Epilogue - Stories Untold
Twilight carefully put the last yellowed page with the others and frowned at the pile she’d rescued from the archives. They finished turning white as she watched, returning to crisp paper under her gaze. “That can’t be right,” she muttered. “Where’s the rest of it? That can’t be the end of their story.”
But it seemed to be. There were other documents accompanying the hoofwritten manuscript, but they were dry records, the agreements established by a diplomat that was very deliberately not named. Transfers of records of those who had fallen in the war and the establishment of a small neutral area on an island off Eyrie’s coast, bland columns of costs and personnel assignments - nothing that shed light on Rose or Gérard’s fate.
There was also nothing about what she had come for, before she’d stumbled across the dusty, forgotten box of records deep in an obscure corner of the archives. But the dribs and drabs of contact between Changelings and pre-Interregnum ponies were far less important than what she had found, be it ever so incomplete. And even if there wasn’t any more of the story, she could at least ask someone who had been there.
Well, when she woke up at least.
Twilight kept Luna’s hours more often than Celestia’s, for obvious reasons, but it was just as well she wasn’t required to get a full night’s sleep any more. And since Luna was awake, she’d probably want to hear about it too. Twilight gathered up the bundle of papers and vanished from the archives in a burst of purple.
Luna was on the balcony of her tower, watching over the mostly sleeping populace in more ways than one. Twilight still found Luna’s dreamwalking hard to wrap her mind around, since she could and did appraise every single dream at the same time, but it didn’t stop her from being available for Twilight throughout the small hours. Of late it had been more work, for she had begun to delve into the dreams of the agonizingly small Changeling population, but she still turned the moment Twilight appeared behind her. “I know that look,” she said with a fond smile. “You found something.”
“Not what I was looking for,” she admitted. “But definitely something.” A flicker of thought duplicated the bundle of papers and she set it down in front of Luna, wrapping the original back in its twine. “It’s history that I hadn’t heard anything about, and you would have missed. If it’s all true, and I think it is, I wonder why I haven’t heard of it.”
“Was Tia keeping secrets again?” Luna lofted the first page, peering at it curiously.
“Maybe. But the documents that came with it were already expurgated when they were written.” Twilight shook her head. There were a dozen possible explanations, and she didn’t want to immediately suspect Celestia even if it did fit with certain of her habits. Instead she raised her voice, calling inside the tower. “Skyshine?”
The pegasus appeared with such startling alacrity that it seemed she could teleport too. “Yes, Princess Twilight?”
“Could you have someone make and bind a clear copy of this?” Duplication was one thing, but making it readable and ready for publishing took more than a simple spell. She proffered the manuscript, and Skyshine took it carefully, no stranger to unique and valuable documents Twilight had dredged from some forgotten hole.
“Of course, Your Highness,” Skyshine said, and vanished again.
Twilight stepped over to join Luna at the balcony rail. There was no light save moon and stars, but that was more than enough for the Princess of the Night. She put a wing over Twilight in absentminded intimacy as she looked over the pages, and in return Twilight leaned into her side while the sky to the east grew lighter. After all the dense and difficult work of the past few weeks and months it was nice to find a few quiet hours to share with Luna. But it was a few hours only, and soon enough Celestia appeared on her own balcony to raise the sun.
Luna gave Twilight a nudge once the sun peered over the horizon, and the two of them flitted over to greet their fellow princess. “Good morning, you two,” Celestia said, exchanging hugs with each of them. “How was the night?”
“Not so unusual for me,” Luna replied. “But Twilight unearthed something interesting.”
“Oh?”
Twilight nodded. “I was wondering if you remembered anything about Compass Rose and Gérard.”
Celestia’s eyebrows went up and stayed up. “Well, that’s a pair of names I haven’t heard for a very long time.”
“So you do remember them!” Twilight’s wings ruffled in suppressed glee. “I found a document but it seemed incomplete, so maybe you know the rest.”
But Celestia shook her head. “In truth, I know little about either of them beyond the impressions and conclusions I formed when I met them, oh, some thousand years ago now. Once I left Aerie I never saw either of them again.”
“What? But...it seemed like they were the entire peace effort!”
“Spoilers,” Luna murmured reproachfully, and Twilight shot her an apologetic look.
“They were,” Celestia allowed. “Which meant that I wasn’t. I was...busy, at the time. Equestria was in a bad way, after the war and, I’m afraid, the Nightmare Winter.” It was her turn to look apologetic, but Luna waved it away. It was history, after all.
