Thanks to my brother for editing the early chapters, and then essentially co-writing the entire second half of this with me and allowing it to become a lot more than it would have been just on my own.

Thank you for the reads, the reviews, and the PMs. If this last chapter was a little late, it's only because I felt the weight of wanting to make it the best that I could for everyone who's read this far. I sincerely hope you enjoy it!

"Well, we're tied: two and two. I feel like we shouldn't try to rush the climax of this whole challenge onto the tail end of the day, especially after that last event... So how about this? We'll break the tie with the Scavenger Hunt the next time I come back. The rules are simple: pick out your favorite thing in the entire Painted World and bring it here. Then, when I get back, we'll argue it out until we can convince the other person to pick ours. Sound good?"

Priscilla took in a bit of a nervous breath at the thought of the impending resolution to their grand game. The uncertain feeling wasn't like her, but lately encountering such changes within herself was hardly surprising.

Would Karenthi consider Priscilla's answer... cheating?

She felt this was an opportunity, and opportunities may be missed. Once that notion had been lodged within her it refused to be unseated. No amount of effort or internal discussion could convince Priscilla to change her mind and choose a silly candidate for presentation. Nevermind silly—she could no longer convince herself to present an ordinary nomination. Even things verging towards meaningful—objects with sentimental value or with ancient histories associated to them—were unsatisfactory, and yet...

She did not want to do the disservice of nominating an object of a radically different tone to the kind Karenthi would bring forward. Worse, Priscilla's chosen object was in stark contrast to the lighthearted tone of the entire game: the game that Karenthi had crafted to bring Priscilla joy. Karenthi was as sweet as she was competitive, and she took both her rules and her victories quite seriously. Priscilla did not want to offend the precious young woman.

If only Karenthi would arrive now, Priscilla would be saved the agony of doubt. But a sustained, self-inflicted silence failed to bring any tell-tale sounds of the Undead's arrival to Priscilla's ears.

Karenthi was late. And Priscilla remained restless.

Karenthi bolted to the end of the rope bridge the moment she appeared in the Painted World. The familiar creaking was usually a sound of comfort, but it failed to work its magic this time as, upon arriving, Karenthi simply felt anxious. She slowed at the end of the bridge for only a second to admire the single blossom that had recently appeared on one of the scraggy shrubs sprouting from the rocks, but then she was on her way again. Sweeping up the winding path, she dashed past the bonfire at a full sprint, tagging it with a quick brush of her fingers as she passed.

In the courtyard she danced through the hail of spears without effort, disappointed that she wasn't able to be distracted by them for more than a few seconds. On the stone causeway she passed the knight and his shriveled companions ere they could strike. Flustered at how quickly she'd traversed the entire Painted World, Karenthi finally relaxed her pace, hoping for a few moments to catch her breath and her thoughts. By the time she'd decided this, however, it turned out that her awkward but unrelenting steps had already delivered her to her destination.

Immediately her cold and jumpy nerves were joined by the tight, tense clenching of her stomach and a dryness in her throat. She was here. She was but a few twisting bends of conversation away from change: the only thing, as far as she knew, that was as exciting as it was frightening.

There had been a point in the history of their growing closeness in which Priscilla had been distressed for Karenthi's safety during her periods of absence. But as Priscilla grew to know the Undead better, her care for Karenthi had been joined by a knowledge that the young woman would come back no matter the adversities that assailed her.

And so those potential adversities no longer troubled Priscilla's thoughts at this point. But there was one worry that she was always unable to erase fully. It consistently crept into her heart when she allowed it to wander; the result of one simple truth that persisted even through the lies and deceptions that had been spun around the Undead destiny.

The Fire must be linked. And Karenthi had a sense of duty that was capable of exceeding even the betrayal she'd been dealt.

It was she who had sparked their entire friendship, who had continued coming back and forcing herself into Priscilla's life more and more. Soon Priscilla had reciprocated, and together they had forged something that surpassed what either of them could have made on their own. But... did what they have manage to compare to the fate of a dying world?

