1?
The spirals of our possible fates coil through the fabric of time and space, parallel, never intersecting. No matter how close they seem, it is a distance that will never be crossed. We may only live one of our lives, one destiny. However…
Fiona heard these thoughts in her head as if they were her own, but she didn’t understand the words, or where they could actually be coming from. Her subconscious mind drifted, and she saw brief flashes of memories, but not all of them were her own.
Herself eating with Natalie when she told her that they were going to Spira, the Duke’s daughter thrusting her blade into a terrible serpentine creature Fiona had never seen before, flying sparks and clashing metal as two men she didn’t recognize fought in the sand, the woman she and her sister had only met briefly at the travelers’ outpost in a position of prayer in a church, in front of some sort of holy icon that she couldn’t quite make out…
Unable to make heads or tails of all this, her thoughts continued to spin. All the memories condensed into a single spiraling line traveling through a starry sky, and then all of it was gone.
* * *
That morning, Fiona woke up feeling unusually disoriented. She figured that if she shook her head a bit it would clear up, but the sensation persisted. It was weird, she had no idea what could be causing this. Had she eaten something funny yesterday? No, that couldn’t be it, maybe it was—
“Are you still in bed, Fifi? I thought I asked you to get up at least fifteen minutes ago! Get up and finish packing, we have to leave soon if we’re going to make it to our first stop by sundown,” Natalie said, peering into the room.
Her sister’s voice rang painfully in Fiona’s head and she groaned. Natalie, mistaking this for a sign of protest against the idea of getting out of bed, rolled her eyes playfully and left the room.
Fiona felt like she had just been on the edge of remembering what her dream had been about, but now it was gone. She tried to ignore the soreness and sluggishness as she got out of bed, slowly got dressed, and then checked over the traveling bags she had prepared the night before.
Natalie stood by the front door, all her bags packed and ready to go, gently tapping her foot on the floor as she waited. “Finally up, sleepyhead? Sorry to rush you, but we gotta move!” Natalie ruffled Fiona’s hair as she approached, then gently nudged her out the door.
* * *
The sky as they set off was dark and overcast. It looked like it was about to rain soon. Hopefully not too soon, because there wouldn’t be any good cover for a while. Today was looking like a pretty bad day for a journey, but they decided to press on regardless. Either way, they would have a roof over their heads at tonight’s destination.
The feelings of disorientation mostly subsided after about an hour of walking, but Fiona still couldn’t muster the energy to respond to her sister’s attempts at conversation with more than short replies, and she didn’t keep up as fast of a pace as she would have otherwise.
The worsening weather wasn’t helping her mood much, either. Noticing something was off, Natalie asked her about it, “What’s up? You seem really out of it today, still tired?”
“Nah, it’s nothing,” Fiona said, starting to feel a bit bad for her brusqueness, “Just woke up feeling a bit woozy, is all.”
Natalie put a hand to Fiona’s forehead, checking for a fever. “Well, I sure hope you’re not getting sick or anything, let me know if you start feeling worse,” she said, concerned.
Just to be safe, she tried a quick identification spell, but physically Fiona was perfectly healthy, so they kept moving.
By this point, they were some ways into Mount Epol Pass, and it had started to drizzle gently. Natalie cast a simple barrier to ward off the moisture; it wouldn’t do much if this turned into a torrential downpour, but it would suffice for any average amount of rainfall.
A flock of Woodwreckers, small red birds with nasty sharp beaks, glared down at them from a sheltered spot under a small, stunted tree. They looked for all the world like they would rush down and attack… if there were at least one less person in this traveling party.
Fortunately, they stayed put, because the two sisters were currently crossing a wet, rickety wooden bridge in the rain—not very stable conditions for a fight.
Natalie’s eyes nervously flickered between the walkway and the sheer distance to the landscape below, keeping a slow pace both because of her own fears, and because Fiona was moving slowly as well, and she didn’t want to be without a shoulder to clutch onto if that bridge started swaying.
Perhaps it was because the din of the now-strongly falling rain muted all other sounds, perhaps it was because she wasn’t in peak mental condition… but Fiona failed to hear the sound of an incoming rockslide until it was already almost upon them.
Realizing that the rumbling she heard was not the sound of faraway thunder, Fiona jumped to attention. In a panic, she pinpointed the location of the sound: it was the cliff just above the bridge, where they were now. Thinking quickly, Fiona gauged the distance to both sides of the bridge: it would be faster to turn and run back.
“Natty… rockslide! Hurry, this way!” she tugged at her sister’s arm frantically and began to pull her along.
Natalie, unprepared, stumbled and nearly fell, costing them valuable seconds. The rumbling was directly upon them now. Heavy rocks from the ledge above began to crack and split off from the surface, dropping down. Fiona kept rushing, kept dragging her less-athletic sister behind her.
