I remember following him out, under the cover of dusk. His scales rippling, sinuous, his wings spread wide. I dared not track him with magic: he surely would have noticed me then. But gliding after him? Perhaps he was not expecting a mundane solution to my curiosity.
Fifty-Three
“A-AND THEN I kicked it in the face!” Rainbow yelled, her face red. She took another long sip from her mug, and stumbled backwards, walking on two hooves.
The crowd cheered, a roar of sound that washed over her, warm and deep. Familiar and comforting, it was, in a small but important way, like coming home. She felt their approval, felt it solidify behind her, a- a sense of righteousness, a confirmation. Every bit as necessary as her theatrics and death-defying stunts, this brought her full-circle, closed the loop. She’d earned it, dammit, and there was the proof—Tumbler swaying where he stood, toasting to her health.
“She,” he coughed, drank more cider, “she did,” he said, drawing another round of whoops from the gathered ponies.
These were the rearguard of Luna’s defence, a force assembled not so much to battle the elemental forces arrayed against them, but the more mundane threats. The famine and drought that could easily cripple their retreat north-wards. The sanitation crews, and disease experts that followed alongside. Those responsible for shelter, for infrastructure, guidance, and management of the vast swarms of ponies fleeing the desolation of their lands. Tens of thousands passed through checkpoints like these every day. It was a logistical nightmare, made worse by the imminent threat forcing them to move, slowly and steadily. Periods of respite and small victories—these were seized eagerly, and nopony had the heart to deny them the release of tension, once every little while.
And so Rainbow’s appearance had been met with perhaps an excessive amount of good cheer.
“Stupid dragons,” Rainbow said, slurring her words. “I dunno what it was even doing there.”
“You’re so brave,” somepony to her left said. “Facing down a dragon . . .”
“Heh. That ain’t nothing. You should’a seen Fluttershy—oh, a friend from back home,” waving a hoof lazily through the air, “made one cry once. Just yelled at it until it flew off, bawling.”
That drew more scepticism. Rainbow filled her mug once more, ignoring the laughter. This was important, right, she thought, staring down into the amber liquid. A long exhalation, drawing out the slow relaxation of tension. Part—scratch that, most of her was still in disbelief. She should have died, and more than once at that.
Why the hell was that dragon there?
She’d need to Jump back, too, and soon—provide that little tip that somehow caused everything to work out. Have to let the others know, too, that only made sense, or they would have come back for her, too. Right?
Rainbow tipped the mug back, sucking at the cider greedily. She burped, patted herself on the stomach, and stood up. “Hey, uhh, thanks for . . . for all this,” she said. “I’ve just gotta, gotta stretch my wings. Yeah.” A beat later and she pumped her shoulders, shooting straight up into the air.
This land was so strange. Every now and then Rainbow thought she’d recognised something—a river, bending in just the right way, or a series of mountains in the distance. But they were never in the right positions, relative to each other, and they always turned out to have differing features. It caused beats of home-sickness, a deep-seated pang that the cider only accentuated. She took a deep breath.
Here, they were verging on the northern plains. The town she’d woken up in, and the castle she’d been helping build, where she’d spent the last two years—all of that was still further north, out near the forested expanses of land. The castle that would become the ruin at the centre of the Everfree . . . that would place her somewhere near Appleloosa, right? She looked down at the grassy hills where they were camped, and snorted.
The wind picked up a bit, tousling her mane and sending delicious little slivers of cold to scurry between her feathers, caress her back. To the south she saw the Stormwall as a vast blackness, a shadow encompassing the horizon. Sparks of light visible even here indicated Luna—she’d missed the Princess by a few hours, it seemed. She dedicated herself to delaying the Storm’s advance, as much as she could. A delaying strategy, and yet there was no lost cheer down below. Rainbow wished she could share their optimism. Her presence alone was reason to celebrate—to believe in their eventual victory. They waited for Celestia, but they believed in Luna.