“Oh.” Twilight frowned, if briefly. As important as they seemed to her, it was hard to remember the two of them had crossed Celestia’s path but briefly. “Maybe the gryphons have something, then?”
“I would suggest going to the source,” Celestia said gently. “And asking the hippogriffs.”
Twilight’s eyes widened. She’d heard of hippogriffs in a purely theoretical sense, but she’d never considered them to properly exist as a race, merely the occasional result of interspecies mingling like zonies or mules. Of course, she’d never had cause to before. It didn’t take much casting about in the records she’d already devoured to find one small line ceding a previous annexation off the coast of Eyrie to an unnamed tribe of hippogriffs, and from there it was only a small leap to connect that with the history she already knew.
“I think I will,” she said, mentally flipping through her schedule. Though she hardly had to worry about anything official when it was only a few minutes after dawn. Most of her tasks were self-imposed, and she still hadn’t cracked the Changeling problem to her satisfaction, but there was dead space for the unexpected built into her morning routine. This certainly qualified. “Do you want to come with me, Luna?”
Luna pursed her lips in thought. “I think I shall pass this time. Changelings sleep late and their dreams are hard to grapple with. Out of Equestria it might not be possible at all.” Then she flashed a smile. “Besides, I haven’t finished the story. It wouldn't do to skip ahead.”
Twilight laughed and stole a kiss from her. “All right, I’ll fill you in when I get back. And you too,” she added to Celestia.
“I look forward to it.”
Twilight’s horn lit and she winked out of existence. She’d never been to Eyrie, of course, let alone the unnamed island nearby, but that was no obstacle anymore, and she spread her wings as crisp sea air washed over her. The ocean shimmered blue below her, and Eyrie looked just as the manuscript had described it, all white and green and plunging water. It reminded her in certain ways of Canterlot, and she wondered if there had been an influence.
The isle she was headed for was a miniature version, with mountains not quite as high, but still ringed by plunging cliffs and covered in verdant forest. It was several hours past dawn here, so there were already a few people awake and a-wing, silhouettes flitting about a half-vertical town sprawling up and down a mountain face. They could have been mistaken for gryphons at a distance but for the tails and cutie marks.
Twilight dropped down toward one with a talon mark on his flank and he rose to meet her, sharp gold eyes watching her the entire way. “Hello!” She said brightly, realizing that his colors were mostly blue and white like Gérard’s, though after so many years that was likely sheer coincidence. “My name is Twilight Sparkle. Is there an archivist or historian in your settlement?” She omitted the ‘Princess’ since it wasn’t an official visit and she didn’t want to make it so.
He studied her a moment before replying. She was used to sharp looks of varying sorts, given the rarefied atmosphere in Canterlot, but there was something very inequine about it that made her smile falter. Then his beak clicked, softly. “You’ll want Binder Heulwen,” he said, his rich, liquid accent falling strangely on her ears. “The building with the compass.”
“Thank you!” She smiled at him and continued on down while he darted out over the forest on his own inscrutable errand. Twilight descended to hover at the midpoint of the town, where something too small to be called a river plunged into a deep pool, and looked around for the compass.
Mostly, she saw eyes. They ranged from molten gold to pale amber, though she caught one flash of blood red before the head turned away. Another talon-marked hippogryph flew out to accost her, politely. “Are you looking for something?”
“I was told to find Binder Heulwen,” she said, pronouncing the Alce name as carefully as she could. “The person I talked to said to look for the building with the compass.”
“Yes.” His beak clicked and he flicked his wings. “This way,” he told her, gliding downward, and she followed. She studied the town and its inhabitants as they went, trying to absorb as many impressions as she could. The buildings were all wood and glass, open and airy and reminiscent of certain neoclassical pony architecture. Of course, ponies wouldn’t have omitted staircases, nor had quite so many balconies.
What caught and held her attention though, once she noticed it, was the dearth of cutie mark variety. There seemed to be no more than five marks shared between the dozens of hippogryphs she saw following her guide. Talon, anvil, crossed wheat and tree, crossed saw and hammer, scroll. She didn’t spot any others before they reached a building at the very bottom of the settlement.
Unlike the others this definitely was built for ponies, though the upper levels blossomed out into the open balconies favored by the rest of the town. And on the door there was a compass rose with a gryphon talon behind it, like a coat of arms. Twilight landed in front of it, on stone-carved stairs leading away and down toward the coast. She stepped forward to rap on the door, her guide already gone.
The door opened and the scroll-marked hippogryph beyond blinked, her eyes widening before she bowed. “Princess Twilight! This is an unexpected honor.”
