Rarity walked by me with an almost guilty expression, as if she knew that words could never truly explain the reason behind what I was seeing. I considered what possible circumstance would've led to the gathering of such a menagerie. None of my hypotheses came close to providing a proper explanation.
“So, are we going to save this... someone or what?” yelled Rainbow Dash. From her tone and her disorderly flight it was evident that she was more than a little inebriated. Behind her, in an even more tipsy state, Gilda the griffin was attempting to land on her hind legs. She brandished in her claw an empty bottle of cyder towards nothing in particular and yelled something incomprehensible, but apparently supportive of Rainbow.
As the two finally landed on the ground, Zecora slowly made her way down the debris; she was clad in a brown cape and on her sides she carried large saddlebags.
“I thought by night this city would be more tranquil
but I see trouble has a way of finding us just like in Ponyville.”
“I met her in the hallway, and she offered to help.” explained Rarity.
“Well... thanks. I... I couldn't hope for better help. Spike seems to be sick, and we still have no idea who sent the help request and where they are... and by the way, when did you arrive in Canterlot... and why?”
“I will explain all later, if you like,
but now it's better to examine Spike.”
“Oh. Yes. Rainbow Dash... and Gida, I guess. Can you two make it across this gap?”
“Race you to the other side!” yelled Rainbow. Before I could say anything else, the two had disappeared into the darkness.
“Wait! You... you... Shoot!”
I returned to Spike. Zecora was pulling up his eyelids, looking at the back of the eyes. She murmured something I didn't understand, then finished examining Spike. Finally, she sentenced:
“I fear that as far as I understand
there is nothing I can do to help your friend;
you see, unicorn magic is what caused the disease
and that, as you know, is outside my expertise.”
For a few seconds there was silence. Rarity was the first to speak.
“Do you know what this is, Twilight? Is this a spell...?”
“ If I remember correctly Hippocrates' Manual of Magical health, there are at least three hundred possible spells that can cause this state, and each has its own counterspell. If we were to try them all, making a quick estimate, it would take between five minutes and... somewhere around five months.”
Silence fell again. Rarity sat down beside Spike, who by now was almost completely unconscious, and whispered something in his ear. It was too quiet for me to hear it, but I couldn't help but noticing Rarity's pained face.
I walked around the platform. There had to be a solution; something we had not yest considered. Around the tenth time I completed my circle, my gaze fell upon the two pieces of parchment. I picked them up and looked at them again. Looking at them together, I noticed something that had escaped us before. The side that was torn on the second paper matched the first paper perfectly. Putting them together, I read:
HELP ME
WALK DOWN
THE ROAD LESS
TRAVELED BY
It was the same message. The mysterious stranger had sent not two messages, but one, torn in two. But why?
Perhaps, I reasoned, Clover wasn't wrong about the impossibility to teleport from inside the caves- perhaps even teleporting a single piece of parchment was so difficult to send that it would arrive in pieces...
Was it possible, perhaps, that there was yet another piece? Looking carefully, the upper border of the first message was torn.
I ran to Spike. Zecora was inspecting the inside of his mouth, with Peewee flying around and chirping. I jumped and pushed Zecora out of the way, right before a green flame exploded from Spike's mouth. A third piece of parchment fell in front of him. Spike belched more black smoke before sighing with relief.
“That was intense.” he said.
“Do you feel alright?” I asked.
“Never been better.” he coughed another puff of smoke “...ok, maybe I have been better. But it takes more than that to stop a dragon.” Spike patted his belly.
Rarity leaned in closer to him. She opened her mouth as if to say something, then stopped. Spike seemed to have understood anyway;
“i heard everything” he said softly.
“I think- i'm almost sure that someone tried to teleport this message from inside the cave. The suppressive field caused by the jewels interfered with the magic spell fracturing the sent item; Spike, being the vector of the spell, suffered from this as the spell drained his energies... almost to the point of splitting him apart from the inside.”
Rarity repressed a gulp. Spike attempted to remain impassive, but his eyes betrayed his fear. I realized I probably should have toned that down.
“But i'm confident you're out of danger by now.” I tired to laugh to lessen the tension, but all I could muster was a fake-sounding lark.
“If indeed the message is the cause of this all,
I believe it's time to read the dangerous scroll.”
We all nodded and I gathered the three pieces; they matched perfectly.
The complete message was:
PLEASE FIND THE
GRIMOIRE TO
HELP ME
WALK DOWN
THE ROAD LESS
TRAVELED BY
For a while no-one talked; we all repeated softly the strange sentence, trying to make sense of it.
“Zecora” I asked “Do you happen to have pen and paper with you?”
“Of course I do, Twilight I just arrived in town
and I haven't had the time to put my luggage down.”
She opened her saddlebags and handed me a pen made out of a cane and a few sheets of paper.
I wrote down the sentence three times.
“Now, the message could be interpreted three ways. First,
PLEASE FIND THE GRIMOIRE;
TO HELP ME, WALK DOWN THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED BY
which would imply our person in trapped somewhere along the “road less traveled by”, whatever that is, and we need to go there to help. We also need to find a Grimoire.”
“Which means...?” asked Rarity. Spike answered her immediately.
“It's a mage's personal book of spells. Right, Twilight?”
“Exactly. Or at least, so it was in the dark ages. Anyway, if we arrange the text differently, we find
PLEASE FIND THE GRIMOIRE TO HELP ME;
WALK DOWN THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED BY.
Which means finding the grimoire is necessary to help them, and walking down the road is probably what we need to do in order to find it. But there is yet another possibility: that it's all one sentence
PLEASE FIND THE GRIMOIRE TO HELP ME WALK DOWN THE ROAD LESS TRAVELED BY
and our stranger needs to walk this mysterious road and we'd have to find the grimoire to help them do it.”
I stopped to catch my breath. I had spoken the last sentence all in one breath and I was afraid none of them had understood what I was saying. Zecora, at least, seemed to have caught it all.
“Regardless of which of your ideas is true
we need to know what is this path we should pursue.”
“Perhaps it's a metaphor”ventured Rarity “or some idiom we don't know...”
“You say this “grimoire” is from times of yore
perhaps even the idiom can be found in old lore.”
“You're right; If we search the library, I'm sure we'll find mention of it somewhere.” I began to mke my way upstairs.
“Aren't you forgetting something?”
“Like what?”
“Like Rainbow Dash?”
“Oh. Right. True. Hehm. I hope they don't take...”
I stopped halfway through the sentence. We all stared at the precipice.
Gilda was flying toward us.
And Rainbow Dash was lying in her hands.