • Skara has a last name in this story: Foxbat.
• Nun Too Holy: The nun does not at all sympathize with Booker and the bullying he endures and mutters about how the cardinal is wasting his time on him.
• Only Friend: Luz is this to Booker, who is the only person willing to celebrate his birthday. Booker is also this to Luz.
• Parental Substitute: At the orphanage, Father Dean is the closest thing Booker has to a parental figure. Dean cares for Booker, but finds him to be a handful to deal with.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech:
  • In chapter 15, Booker lays one out for Luz not only endangering her friends with a move from an Azura movie during Grudgby training, but for all the times her impulsiveness became a problem, both before and after arriving to the Boiling Isles. While Booker regrets saying all of that stuff, Luz admits that she never took into account how her reckless and impulsive actions, desire to live out her fantasies, and refusal to acknowledge the reality of the situation has consequences.
    "This is exactly what [Booker] been saying all day! All this time, [Luz] been so focused on living out your fantasies that you fail to consider other people! None of this would have happened if you had kept your mouth shut! After all the times I had your back and after all the sh** you put me through, I would have thought you would at least learn by now. But no! You just keep getting people you know into bad situations!"
  • King later lays one out for Booker's uncle York in chapter 17 when he refuses to help Booker and his friends break into the Conformatorium and free Eda.
    "So that's it?! After all that talk to Booker about leading a revolution and getting back at Belos, [York] chose to hide like a coward?! [...] Y-You heard [King], coward! As the King of the Demons, you're going to listen to me! You're the Crow Wizard! The witch who's been inspiring many to stand up against Belos. And now, when you have a chance to strike at the heart of Belos' institution, you think you're not powerful enough to stop a petrification ceremony? Not only that, you're just gonna let your friend, Booker's new mom, die?! Without even a fight?! You say you're protecting your family, but you're letting your family die right now. This isn't you being cautious. This is you hiding like a coward! If you can't do what's right for your family, then you don't deserve to wear that mask!"
• Related in the Adaptation: Skara and the Usurper (named Gray in the story) are shown to be siblings in Chapter 9, whereas they are unrelated in the actual show.
• Ruder and Cruder: This story has a ton of adult language than anyone would expect in a Disney cartoon.
• Running Gag:
  • Every time Booker's height is mentioned.
  • Every so often, a character will wonder why they put up with two certain someone's. To which, they respond, "Because we own you" and "Because you love us."
• Shipper on Deck: Willow makes an instant fan out of Gus after informing him of Booker and Luz's crushes on each other before admitting her belief that they're adorable together.
• Shout-Out:
  • Booker lashing out when someone brings up his height will bring to mind Edward Elric.
  • See Billy & Mandy's Big Boogey Adventure for clarity on the "Because we own you"/"Because you love us" gag.
  • At one point, Booker namedrops Jimmy Neutron when saying he and his friends aren't as smart as Warrick when it comes to inventing.
  • Boscha quotes Sasha Waybright when telling Skara to back off after making an attempt to defent Booker.
    Boscha: [angrily] I'm not going to lose to a loser who forgot his place! And I suggest you remember yours and do as you're told. End. Of. Discussion.
  • For Chapter 16:
    • Before Booker steals the Healing Hat, Gus suggests replacing it with something that weighs the same. Booker responds with this:
    Booker: Oh, sure, like that fucking worked in the movie. If it didn't work for Indy, it's not gonna work here.
    • Luz attempts to mess around with a relic, only for Amity to pull her back by her ear, Luz apologizing and begging her to stop treating her like she's Brock.
• Team Member in the Adaptation: During the period when Amity was captain of the Banshees grudgby team, Bo had been one as well, something that didn't happen in the show.
• Trauma Button: Fire is this to Booker, since it's how his family died on the day of his 7th birthday.
• Wham Line: In Chapter 17, Belos tells Booker that since he has the power of a Titan, he also holds Titan's Blood in his body. That's the reason why Belos wants Booker's blood.
• Would Hit a Girl: In a flashback in Chapter 4, Booker attacked one of the female bullies for taunting him about the death of his family, something that said bully lambasts him for. In Chapter 15, he doesn't even hesitate to attack Boscha in Willow's defense when she won't stop picking on her.

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