Except . . . Rainbow remembered the heat of the dragon’s fire. Remembered it strip the emotion from her, bleed her power out in its furnace. She remembered the cold inside—like its heat had burned her nerve endings, caused the afflicted areas to go completely numb. They could interfere with Coromancy, somehow. Worse, they were associated with the Storm. That wasn’t a logical conclusion, so much as something Rainbow had intuited, an association of coincidence. They operated under Its shadow, they had an agenda, their magic was antithetical to her own. Cross-purposes and . . . and, Rainbow sighed again, heavily, feeling the weight press on her mind. And Discord. A draconequus, she recalled. Dragon and pony combined.
She shook herself all over, fell a few dozen feet to gather speed, and twisted it into circular motion, spinning herself around and around, wings tucked tightly against her body. The cider was warm in her belly, the wind cold against her fur. She could hear the voices below, spilling up towards her. She felt a grin spread across her lips. She’d witnessed first-hoof, more times than she could count, how time-travel had been used to entrap, to assure, to ensure outcomes. She knew she’d go back to help herself against the dragon, there wasn’t anything that she could do to stop that. She might have hated that, once.
Now? Now, she knew, somepony had lied about an artifact. Their mission would never have been approved just to rescue another three stragglers at the expense of advancing the dragon’s nebulous agenda. But the right words, in the right place . . . and who could blame her? After all, it had already happened.
Resolute, she landed, to find everypony crowded around the western edge of their camp, murmuring to each other—eyes fixed on the sky. Rainbow quietly trotted up behind the crowd, craned her neck. Right at the edges of her vision, where the shape began to blur into the background night, she saw the quick, pulsing motions of flight, and of a serpentine body speeding north.
***
Rarity’s eyes fluttered open, taking in the warm wood lining the ceiling above her, travelling down the wall, lined with tapestries, past furniture decorative and functional, ornately carved, and, in some cases, grown to fit their intended purpose seamlessly, to the door.
She cricked her neck, winced at the loud crack, and then stood, briskly moving out. She did nothing to correct the scowl plastered over her face.
Oh, she had a bone to pick, all right. After ceding the rest of the interviews to Foresight, she’d fled to her bed-chambers and sought the incident in question—an expedition occurring some two years, seven months ago. She’d caught glimpses, though, as with all attempts, her Sight had been somewhat stymied by the encroaching Storm. Typhus did not tend to mix well with Coromancy, as she’d learnt.
So she’d fallen north and watched. Saw Rainbow take a survivor, flee to a refugee outpost. Left him there and returned, heading straight to debriefing—this now taking place just a few days ago—with what she probably thought of as a convincing look of heartbreak and defeat.
The fool part of it was that they’d all gotten away. Why she even bothered to trick the system . . .
Rarity’s pace sped up.
She knew where the Chasers were stationed, of course, and flung the door open hard enough to have it rebound against the stone wall.
“Rainbow Dash,” Rarity announced, stepping inside. “You have some questions to answer, missy.”
Her target was sitting a large wooden table, playing cards held tight against her chest. Blitz, opposite her, had his flush with the table, his brow tightening as he turned to Rarity.
“What’s she done now?”
“None of your concern,” Rarity said, her mouth biting at the words.
Rainbow gulped.
“I guess we’ll finish later?” Blitz offered Rainbow, an apologetic half-shrug as he turned away. Rarity tapped the floor as she waited for Rainbow to join her in the hall.
“Look, Rarity, I just-”
“Oh?” Rarity interrupted her, “so you do know what this is about? Oh, excellent, I thought I was going to have to go over all the little details for you.”
“No, it’s just that-”
“It certainly wouldn’t have anything to do with you being a blithering idiot, would it?’
Rainbow bristled. “Now that’s not fair, I-”
“Would do well to keep my mouth shut while we’re in public,” Rarity said. To her credit, Rainbow didn’t try to respond to that, though she did open her mouth.
Rarity took the lead, with Rainbow trailing her, as they made their way back towards the examining hall. She’d asked Foresight to keep Tumbler here—there he was, sitting in the corner looking sorry for himself. The jerk.