Astoundingly, to Priscilla that was no longer even a question. By the time she'd thought to be concerned over it, her heart had already given its resounding reply. Her greatest source of agitation now was that she had allowed Karenthi to leave last time without telling her. She wanted Karenthi back here so that the Undead could never again leave for the world outside without knowing the truth. Priscilla wanted to impose, to affect, to leave Karenthi with the weight of Priscilla's will before there was a chance of the young woman deciding what she would do.

Her pervading nervousness over speaking such words was eclipsed by the nauseating discomfort of wishing she'd spoken them sooner.

"Hey, Priscilla."

The poor half-dragon felt for the first time in many ages the tingling sensation of her body attempting to leap out of her own scales in fright. In an (admittedly, less vocal) inversion of the time she'd stalked Karenthi during their invisible game of hide-and-seek, Priscilla had been caught so deep in thought that being startled out of it left her winded.

She must have looked the part too, for Karenthi stood with eyes wide, stunned at her first and entirely accidental success at catching Priscilla off guard. But Priscilla believed, as she struggled to recover some decorum, that rather than having been caught at such an extreme level of distraction, this was simply Karenthi's true skill in stealth when she was neither humming nor singing nor stomping her feet, for a change...

"Hello, Karenthi."

The entertainment of a thought flashed in Karenthi's expression: that this was a perfect opportunity to tease. But the thought mysteriously seemed to find no foothold. Instead, they were both exposed to the undead's highly awkward reply.

"So, how are... things?"

Karenthi let out a massive internal groan. She wished she could have walked into another invisible handful of snow just now to snap herself out of this nervous daze! Wait, in hindsight, how had Priscilla turned the snow invisible back at the end of that fight? Karenthi had assumed that Priscilla's clothing and weapons were somehow magically enchanted to turn invisible along with her, but a random handful of snow was a spectacular achievement, even by Dusk's standards.

That mental tangent had now caused her odd greeting to be followed up by an even odder protracted silence. Twenty seconds in and this encounter was not going anywhere close to how she'd planned it.

Planned? That was a strong choice of word. Karenthi had rehearsed one meagre thing. Ad nauseam, granted, but that was it. Her mind scrambled for something to say before the silence extended any further.

"W-Wow, it's been four days and I'm still trying to recover from that snowball fight."

Priscilla seemed thankfully to gloss over the awkwardness, putting a finger to her cheek in a sheepish gesture.

"Ah, I do... almost feel guilty about that."

And sheepish was the word, as Priscilla's smile was far too tame to be considered coy. Though the way she'd drawn out the 'almost' just a little bit eased some of Karenthi's nervousness. Nothing had been a truer indicator to her of Priscilla's sincere enjoyment on that day than the half-dragon's relentless self-satisfaction in her victories. Karenthi was—in a shocking revelation—sincerely glad that she had lost the snowball fight. The true game had been, all along, to give Priscilla the best time imaginable. And that was the one contest from the entire day that Karenthi had absolutely refused to lose.

"I admit, when I first met you, I wondered if you offered to let your accidental intruders leave peacefully in an act of self-preservation—that perhaps you were weak and sought a way to avoid confrontation." Karenthi led out a bit of a relaxing breath now that they'd settled into a conversation and her mind had been forced to give up on over-thinking every word she said. "Knowing now just how false that is, it makes that first moment when you asked me to leave rather than attack me on sight both a lot scarier and a lot sweeter."

With the heat of combat and thrill of competition far in the past, Priscilla demured in little more than a whisper, "You're flattering me quite unnecessarily..."

Karenthi wanted to enjoy this successfully restored normalcy to their conversation, or even better, Priscilla's now fantastic blushing expression, but neither of those were the reason she was here. Neither of those could be allowed to distract her from what she had to do.

"Priscilla. Are you ready?"

The towering, barefooted, silver-haired scaled woman nodded immediately.

"I am. Before we begin, however, may I commit the selfish offense of prefacing my decision?" Wait, was this about to be some sort of caveat? Then Priscilla was stealing words right from Karenthi's mouth. She nodded and listened intently for what Priscilla would say. "I... debated my choice for some time. I have, in the end, chosen something that I believe is outside of the spirit of this final competition. Regardless, I have decided that nothing else will do, and I am willing to disqualify myself in order to share my answer. In light of that, I think it would be best if you were to present your choice first in the proper spirit of the game, and then hear me afterwards."

