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ashacroneFor the @voltronsecretsanta2k18
My recipient is @wonderlandswurst
I am sorry. I kinda… harassed you… via anons to see what you might want. I hope this is not too awful.
Fic title: Out of the Lilac Wood
The Last Unicorn Fusion/ Fantasy AU
Characters: Allura, Pidge, Lance, Lotor
Pairings: Lotura, Plance
Rating: Teen and Up
Unfinished (I’m working on it! But if I waited too much longer I’d… well. It might never have happened)
Summary: The unicorn had never left her wood before, until she overhears a pair of hunters talking. Suddenly, she cannot find peace, because the questions always plague her. What happened to the other unicorns? Why did the Black Lion hunt them? So she leaves. Along the way she discovers allies, uncovers mysteries, and finds her way towards understanding mortals and mortality, and the sweet pain of regret.
The unicorn lived in a lilac wood.
How long she had been there, she couldn’t say. It had been long enough, it seemed, for her mane to turn the argent of storm clouds over sable night. Her dainty, deer-like body harbored the strength to slay a king’s army and her horn, which shimmered with its own quintessence-fueled light, could heal even the deepest wound.
She, like all of her kind, was immortal. Though her own name had long since been forgotten, her eyes were still bright and clear, filled with the beauty of her wood. She roamed under the trees, through the violet meadows, watched the animals be born, play, find their mates and bear young, then age and die, and then wait for the cycle to begin anew.
She didn’t remember the last time she had seen another unicorn. They found each other and mated but rarely; and no place was more magical than where a unicorn had been born. She had not left this wood since her own childhood, and the face of her mother was as lost as her name.
Despite this, she felt no loneliness. Just the endless cycle of seasons, of watching the creatures under her care live their lives in ways she could not touch, or feel.
Part of her knew there was an outside world, a place that was not her wood. But they didn’t matter to her, because it was not her place. Her place, full of fragrant trees and feathery grasses, a places where she and her creatures lived.
How long she had lived alone, she could not know.
What she had not expected was to one day to hear the sound of hoofbeats, heavy and dull, quite unlike her own, ungainly as they tried to pick their way through the winding deer-trails.
She followed them, curious, unafraid, a shadow through the undergrowth. The form of Galra, one of the many peoples of her world, sat astride their huge horses, strong enough to bear knights in full armor or beings half a body length bigger than the more numerous humans.
“I don’t like the feel of this place,” one murmured. “Creatures who live in a unicorn’s forest grow their own power over time. Mostly how to stay out of sight. We could learn much from them, Antok.”
“Unicorns?” The bigger one, Antok, scoffed. “That is the urgent business that has sent us here? Kolivan, you have us out here searching for fairy tales?”
“Our records are concrete in the details. There was a unicorn reported here in ancient times,” Kolivan replied. The unicorn picked her way closer, curiosity stirring in her chest. She had not felt such since… “But the most recently reported. Notably, after the rest went missing.”
“This is a forest, Kolivan, like any other. You have no evidence.”
“The leaves never fall here. Nor does it snow. In fact, the weather is almost perpetually spring.”
“No magical creatures have been reported since-”
“There is one left in the world, Antok,” Kolivan said. “Recorded in the diary of King Alfor. Her name was Allura.”
The shock of hearing a name- her name, long lost and forgotten- made Allura trod upon a leaf, causing a soft rustle barely distinguishable from a breeze. But it was enough. Just… enough.
Antok didn’t notice, yet Kolivan’s large ears flickered towards her, and she held her breath like a flower.
“Alfor’s magical beasts compendium was written over a hundred years ago,” Antok grumbled. “Let’s turn around. Look somewhere else.”
“Go ahead of me. I would like to take a few moments,” Kolivan answered; Antok’s horse turned, and he pushed his mount into a gallop. Kolivan lifted his chin once the hoofbeats faded.
“Stay where you are, Lady Allura,” he called. “This is no world for you. Stay where you are. Protect the creatures under your care. Give life to this place, make it beautiful. There may be others who will follow, to try to find you. Do not let them. Take care, live, thrive- because you are the last.”
She watched him, not drawing breath, until he turned himself and left.
I am the only unicorn there is? The thought was so strange- it had never bothered her before. “I am the last?”
Those were the first words she has spoken, even to herself, in decades.
From that moment, she knew no peace. She had lived alone for ages, content to allow time to flow around her. Now… now it crawled over her skin. Each moment, like ants, prickling her skin and tangling in her mane. Too much. Even the familiar paths, the motions of life- watching those under her care, seeing them grow and change, birth and death- was not enough.
A unicorn was not meant to question, to consider, to be restless. And yet-
Motion caught her eye, where there should be none, even as the sun crawled its way high back into the sky. A butterfly; brilliant orange and humming to himself, snatches of song and poems. Fleeting. Fragile.
“Hello, Butterfly,” she asked him, distant and polite. “And from where did you come?”
“From distant lands I have come, my lady,” he cooed, twining around her horn before landing on her nose. “To visit to most beauteous creature in our world.”
The flattery was pleasant but…”You say you have travelled far? From where?” Her breath caught in her throat. “Do you know me, butterfly?”
