//------------------------------//
// Very Knightly 
// Story: Count's Traveling Haunted House 
// by misskoifishpony 
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Spike had a rather difficult time opening his eyes. Not only was his body throbbing in pain, but his head was experiencing an unpleasant headache. And of course, his over-puffed costume helped with this situation by over-heating his body. This made him sweat to no end. He wondered why he agreed to walk around in this ridiculous costume. But this made he realize "Rarity!"

"I'm over here Spikey!" exclaimed Rarity from a distance.

This gave Spike the energy to open his eyes and turn his head to the right. He found Rarity hanging from the top of the castle's spikey pillar by her long and sparkly cape. He just realized that giant tube transport them on the castle's roof. He also noticed how Rarity's braids and tail were now incredibly messy, and how there were new tears and rips in her fabulous costume. Rarity crossed her front hooves over her chest to show dismay for her humiliating position. She would unhook her cape from this pillar if she could. Unfortunately, her magic isn't strong enough to lift her own body weight, no matter how light she is. The heaviest thing Rarity can lift with her magic is a basket filled with fabrics.

Spike responded to Rarity's call with "Hold on Rarity, I'm coming!"

Despite having the aching feeling his head and the soreness in his muscles, Spike tried to wiggle and stretch his body into a standing position. However, his large costume prevented Spike from doing so. But Spike ignored this, and focused on getting to Rarity. Rarity saw how much uncomfortable and inflexible the costume was, and decided to magically unzip Spike from his Olaf disguise.

Spike was surprised by this, and during the unzipping Spike shouted to Rarity "Rarity! No!" After that, Spike tried to pull the zipper up with his left claw.

Rarity scolded Spike "No Spike! You've been in that costume for far too long!"

Once Rarity pulled Spike out the Olaf disguise, she toss the costume over his shoulder. And this made the costume fly over the edge of the castle roof. Spike sighed in exhilarating relief, and gave Rarity a thankful smile. Even though Spike a little disappointed in letting Rarity down on their costume idea, Spike could tell that Rarity wasn't disappointed in him. Rarity instead gave him a comforting smile, a sign that she was more worried about his welfare than over some silly costume.

Once Rarity magically placed Spike on the ground, Spike immediately ran over to Rarity and pulled on her front hooves. The first tug was no success. He tried the second time with more tension put into his little arms, but it failed. He prayed that third time was the charm, however instead of pulling Rarity off the pillar, it made Rarity whisper "Ow."

Spike's tug on her front hooves made her legs stretch in pain, and his claws started to dig into the fur and skin before her hooves. Spike let go of Rarity's hooves to shake out his claws, trying to prepare them for the fourth try. Spike even spit into his purple claws and rub them together to create some heat and friction. This disgusted Rarity to her core, but she tried to not show her disgust because this is Spike's way of helping her. Besides, Spike wasn't sick and dragon spit is not to terribly disgusting if comparing it to the spit of other creatures.

With a determined look on his face, Spike let it out a "Let's do this!" before placing his claws on Rarity's hooves.

This fourth try was Spike truly testing the peaks of his strength. Not just the strength in his arms, not his overall strength. He even used the muscles in his legs to help support this tug a war. After two minutes of agonizing pulling and stretching Rarity's front legs to their limit, Spike finally managed to unhook Rarity from the pillar. But the price of this mission caused Rarity's long cape to rip, and she ended up with a cape that only went to her withers. Rarity landed harshly into Spike's arms. It took the remaining strength in his arms and legs to keep Rarity's upper body up. Luckily this didn't last long, Rarity was able get up quickly on her own.

Rarity smiled sweetly into Spike's eyes which made him to smile in embarrassment and try to advert his eyes from her beautiful starry eyes. Rarity then looked behind to see the damage done to her fabulous handmade costume that took her all October to make. She gasped softly seeing her shimmering cape reduced to a small, wispy, piece of cloth blowing in the breeze.

Spike shared in Rarity's despair and looked at the cloth in sadness and guilt. Rarity looked back at Spike, feeling so awful in forgetting his kind rescue. She cooed at him "It's alright Spikey-Wikey. That silly cape was getting too heavy for me anyway. Thank you for being my knight in shining scales."

She added a little muzzle nuzzle with Spike with the mention of her "knight in shining scales". Spike couldn't contain his blush as it started to spread across his cheeks and creating a fiery heat in his nose. He clenched his teeth and almost held his breath during the experience.

After their little nuzzle, Rarity cheerfully added "Well now that we got that little mess out of the way, how we about we start looking for the others?"

It took a moment for the little dragon to get back into reality, but after Rarity patted the spines on top of his head, he quickly cheered with Rarity "Um yeah! Let's do it!" Rarity couldn't help but giggled at her little Spike.

Rarity observed her surroundings, looking all over the roof for some kind of smooth and easy exit off it. When she looked past the pillar she was hooked on to, she noticed a drain pipe system. She carefully went over to the drain pipe and looked over to find the pipe going down all the way to the ground. At the bottom of pipe, Rarity saw the castle's magnificent but dreary looking garden. It reminded her of a cemetery combined with the Everfree Forest. The pipe was big enough for them to climb down on, which was just perfect with Rarity.

Rarity called out to Spike "I found a way down!"

Spike swiftly made it to the drain pipe and looked down at it to assure that this way was safe for him and Rarity. He smiled at Rarity and said "This is perfect! Great job Rarity."

Rarity pushed her front hoof through her mane and stated "Well I do try."

While Spike was helping Rarity climb down, the duo didn't notice a large pair of menacingly looking red eyes observing them from behind the spikey pillar. The glowing eyes belong to a massive shadowy figure with sharp claws that could claw out titles and stone that made up the pillar. The shadowy figure smirked at the two creatures with his snarling fangs.