Karenthi's heart beat harder in equal parts excitement and trepidation. Damnit, her heart wasn't ready for this yet! She'd come here expecting that she'd be able to organize her thoughts one final time while she asked Priscilla to go first. And now Priscilla had something important enough to say that she was prefacing it with a similar request? Karenthi wanted to be respectful, to accommodate Priscilla, but... If there was ever a time when it was acceptable to be completely selfish, she told herself, it had to be now!

"P-Priscilla, I... have an even more selfish request to make. Um, I think it's very sweet that you're taking this so seriously, but I'm—how should I say this... The point has only ever been to have fun. There is no such thing as 'cheating' or breaking the rules or anything like that. There is no right or wrong kind of answer, and you don't need to apologize or worry about those details. In addition, I've also, um... W-Well, if it's alright with you, I would..." Karenthi felt so self-indulgent for asking this, but her run here had proven drastically short, and given that she was so nervous and caught off guard that she now felt ready to explode, she had to make this bid for more time. "I would really, really like to go second."

Oh. Was... that how it was? Priscilla suddenly felt an even greater pressure, a new sort of intensity foisted upon her future words. She wanted to speak second even more so after what Karenthi had just said. But for the sake of both of them speaking their minds, to ensure that nothing got in the way of these impending words, Priscilla acquiesced.

"Very well. Then I will go first."

It was in the moment that Priscilla prepared to give her presentation that both women realized neither of them were holding anything, despite claiming readiness to present their nominations for the grand scavenger hunt.

"My favorite thing in the Painted World, Karenthi, is you." Karenthi was convinced that her heart stopped beating. "There are things in this place that I find quaint. Others that I find enjoyable. Some that I treasure dearly. There are mementos, evocateurs of nostalgia, and things that have served as emotional comforts. There are creatures of which I feel fond and of others pleasantly tolerant. But Karenthi, I have no means of comparison or measure by which to properly express how much I value and cherish you. Lest you suppose otherwise, you are not special to me merely by virtue of being the first person with whom I could converse and connect after such a long time alone. I have known kings and queens, goddesses and princes, nobles and servants, and I remember every one. Though the scope of our game is limited to this world, I assure you that even should these past acquaintances somehow fill this land of snowy stone, still you would conquer them all, even without your sword. Karenthi, in all the Painted World, in all Anor Londo—in its height or its ruin—in all the world that I have ever seen or known, I have never met anyone like you. You have changed me in ways I thought impossible. You have overcome what solitude and rejection and abandonment forged in me over the course of centuries. You have shattered fetters that wrapped my heart since before I can even remember." Priscilla took a brief pause to catch her breath, her words having come close to being hurried. "I was worried initially that you would feel burdened by these words, pressured by the impact that you have upon my life. Perhaps you do feel that way. But you are strong, Karenthi. You have borne weights so tremendous that they crushed me, and you were able to pull me out from beneath them. I want you to know what you mean to me, even if you should find such knowledge oppressive. This is my selfishness, I believe, but for once I feel no desire to restrain it. Words seem to me suddenly too trite to convey my heart. Would that I were queen or princess of a land not so barren as this, for I would knight you, and present unto you all I had until you understood how deeply I admire and love you."

Priscilla had never struggled so greatly in all her life to maintain eye contact with an individual. When she finished, Karenthi was still staring up at her, eyes wide and absorbent as if she was aware of nothing else in all this living painting.

A firm wind blew through the columns of the lonely tower, laden with unusual warmth. The snow around Priscilla's feet was more akin to the nearly forgotten form of slush.

Karenthi finally took a deep breath and looked at the ground. Her exhale trembled a little, and her complexion had continued to ascend the spectrum toward tomato red.

The Undead had a few false starts as she attempted to reply, each of which caused Priscilla's throat to constrict and her heart to palpitate. Priscilla anticipated this coming moment even more than she had looked for Karenthi to return to her in the first place.