“From across the lands,” he said again. “I once stood as Alfor’s right hand,” he went, in a sing song that told her he was reciting a poem. Ah. He was, of course, a butterfly. She should have known better.
“Have you- have you heard any other tales?” she asked softly. “Of others? Like me?” The moment was urgent, painful, lodged in her chest like a blade. “Do you know me, butterfly?”
“Unicorn,” the little butterfly said. “It means ‘one horn’! Not too difficult to understand. And that’s what I call lucky! Or is that a rabbit foot,” he asked, drifting about. “Not as strange as the eels.”
Allura let out a soft breath. “Butterfly. Have you seen others- like me? Other unicorns?”
The little butterfly drifted off her nose, making odd calls and noises, saying he was talking to the yelmors, sputtering about weblums- Allura was almost sure she would never get an answer for him and was about to turn into despair-
“No, please, my lady,” he said, voice pleading. “Please. You can find the others if you are brave. Steel your heart, great warrior! After the war- oh, it was terrible. The monster was unleashed. A great black Lion, prowling the night. A beast of endless terror. It drove the unicorns from their homes, their forests. With great jaws, it pushed the unicorns, all of them, to the ends of the Earth.” The little butterfly swirled about like a ribbon on a breeze. “Listen- to the tale of the Great Coran Coran the Gorgeous Man-”
“I am listening,” she insisted, springing after him. “Please, tell me what more you know-”
But a great breeze blew through the trees, and drove the little butterfly away.
Allura stared after it. It was the first time she had thought to understand what had happened to her people. To understand that somehow she had been spared their fate. A butterfly’s mind had little space but for ancient tales and songs, no ability to understand the future or the past. Whatever had befallen her kind… it could have happened in the ancient past and the butterfly heard it in passing.
It could have happened within a year.
But did it matter?
She had to know.
The decision was a terrifying one. She was a unicorn, and this was her forest. Allura let her legs and hooves carry her, for the first time allowing noise to sully her woods. The animals scattered before her, terrified and upset that their protector’s spirit was so distressed. But they hadn’t the wit to comfort her.
The choice was there. The opportunity awaited her. She walked slowly to the path that lead from her woods to the outside world, and Allura knew what she had to do.
She wasn’t sure even why it mattered. Her kind were solitary. She could remember a time before the woods but briefly; images of a man telling stories with gentle hands, soothing a frightened filly. Fighting a dragon. Healing the man. Only images remained. She had not seen her own kind in so long.
That was important.
That was why she decided to leave.
Closing her eyes, Allura took one long, last breath from the cool lilac wood, filling her lungs with the scents of flowers and beasts and home, and refused to look back.
~*~*~*~*~
The road was long.
Her legs turned weary, her mane became stiff with dust as she first galloped, slowed to a trot, finally a weary walk slowed her to almost nothing. She stayed clear of human cities, because her people would not stay there. But she had to find the Black Lion; it was the only thing she knew to follow.
Where and when it might be, she knew not. Only that time dragged her down. Seasons rolled down her back, though she did not track them.
This exhaustion was why she was caught, during a dream of home. All she knew was that whatever dream held her even more strongly than iron bars she woke behind.
She surged to her feet, but could feel the bars surrounding her, pressing in. The lock knew her distress and laughed as she tried to use her magic on it; whatever spell confined her held her even more than the bars.
Three figures awaited her. The first eyes she met were those of a ancient hag. She was clad in purple robes, face slashed by two red scars. Her expression held sadness and pity, and a strange longing that made her feel like… prey.
Beside her was a massive Galra, body and face broad and powerful, one eye covered in a patch. He looked unimpressed, dismissive. “We didn’t need a cage,” he mumbled. “A good sound rope would have done the job.”
Both the crone and the giant stood well over the last figure, dressed in ragged green. The faint light caught the figure’s spectacles, and in the dim she could make out brown hair. A human, then, not an Altean like the ancient woman beside her. The figure was bony, face eager and quick. There was something like surprise, but none of the angered longing that clung to the crone, or the dismissal of the giant.
“A rope that could hold that mare has not been woven,” the crone answered. “Tend to the other beasts. I will look after this one,” she said, approaching the cage as she shooed off the others. A few moments later and Allura tried to press as far away as she could within the tiny cage.
“A miracle I do not see every day,” the ancient murmured. “I had thought all your kind had gathered up by the Lion.”
“The- what?” Allura whispered, trying to straightened even as some primal fear held her fast. “You- what do you say? You know me?”
The crone snorted softly. “How could I not?” She threw back her hood; it took Allura let out a cry of horror and shock; upon the crone’s brow there was a mark, round, like an empty void where light should be. A place where a horn might have been. “We are not so different, you and I.”
“How- what are you- are you-”
The crone laughed, a sound like talons gouging through steel. “I am Honerva. And yes, once I was like you.” Her long, bony hands eased the bars, and the enchantment hissed and giggled at the presence of their mistress. “You were the child Alfor spoke of.” Allura couldn’t move her head; old age and cold snows seemed to caress her face. Her bones ached with the time she had never been aware of before. “What are you doing here, young one? You would think you were courting your own death to leave your forest.”
And Allura felt such longing to flee, to run for this abomination in front of her.