“Oh, I’m not here officially,” she hastened to assure, presumably, Heulwen. “I’m surprised though, nopony else recognized me.”
“I suspect most of them did, but we are so far from Equestria. Its concerns seem rather remote to most of us here.” Heulwen’s eyes went distant for a moment, then she backed up, gesturing Twilight in. “Ah, but where are my manners? I am Binder Heulwen, and I bid you welcome to the Embassy.”
The name made Twilight’s ears prick, and she stepped in curiously. It looked old, it smelled old, it felt old. Not the age that creaked and cracked and wore things down, but the venerable, comfortable maturity of a place that had been lived in. The wood was worn but well-polished and shone darkly, the tiles in the floor clearly repaired many times over, giving them a kintsugi cast. A pair of desks dominated the lower floor, just as aged as the rest of it but still in use, to judge by the papers and books. “Thank you,” she said, breathing in the rich, dizzying scent of history. “Though I suppose I should tell you why I’m here.”
“It had crossed my mind to wonder what the brand new princess-goddess of Equestria was doing, unannounced, in Aelwyd.” Heulwen’s eyes glinted briefly, her voice holding an edge that was more gryphon than pony as she regarded Twilight.
“It’s nothing urgent,” she told Heulwen. She didn’t say it wasn’t important, because it was, but something that had stayed buried for the span of a millennium would keep. “I just recently came across a document in Canterlot’s dead archives.” The box hadn’t even been marked. “It was about Compass Rose and Gérard, but it...stopped rather abruptly. I was hoping I could find out more here.”
Heulwen was silent for a moment, then described a circle with her talon, taking in the room. “This is a good start. They lived and worked here from just a month or so after the end of the war to the end of their days.”
“Oh.” Twilight surveyed the room with new respect. “So it really was an embassy, originally.”
“And still is, really. Aelwyd does have relations with Eyrie and Equestria, however infrequent.” Her beak clicked as she regarded the piles of papers on one of the desks, somewhat mournfully. “Sometimes not so infrequent. I’m behind on my work.”
“I didn’t mean to interrupt…” Twilight began, but Heulwen waved it away.
“The work will be here tomorrow. You are here now. I am sure you want more than just to see the old house.”
“Well, the document I had ended just when they were starting negotiations with Aida. I was wondering if you had any records of what came after.”
“Oh, I think I know what you’re talking about. Stripehoof took down Rose’s story at some point before they moved into the Embassy. We have a copy, but I always wondered what had happened to hers. I know Rose asked her to bury it, at least for a while.”
“Well, she certainly did.” Not that Twilight blamed her. It was hard to imagine now, but at the time hardly anyone would have understood the choices either Rose or Gérard made, and they both had family and friends to protect. Not to mention making sure the story was preserved properly, and not altered by an overly-patriotic bureaucrat.
“Most of their legacy is in Aelwydd and in us, but there are a few writings we have preserved across the years.” She beckoned to Twilight and led the way deeper into the Embassy.
“In you? Are you a descendant then?” Twilight inquired as she followed Heulwen through the back of the office, past a kitchen and up a shallow flight of stairs to a raised sitting room. The morning sun streamed in over more well-used furniture, looking sinfully comfortable in the bright shafts of light. There was also a fireplace at the far end of the room, and over the mantel there hung a painting whose subjects she recognized instantly, despite having never seen them before.
Rose and Gérard looked out at her from across the centuries.
“We all are,” Heulwen said from behind her. “There are a few rare children born of pony and gryphon couples, yes, but they do not bear hippogriffs. The children of Gérard and Rose always breed true.”
She tore herself away from the paintings to look at Heulwen with a sudden, more scholarly interest. “Really? Why is that?”
“Nobody knows.” She clicked her beak thoughtfully. “Perhaps it is because they were the first. There is always something special the first time something is done. Or it could be love. It is a powerful thing, after all, but it seems arrogant to say that none since have loved as deeply as they did. Or there are forces none of us know.”
“It could be all of them at once,” Twilight said, turning to look again at the painting. She knew very well how the world could work in mysterious ways, or at least obscure ones. “Perhaps I’ll find out for you, eventually.”
“Perhaps. It may be there is a clue in their letters.”
Twilight reluctantly turned away to join Heulwen at a small glass case set against the wall. There were only two objects inside. A thin, leather-bound volume, and a bone box. Her eyes stuck on the latter, and when Heulwen opened the case, she reached out with a hoof only to stop herself before touching it. She decided she didn’t want to know if there was anything inside it.
