It was in the beautiful and terrible light that Sorrel finally awoke. But not in a bed or some other situation, as Sorrel would have thought. Rather, she was in Florian's arms, the way one would carry a bride.

Seeing his indigo eyes, the remnant of the bloodline Muirgen was once a part of—it was sobering and exhilarating at the same time. They had a tomorrow now, one free of monsters and shadowy-gardens.

But with that tomorrow came a responsibility.

Never again.

"Are you alright?" Florian asked.

"Yes, I'm fine, I can walk." Sorrel gently pushed. "You can set me down now."

Florian chuckled and set Sorrel down on the ground.

She didn't have any time to orient herself to her surroundings when she was nearly tackled by Gwynn in an embrace.

"You're okay!"

"Yes, I'm alright." Sorrel laughed. "You came to rescue us, then?"

"Yes, of course." Gwynn smiled. "I'd always come for my sister."

Sorrel understood the weight of those words truly now.

"I don't understand," Versailles admitted as the twins separated. "She just disappeared, somehow. In a flash of light, she was gone and you all were freed from the sleeping spell."

Sorrel turned away from her sister to see the others on the ground. Pirlipat reached for Layla, while Delphine attempted to pick herself up from the ground in dignity. Akira scrambled to his feet, a little unsteady, but ready to face the morning.

"I think we might have had something to do with that." Sorrel shared a smile with Gwynn. "I don't think she will be bothering us anymore."

Smiles broke out across the room. They had won.

Still, Sorrel felt some sorrow towards Muirgen, even if she'd only gotten a glimpse of the girl that the Spider-Queen had been.

"What do we do now?" Akira asked as he clasped a hand on Coppelius's shoulder.

"I don't know," Coppelius admitted.

"I think I know." Sorrel met Gwynn's eyes. "I think we all know."

"Home." Gwynn's expression was wistful. "You all should come with us."

"We would be happy to." Versailles took Gwynn's hand.

Sorrel grinned.

----------------------------------------

Never would Gwynn forget that most precious morning. The sun had only just risen over the waters of Lemuria, casting everything in that perfect glow when they made their trek from the spaceport to the cottage in Arcadia where Celine had newly made her home. Kiana Albion had been the one to give them the address—an easy favor, she claimed, for the two girls who had saved Ondrina.

Gwynn was the one knocked on the door, their travelers and the Ondrina family behind her. It was several minutes before Celine was able to answer the door.

"Gwynn? Sorrel?" Her blue eyes widened and sparkled. She tossed her dish-towel to the wayside and embraced her daughters.

"I can't believe it!" Celine cried as they parted. "You're back!"

Her eyes lingered at Sorrel. "All of you are back."

Sorrel visibly swallowed, tears forming in the corner of her eyes. "I said I would, Maman."

Celine's fingers brushed over Sorrel's freckled cheeks. An understanding seemed to pass between them. For Gwynn's entire life, they had been at odds, somewhat. Sorrel was their father's daughter, unable to put up roots, never able to stay put comfortably for all her soul had wandered the stars above. But something about their journey had changed her.

It had changed both of them—for was Gwynn still her mother's daughter?

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"I never should have doubted you." Celine smiled tenderly. She glanced beyond them. "You've brought friends!"

Gwynn looked over her shoulder and smiled. Versailles took her hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze. "A few."

Celine let out a low whistle. "There must be so much you have to tell me. I imagine you've been up to a lot, since you left."

Something cracked in Gwynn's heart to hear it, to see that look in her mother's eyes. When Sorrel had left, it broke her mother's heart—or so Gwynn had thought. But what she did was worse, she'd left when Celine had thought she could rely on her to always be around.

And instead, Gwynn had done what she was born for, what she always had done—follow Sorrel and keep her out of trouble.

No, she'd done more than that. She felt it in Versailles's hand entwined in hers, the crystals dangling from her wrist.

"I do," Celine assured them, drawing Gwynn out of her thoughts. There was absolution in her deep blue gaze. "All of you."

----------------------------------------

Gwynn escaped out into the cool late morning air and smiled. Her mother had made a new garden, had already planted roses among more tropical blooms. It was a perfect new start.