A unicorn, like her. A unicorn, who had her self, her being, stripped from her. A unicorn, who had become mortal.
“I came to search for our people,” Allura whispered, hearing her own voice try to push away the terror that clung to her skin. “To find them.”
“And why do you care? It is not in our nature to be curious.”
Allura swallowed. Memories of a time before were dim, everything seemed to fade away. “I - I needed to know.”
Honerva laughed, but it was a humorless thing. “You are a peculiar child, aren’t you.” The once-unicorn shrugged, before stroking her fingers through Allura’s mane. “Well, you are safer here, with me. The Black Lion cannot have you.” Her fingers withdrew, and Allura tried not to shiver in relief. “You should thank me for protecting you.”
Allura had never been given to fear before. But she knew it now, and it held her for hours.
The existence of the Honerva, the possibility of a unicorn, one of her own kind- stripped of herself, of everything that made her what she was-
She fought to breathe.
“Hey- hey you,” a voice said, and Allura couldn’t heed it, struggling through the realization that she might not simply be killed that time itself would come for her-
“You’re okay. You’re safe,” the voice went on. “Well, as safe as you can be in a magical laboratory, but no one is trying to kill you right now. She’s gone.”
Allura’s eyes darted about, flickering over the small figure in green. She kept her silence, but the breathing eased.
“Yeah, hey, that’s it,” the figure cooed. “You’re gonna be okay. Listen to my voice. You’re in a magical laboratory. It belongs to a witch named Honerva. She’s… she’s kinda old. She’s really scary. She’s… well, she’s been looking for… nevermind that part right now. Don’t worry about it.” The green hood deflated, then perked up. “Don’t worry about a thing, because I, Pidge the Magician, am going to get you out of here.”
The thought of the little figure doing that sent her thoughts careen out of their previous whirlwind. “What? But you-”
“Hey- you can speak,” Pidge crowed. “I won that bet with myself. I mean, it’s not like I had anyone to bet against. Sendak’s alright and all but he’s not exactly someone I could ask if he thought you really were a unicorn because he can’t tell you’re actually a unicorn.”
Allura blinked slowly. The whirlwind of words calmed her, gave her something to latch onto beyond the great yawning void of mortality. “Laboratory? Sendak? Where am I? What’s going on?” And a beat later. “You’re a magician?” She looked to be barely more than an apprentice at best.
Pidge perked up, then deflated. “Well, it’s… kinda, well, a long story. And don’t you dare confuse me with a kid like Sendak who can’t mix a potion or, well, anything. I’ve been training since I could walk!” She drew herself up, hands on her hips to make herself look bigger. “I can-” then she winced. “Well, are you able to listen without another panic attack?”
Allura got her feet under her, flinching away as her horn dragged over the top of the cage, and took a look around. The cage was cold, iron bars- immune to most magic. Her ears caught the sounds of other beasts in the same space, though she could not see them. The torches were too dim.
They seemed to be in a caravan of some kind, though Allura wasn’t sure.
“Where am I?”
“Well, about that. I mentioned magic laboratory, right? More like… kinda. We travel around, collect magic creatures. Most of ‘em, they aren’t sentient or sapient. Just- y’know. Except for you and… and that one, they’re usually no smarter than grigs. She’s trying to learn how to pull the magic out of them so she can…”
Allura threw herself at the bars, making the entire cage rattle.
“Hey, hey! Calm down!” Pidge hissed. “I’m trying to get you out of here! But if you wake up Sendak and I have no idea how long that sleeping potion will last, he’ll come in here and I won’t get another chance.”
Allura caught herself. “You would free me?”
Pidge grinned, showing off her teeth. “Of course. I am Pidge the Magician, after all.” She threw out her hands, muttered to herself, and Allura looked around.
She was back in her woods, seeing the lilac bloom in spring. The sight made her heart rise to her throat, but-
The iron bars were still there, pressing. None of this was real.
“Yeah. Um. Sorry,” Pidge muttered. “That- that really should have worked. Sorry.” She took a deep breath, and exhaled again. Reached for the lock.
Moaned loudly as she drew her hands back, burned and bloody, and hid them under her coat.
“You… have you ever performed any kind of… breakout before?” Allura asked, and would have been amused at Pidge’s dirty look under different circumstances.
“Have you?”
Allura admitted, she had not. “Keep trying, please.” She knew that she would not survive whatever the witch would do. “There has to be a way.”
Pidge nodded and licked her lips. “Okay.” Her fingers bled as she cast them about this time, and Allura swallowed as the air turned thick and- the bars were collapsing, the room was shrinking-
“Stop!” she called, hunching down, trying to make herself smaller. “The bars, the cage!”
“Quiznak!”
There was a feeling like the magic had been uprooted, cut, and the shrinkage stopped. The cold bars nearly pressed into Allura’s flesh, but-
Pidge stared at the cage with horror, then at her hands. “I am sorry. I am so, so sorry- I didn’t mean for that to happen.” Her eyes gleamed, tears starting down her cheeks. “Are you-”
“I’m fine,” Allura said, panting. “You can do this. Just- get me out. Please. Get me out.” She could feel the eyes of the other creatures on her.
Pidge swallowed hard, muscles quivering. Even that small amount of magic had taken so much out of her.
