Strike The Horizon

Unwound: Epilogue

CW: Light discussion of trauma and body horror.

Everything hurt.

Zelith’s eyes were heavy, opening them proving near impossible. The lavender sky above was darker now, a solitary moon dominating the sky.

Only one. Huh.

As the mage struggled to sit up, she glanced down to find her uniform had been ripped, strategically cut away where the injures sustained during her ritual were, the injuries themselves wrapped in linen.

“You are going to need to tell me how you got those.”

Zelith looked to her left, towards the familiar voice. Grey was sitting nearby, a small fire built on the sandbar they sat on. A strange fish was roasting on a stick, Grey wolfishly grabbing a chunk in her teeth and holding it over towards Zelith.

“Had a hell of a time wrapping those with one arm.”

Zelith gingerly took the offered food, smiling weakly as she tilted her head.

“…You know we have no way of knowing this isn’t poisonous, right?”

“Well, hope it isn’t. Only thing I could hunt down,” Grey said, shrugging.

Unable to argue, Zelith took a bite, savoring the taste of actual food for the first time since she’d run out of salvageable rations in Lahrii. As she let out a long sigh, putting the stick back over the fire, her eyes eventually met Grey’s again.

“Sorry for passing out. How long was I unconscious?” she asked, looking up towards the moon. “Looks like it was…five hours, if the apex and speed of this moon is similar to one of ours.”

“Yeah, around that,” Grey said, chuckling. “I don’t know why you ask me the time questions.”

As the part-lycan shifted her posture, she grinned, sharper incisors visible.

“I am glad you managed to find me. Teleported, right? Looks like it was rough.”

Zelith glanced down at her arms, the wounds in her arm and her shoulder, her gaze eventually falling again on her mutated arm. The entire limb was almost skeletal, held together by exposed muscles and strange eye-like growths, tentacles drifting through the air around it.

“Basically a teleport, yes,” Zelith said, voice quiet. “It took some time. Figuring it all out, getting the materials. I don’t know exactly where we are, but that rift sent you far from Valos. Getting back will be difficult, if possible at all.”

“Back to Valos? Why, when we have this place to explore?” Grey said, laughing. “You always talked about adventures. Asked for stories about the road. But this place! We could be the first to ever see it.”

As Grey grabbed the fish again, she looked over Zelith, noting her gaze was still locked on her mutated arm, a frown coming to her face.

“But I think you are the one with the story right now.”

For a long moment, the only sound was the waves lapping against the boat, some streams managing to breach the top of the sandbar. Grey and Zelith sat next to the dwindling fire as Zelith squeezed her eyes shut, muttering to herself as she counted the seconds, made certain her internal clock was accurate.

“…Reality broke. In Lahrii,” Zelith said. “Whatever they were doing, it was damaging the barriers between the realms. Drawing things in, like sharks drawn to an open wound. Aberrations slipped through. Warped time, space, everything. Even us.”

She held up her arm, breathing in as she tried to find the words to continue.

“I was trapped, in a loop. From the time you vanished to whenever I died. Over and over. I only escaped by completing my spell, managing to use it against them. Countless alternate versions of myself, sent across the worlds, all trying to find you. And I did. Collapsed the multitude until only I remained. The one who found you.”

Grey was looking at her, her frown deepening as she looked at the mage.

“…Whenever you died. How many times did you die?” Grey said, her tone quiet.

The calculations were easy, almost instinctive, as Zelith glanced over towards Grey.

“Most loops lasted around a day. Two thousand and ninety, give or take twenty or so,” Zelith said, spinning the fish with her non-mutated hand, watching as the smoke drifted around it. “Around six years.”

“I vanished for you…six years?” Grey seemed flabbergasted, looking at Zelith as she stood up.

“Yes,” Zelith said, still looking at the fish. “I wasn’t sure if you were alive, or where you were. But I had to do something, and it worked.”

Grey began to walk closer, fumbling a bit as she was clearly trying to cross her arms before remembering one was missing, instead putting it on her hip.

“…Flower. Why do you keep looking away from me.”

Zelith reached a clawed finger to touch the fish, trying to force herself to look towards Grey again, but finding she couldn’t.

“I hesitated. I hesitated, and you lost your arm. We lost our homes, because of me.”

Grey muttered something, Zelith turning to try to catch it before she felt Grey’s arm wrapping around her shoulder, the other woman putting her forehead to hers.

“Do not dare blame yourself for that. You are not the ones who broke worlds. You are the one who fought through that time-hell to find me.”

As Zelith’s breath caught in her chest, Grey traced her hand along the tiefling’s mutated shoulder, glancing down at it.

“And I am not the only one who’s lost an arm to this.”

Sitting in the sand, Grey put her clawed, gloved fingers below Zelith’s chin, gently moving the tiefling’s head to look into her eyes, the two glowing blue orbs locking together as Grey smiled.

“It is easy to slide back into bad habits. To give in to hesitation. To think you aren’t good enough. But that is not you, Zelith. Not the you I see. I see a woman so dedicated she broke countless horizons to find me, who died countless ways over six years to find a chance to do so. You have no need for fear. Least of all when it concerns me.”

Zelith smiled, weight lifting from her shoulders as she leaned into the touch, reaching a hand up to hold Grey’s.

“Gods, I’ve missed you.”

The kiss was immediate, Grey gripping the back of Lily’s head. After enough breathless moments they had to break apart, Lily laughed as Grey braced herself, awkwardly lifting Zelith with her forearm, striding towards the boat.

“Why is it always boats?” Zelith teased, snorting a bit.

“You tell me, you’re the one who lived on an island,” Grey said, grinning as she carefully set Zelith down.

“Now. Let’s make up for lost time.”