"...Is it some sort of karmic justice that I thought I was prepared for this situation, but expected to be the one rendering speechlessness instead of the one caught speechless?" She flashed a faint smile. "I... prepared something for today. I didn't expect to be following something that incredible, but I took the last few minutes to think through my script again, and I think that it might serve... as something of an answer to your words. I-I know it's cruel of me to ask you to listen to something long-winded and seemingly unrelated right now, but the alternative is probably another few minutes of me staring into the snow like an idiot. Is that... alright?"

Priscilla swallowed, surprised at the dryness of her throat, and put on the best smile she could manage through her state of tense anticipation.

"Of course, Karenthi."

The young woman nodded and took another deep breath, doing her best to calm herself and focus on what she had prepared.

"You uh, seem to like my stories, so I... prepared this for you."

Karenthi fidgeted an unusual amount, even for her, and looked to be having a hard time getting herself to continue. Nervousness seemed to pervade her on a level far deeper than the amusing, flustered moments that Priscilla was used to seeing.

Priscilla watched as Karenthi tried to loosen her posture into storytelling form, though the transition this time was adorably unsuccessful, habit failing to erode the jitters in her frame. Priscilla tried to suspend her desperate need to hear Karenthi's answer in an attempt to enjoy whatever this was going to be.

"Once upon a time, in the dying land of Lordran, surrounded by death and hopelessness, a lone hero one day stumbled from the demented nightmare of reality... into a fairy-tale—a real fairy-tale!" Karenthi took a full inhale, her breath coming a little easier. "There she found a decaying castle guarded by soldiers of slime holding sharp spears, a bridge defended by the slumbering corpse of a dragon that would crush her if it were ever to awaken, and at the end of it all a princess: locked in her lonely tower of cold and ice."

Karenthi met Priscilla's eyes with an expression too sincere to remember to be embarrassed. She'd started gesturing with her arms and her steps, sketching the landscape of her imagined Ariamis in the air, pacing only a few feet at a time and turning sharply on her heel. Things such as doubt and self-consciousness were, even if still alive and strong, pushed aside.

"The princess seemed a bit scary at first, if the hero were honest. But even after their short exchange, the hero couldn't get the princess out of her mind. So she came back. Again. And again. Even if she were destined to lose every game of checkers. And soon, somehow, without even realizing it'd happened, she and the once-frightening princess had become friends. In the strangest place, amidst the darkest terrors, the hero had found someone gentle, kind, funny; someone upon whom the hero could lean for strength, and place even her heaviest burdens."

As the echo of her most recent words traveled back to her on the wind, embarrassment returned to the surface in full force and Karenthi hastily averted her eyes, spinning to face out toward the snowy emptiness to allow herself to continue the tale.

"...But even with such a person to call friend, still the hero fretted. The hero doubted. The hero lost faith. When her quest—her sworn duty bestowed upon her by the gods!—fell to pieces, she thought she was lost. For in the realm of Lordran, when an Undead loses their purpose, they lose themselves as well."

The wind whistled quietly, and everything seemed to grow more still and barren. Karenthi continued in a near whisper.

"But that was when the hero realized that she'd been wrong all along. She was not without purpose. Even before her false quest had crumbled, she had betrayed it and chosen a new quest within her heart. Her hero's vow had been broken within her long before that supposed destiny had been proven to be a lie."

Karenthi turned back towards Priscilla, face flushed red but smiling regardless. She bit her lip, hands suddenly clasped together to keep from shaking. There was no more script. Karenthi shook her head.

"A-Ah, but even in the moment of truth, the hero still hesitated to say what she wanted to. She was afraid. Even after facing incomprehensible terrors time after time, she was still scared stiff of... of baring her soul to the person she trusted most. E-Even after the princess had been so honest and sincere, the hero... the hero still fretted over nothing, and talked in circles and..." Karenthi clenched her fists tight. "But sh-she overcame her stupid fears and said... what she wanted to say!"