Allura tried to calm herself. “What other creatures does she have under her thrall?”
“There’s… um. Mostly mundane. There’s a deer that she’s changed into a qiln, grigs, like I said. She had a dire boar, but it died last week. A hellhound she managed to turn into a pit bull. She’s more interested in changing one thing to another, but she has to drain more powerful creatures to do it. If she didn’t have-” Pidge’s voice caught. “She has one powerful one that she uses as her source of magic. If she hadn’t found him while he was sleeping, like you, I doubt she could have beaten him.”
“What creature?”
“Me,” a voice said, softly, from deep in the shadows. Allura peered into them; they clung harder to the form, but she could make out golden eyes, slit like a cat’s, and the smell of hot brimstone and scales rasping against the floor of the cage.
“A dragon.” A creature like herself; a true immortal, a horror to her beauty. She felt no fear in his presence, though she could tell that Pidge was terrified. “What are you-”
“Waiting, patiently, for my moment.” He shifted within his cage. “The almost-mage frees you? Free me as well,” he demanded.
“Ignore him,” Pidge answered. She was patting herself down, looking like a wet cat. “He tries to tempt everyone who comes by. He’s… Listen. I do not want to be here when he gets out.”
“FREE ME!”
“Listen, unicorn, he’ll kill everyone here if he gets out,” Pidge protested. She shivered and looked over her shoulder. “My dad told me about that guy. He’s got a reputation.”
Allura glanced over as the dragon’s golden eyes glowed. She thought she could make out white hair and a scar across the bridge of his nose. “Please. Hurry.”
“Yeah,” Pidge said and sighed, pulling out a ring of keys. “You know, I had plans to magic you out of here and be so cool doing it. But the best you’re going to get is me being sneaky and stealing the keys from Sendak when I drugged him.”
Allura watched as Pidge brought the keys to the lock, which mocked her the entire time, calling her a failure of a mage, half skilled, little old bones- but open it did, and Pidge threw open the door with a flourish.
Allura surged forward, away from the bars, feeling the enchantments on her breaking like spider webs.
“PIDGE!” The big Galra from before thundered into the clearing. “What did you put in my drink?”
“Hehehe - oh quiznak.” Pidge rushed forward, throwing her meager weight at Allura’s flank. “Hurry, get out of here! Run!”
Allura didn’t leave, instead dancing clear as Sendak rushed Pidge, making her yelp in terror. There was something Allura had to do.
The other creatures held were in a loose semi-circle around the clearing, and Allura could sense their pleas. To run, to hide…To kill, to maim, to ruin the one who held him…
Allura ignored his voice, instead heading towards the dog first. She couldn’t return him to his true self, but she could free him.
One by one, the creatures emerged from their cages while she ignored the sounds of Pidge trying to evade the massive Sendak- until she no longer could.
“I will defend the little one,” the voice whispered in her head. “I will rend him limb from limb and the other one, too.” She saw a tongue lick the air, fire following. “Set me free and I will show you… mercy.”
Allura lowered her head, channelling her magic through her horn as she could hear Pidge howl “No!” behind her.
The cage exploded as the white dragon flew, free, his long sinewy body twisting through the air like a snake’s as he blew into Sendak and sent him colliding with one of the empty cages. He followed, jaws open, a long crunch and dark fluid dripping from teeth.
Laughter was all that interrupted the ravening, and applause. “Not alone. You were too weak to free yourselves alone.” Honerva’s eyes alighted on Pidge, lifting an eyebrow. “You betray me little one? You know what this means.”
Allura saw Pidge get to her feet, breathing hard and holding her ribs. “I have had it with you, Honerva. I am not letting you hurt any more creatures. Seriously! Kids these days! What’s wrong with you? You have one little marital spat and you decide to-”
“Undo what was done? I am not alone in these desires,” Honerva answered, seemingly oblivious to the dragon curling away from the mangled form of her henchman. “Is this worth it?”
Pidge’s shoulders hunched forward, kneeling on the ground. Allura could tell that her eyes were trying to swell shut.
“Unicorns cannot feel regret, you know, and for all my time as a mortal, I have not found it in myself,” Honerva went on, eyes on the dragon behind her. “But I know you can. Let that be my final revenge on you. Killing the one who had been your only safety all these years.”
“And as for you, Silver Dragon,” Honvera went on, watching the great dragon curl upon himself, winding to pounce. “You will remember forever this time. I caught you. I held you prisoner. My immortality may be gone but yours will forever be-”
Pidge and Allura both looked away as she was cut off, ignoring the crunch of her bones torn and ripped from her body.
Allura walked to her, the touch of her horn repairing broken ribs, black eyes and contusions. “Let’s go.”
There was a soft squeal from behind them, followed by sinister laughter.
“Don’t look back, and don’t run. You must not run from anything immortal, it will catch his attention,” Allura said calmly. She had witnessed hunters taking their prey before.
But the idea of it being one of her kind made her feel ill.
“Yeah, but-”
“Let’s go.”
Pidge steeled herself, wrapping her green cloak tighter around her shoulders. “Okay.” She gulped. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.”
They left the clearing and Honerva’s end, not looking as the great Silver Dragon took the skies, underneath the red of the moon.
