Epilogue

Stella could see her breath in the chilly air, but their physical exertions were keeping them warm. She jogged back over to the toppled burlap dummy and hauled it upright.

"You're getting quicker, but you have to remember to go for the head. Nothing else will even slow them," she said. The thirteen-year-old girl nodded and took a breath before launching into another attack on the dummy. This time, her blade struck true, and she sank the knife into the dummy's forehead. The girl looked to Stella and beamed with pride.

"Check out Lena over here," Stella called to Maggie, who was in the midst of training Courtney, Lena's older sister. Maggie whistled.

"Keep up that good aim," she praised, and Lena's proud smile grew wider.

"I think that's enough for today," Stella said. The sun was getting low in the sky, and she hoped Daryl would be back from his hunting excursion soon.

Winter was almost upon them. Stella guessed that it was likely mid to late November. Since their arrival to the camp that previous spring, their group's numbers had grown to upwards of 40. Lena and Courtney were two of the most recent arrivals, and surprisingly, the girls had little to no experience fighting the dead. Stella and Maggie had taken it upon themselves to train them so that they would be able to defend themselves if they needed to. Despite the girls' parents' initial protests, the girls were eager to learn, and they had proved to be very capable students.

Stella watched Lena shove her knife into its sheath on her belt and walk back toward the camp. She noticed Carl lingering nearby and had to suppress a smile when he and Lena began walking toward the water basins together. Carl had been relentlessly crushing on Lena since she had first arrived at the camp, and it looked like he was finally making progress in his efforts to befriend her.

She walked through the woods away from camp and toward her and Daryl's cabin. It was a good distance away from the main camp and gave them the illusion of solitude, even though the rest of the group was still close by. The cabin wasn't at all fancy or large, but it was home. Daryl and several of the other group members had built it using techniques reminiscent of eighteenth-century pioneer life, notching the logs together and sealing the cracks with wood chips and mud. It had one tiny window and a dirt floor, and it was only one room, but it was all Stella and Daryl needed.

Stella opened the door and took off her jacket, setting it on the top of one of the kitchen chairs that Daryl had swiped from the restaurant by the marina. A crudely-constructed bed was in one corner, and a bookshelf held their belongings and few kitchen supplies in the other corner. Thanks to a former stonemason who had joined the group a few months back, they also had a small stone fireplace along the back wall of the one-room cabin that brought warmth and a way to cook small meals. The stonemason had been installing fireplaces in as many shelters as possible before winter hit, and the group couldn't have been more thankful.

They had only had a few altercations with bad people in the past few months. Usually the threat had been small and easily disposed of, and the use of the house boats for a constant night watch helped to identify threats before the threats noticed them. Fires on the shoreline could be spotted from a long ways off when everything around the island was dark. More often than not, the fires belonged to harmless survivors, and after rigorous questioning and discussion among the group, the survivors were invited to join their community. Now there were 45 people living on Three Sisters Island, and though Stella didn't know everyone by name, she thought most of them were good people. It gave her faith that not all of humanity had gone sour, a belief that Beth had held even when there was plentiful evidence to the contrary. The island community had restored much of their humanity. The normalcy was reassuring.

Stella bent to light a fire in the small fireplace. She warmed her hands in front of the flames. A knock at the door jerked her out of her thoughts, and she strode across the small cabin and opened the door to see Beth standing in front of her.

"Hey," Stella greeted with a smile, holding the door open for her. Beth entered and smiled when the warmth from the fire washed over her.

"A few of us are gathering in the hall to play Catan after dinner," Beth said. "Would you want to join?"

"Only if I can be red," Stella replied, and Beth laughed. She and Beth often fought over who would get to use the red pieces. It was both of their favorite.

"Fine," she agreed, her eyes twinkling. "I'll see you in the hall then. Maybe in like two hours?"

"Sounds good," Stella said. Beth flashed her a smile and exited the cabin. The hall was a community space they had constructed a few months prior. It didn't live up to the implied size of its name, but it was still larger than most of the shelters on the island. The community used the space for activities, group meals when the weather was poor, and meetings when community business needed to be discussed. Stella smiled, looking forward to the game later. She was glad they had swiped the game from the peach orchard all those months ago.

The door to the cabin opened again, revealing a grimy-looking Daryl with three dead squirrels strung over his shoulder. He had been hunting in the woods off the island for most of the day. Stella made her way to him and gave him a deep kiss.

"You need a wash," she said teasingly as she pulled away. He grinned and shrugged, dropping the squirrels on the table.

"Maybe I like bein' dirty," he replied, his voice low and laced with secondary implied meaning. Stella rolled her eyes at him.

"You catch anything good today?"

"Yeah," he nodded. "Took me all day, but I got a deer. It's down in the hall. Gonna go butcher it up for a stew. Hannah said she'd cook for everyone tonight."

Stella nodded. "Beth came by and said people were going to play Catan after dinner. You wanna play?"

He shook his head. "Nah. I'll just watch you play."

Stella pressed herself into him and reached her hands under his shirt, her fingertips ghosting over the skin on his back.

"Maybe we should play our own game first," she said suggestively. Daryl's blue eyes danced with amusement as he looked down at her. He laced his fingers through her hair, as he so often did, and pulled her lips to his in a slow, passionate kiss. He pulled away and caressed her cheeks with the pads of his thumbs. He stared at her, his gaze unwavering. She frowned slightly, wondering why he was staring.

"How are you so perfect?" he murmured.

"C'mon now," Stella chided. "Nobody's perfect."

"You make me think otherwise."

Stella laughed softly. "Nah. But maybe I was made just for you, and you for me."

Daryl smiled down at her. "Absolutely."

His lips found hers again, and Stella found herself getting lost in the kiss. Daryl could be covered in dirt and grime, but she still found him irresistible. He broke the kiss before she could get too carried away.

"I love you," he said. Stella's heart swelled a little with the words, her chest feeling like an inflating balloon. Hearing him say that never lost its magic on her.

"I love you," she replied.

Daryl pulled away and gave her one last smile before leaving the cabin, probably to prepare the deer he had caught for dinner. Stella sighed wistfully as she watched him go. When did life become so wonderful? When the dead had started walking, Stella never would have believed she would find such complete happiness. Even though civilization was all but destroyed, the dead rose and ate the living, and nothing was as it used to be, Stella couldn't remember ever being happier.

She had friends. She had a home. She had a man she loved with all her heart who loved her right back. She had everything she needed. This was what life was supposed to be. She and Daryl were happy, and furthermore, they were safe. And the life they had was definitely worth celebrating.

The End

And it's over! Thank you SO MUCH to everyone for your reviews, favorites, and support. I couldn't have done it without you. :)

I'm going to take about a week off before publishing my next story (I want to have the entire story outlined before I start writing). The new story will be called Dixon's Vixen, and it will be an AU Daryl/OC story set in 1920s Prohibition. So if bootleg booze, speakeasies, and rebellious flappers sound interesting to you, keep an eye out for the new story!