Rarity pointed him out from the doorway, and, in a low voice, “Recognise him?”
A somewhat sullen reply, “Yeah.”
“Right,” Rarity said, and let out a breath—a sudden sensation of calmness, a cold frisson running down her spine. She had the right of this, then, and it was not so great a mess it couldn’t be untangled.
She kept Rainbow quiet until they made it back to her chambers, where, with only moderate embellishment, Rarity was sure, Rainbow told her what had happened. How she’d gone looking for an artifact, only to find refugees and a dragon. Fought the dragon to a standstill, sent it running, and saved their lives. Recognised that there was no artifact—no impetus for the mission. Further recognised that that meant she must have faked it in order to save them.
“Rainbow,” Rarity said, enunciating each word clearly, crisply. “You are an idiot.”
Rainbow scowled at her.
“A colossal idiot. A great big flaming wreck of idiocy. A stallion’s taint has more sense than you do. I would rather put my cat in charge of the Boutique than you—at least she’d only destroy all my yarn. The-”
Rainbow waved her off. “Alright, alright, I get it.”
“You realise the only reason this happened is because you’re dumb enough for this to happen, right? That’s how it works. There is no progenitor loop, you’re just always this dumb, and you’ve always been this dumb, and you always will be this dumb.”
Maybe she’d been overdoing it a bit. Rainbow wasn’t looking at her anymore, and the outcome wasn’t terrible. Still, if even the concept that even if she knew they weren’t risking their lives didn’t make it okay to risk their lives was beyond her . . . Rarity despaired. Sometimes, she really did.
But there was something more illuminating under that. Something more important, more real. Despite spending two years here, Rarity still woke up each morning feeling like she was in a dream. She didn’t belong, didn’t fit in, and never would. Rainbow, though—Rainbow she’d clung to, her one lifeline in all the chaos.
And now she was hurting.
“Hey,” Rarity said, dropping the tone. “Hey now, come here.” She moved to Rainbow and wrapped her in a hug. “I just want you to talk to me about this stuff, okay? We’re supposed to be a team here. I need to know when you’re feeling like this.”
“Like what,” came the hesitant reply, though two wings spread to envelop Rarity.
“Like,” Rarity bit her lip, reached for the right words. How had she been feeling, these past few months? Like a leaf, floating down an endless river—cut off, adrift. “Like you’re out of control,” she said, and felt Rainbow tighten her hold.
“It wasn’t even him,” Rainbow eventually said. “That guy in the hall—he was there. But he didn’t call in the mission.”
“He says he did.”
“Nope,” shaking her head.
“They felt guilty,” Rarity said, resting her chin on Rainbow’s scalp. “They know why the systems there, and they saw you all get hurt. I Saw you get hurt.” She pulled back to gaze into Rainbow’s eyes. “Don’t scare me like that again, okay?”
“Okay.”
“And the next time you need to lash out, let’s maybe not do it with the elaborate life-saving system involving time travel I can still barely get my head around.”
A short laugh. “Okay. But Rares . . . I think I really needed it. With the system, I mean.”
Rarity gave her a lopsided smile. “I get it.”
“You . . .” Rainbow paused, then smiled back. “I guess you do, don’t you. Hah.”
A knock at the door, before somepony they’d never seen before stuck her head in. “Uhm, apologies, Seer—oh, Chaser, sorry. Ah, Foresight said I’d find you here.”
Rarity opened the door fully. “And what can we do for you?”
“Ah, the Princess Luna requests your presence in the audience chamber.”
Both their eyebrows shot up. “Do you know what this is about, dear?”
She glanced at the floor, trembling. “A dragon’s here.”
***
“And so?” Luna asked, stepping forward from the dais lightly.
“A trade, if you will. A bartering of services.”
“I would not hold the world at stake, dragon, no matter what evils you think of me.”
A throaty chuckle. It set Luna’s hackles to rise, a shiver down her spine.
“Granted. And yet, there is much we might do for each other.”