To be continued.
My recipient is @wonderlandswurst
I am sorry. I kinda… harassed you… via anons to see what you might want. I hope this is not too awful.
Fic title: Out of the Lilac Wood
The Last Unicorn Fusion/ Fantasy AU
Characters: Allura, Pidge, Lance, Lotor
Pairings: Lotura, Plance
Rating: Teen and Up
Unfinished (I’m working on it! But if I waited too much longer I’d… well. It might never have happened)
Summary: The unicorn had never left her wood before, until she overhears a pair of hunters talking. Suddenly, she cannot find peace, because the questions always plague her. What happened to the other unicorns? Why did the Black Lion hunt them? So she leaves. Along the way she discovers allies, uncovers mysteries, and finds her way towards understanding mortals and mortality, and the sweet pain of regret.
The unicorn lived in a lilac wood.
How long she had been there, she couldn’t say. It had been long enough, it seemed, for her mane to turn the argent of storm clouds over sable night. Her dainty, deer-like body harbored the strength to slay a king’s army and her horn, which shimmered with its own quintessence-fueled light, could heal even the deepest wound.
She, like all of her kind, was immortal. Though her own name had long since been forgotten, her eyes were still bright and clear, filled with the beauty of her wood. She roamed under the trees, through the violet meadows, watched the animals be born, play, find their mates and bear young, then age and die, and then wait for the cycle to begin anew.
She didn’t remember the last time she had seen another unicorn. They found each other and mated but rarely; and no place was more magical than where a unicorn had been born. She had not left this wood since her own childhood, and the face of her mother was as lost as her name.
Despite this, she felt no loneliness. Just the endless cycle of seasons, of watching the creatures under her care live their lives in ways she could not touch, or feel.
Part of her knew there was an outside world, a place that was not her wood. But they didn’t matter to her, because it was not her place. Her place, full of fragrant trees and feathery grasses, a places where she and her creatures lived.
How long she had lived alone, she could not know.
What she had not expected was to one day to hear the sound of hoofbeats, heavy and dull, quite unlike her own, ungainly as they tried to pick their way through the winding deer-trails.
She followed them, curious, unafraid, a shadow through the undergrowth. The form of Galra, one of the many peoples of her world, sat astride their huge horses, strong enough to bear knights in full armor or beings half a body length bigger than the more numerous humans.
“I don’t like the feel of this place,” one murmured. “Creatures who live in a unicorn’s forest grow their own power over time. Mostly how to stay out of sight. We could learn much from them, Antok.”
“Unicorns?” The bigger one, Antok, scoffed. “That is the urgent business that has sent us here? Kolivan, you have us out here searching for fairy tales?”
“Our records are concrete in the details. There was a unicorn reported here in ancient times,” Kolivan replied. The unicorn picked her way closer, curiosity stirring in her chest. She had not felt such since… “But the most recently reported. Notably, after the rest went missing.”
“This is a forest, Kolivan, like any other. You have no evidence.”
“The leaves never fall here. Nor does it snow. In fact, the weather is almost perpetually spring.”
“No magical creatures have been reported since-”
“There is one left in the world, Antok,” Kolivan said. “Recorded in the diary of King Alfor. Her name was Allura.”
The shock of hearing a name- her name, long lost and forgotten- made Allura trod upon a leaf, causing a soft rustle barely distinguishable from a breeze. But it was enough. Just… enough.
Antok didn’t notice, yet Kolivan’s large ears flickered towards her, and she held her breath like a flower.
“Alfor’s magical beasts compendium was written over a hundred years ago,” Antok grumbled. “Let’s turn around. Look somewhere else.”
“Go ahead of me. I would like to take a few moments,” Kolivan answered; Antok’s horse turned, and he pushed his mount into a gallop. Kolivan lifted his chin once the hoofbeats faded.
“Stay where you are, Lady Allura,” he called. “This is no world for you. Stay where you are. Protect the creatures under your care. Give life to this place, make it beautiful. There may be others who will follow, to try to find you. Do not let them. Take care, live, thrive- because you are the last.”
She watched him, not drawing breath, until he turned himself and left.
I am the only unicorn there is? The thought was so strange- it had never bothered her before. “I am the last?”
Those were the first words she has spoken, even to herself, in decades.
From that moment, she knew no peace. She had lived alone for ages, content to allow time to flow around her. Now… now it crawled over her skin. Each moment, like ants, prickling her skin and tangling in her mane. Too much. Even the familiar paths, the motions of life- watching those under her care, seeing them grow and change, birth and death- was not enough.
A unicorn was not meant to question, to consider, to be restless. And yet-
Motion caught her eye, where there should be none, even as the sun crawled its way high back into the sky. A butterfly; brilliant orange and humming to himself, snatches of song and poems. Fleeting. Fragile.
“Hello, Butterfly,” she asked him, distant and polite. “And from where did you come?”
“From distant lands I have come, my lady,” he cooed, twining around her horn before landing on her nose. “To visit to most beauteous creature in our world.”
The flattery was pleasant but…”You say you have travelled far? From where?” Her breath caught in her throat. “Do you know me, butterfly?”
