Author's Note: Well, we made it. This is the final chapter of Seven Wonders, and I hope you enjoyed the story. I had other ideas of things to do, but honestly none of them felt like they fit quite right, and this felt like a good ending place to me. This is a lesbian fairy tale after all, and it ends... well... mostly like a fairy tale would.
Thank you to everyone who has read, reviewed and supported this story. It was my first ever multi chapter romance, and I hope I was able to do a good job. Please let me know what you thought of the story.
And if you haven't done so already, I highly recommend listening to the Fleetwood Mac song "Seven Wonders" that was the inspiration for this fic. I must have listened to it fifty times while writing this story. But really, anything by Stevie Nicks is amazing and I highly recommend it.
Well, without further ado, please enjoy the conclusion to Seven Wonders! :)
Chapter 25: The Rainbow's End
The days that followed their battle against Ganon were mostly a blur to Samus and Zelda. So many things happened so quickly that it was difficult to keep track of everything. There were repairs and preparations to be made, people to mourn, and most importantly a kingdom to rule. After all, the King of Hyrule was dead, and there was only one heir who could take his place.
The morning of Queen Zelda's coronation was probably the most hectic one yet, and it didn't help that it was the very next day after the late King's funeral. The abruptness of everything had given all of Hyrule emotional whiplash, and it was surreal to watch everything change over from deep mourning to intense celebration in less than a day's time. No one felt it more than Zelda herself.
She sat alone in her bedroom, momentarily having escaped from her guards and everyone else in charge of preparing her for the big day. Her hair was already set in the most elaborate curls with white flowers interwoven in braids along the back. She was wearing a puffy and ornate gown that was mostly white, save for the bust, which was a deep red wine color. It seemed like a strange look on her, but it had been her mother's dress so many years ago when she had sat as Queen of Hyrule, and it seemed only fitting that Zelda should wear it now that she had finally grown into both it and the role.
Zelda sighed as she glanced at herself in the looking glass. Her face was elaborately made up, much more so than usual, and she thought the darker shades of rouge and lipstick made her look so much older than she had been only a few days ago, but then again, in a lot of ways she was. And once more she was stricken by how much she had grown to resemble her mother.
A rapping at her door made the Queen-to-be sigh. She knew her respite would be short-lived, but she had hoped for a few more minutes of freedom before being ushered back into the insanity of coronation day.
"Come in," she called after a moment, fully expecting to be pulled back out and made to go through the motions of a ceremonial day when she was so emotionally exhausted she wasn't sure how she was even still sitting up. To her surprise, however, she perked up as soon as she saw the door open and watched Samus step through.
The bounty hunter smiled at her, not needing to say anything at all. It was enough to set Zelda at ease as Samus came closer. The hunter was also dressed in traditional ceremonial dress, but it was the dress of a knight, or at least one soon to be knighted. She had on black breeches and a deep red tunic, the same color as the bust of Zelda's dress. It was emblazoned with a golden Triforce emblem, and the same symbol appeared on her black leather gauntlets, which matched her black leather boots. Her hair was pulled into a low ponytail and tied with a deep red ribbon, and despite the fact that she was in men's clothing, the whole ensemble perfectly complimented her muscular yet still feminine physique.
"How did you know where to find me?" Zelda asked, standing up and walking over to her beloved. As ridiculous as she felt in her ceremonial regalia, she thought Samus looked perfectly handsome in hers, and there was something about seeing her that filled her up with energy and made the rest of the world fall away.
Samus put one arm around the princess's shoulder and kissed her on the forehead. "I had a feeling."
Zelda placed both of her hands on Samus's chest and leaned into the hunter's embrace as two strong arms wrapped around her. She closed her eyes as she listened to the sounds of Samus's heart beating.
"I really don't want to go through with this, you know. It feels like once I go out there and become Queen, it just makes everything that happened real."
Samus kissed her forehead again. "But it is real, my love. One way or the other. And I know it's hard, but your people need you now. Seeing you officially coroneted as Queen will help them start to heal, and I'll be right here, by your side."
Zelda smiled as she looked up at Samus. "My knight in golden armor. Officially."
Samus had been the one to come up with the plan a few days ago, back when Zelda's father had first been slain. "That's right. Once you're Queen, you can make me a knight, and I'll be able to call Hyrule my home. So no matter where I am in the galaxy, I'll always have some place to return to."