Karenthi shut her eyes and took a deep, slow breath, opening them to the sight of the object of her affection, perched and waiting as if on the edge of a cliff, and that was all it required for her entire body to calm itself. In the span of a moment Priscilla watched a previously unseen resolve smother all else, leaving before her a Karenthi of mountainous strength; an undead of such tremendous resolve that not a single one of Lordran's terrors had ever stood a chance.

Karenthi drew a sharp breath the words came out in a shout.

"Priscilla, I want to stay with you!"

Every syllable rang loud and clear in the Painted World's anticipatory quiet. This time bolstered by the echoes of her own bold words, Karenthi now easily forged ahead.

"Now and later. I want to experience things, if only to experience them together. If I had to put this feeling into words, this new purpose or destiny or whatever, it's just, you. You're... you're it. All of it. And somehow, even if that doesn't make a whole lot of sense, I can't think of any other way to say it. I want to be your friend, your knight, your companion, but somehow even those aren't quite enough. It's more than each of those—than all of those."

She stepped forward, looking up with a desperate expression as one of her hands was clenched tight against her chest.

"Let someone else rekindle the flame! Let them snuff it out! Let the world burn. Or freeze. Or turn to stone. Let Gwyndolin make a new false sun. Let Frampt lie to and manipulate another thousand would-be heroes. Let the vessel of lords remain empty. I—" She slowed, taking a few deep breaths while staring upwards straight into Priscilla's eyes. "I don't care. Let me have you."

The air split with a crack like thunder as a massive icicle broke free and crashed to the stone by the tower's entrance. Even as the sounds of its shattering faded, there was a din of noise in its wake. Smaller icicles broke loose all around and above them in a tinkling chorus of falling glass. The relentless pit-pat of falling water was added as shelves of snow started to drip onto platforms below.

Neither of them had so much as flinched at the tremendous crash of the Gough-sized spire of ice. They stared at each other, both incapable of averting their eyes for anything.

In her deepest of dreams, Priscilla had imagined this. She had desired, wished, prayed for this. Even at risk of being wounded at the core of her being, she had made the irreversible decision to want.

Now that it was real, the world felt ephemeral, intangible. Hope was a far cry from belief, and the transition from dream to reality left her dazed.

"...Ok." Priscilla felt too much to make a more elaborate reply at the moment. She just whispered her affirmative with all her heart. Karenthi's widening, shimmering, star-filled eyes welcomed her, drew her forward. "Stay with me, Karenthi. Please."

The young woman—Karenthi, who was now something even more special, more precious than she had been before, an entity currently morphing in Priscilla's mind as it tried to wrap itself around the reality of this change—suddenly giggled, and the sound had never been so lovely as in this moment.

"'Please?' Even after all that?" Karenthi extended her hand, palm upward, as the veritable rain of melting snow and ice all drizzled around them. Priscilla's heart seemed to rise within her chest, her throat filled with a near choking sensation of overwhelming joy.

"You know, Priscilla, this place is really wonderful, but in hindsight I don't think that it was ever the Painted World that I considered home. I now realize it's you that I was always hurrying home to."

Through Priscilla's elation and wonderment escaped, of all things, a halted laugh that entered the world in the form of her second ever snort.

"Karenthi... how long did you spend practicing that?"

The young woman blinked, her eyes widened, and then her face turned red on a level that eclipsed the tomato scale altogether.

"W-w-what are you talking about? That one was off the cuff!" Priscilla raised an eyebrow of tremendous doubt with her pale hand covering her repressed giggles. "Ok, so I came up with it yesterday and thought it was really good, so I jotted it down for future reference. What's the big deal?" She showed the underside of her left forearm, generously inked with key words and a few of the phrases she was clearly most proud of. "I-Isn't that fine? The fact that I put so much work into it being kinda sweet in itself?"

Priscilla was radiant with both bemusement and the joy of the feelings just shared between them.

"Yes, it's adorable, Karenthi." That stopped the young woman's protests, as well as her next few heartbeats. "But peeking at your notes right before the test? You seem frighteningly comfortable with cheating at all sorts of things lately."

Karenthi crossed her arms defensively while fighting back a smile. It was a whole new experience, trying to keep up this banter while her heart was still up in the clouds and all she wanted to do was just shout into the snowy abyss how happy she was.