Luna sighed. It wasn’t wrong—but then, they never were. Dragons had been almost as bad as the Storm itself, once the dust had settled. Racing ahead of it, targeting stragglers, refugees, those unlucky or foolhardy enough to be caught alone.
“Your hostilities against my people?”
Agyrt blinked. “Hostilities?” His lips curled up, exposing glittering fangs. “Ah, you speak of His. The Taken.”
“Thralls?” Luna raised her chin. “An easy defence. It does not absolve you of their crimes. Order must be maintained. Justice will shine through.”
“I . . . see your point. Regardless, this peril will not persist. On this, you have my word.”
Luna’s turn to falter, her strong front stumbling against a lack of resistance. “So easily?”
“It has never been my intent to foster disharmony between us. You, of all, have known me long enough to know that much.”
“Luna does,” Luna agreed. “But the Princess cannot.”
Agyrt inclined his head, ever so slightly.
“I find myself wondering, then,” Luna continued, “what possible boon you might request of Us?”
“Your sister works, I understand, to free those caught in His grasp. Your Thralls, you termed them. Apt, if incomplete.”
“Ah. You would request the extension of such a service to your own.”
“Yes. And in return, I shall make sure you all live long enough to see it done.”
“Open cooperation?”
“Nothing so base. An understanding. You are aware of my particular talent for Foresight?”
Luna tilted her head. “As are you, of mine.”
“Defer to your betters in this arena, Princess,” Agyrt said, the stone vibrating, ever so slightly, where he clutched at it, claws sunk deep into the side of the castle, face peering through the window. “The Storm blocks Harmonic inference. But Dragons are of the deep: we have no such difficulties seeing order in chaos.”
“Then why?” Luna asked, bluntly. She stepped closer still, reaching forward to the windowsill to stare Agyrt in the eye. “Your Mad God has done more for you than any other in generations. It would surprise me nothing to learn, one day, of your involvement in his release. In my sister’s obsession, and those damnable legends that caught her eye.”
He just smiled that infuriating smile. “It sounds to me that there is one even I defer to, in your apportioning of blame.”
“I-” Luna began, only be cut off be a waving talon. Masonry crumbled to the ground, far below.
“Never mind, never mind. Nonetheless, my talent. It makes me aware of a great deal of information you will not be privy to.”
“I take it you’re about to share.”
“Hmph. How did you defeat Him?”
Luna frowned. “Another of Celestia’s legends. The Well. She tells me she entered it, and then it entered her—shut up—and she bore it back with her. I caught just the afterimage of that flight, but even then, it was . . . radiant.”
“That power was a match for Him, then. But it wanes, Luna, and it will not protect you again.”
“He is bound, and will remain so forever. I’ll see to that personally.”
Agyrt bit his lip.
“Another threatens you. The mad serpent, and those Taken he has amassed under her wing.”
“I’m not worried about Discord.”
“You should be.”
And then Luna saw it. Perhaps she had been overwhelmed—the constant stress of war and the weight of those remaining lives she remained in charge of pressing down on her, refusing to let her glance upwards, gain perspective. Perhaps she had been stupid, and simply overlooked that little reminder. Mostly, though, she thought it a form of desperation, a last, gasping effort at preserving some semblance of hope.
“The dragons,” she whispered, pulling away from Agyrt. “Where are the dragons?”
Where else could they be? Swallowed up by the Storm—by the culmination of their very being? No, of course not. He had them. Discord had them.
“Then . . . then he lulled us.” Luna’s head shot up, fixed Agyrt in place. She advanced once more, anger, and a desolate fear shooting in little lonely sparks down her limbs, leaving her fur to stand on end and her skin to prickle. “When?”
“Soon,” he whispered back, all trace of levity vanished. “Too soon, my dear, far too soon.”
“Your aid,” she said. “I accept the offer. Celestia will be here imminently”—as she cast out her mind, locating her sister’s, isolated in a tower, spoke to it with urgent words—”and we can plan. We can . . .”
A crack, and Celestia was there, turning to Luna with a frown. “Sister? What is . . .”