Zelda was about to say something when there was suddenly another knock on the door. This time, Impa stepped in and looked at the soon-to-be-Queen wrapped up in the arms of the soon-to-be-knight. Her face was unreadable, and while Zelda knew most members of her Court did not approve of her relationship with Samus, Impa had at least been kind enough not to say anything out loud. It wouldn't have mattered if she did, but Zelda appreciated that her longtime protector and caretaker respected her enough to respect her relationship, even if she didn't understand it or necessarily agree with it. She was sure that in time Samus would grow on Impa given how much the two warrior women had in common.
"Are you ready to go, Zelda?" the Sheikah woman asked.
Stepping out of Samus's embrace, Zelda nodded and followed her out of the room and toward the castle grounds where the procession would be held.
The coronation was not as long of a ceremony as Zelda had thought it would be, or perhaps it only felt that way because of how wrapped up in it she was. There was something invigorating about appearing before her people, in front of all of Hyrule, and accepting her crown as they cheered for her. Their renewed hope in their kingdom filled her with a renewed energy, and she felt more alive than she had in days.
The best part by far, however, was when Samus came forward and knelt before the newly crowned Queen. As Zelda looked down, she saw the hunter's blue eyes staring back at her, filled with love, and she was so thankful for the chance to do what she was about to do. Gently, she took the ceremonial sword and touched each of Samus's shoulders, officially dubbing her Lady Samus of Hyrule and making her a part of her world for real.
It wasn't a wedding. Such a thing was still unheard of between two women, but it felt like much more than a regular knighting to either Samus or Zelda. It was a symbol of their commitment to one another, an official way of making Hyrule Samus's true home, one she would belong to, even when she was out amongst the stars. And it was the grandest of ways to end Queen Zelda's coronation.
There would be plenty of time in the future to get the people of Hyrule used o the idea that Samus was more to Zelda than just a knight. They both knew rumors would spread before they were ready to officially come out, especially given that they had shared a bed every night since they had arrived on the planet. But that was all right. People would just be that much less shocked when they learned the truth.
It took a long time for things to calm down after the ceremony, and it wasn't until late in the evening that Zelda was able to give her guards and the members of the Royal Court the slip and run off to where she needed to be. There was still one thing left to do now that all of Hyrule was satisfied that order was being restored and their new Queen had been crowned.
As they had planned days before, Samus and Zelda snuck out together to the Temple of Time. They traveled hand in hand under the cloak of the moonlight, still dressed in their outfits from the day's ceremony. It didn't take long to get there, presumably because everyone who was supposed to be watching over Zelda was just as exhausted as she was, or perhaps because Impa and the others knew that there was nowhere in the universe safer for the Queen to be than by Lady Samus's side.
At any rate, they arrived at the Temple of Time just as the full moon was shining in through one of the stained glass windows. Link and Emmiline were already there waiting for them. Link was in his own ceremonial tunic, similar to the one Samus wore although in a deep forest green. Emmiline was dressed once more in the white Chozo robes as she waited beside Link at the Temple's alter.
"Zelda!" Link called with a grin. "Samus! Hurry up! We've been waiting for you!"
Emmiline nodded. "Couldn't exactly start without you," she murmured, looking embarrassed as though the words had come out more hostile than she had intended. "You have them, right?"
Samus touched a brown satchel than hung at her hip. "Yes."
The Rito nodded. "Good then. Bring them forward."
She looked over to the newest edition to the Temple of Time. Where the Master Sword had once been sheathed in stone, it was now sheathed in the stone statue of a prone Ganondorf. It had been moved there for safe keeping the very same day of his defeat in hopes that sealing him back inside of the otherwise abandoned temple would keep his evil powers at bay.
"So we've got the six spherical Wonders and two pieces of the Triforce," Emmiline thought aloud. "The question remains as to how we access Ganon's piece of the Triforce…"
Samus seemed intrigued by that question and wandered over to the stone Ganon, laying on the ground and frozen in a position as though he were still doing battle with the invisible vines that had once ensnared him. The Lady Knight looked over to the hand which still bore the symbol of the Triforce and, before anyone realized what she was doing, stomped on it. The forearm crumbled beneath her boot, and the severed stone hand fell to the ground. Samus bent over, picked it up, and looked over to the others.
"I removed his triangle. Now can we get started?"
Emmiline looked horribly scandalized, but Link burst out laughing as Samus stared back at all of them with a perfectly straight face. Zelda smiled and nodded.
"Yes, love. Thank you. That'll do just fine."
"Er…" Emmiline made an awkward avian screeching noise as she looked between Samus and Zelda and then back over to the altar, but finally she sighed and relented. "Sure… that'll do. I guess."