“These are their letters to their children.” Heulwen took out the book and closed the case again, offering it to Twilight. She took it carefully, suppressing the urge to wrinkle her muzzle at the leather. All of her books were bound with canvas, of course, but that wasn’t an excuse to be unnecessarily squeamish.
“Thank you for sharing this with me,” Twilight said, more formal than before. “I didn’t even know Aelwydd existed before today, so I know that Equestria has overlooked you. I would understand if you hadn’t felt like giving me the chance to read this, and I appreciate your generosity.”
Heulwen went still, almost motionless for a moment, then inclined her head to Twilight. “It is rare that any pony or gryphon shows real curiosity about us or our progenitors, so it is gratifying to see a princess of Equestria take a personal interest in people who are so dear to us.”
“I think it’s time for their story to become known,” Twilight told her. “And yours. We are cousin races, after all, and even if there are ponies left who would resent gryphons, we can’t allow them to stop us from being friends.”
“We may be cousin races, but we are neither ponies nor gryphons,” Heulwen canted her head. “Though I think we would welcome a closer relationship with Equestria, I do not think it is as simple as that.”
“After reading their story, I understand that,” Twilight said with feeling. “But I still think it’s worth pursuing. And I may have an even better idea after reading these.” She hefted the book.
Heulwen nodded. “If you need me, I shall be downstairs,” she said, and clicked her beak. “Catching up on the Equestrian correspondence, just in case.” Twilight watched her go, then settled on one of the couches. It was as comfortable as it looked, and she stretched for a moment before opening the cover.
The contents within were in two different styles, which meant that, incredibly or even impossibly, they were the originals, somehow preserved through the ages despite the book being clearly well-read and well-loved. And she didn’t even need to read a word to know whose writing was whose. Rose wrote in neat, squared, and clear letters, whether Alce or Equish, as befit a mapmaker. Gérard’s writing, on the other hoof, flowed smoothly, even elegantly, across the page, as liquid as Alce itself.
Though she couldn’t speak it, she could at least read Alce, courtesy of her binges through Canterlot’s vast libraries, so she settled down to see what Gérard and Rose had to say. Most of the entries were mundane if heartfelt, but scattered throughout were hints at the life they led after the end of the war.
My beloved sons and daughters,
I can never express enough how much of a blessing you have been to me. I had given up on the dream of children a long time before I even met your mother, and no matter how much I loved my Rose, she was not a gryphon. We both knew all we would have was each other, but to us that was more than enough.
But we were wrong, and wonderfully so. You are something new to this world, and you should never forget that. There will be those, both gryphon and pony, who will scorn you because you are both and neither, but their words are theirs alone and cannot touch the heart of what you are.
I have come to know you as you have grown, and each of you is, by yourself, what Rose and I only are together. The sharp yearning of the gryphon tempered by the centered confidence of the pony. The seeking and the finding without ever being truly lost. Even with this, I will not pretend the coming weeks and years and centuries will be easy, but know that I am and always will be proud of you.
Your father,
Gérard, Clan Hippogriff
For the first time she read Gérard’s words directly. The emotion in them was obvious, but she felt that she missed out on the subtleties of his Alce, which wasn’t quite the same dialect that the gryphon ambassadors spoke these days. It had a richer, more formal cadence, as befit its author, and reminded Twilight of Luna’s voice when she slipped into memory. Rose, on the other hoof, was somewhat more solid, if no less heartfelt.
My dearest children,
I think any miracle comes with a price, and you came with one I do not know how any of us will pay. Shortly after I found I was with child for the first time, Aquila came to meet with us. That was disturbing enough, but his news was worse. He was dying. What your father and I were doing, through Aida and Kree and Ganon, through letters and stories, was changing gryphons. Perhaps not all that much, in the end, but enough, and he could no longer properly be their judge.
And when you kill someone, there is a debt to pay.
But how does one repay the death of a god? I fear it is an obligation I will have to pass to you, but I trust you will not take it as a burden. It is something to be strived against and for, because it isn’t something that can be measured against goods or labor. It can only be paid by being extraordinary. In this I feel you are in good stead, with the strength of gryphons and the harmony of ponies behind you. So long as you keep your honor and integrity, I trust you will always find your way.
All my love,
Compass Rose
Twilight paused and took a breath. After finding the hole in the world where Aquila had been, she had expected to find in his death some world-shaking catastrophe, something great and terrible. But here it was, buried in a few words in an obscure place, and it was nothing less or more than change.