But Luna stared out the window, at the empty space where Agyrt Vaeros had been hanging.
***
They entered the throne room at a trot, expecting . . . well, Rainbow wasn’t really sure what she was expecting. Rarity’s Sight hadn’t been able to give them more than a vague deadline of soon, which was both encouraging and infuriating, and on one hoof, the likelihood that this, whatever it was, would turn out to be related to the event that clouded Rarity’s senses seemed high.
On the other hoof, dragon.
But whatever it was, it was gone by the time they arrived, seeing just Luna conferring with Celestia, near a window. The Princesses notived their entrance near-immediately, and with a swift motion, Luna beckoned them over. Rainbow just barely noticed the sound of the throne room doors closing behind them, leaving the four of them alone. That was odd, too, she was sure neither Princess trusted them this implicitly.
“Rainbow, Rarity,” Luna greeted them, her voice clipped.
They both bowed, muzzles coming close to the ground. “Your Majesties.”
Celestia made an amused sound as they rose. “Thank you for coming so promptly.”
“You—they said there was a dragon?” Rainbow ventured.
“Quite,” Luna said. “I am told that you knew it, even. It features prominently in the memories on yours my sister saw.”
Ah. Rainbow bit her lip. If she was honest with herself, that little incident still left her a ball of inarticulate rage. Best to simply . . . not think about it. She swallowed, pushing the memories away. It would do her no good, anyway.
“Just one comes to mind, Your Highness,” Rarity said, beside her. “We usually refer to him as the Drac, or Drac, though I understand his given name is Agyrt.”
Luna’s grimace-smile grew tighter. “Quite. What can you tell us of it?”
“He is . . .” Rarity visible searched for words, head tilted just slightly, ears twitching, “odd. Incredibly old, and with wisdom befitting such, with a deep understanding of magic and the world. Inscrutable, speaking with layered meaning and verbal traps. Genuine—at least so far as his tutelage of a friend of mine goes. I would not go so far as to extend him my trust, but neither would I say our goals are far diverged.”
Luna mimicked Rarity’s head-tilt. “And you, Rainbow?”
“Bwuh?”
“Agyrt. Have you found him to be fair?”
Rainbow snorted. “Only to his notions of fairness. That old snake doesn’t play anything straight, and there’s always something else. Uh, Your Highness.”
“Thank you, Rainbow,” Celestia said. “Sister, I cannot counsel hesitation. We have but a limited window to act.”
“I concur. Show me.”
Celestia nodded. “Rarity, step forward.”
Rainbow had to physically restrain herself from interjecting. She hated feeling like this, like a tool, acquitted well, but now put aside, the focus drifting to other matters.
Celestia’s horn sparkled, and her eyes sank into a brilliant white as she approached Rarity, leaning down to peer into her. Rarity stiffened, suddenly, then relaxed as Celestia’s magic took hold, the warm glow suffusing her, supporting her. When Celestia withdraw, just a few moments later, she collapsed to the ground, trembling slightly.
Rainbow was at her side in an instant, helping her stand. “Easy, easy there Rares.”
“Ah, ‘m sorry, dear,” Rarity said. “Just . . . jus’ a moment.”
And now Celestia did the same with Luna, looking up, instead of down. Rarity watched them with wide eyes, though Rainbow found herself more concerned with the weight of her friend, leaning against her shoulder. She extended a wing, and wrapped it around Rarity, through it, feeling her heartbeat thumping in her chest.
She looked up when the Princesses separated, though they remained locked in eye combat, minor facial expressions flitting back and forth. Rainbow felt Rarity slowly begin to stand firmer, take more of her weight until, with a slight shake of her torso, she stepped aside, shooting Rainbow a grateful glance. Rainbow carefully folded her wing back at her side, absently preening the odd displaced feather.
"’Tia, no.”
“It is the best way to protect them. I took the concept from Rarity, anyway, and Discord-”
Luna stomped a hoof. “No.”
Celestia huffed. “It works, though. It’ll remove His touch.”