The ritual itself was fairly straightforward as Emmiline laid out the six orbs on the altar and then Link and Zelda placed their hands along with Ganon's severed stone appendage on the altar. Samus watched, knowing she would have a part to play in the end but not sure exactly what that would be. She could hear Emmiline speaking some words in Chozo, but it was a dialect she had never heard before, and she couldn't understand what the Rito was saying. Eventually, Emmiline stopped talking. The ritual seemed over as Zelda and Link pulled their hands away and everyone looked over to Samus.
She raised an eyebrow. "That was it?"
"Oh no," Emmiline shook her head.
And no sooner had the Rito said those words than the altar began to shake. All six of the Wonders began to glow brilliantly in their respective colors as they rose into the air. Zelda, Link, and Emmiline stepped back as they realized the six orbs were beginning to float in a circle, and within that circle, reality was becoming distorted. The Wonders were opening a portal.
"What's going on?" Zelda asked, a note of panic in her voice.
"If you gather the Seven Wonders," Emmiline said, as though reciting it straight from a verse, "it'll make a path to the Rainbow's End."
Slowly, the Wonders stopped spinning and began to fuse together into a ring of light surrounding the entrance to the portal. Samus and Zelda looked through it to see what appeared to be some kind of other dimension, something that was as infinite and dark as outer space itself but illuminated by stars. And there was a path, just as Emmiline said. A road that seemed to be an actual, solidified rainbow.
"You want us to walk across that?" Zelda asked, staring out into the vastness of space through the portal. "What will we even find at the end?"
"The final Wonder," Emmiline said. "A link between worlds or something like that. Something said to bend the very fabric of time and space itself and take the user wherever he or she wishes to go."
Zelda could feel her heart quicken at the thought of such a power. Up until now, the Wonders had been useful in battle, but the idea of having something that could transport her anywhere she wanted to be… it meant never have to actually be away from Samus for long. It was better than anything she could have imagined, and she could understand why Ganon would want it so badly.
"Well," the Queen said, holding her hand out to her Lady Knight. "Shall we go?"
Taking her hand, Samus gave her a gentle smile. "As you wish."
Together, Samus and Zelda walked hand in hand through the portal and onto the rainbow road, and as they stepped into the dimension, the portal closed behind them. They were past the point of no return, and yet it did not seem to matter. Because as they walked together, they knew there was no one else in this entire world but the two of them.
And as they walked, they gazed out at the vast empty sky and the starlight that twinkled in and out, and for the first time since they had confessed their feelings for one another they felt truly free. Free from everyone's eyes and thoughts and comments on their relationship and speculations on what they were to one another. For a moment, they didn't have to be a Queen and her Knight or a princess and a bounty hunter. They were just two women in love. Two women holding hands and walking down a road together without anyone staring.
They were almost sad when they reached the end of the rainbow road, but they knew that the Rainbow's End was only the beginning. There, on a Pedestal, sat one last Wonder. It was larger than the others and not quite spherical. It must have had hundreds of facets, and it was clear and shone like glass.
Samus and Zelda stood hand in hand as they looked down at it together.
"I guess this is it," Samus said. "Mission accomplished."
"What are you talking about?" Zelda asked with a playful grin. "This is only the beginning. With this, I'll never have to be apart from you for very long. I can teleport to you and return to Hyrule in no time at all. And you'll be home with me most of the time anyway."
"Home," Samus said with a sad smile. "It's been such a long time since I've actually had one of those…"
"Well now you do. You have Hyrule."
Samus chuckled and shook her head. "No. I have you. Wherever you are, that's my home. That's where I'll always return to."
"And I'll always be waiting and ready for you. And I'll cherish the time we do spend together."
"Are you sure you're willing to sign on for all of that? I do travel a lot. My life is dangerous… as you know. It won't be easy."
Zelda just laughed and shook her head. "I don't want easy. I want you. I don't have to be willing to sign on for all of this. I already have. I'm yours, Samus. I love you, and I want to be with you. Forever. Regardless of what my kingdom says. No matter who we have to fight. In sickness and in health. Come what may. I can face anything. All I ask is that you're by my side for the rest of my life."
Samus could feel her heart pounding in her chest, and as she looked down at Zelda, she was overcome with a sudden desire for her partner. She pulled her close into an embrace and a deep passionate kiss. She could feel the desire in Zelda as well as they kissed long and deep and savored each second of contact with one another before slowly pulling away to catch their breath. When she could finally speak, Samus looked down at Zelda, love and determination in her eyes.
"I love you, Zelda. More than anyone or anything else in the universe. And I swear to you, I will be by your side for the rest of the my life."