“From across the lands,” he said again. “I once stood as Alfor’s right hand,” he went, in a sing song that told her he was reciting a poem. Ah. He was, of course, a butterfly. She should have known better.
“Have you- have you heard any other tales?” she asked softly. “Of others? Like me?” The moment was urgent, painful, lodged in her chest like a blade. “Do you know me, butterfly?”
“Unicorn,” the little butterfly said. “It means ‘one horn’! Not too difficult to understand. And that’s what I call lucky! Or is that a rabbit foot,” he asked, drifting about. “Not as strange as the eels.”
Allura let out a soft breath. “Butterfly. Have you seen others- like me? Other unicorns?”
The little butterfly drifted off her nose, making odd calls and noises, saying he was talking to the yelmors, sputtering about weblums- Allura was almost sure she would never get an answer for him and was about to turn into despair-
“No, please, my lady,” he said, voice pleading. “Please. You can find the others if you are brave. Steel your heart, great warrior! After the war- oh, it was terrible. The monster was unleashed. A great black Lion, prowling the night. A beast of endless terror. It drove the unicorns from their homes, their forests. With great jaws, it pushed the unicorns, all of them, to the ends of the Earth.” The little butterfly swirled about like a ribbon on a breeze. “Listen- to the tale of the Great Coran Coran the Gorgeous Man-”
“I am listening,” she insisted, springing after him. “Please, tell me what more you know-”
But a great breeze blew through the trees, and drove the little butterfly away.
Allura stared after it. It was the first time she had thought to understand what had happened to her people. To understand that somehow she had been spared their fate. A butterfly’s mind had little space but for ancient tales and songs, no ability to understand the future or the past. Whatever had befallen her kind… it could have happened in the ancient past and the butterfly heard it in passing.
It could have happened within a year.
But did it matter?
She had to know.
The decision was a terrifying one. She was a unicorn, and this was her forest. Allura let her legs and hooves carry her, for the first time allowing noise to sully her woods. The animals scattered before her, terrified and upset that their protector’s spirit was so distressed. But they hadn’t the wit to comfort her.
The choice was there. The opportunity awaited her. She walked slowly to the path that lead from her woods to the outside world, and Allura knew what she had to do.
She wasn’t sure even why it mattered. Her kind were solitary. She could remember a time before the woods but briefly; images of a man telling stories with gentle hands, soothing a frightened filly. Fighting a dragon. Healing the man. Only images remained. She had not seen her own kind in so long.
That was important.
That was why she decided to leave.
Closing her eyes, Allura took one long, last breath from the cool lilac wood, filling her lungs with the scents of flowers and beasts and home, and refused to look back.
The road was long.
Her legs turned weary, her mane became stiff with dust as she first galloped, slowed to a trot, finally a weary walk slowed her to almost nothing. She stayed clear of human cities, because her people would not stay there. But she had to find the Black Lion; it was the only thing she knew to follow.
Where and when it might be, she knew not. Only that time dragged her down. Seasons rolled down her back, though she did not track them.
This exhaustion was why she was caught, during a dream of home. All she knew was that whatever dream held her even more strongly than iron bars she woke behind.
She surged to her feet, but could feel the bars surrounding her, pressing in. The lock knew her distress and laughed as she tried to use her magic on it; whatever spell confined her held her even more than the bars.
Three figures awaited her. The first eyes she met were those of a ancient hag. She was clad in purple robes, face slashed by two red scars. Her expression held sadness and pity, and a strange longing that made her feel like… prey.
Beside her was a massive Galra, body and face broad and powerful, one eye covered in a patch. He looked unimpressed, dismissive. “We didn’t need a cage,” he mumbled. “A good sound rope would have done the job.”
Both the crone and the giant stood well over the last figure, dressed in ragged green. The faint light caught the figure’s spectacles, and in the dim she could make out brown hair. A human, then, not an Altean like the ancient woman beside her. The figure was bony, face eager and quick. There was something like surprise, but none of the angered longing that clung to the crone, or the dismissal of the giant.
“A rope that could hold that mare has not been woven,” the crone answered. “Tend to the other beasts. I will look after this one,” she said, approaching the cage as she shooed off the others. A few moments later and Allura tried to press as far away as she could within the tiny cage.
“A miracle I do not see every day,” the ancient murmured. “I had thought all your kind had gathered up by the Lion.”
“The- what?” Allura whispered, trying to straightened even as some primal fear held her fast. “You- what do you say? You know me?”
The crone snorted softly. “How could I not?” She threw back her hood; it took Allura let out a cry of horror and shock; upon the crone’s brow there was a mark, round, like an empty void where light should be. A place where a horn might have been. “We are not so different, you and I.”
“How- what are you- are you-”
The crone laughed, a sound like talons gouging through steel. “I am Honerva. And yes, once I was like you.” Her long, bony hands eased the bars, and the enchantment hissed and giggled at the presence of their mistress. “You were the child Alfor spoke of.” Allura couldn’t move her head; old age and cold snows seemed to caress her face. Her bones ached with the time she had never been aware of before. “What are you doing here, young one? You would think you were courting your own death to leave your forest.”
And Allura felt such longing to flee, to run for this abomination in front of her.
A unicorn, like her. A unicorn, who had her self, her being, stripped from her. A unicorn, who had become mortal.