“And replace it with your own.”
“ . . . Is that not preferable?” She sighed. “Look, I don’t exactly see that we’re spoiled for choice.”
“Can you not truly not alter the spell?”
“Not without—well, without abandoning everypony! Much less the dragons that remain! And . . .” Stepping forward once more, Celestia bent to touch her horn to Luna’s forehead. It pulsed, once, then stopped.
“Ah, I see.”
“Protection. Safety.”
“And Agyrt?”
“He knows it is coming. He expects to fight it from within, I imagine.”
“I can’t imagine otherwise,” Luna said, dryly. A smile crept along Celestia’s face too, as if they were sharing some in-joke lost on Rainbow. The greater significance of the discussion, however—that she understood implicitly.
It was everything they were looking for, laid out in stark light before them. And they had placed it there.
. . .
Rainbow was going to punch something, when she got home.
“Sister,” Luna said, trailing off. Abruptly, she twisted, eyes locking onto Rainbow. “Past time for the two of you to leave, I suspect. Confer with my sister tomorrow, before you depart.”
They bowed, once more, and departed, and though they glanced at each other more than once, they restrained their frantic musings to the relative safety of Rarity’s chambers. Even with the relatively frantic activity in the halls and passages of the castle, ponies of all sorts trotting about, it was a near thing, and Rainbow could hardly blame herself for not waiting for the door to close, could she—nor reasonably be expected to monitor her volume.
“Did we jus-!”
“I cannot c-”
Hmm. She could still hear herself, voice bouncing off the walls. She didn’t think this chamber designed for acoustics. Rainbow ducked her head, trying to hide the sudden blush behind locks of hair, and weakly waved a hoof Rarity. “You go.”
With an eyebrow raised, “I . . . suffice that I shan’t complain about returning home. Nor you, I suppose. But the manner of it, well, it irks me somewhat.”
“You mean the way we were basically thrown out like last week’s dishwater?”
Rarity scrunched up her muzzle. “Quaint. But yes, it was abrupt. What do you think?”
“I think we’ve seen just about everything we could, Rares. We’re not particularly wanted her, and we’re damn sure not needed—not anymore, anyway.”
“True enough.”
“I just-” Rainbow, huffing, jumped forward and spun a back-flip. “-just what did Luna even want? Some vague notions of a magical barrier? Some disturbance blocking your Sight?”
“We don’t know-”
“We aren’t dumb, either,” Rainbow cut her off. “You know it’s them. Hell, we even know why—or at least, the most obvious reasons. And if we do stick around, just in case, and get hurt? Or killed?” She shuddered. “Future-proofing only works in reverse. There mightn’t be any home waiting for us.”
Rarity stepped forward to embrace her friend. “I . . . there’s still things we’re missing. But, Rainbow?”
Looking up, Rainbow found sympathy—a shared understanding. And, wonder of wonders, she didn’t recoil, but instead sagged into it, let Rarity repay her for her earlier shoulder-rest.
“I agree. The time for dancing around the issue is—to tell the truth, long since—past. So we’ll just ask, tomorrow, okay? And then we’re going home.”
Rainbow smiled. She could almost taste it. “Goin’ home.”
***
“You will have to Jump past it, I’m afraid,” Celestia said, her head bowed over her work. “It won’t differentiate between space-time and time-space entry, and the border is really more decorative than functional. Still, it should stick out like nopony’s business in your Sight, Rarity, so I doubt that’ll present much difficulty.”
What. Rarity took a second to parse that. Rainbow, of course, jumped right in. “Past it? We don’t even know when that’ll be!”
Celestia snorted. “I doubt it’ll be much after you left. It’s designed to fail, Rainbow. I know the two of you have been busy enough, accumulating information about our age to take back to your own. You must have heard of the Brightstream, and how we released Typhus.”