Suddenly, she felt an impact so shocking it nearly stopped her heart. It wasn’t the feeling of a boulder from above. It was the feeling of Natalie, wrenching her arm free, and shoving her forwards with all her strength, and her magic as well. Fiona was quickly and cleanly propelled away a safe distance. But there was no way Natalie could do the same for herself.
Fiona pulled herself up from the ground, which was now muddy from the rain, and looked behind her, stomach twisting with the deepest terror she had ever felt.
Natalie herself wasn’t crushed by any of the falling rocks, but the bridge she stood on was. Fiona was too far away to see the expression on her face as she disappeared from sight among the soil, debris, and rain.
Sprinting back to the edge of the destroyed bridge, she tried with all her might to see where her sister had fallen. She thought she saw a glimpse of the color of the robe she had worn today, but then it was gone.
* * *
Fiona couldn’t feel anything. There should have been screaming and crying, but there wasn’t. Just nothing. This couldn’t be real, right? Her thoughts spiraled around each other in an endless loop.
She can’t be gone. Where did she fall? She had to have survived this, somehow. She can’t be gone. Where did she fall? She had to… Somehow… She can’t... No…
Trembling from the emotion, and from the cold that permeated her body now that there was no longer Natalie’s barrier to keep the rain away, Fiona stood up from where she had been collapsed to her knees for the past several minutes.
She knew she had to get down to the base of that cliff, Natalie could still be alive down there, suffering. She would have to go the long way around to get down there… She knew a way, but it was all the way back through the forest on the other side of Prola.
She tried to start running back down the path in the direction of the village, but it soon turned into more of a stumble. It was over an hour’s walk, after all, too far to run. Pushing herself as hard as she could, that hour was absolutely agonizing.
Back in Prola, finally, she saw some lights flickering in the windows of a few houses. Of course, she thought through the muddled haze in her head, she would need to ask for help. She couldn’t exactly go alone through the forest where there might still be monsters lurking about, not in these conditions. Not in her condition.
She tried the general store first. Natalie had always helped their business by buying imported herbs through them. It was closed for the weather, but the shopkeeper’s wife answered the back door when Fiona knocked.
Seeing the girl who she had always treated with disdain standing there, soaked and muddy… she just made a sound of disgust, and shut the door.
Fiona tried several of the other houses. The home of the man whose cramps were eased by Natalie’s balm. The home of a child Fiona would sometimes play with, and sneak some extra snacks when his parents weren’t looking. The home of another couple, one of whom Natalie’s care had saved from a severe illness.
But the result was the same every time.
“Go home, filthy animal.”
* * *
Fiona had never seen another person with ears or a tail like hers. For as long as she could remember, she had been taken care of by Natalie’s parents, and then eventually just Natalie herself.
As far they were concerned, Fiona had been a part of the Ferwell family since birth. She and her adoptive family had never thought for a second that she didn’t belong among humans.
But outsiders believed otherwise. All her life she had shut out any remarks she heard from people implying she was different. Comments about uncleanliness, about feral instincts and habits, or worse. None of them were worth thinking about, because none of them were true.
For years Fiona chose to believe that the people of Prola were just generally suspicious or discourteous to others overall, but it had been her who was being singled out. It took a while for Natalie to notice this, and she tried so hard to protect her little sister... but she couldn’t be there for her all the time.
And now she could never be there for her again.
* * *
Having given up on trying to recruit the help of any of the villagers, Fiona left for the forest alone. Soaked, hungry, exhausted, sore, she probably should be stopping to rest, but she powered through it.
No creatures made an effort to attack her as she passed through the woods. Most living things were more concerned with seeking shelter from the downpour, and the Mindrakes were enjoying the chance to soak up all the moisture they could from the earth.
Fiona was close to where the path that led down to the bottom of the cliffs was now, she was sure of it. She finally reached the incline, and started to descend. Keeping her footing was difficult, but she made it down without stumbling.
This roundabout path felt like it had taken an eternity, but she didn’t even let the thought that it might be too late now enter her head. She just kept moving. And moving. And moving...
* * *
Physically speaking, under the strain Fiona had been putting her body through, there was no way she should still be standing. But something kept her going. A well of energy that wasn’t deep enough to ease the aches and the exhaustion, but yet it never seemed to run dry.
One might have attributed this to her pushing past her limits through sheer desperation, but that wasn’t enough to account for this. Regardless, Fiona herself spared no thought to any of that.
At some point, the cave-like canopy had been replaced with the roof of an actual cave, which Fiona must have stumbled into in her confusion. Whatever. She wasn’t even sparing energy to think anymore.
* * *
Fiona must have stopped to fall asleep eventually, because she wasn’t walking anymore. Every muscle in her body screamed at her as she rose from the cold, damp stone floor, but she did so anyway. She was almost at the end of this cave, wherever it might lead...
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