“I came to search for our people,” Allura whispered, hearing her own voice try to push away the terror that clung to her skin. “To find them.”
“And why do you care? It is not in our nature to be curious.”
Allura swallowed. Memories of a time before were dim, everything seemed to fade away. “I - I needed to know.”
Honerva laughed, but it was a humorless thing. “You are a peculiar child, aren’t you.” The once-unicorn shrugged, before stroking her fingers through Allura’s mane. “Well, you are safer here, with me. The Black Lion cannot have you.” Her fingers withdrew, and Allura tried not to shiver in relief. “You should thank me for protecting you.”
Allura had never been given to fear before. But she knew it now, and it held her for hours.
The existence of the Honerva, the possibility of a unicorn, one of her own kind- stripped of herself, of everything that made her what she was-
She fought to breathe.
“Hey- hey you,” a voice said, and Allura couldn’t heed it, struggling through the realization that she might not simply be killed that time itself would come for her-
“You’re okay. You’re safe,” the voice went on. “Well, as safe as you can be in a magical laboratory, but no one is trying to kill you right now. She’s gone.”
Allura’s eyes darted about, flickering over the small figure in green. She kept her silence, but the breathing eased.
“Yeah, hey, that’s it,” the figure cooed. “You’re gonna be okay. Listen to my voice. You’re in a magical laboratory. It belongs to a witch named Honerva. She’s… she’s kinda old. She’s really scary. She’s… well, she’s been looking for… nevermind that part right now. Don’t worry about it.” The green hood deflated, then perked up. “Don’t worry about a thing, because I, Pidge the Magician, am going to get you out of here.”
The thought of the little figure doing that sent her thoughts careen out of their previous whirlwind. “What? But you-”
“Hey- you can speak,” Pidge crowed. “I won that bet with myself. I mean, it’s not like I had anyone to bet against. Sendak’s alright and all but he’s not exactly someone I could ask if he thought you really were a unicorn because he can’t tell you’re actually a unicorn.”
Allura blinked slowly. The whirlwind of words calmed her, gave her something to latch onto beyond the great yawning void of mortality. “Laboratory? Sendak? Where am I? What’s going on?” And a beat later. “You’re a magician?” She looked to be barely more than an apprentice at best.
Pidge perked up, then deflated. “Well, it’s… kinda, well, a long story. And don’t you dare confuse me with a kid like Sendak who can’t mix a potion or, well, anything. I’ve been training since I could walk!” She drew herself up, hands on her hips to make herself look bigger. “I can-” then she winced. “Well, are you able to listen without another panic attack?”
Allura got her feet under her, flinching away as her horn dragged over the top of the cage, and took a look around. The cage was cold, iron bars- immune to most magic. Her ears caught the sounds of other beasts in the same space, though she could not see them. The torches were too dim.
They seemed to be in a caravan of some kind, though Allura wasn’t sure.
“Where am I?”
“Well, about that. I mentioned magic laboratory, right? More like… kinda. We travel around, collect magic creatures. Most of ‘em, they aren’t sentient or sapient. Just- y’know. Except for you and… and that one, they’re usually no smarter than grigs. She’s trying to learn how to pull the magic out of them so she can…”
Allura threw herself at the bars, making the entire cage rattle.
“Hey, hey! Calm down!” Pidge hissed. “I’m trying to get you out of here! But if you wake up Sendak and I have no idea how long that sleeping potion will last, he’ll come in here and I won’t get another chance.”
Allura caught herself. “You would free me?”
Pidge grinned, showing off her teeth. “Of course. I am Pidge the Magician, after all.” She threw out her hands, muttered to herself, and Allura looked around.
She was back in her woods, seeing the lilac bloom in spring. The sight made her heart rise to her throat, but-
The iron bars were still there, pressing. None of this was real.
“Yeah. Um. Sorry,” Pidge muttered. “That- that really should have worked. Sorry.” She took a deep breath, and exhaled again. Reached for the lock.
Moaned loudly as she drew her hands back, burned and bloody, and hid them under her coat.
“You… have you ever performed any kind of… breakout before?” Allura asked, and would have been amused at Pidge’s dirty look under different circumstances.
“Have you?”
Allura admitted, she had not. “Keep trying, please.” She knew that she would not survive whatever the witch would do. “There has to be a way.”
Pidge nodded and licked her lips. “Okay.” Her fingers bled as she cast them about this time, and Allura swallowed as the air turned thick and- the bars were collapsing, the room was shrinking-
“Stop!” she called, hunching down, trying to make herself smaller. “The bars, the cage!”
“Quiznak!”
There was a feeling like the magic had been uprooted, cut, and the shrinkage stopped. The cold bars nearly pressed into Allura’s flesh, but-
Pidge stared at the cage with horror, then at her hands. “I am sorry. I am so, so sorry- I didn’t mean for that to happen.” Her eyes gleamed, tears starting down her cheeks. “Are you-”
“I’m fine,” Allura said, panting. “You can do this. Just- get me out. Please. Get me out.” She could feel the eyes of the other creatures on her.
Pidge swallowed hard, muscles quivering. Even that small amount of magic had taken so much out of her.