"Oh, this again? Well then, I'm surprised you didn't turn invisible while spilling your heart to me, since we both know that becoming completely transparent is never cheating no matter the circumstances."

"That is not a bad idea. Perhaps in the future when I feel compelled to speak similar such words to you again, I shall render myself—"

"W-Wait! I take it back. No invisibility for you and no sneaking notes for me, ok? We'll both keep saying this sort of thing without... hiding behind anything."

Priscilla tried to smile victoriously but it came out as a silly, flustered grin of a schoolgirl rather than of an immortal half-dragon.

"S-So you... have further such things that you intend to say to me...?"

Karenthi's jaw hung open at the priceless tone of the embarrassed query, but a newly born prick of responsibility—no, privilege—prompted her to speak rather than remain in silent, appreciative shock.

"Yes, I do. A lot more."

Priscilla impulsively reached out and took Karenthi's hand, ice tightly entwining with fire in a paradoxically electric sensation. A light kindled in Priscilla's eyes, suddenly blazing in sparkling moonlight radiance that had Karenthi enthralled. Priscilla's voice was an excited whisper.

"Lets go, Karenthi."

"Go? Wh-where?"

Leading the way, walking sideways to keep her gaze locked with Karenthi's, Priscilla led them towards the plank at the edge of the tower.

"Anywhere. Everywhere."

Karenthi's brain sputtered in confusion, and her mouth found itself forced to follow suit.

"Wh—b-but where... Are you—Priscilla, wait!" Her words finally caused the halt that her heels digging into the snowy stone had not. Karenthi continued right away, the nostalgic abyss of exit mere feet from Priscilla's leading step. "Priscilla, we can't just—aren't you trapped here?"

Priscilla shone, glowing as though the answer to that question was the most obvious thing in the world. Her blossoming smile was so permeating that Karenthi felt it all the way through their connected hands.

"The princess then put her faith in her precious hero, believing that whatever had bound the princess to her snowy world of stone... had been defeated."

Karenthi was too excited to breathe. She voiced her last, dying strain of doubt with no conviction.

"Are you... sure that it's safe? That it's..."

"I suppose that, in a way, trust can be seen as a form of uncertainty. But if there is anything you have taught me, Karenthi, it is that emotions fostered towards another hold a distinct, magnificent sort of power. I will trust in the love that I feel burning so brightly in my heart right now."

Trying to bite back a completely face-consuming grin and failing completely, Karenthi skipped forward the few remaining steps, coming right up to the jagged lip of stone and spinning around.

"Hey, Priscilla, have you ever heard the joke about cats and buttered bread?"

"Hm? Something about landing upside down...?"

"Close enough. I was just wondering: if we step off the plank together holding hands, do you think your grace will cause us to descend in a gentle dive, or will my un-coordination drag even you into one of my hopeless spirals?"

Priscilla cocked her head, a faint smile playing at her lips even though her eyes were suddenly serious.

"Your knack for injuring yourself is as impressive as it is cute, but do you really doubt my ability to protect you?" The sincerity in Priscilla's tone caused Karenthi's next heartbeat to pound roughly against her ribs. "It may perhaps be the greatest challenge I have ever undertaken, but I intend to protect you so fully that you shall never have need of a humanity sprite again."

It seemed strange that they were about to exit this painting by falling, because Karenthi was certain right now that she was soaring. It had been a close battle thus far, but for all her practice and thinking up words to express her affection, Karenthi felt she had definitely been bested at the end by that final promise.

"...I think I like the sound of that, Priscilla."

Gone was any trepidation of uncertainty. Come in full were visions of their future, of distant lands, of cities and plains, of roads walked side by side. Shed were the shackles of the past, of the supposed destinies that had been forced upon them both. Forward was anything. Everything.

"Then, shall we, Karenthi?"

They looked down, a steady rain of water and slush visible as it fell from all sides of the tower behind them. With no countdown, only a shared tightening of the grips on each other's hands, they stepped forward off the plank and plunged down into the worlds beyond.