Sorry for the long break, being honest this story just doesn't hold as much interest for me as it did when I started.

Writing it just takes more energy than I ever expected. One possibility is that this story will just be shorter than I thought it would be, another option is that I just update really slowly compared to literally everything else.

I am interested in what you would prefer.

I'm kind of interested in other projects.

However I want you to know that means probably choosing one over another...

A Real Heart Stealer

The package came on a Wednesday, bright pink and wrapped in red ribbon, it sat on the mystery shack's porch for several hours that morning, before finally Mabel found it.

Written across the box, in elegant eye catching font were the words, 'For Mabel, from your secret admirer'.

Mabel giggled at the thought, opening the box with the care and tenderness that Fox shows to a hen it has caught, inside awaited a small beautiful locket, marked in the shape of the heart.

Elsewhere, Dipper found himself sitting around the stone table, sitting in the heart of the young wizards headquarters. Soon he was joined by Candy, who was dressed in dark red and green garments, carrying a staff of pale birch, topped in a small piece of old bone, carved into a crescent.

Gideon was there as well with his own staff. The group stood silently for a moment, before Candy started.

"Why aren't we telling Mabel?"

"I'm with Candy here, I mean it doesn't make much sense to me." Gideon added.

"Because they'll want to help, and that's going to get them hurt."

"But if the Sorcerer is targeting us won't they already be in danger?" Candy pointed out, leaning on her staff.

"We can deal with the Sorcerer ourselves, as long as nothing has happened in the last hour, everybody should be fine."

"Sooo, you're going to keep your sister and your friends in the dark so that they don't help us?" Gideon said, chortling, "Pines, you're a dumb cookie sometimes."

"It'll be fine, he can't attack most of the places I care about." Dipper said, rising from his chair.

"Same here." Candy muttered.

"We all know there are other ways to attack people."

"None that are easy to use." Dipper said, grabbing his staff from the ground, "Anyway, we're going to stop him before it comes to that."

The Sorcerer in question at that moment found himself sitting in a cave, talking to ghosts. Each a light glow, dancing in and out of the dreamscape.

"I think I've found you a knee body Morgane, presuming you're interested."

"I might be, depends what you've got." Morgane answered, her voice a soft whisper that barely made it through the soft noises of the cave..

"Ooh when do I get a meat bag, kid?" Cipher asked his voice filled with sadistic, yet childish excitement.

"When you've earned one Cipher. So far all you've done is told me to target the girl, which I've successfully done."

"Her body? It's probably filled with poisons of all kind. Though the defenses in place around her might make controlling her, interesting." Morgane said, a grin spreading across her ghostly face.

"Whaaat! If she gets shooting star, I want Pinetree. Though I suppose it's only fun if I can make the others watch."

The Sorcerer gave a sigh turning, "Enough of this. When the work of the Druids and these new law keepers is undone, you will each have plenty of fun yourselves. Morgane you'll have your kingdom, and Cipher, you'll have yours."

"Great, not that I understood much of it." Cipher grumbled.

"Morgane, if you could take me through the ritual once more."

"It's based in old Faerie Magic, the kind I used in my days upon the earth, there are elements of Demon magic that will make it even harder to use. The two in combination is rare, it in theory should shatter the old laws. Magic will poor from the old sources, the Faerie gates and the Hell Gates will open once more, and magic shall be free."

"The risks?"

"There are always risks. The greatest risk is self-destruction, but that is a price for freedom."

"You're right of course." The Sorcerer said quietly, his face hidden in shadows, as he gripped his staff.

Pacifica found herself in a beautiful dress, with perfect makeup, and beautiful earrings, next to her mother and father who were also perfect, with each grey hair dyed perfectly and there wrinkles hidden behind just enough make up.

She smiled widely as the camera flashed, and she hated every second of it. Which was just about normal now.

A few years ago she would have enjoyed it, but now it was all so obviously fake, so childishly designed to make the world seem perfect that it disgusted her.

She wasn't on good terms with her parents, anyone she cared about knew, her parents knew as well, but they were involved so it almost felt pointless to add them. It had become somewhat obvious she was trying to avoid them, with how little time she was actually spending at her own home.

Some people, when gossiping among friends, claimed that it was the financial decline that caused the family to have problems, yet finances had somehow become something Pacifica cared about very little. The arguments were about her choice in friends and for that matter boys.

Her relationship with Dipper had ceased to be a secret since two or so days after they started dating, because a female friend related to Dipper in someway, who's name will go unmentioned to protect her, was bad at keeping secrets.

Also apparently because of a betting pool.

Still, since they had started dating Pacifica couldn't help but feel more relaxed about her life. She couldn't explain why, but she knew things would turn out for the best. The fact that her boyfriend had magic that could create food and other materials helped dissuade the panic.

There were always going to be problems though, Dipper's way of idiotically trying to protect everybody by telling them nothing was part of that. It wasn't hard to tell most of the time. Just the day before he had lied about the attack on Pacifica, Mabel, Wendy, and Candy.

Mabel and Wendy hadn't picked up on it, but Pacifica had. Mabel, because Mabel was often too trusting and too illogical to think about it. Wendy because she was too used to the weird things randomly attacking them explanation.

But Pacifica knew that Dipper had only told the other magic users about it. Which meant it was dangerous and as stupid as Dipper could be, he was capable of handling magical threats better than her.

So she wouldn't say anything about it, not unless she needed to.

Dipper reentered the shack to find Mabel sitting on the couch staring out into space, her eyes wide in a trance like state, her hand clutching the necklace around her neck. Dipper paused looking over at her, "I thought I hid all the Smiledip."