“Sure, but-”
“Well,” Celestia continued, “Harmony came with more than just the substantial upgrade to my magical potential. There was . . . hmm. A great deal of understanding in there, sort of, implicit knowledge of how all this functions. Most of that knowledge faded, to my great disappointment, when I relinquished my hold, Typhus vanquished. Part of that was, I suppose, the world’s heartbeat. The way energy flows in and around us. Did you know, for instance, that magic isn’t some internal force of will? It’s actually a gaseous material, invisible and odourless, that permeates the world. That’s why our horns glow—they’re connecting and amplifying the energy that already exists—and concentrating it around our Implements . . .”
Rarity was off-balance. Too much, all at once, after years of relative secrecy. She raised a hoof, trying to slow down the diatribe until she could get her footing. Thankfully, Rainbow was there to put her hoof in her mouth.
“What are you doing?”
Celestia glanced down, where her hooves, faintly aglow, were moving over a deep, dark metal. Burnished steel, somehow imbued with the blue of night. Impossible to mistake, the armour of Nightmare Moon. Of Luna. “I’m,” she ran her tongue around her mouth, “preparing.”
Rainbow had her face in her hooves. Rarity just patted her on the back. It was, now that she thought about it, so much easier to just go with the flow and try to put the pieces back together afterwards. Almost zen, in a way. She found she had to chuckle at the thought.
Celestia just stared at them, faintly inquisitive. Oh, she must have thought them crazy, right then. After all, here we are, discussing the fate of the planet and our species over the next thousand years or more. Hardly a laughing matter, Rarity, you know to comport yourself better than this.
Her chuckles abruptly turned into a long peal of open laughter.
When she regained control of herself, the last few bubbles of mirth still rising in her through, she began to wave a hoof at Celestia, urging her to go on.
“Well, it seems obvious now. I suppose you and Luna dreamt this all up, then?”
“I stole most of it from you, of course,” Celestia said. “It’s so easy when you can see the results before the game even begins.” She smiled. “I must thank you, nonetheless.”
Rarity nodded. “I assume you have Discord handled, then?”
Celestia visibly plucked the thought from the air and put it in its own box. Out of mind, out of sight, right? “We have—we hope we have—his measure. Thanks to the two of you, we know what he is and where he came from. Thanks to Agyrt, we know what to expect from him. He’s still a threat—always a threat, but I am confident we’ll be able to contain it. And, in any case, it isn’t something that should worry the two of you.”
“Then I can think of just one last detail.”
“Of course. The Elements.”
Rarity smirked. “Yes. Might I surmise they were what remained of Harmony’s power?”
Celestia raised her eyebrows.
“Oh, it’s nothing much. Twilight mentioned—and I noticed myself, much less Rainbow’s rather explosive growth—a steady rise in magical might, some weeks before we left. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but now? Simple logic.”
She nodded, and if Rarity thought that nod a slight bit deeper than earlier, well, who could blame her? “Yes, that would be my hypothesis as well.” She reached around, and brought forth a single rock. A gemstone, topaz, inset in a brilliant gold necklace.
“This is The Element of Harmony—yes, I stole your nomenclature.”
Rarity reached forward, then stopped herself., and took a deep breath. “How does it break?”
Celestia gave a wan smile. “I expect I’’ll find out soon. We shan’t risk you, though. I will be ready in just a few days—you are leaving now.
“Are you up to it?” Rarity asked her friend.
“Y-yeah,” Rainbow said, then cleared her throat. “If I managed last time, it should be a cakewalk now. Particularly if we stock up a bit before leaving.”
“I insist upon it, even,” Celestia said.
“Well, then,” Rarity said, trying to swallow the lump that had suddenly appeared in her throat. “I . . . I don’t know. I had expected something . . . else.”
Rainbow nodded.
“Fleeing in the midst of some great battle,” Celestia suggested, a wry smile playing at the corner of her lips. “Myself pushed to the edge, throwing out some great spell as a last, desperate measure. Literally being chased into the time-stream, hearts pounding? Nothing so dramatic, I’m afraid. At least not for the two of you. This is our risk, in the end.”
“I think,” Rarity said, “we’ve had enough drama to last a lifetime.”
And, she thought, for once she meant it.