Allura tried to calm herself. “What other creatures does she have under her thrall?”
“There’s… um. Mostly mundane. There’s a deer that she’s changed into a qiln, grigs, like I said. She had a dire boar, but it died last week. A hellhound she managed to turn into a pit bull. She’s more interested in changing one thing to another, but she has to drain more powerful creatures to do it. If she didn’t have-” Pidge’s voice caught. “She has one powerful one that she uses as her source of magic. If she hadn’t found him while he was sleeping, like you, I doubt she could have beaten him.”
“What creature?”
“Me,” a voice said, softly, from deep in the shadows. Allura peered into them; they clung harder to the form, but she could make out golden eyes, slit like a cat’s, and the smell of hot brimstone and scales rasping against the floor of the cage.
“A dragon.” A creature like herself; a true immortal, a horror to her beauty. She felt no fear in his presence, though she could tell that Pidge was terrified. “What are you-”
“Waiting, patiently, for my moment.” He shifted within his cage. “The almost-mage frees you? Free me as well,” he demanded.
“Ignore him,” Pidge answered. She was patting herself down, looking like a wet cat. “He tries to tempt everyone who comes by. He’s… Listen. I do not want to be here when he gets out.”
“FREE ME!”
“Listen, unicorn, he’ll kill everyone here if he gets out,” Pidge protested. She shivered and looked over her shoulder. “My dad told me about that guy. He’s got a reputation.”
Allura glanced over as the dragon’s golden eyes glowed. She thought she could make out white hair and a scar across the bridge of his nose. “Please. Hurry.”
“Yeah,” Pidge said and sighed, pulling out a ring of keys. “You know, I had plans to magic you out of here and be so cool doing it. But the best you’re going to get is me being sneaky and stealing the keys from Sendak when I drugged him.”
Allura watched as Pidge brought the keys to the lock, which mocked her the entire time, calling her a failure of a mage, half skilled, little old bones- but open it did, and Pidge threw open the door with a flourish.
Allura surged forward, away from the bars, feeling the enchantments on her breaking like spider webs.
“PIDGE!” The big Galra from before thundered into the clearing. “What did you put in my drink?”
“Hehehe - oh quiznak.” Pidge rushed forward, throwing her meager weight at Allura’s flank. “Hurry, get out of here! Run!”
Allura didn’t leave, instead dancing clear as Sendak rushed Pidge, making her yelp in terror. There was something Allura had to do.
The other creatures held were in a loose semi-circle around the clearing, and Allura could sense their pleas. To run, to hide…To kill, to maim, to ruin the one who held him…
Allura ignored his voice, instead heading towards the dog first. She couldn’t return him to his true self, but she could free him.
One by one, the creatures emerged from their cages while she ignored the sounds of Pidge trying to evade the massive Sendak- until she no longer could.
“I will defend the little one,” the voice whispered in her head. “I will rend him limb from limb and the other one, too.” She saw a tongue lick the air, fire following. “Set me free and I will show you… mercy.”
Allura lowered her head, channelling her magic through her horn as she could hear Pidge howl “No!” behind her.
The cage exploded as the white dragon flew, free, his long sinewy body twisting through the air like a snake’s as he blew into Sendak and sent him colliding with one of the empty cages. He followed, jaws open, a long crunch and dark fluid dripping from teeth.
Laughter was all that interrupted the ravening, and applause. “Not alone. You were too weak to free yourselves alone.” Honerva’s eyes alighted on Pidge, lifting an eyebrow. “You betray me little one? You know what this means.”
Allura saw Pidge get to her feet, breathing hard and holding her ribs. “I have had it with you, Honerva. I am not letting you hurt any more creatures. Seriously! Kids these days! What’s wrong with you? You have one little marital spat and you decide to-”
“Undo what was done? I am not alone in these desires,” Honerva answered, seemingly oblivious to the dragon curling away from the mangled form of her henchman. “Is this worth it?”
Pidge’s shoulders hunched forward, kneeling on the ground. Allura could tell that her eyes were trying to swell shut.
“Unicorns cannot feel regret, you know, and for all my time as a mortal, I have not found it in myself,” Honerva went on, eyes on the dragon behind her. “But I know you can. Let that be my final revenge on you. Killing the one who had been your only safety all these years.”
“And as for you, Silver Dragon,” Honvera went on, watching the great dragon curl upon himself, winding to pounce. “You will remember forever this time. I caught you. I held you prisoner. My immortality may be gone but yours will forever be-”
Pidge and Allura both looked away as she was cut off, ignoring the crunch of her bones torn and ripped from her body.
Allura walked to her, the touch of her horn repairing broken ribs, black eyes and contusions. “Let’s go.”
There was a soft squeal from behind them, followed by sinister laughter.
“Don’t look back, and don’t run. You must not run from anything immortal, it will catch his attention,” Allura said calmly. She had witnessed hunters taking their prey before.
But the idea of it being one of her kind made her feel ill.
“Yeah, but-”
“Let’s go.”
Pidge steeled herself, wrapping her green cloak tighter around her shoulders. “Okay.” She gulped. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.”
They left the clearing and Honerva’s end, not looking as the great Silver Dragon took the skies, underneath the red of the moon.
To be continued.