She'd helped Celine in the kitchen—all of them had—before sitting down to a large breakfast in which they regaled her with the stories of what they'd done, where they'd been. It was a good time. No one else would know the story of what had truly happened. No one knew what they were truly in danger of. All they would know is that Annwyn had a new king who deposed the old, one ready to bring peace. But Celine and the House of Ondrina would remember the daughters of Celine Marchand, who had defeated a god in battle.

It was more complicated than that. But Gwynn had a feeling her mother would not grasp the complexities of what had really happened in Castle Tristerion, at the edge of the stars. Now the children of House Ondrina had taken to entertainment with tricks. Celine couldn't help but smile.

Gwynn thought that a good time to sneak out to this back garden. She was grateful for a moment alone, away from everyone. It made her sad, to see how she had changed. She could see it in her mother's eyes, she expected that surely her adventures would end here.

But that wasn't who she was. Not anymore.

"I'd wondered where you'd gotten off to."

"Sorrel." Gwynn didn't have to turn around to know her sister by her footsteps. "Enjoying the party?"

"Of course." There was a laugh half-born in her throat as she sat down on a stone bench by where Gwynn stood. They were quiet for a moment—enough for Gwynn to gather her courage to ask the question on her mind.

"What comes next?"

"Oh, that's easy!" The laugh came now. "Florian's got no interest in trying to bring back the dynasty. But he wants to reconnect the castles again, now that he's reclaimed Castle Tristerion and Castle Fantasma. Make it into a home, not a haunted place. I'm going to help him."

It made sense. She'd done so much for him. It only made sense that she would follow him one more time.

"You could come with us." Sorrel's eyes were earnest.

Gwynn paused, lips open—but unable to speak, to form words.

"I think she might have plans of her own, this time."

"Versailles!" Gwynn whirled around. There he stood in her mother's back doorway, no longer so angry, so tired-looking. For once, she saw hope in those indigo eyes, the same kind of reverence of that one night.

"I see that you do." Sorrel got up and brushed against Gwynn with a pat on the shoulder as she passed. "I'll leave you to it."

With that, Sorrel left the two of them alone in the back garden.

"I hope you've been enjoying your stay here." Gwynn managed a smile.

"I have." He paused. "Your mother is a kind woman. Very generous. And hardworking."

"I know." Gwynn bit her lip, faltered in her attempt to keep up the cheer. "Hopefully she won't have to work so hard now that I'm back for good."

He frowned. "You're staying, then?"

In spite of that, he tone was too light, too conversational. It was an all-too-clear masquerade for something deeper.

Gwynn glanced down at her ring finger, the one where she hoped someday a marriage band might one day be. "Maman needs me."

Those three words said enough, thousands in their simplicity.

It was difficult to keep speaking. "What adventures do you think you'll get up to, now that it's all over?"

"I don't know," he admitted as she approached. "I never—I never thought that this day would come. I would have thought I'd have died long before any of this was possible."

"That's fair." Gwynn's fingers found his.

"You don't have to stay, you know."

She blinked up at him. She was crying, she realized. The last choice was hers, to break her mother's heart one last time—or to go with the prince who had thrown away everything for her.

"I need you." He cupped her cheek. "I know that's selfish—but I need you by my side."

He swiped a tear away with his thumb. "And you could be so much more. You could go to the witches, become a star in your own right. We wouldn't be gone forever."

"No, we wouldn't." There was truth to that.

"Say you'll travel with me." An argument, a plea. Everything she'd ever wanted, but denied for herself.

"I will."

With that, he dipped her into a kiss in her mother's garden, the roses all a-bloom.

----------------------------------------

It was several days later, when they'd said goodbye to Celine with promises to return, promises that she now believed, that they arrived at Otso. It was at the train station in Bozhidara, at the base of Mount Fantasma, that the two sisters said goodbye.

It wasn't forever. They knew their paths would cross again as they embraced under the falling snow.

But it was a change in paths. No longer would it be that wherever Sorrel went, Gwynn would follow. They had their own destinies. Sorrel would part to join Florian and the other children of House Ondrina for Castle Fantasma, to make an abandoned house a home. While Gwynn and Versailles would join Katherine to the patch of summer in the icy mountains to learn the secrets of the universe.

There would be more adventures to come, another story to tell.

But the bond between the sisters remained among the red and white roses in the back garden of a cottage on Lemuria, in the rubble of Perrault as life began anew.