Mabel turned, her mouth changing into a smile, not the normal bright smile Mabel gave, but a smug grin, which grew wide across her face, her hands moving to be folded together, then she spoke, the voice was entirely hers, but the tone and syntax were so entirely unmabel-like it was strange, "Hello Dipper Pines, it is wonderful to see you, face to face."

Dipper blinked, then gripped the staff in his hand pointing it towards Mabel, "You're the sorcerer!"

"Very clever of you, though you'll have to do better than that if you want to beat me."

"Where's Mabel?"

"Mabel? Oh she's right in front of you, at least in body, her soul however, her soul is in my possession."

"How? There are protection spells that should alert me if she's attacked!"

"But she wasn't attacked, she accepted a gift, she took the spell willingly." The Empty-Mabel said, still smug.

"So what do you want?"

"Can't a sorcerer just empty the body of your twin to speak to you?"

"No."

"Fair enough. I want your staffs."

Dipper paused looking at the object in question, "What do you mean my staffs, I've only got one."

"All of your staffs. Your druids will hand them over to me."

Dipper froze for a moment, but as it passed he nodded, "You'll have mine, I'll see if the others will help."

"Good, have a nice afternoon Dipper." The Empty Mabel said, before it once more fell cold, slumping back in the chair.

There was a long pause around the stone table, the three wizards gathered all seemed to be listening to the movements of the wind and the slow breaths of each other.

"Soooo, you're telling us that you got your sister's soul stolen, by not warning her about the dark sorcerer, and because of that we are probably all going to lose our staffs?" Candy asked narrowing her eyes at Dipper.

"That about sums it up."

"Pines, you're an idiot." Gideon said with a sigh.

"Yeah."

"Sooo, when are we giving him our staffs?"

"He didn't tell me, but I guess he'll inform us somehow."

"Great, so we're waiting?" Gideon said, anger dancing in his tone.

"No, we're preparing, I'm grabbing Wendy, she knows the woods better than any of us."

"So we're using her to help us plan a trap?" Candy asked.

"Kinda, I don't have it all worked out yet, but it will be great."

Thorn-Staff sat, his eyes closed, his voice whispering and cold, the words of an old language burnt across the tip of his tongue, a thousand voices moved in sequence with him, matching his every movements of the lips and tongue. Beyond all that there was the darkness, it lay beneath everything, it sung in the gaps where words broke and where punctuation found itself.

There the shadows sang.

That was magic old and powerful, chaos bound in delicate chains, which spun a thousand realities to life.

Then there came the gong, the loud and powerful crash of the instrument echoing off the walls, with a smile the eyes of the Sorcerer snapped awake.

"How can I help you Dipper."

"When do we meet."

"Let's say Dusk, as for the location, let's meet at the Statue."

There was no need to ask which statue, in Gravity Falls there was only one Statue that mattered, a statue now missing a piece, a statue forged of a demon frozen into stone, hand ever extended as if in readying for a handshake.

In the setting sun one could almost see the life in the statues eyes, a last dancing flicker of the dreadful chaotic flame which had dwelt within the creature so long. Dipper stood waiting, Candy, Wendy, and Gideon at his side, Mabel stood behind them, her eyes blank and trance like as usual.

Dipper did not hear them approach through the woods, but never the less they appeared, the dark haired boy who seemed to Dipper no older than him, simply smiled a cold smug smile upon seeing Dipper.

"Your staffs, then I'll return her soul." the sorcerer said his voice cold against the warm summer air, his form all black and green against the dancing pinks, yellows, and reds of the sunset nearby, the stars beginning to spark into life to the east.

"Not going to happen, if we give you our staffs we can't make sure you go through with the bargain." Dipper answered.

The sorcerer sighed, "Very well, one of you provide me with your staff, then I'll give you her soul. I'll take the rest of your staffs after her soul is returned."

Dipper nodded tossing his staff to the ground in front of the sorcerer who smiled, and then released from his hand a soft green gold glow, which danced through the air like dust, slipping into Mabel's mouth and nose, her eyes tightened then blinked, looking around at the environment as if to absorb data.

"Okay bro-bro you got some explaining to do." Mabel said, as she examined the sorcerer in front of them, "Who's the guy."

"He very briefly stole your soul. We've got it back now so don't worry about anything, my dear." Gideon said grinning at Mabel, who merely shrugged.

The sorcerer smiled, "Satisfied? Now for the rest of your staffs."

Dipper grinned, "Not happening!"

The other two magicians sent bolts of magical energy at the sorcerer, who countered them with a wave of his own staff, sighing a shadow leapt from his staff obscuring everything. The sound of wood snapping burst through the air, and upon the disappearance of the shadow they found Dipper's staff broken, and the orb at the top of Gideon's staff slightly cracked.

"Well that backfired." Dipper said aloud, examining the staff broken at his feet, "It'll take at least a week to even repair this, and I'm not sure I know all the right spells."

"It'll be fine right? I mean I'm back in my body, we're all alive. We can deal with it tomorrow." Mabel said grinning.

"Right." Dipper said, his voice soft and tired as he looked around to see where the sorcerer had disappeared to.

"It'll be fine man, let's head back to the shack and save any more investigating for tomorrow."

Dipper nodded once more, picking up the pieces of wood that had once been his magical focus. The sorcerer smiled as he walked back to the cave he had established himself in, clutching at a singular splinter of the wooden staff that had once been Dippers.

Sorry for the long long time between updates.

I am getting this up literally right after finishing it, but there was probably a solid month between starting and finishing this chapter.