She had no idea how much it weighed on Rose and Gérard, and their children. It wasn’t mentioned again, and while Twilight understood the idea of indebtedness, it wasn’t writ into her bones like it was for gryphons. That small, sideways discovery made her feel more like Rose, glimpsing something entirely alien from the corner of her eye, able to grasp the shape but not the details.
My beloved sons and daughters,
We all know the world is a harsh place, and this past spring has only driven that point home with a vengeance. But we are all alive and whole. I beg you not to blame the gryphons for it, or the ponies, because it is simply their natures to act as they do. We are a bridge between, no matter how difficult that may be at times, and consider that we are all safe in no small part thanks to Kree and Stripehoof - gryphon and pony.
Ponies fear that which disturbs their harmony, and gryphons fear that which does not show its strength. You can do both, or neither. It may be tempting, especially after all that has happened, to give no offense to either, but someone must lead. I know what it is to be lost, and both ponies and gryphons must have someone to follow if they are to ever find a way between.
Your father,
Gérard, Clan Hippogriff
Despite her near-total knowledge of Canterlot’s archives, she couldn’t find any reference to the incident Gérard alluded to. Given how deeply buried the pair had been in the first place, that was hardly surprising, but it still piqued her curiosity, especially that Kree had protected them. Perhaps she could press Heulwen for more, sometime later.
The last entry in the small bound volume seemed ever so slightly more worn than the others, the ancient paper warm under the light of the sun.
My dearest children,
Now that you have children of your own, I imagine you are expecting me to give you some motherly (or grandmotherly) advice whether you want it or not. But really, I don’t know how much I can tell you that you don’t already know. In some ways children are alike all over, and when you were small you were as much a terror as any pegasus foal or gryphon fledgeling. But in other ways they are profoundly different, and where a pony child would need gentle encouragement, a gryphon child needs a challenge. But you are not raising ponies or gryphons and, I expect now, none of my children ever will be.
I know Gérard and I have made mistakes, fallen short at times, in raising you. All parents do. But few parents are in the position of raising children not only of another race entirely, but also of a race that has never existed before. All I ask is that you learn from those mistakes, and grasp the opportunity to shape the future of an entire species. The lessons you pass on will carry throughout generations.
But I’m not worried. Every parent thinks well of their children, but I feel we have been blessed, not only with you but with the others you have grown up with, and you have become all that any parent could ask for. We won’t be with you forever, but so long as you trust in yourself, you should have have no fears for the future.
All my love,
Compass Rose
Slowly, gently, Twilight closed the book. She hadn’t really found much of the story she was looking for, just fragments and outlines, the remnants of a history long past. But it was enough. It had defined a door for her to walk through, and the other side held hippogriffs and perhaps even gryphons. Even with the changelings, even with all her other duties, it was one she couldn’t resist stepping through.
As soon as she told Luna that Rose and Gérard’s story had a happy ending.
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Ah...and here I was expecting things to continue right where they left off, after their admittance of love.
Kinda disappointed, but this is a very interesting ending in it's own right, and it works out fine all the same.
Nice way to wrap things up - I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Bravo, excellent ending
I'd like for there to have been a little more direct closure here to the story of Rose and Gérard, or better yet in the previous chapter. But I like how you handled the ending, in the future where someone invested in the story can bring it to others. And who more perfect for that than Twilight?
Wonderful story, and an excellent read. Thank you for this.
Lovely story.
Perfect. Absolutely perfect.
6142278 You misunderstand completely.
It's not "giving them what they want" it's "treating them like they expect a victor to treat them." You might want to think of WWI rather than WWII here.
6142351 Exactly, of course we couldn't give the nazis what they wanted, but treating them like living beings? Some people may argue against it, but even the nazis were conscious.
But war is complicated like that.
That was not quite the ending I expected, but then this has not been quite the story I expected either. Thank you for this wonderful and thought-provoking story, and for the time it cost you.
Great ending. Love the little adventure you brought us through.
Great story.
Man...once again I'm left speechless. That feeling of emptiness and whole, content yet yearning for just a bit more.
A long nostalgic journey we lived through word by word, for it all to become simply a distant memory.
I suppose this isn't a true ending, but a horizon you can say, a realm of far more upon reaching a mountain's peak.
I'm excited for what adventures you have awaiting for us.
This story was so damn awesome. Thank you.
..A changeling story is next? Awesome.
Also, stories like this make it seem like the site needs a Heartwarming category.
This is why I waited to read Cartography until it was finished. I knew my day would be sacrificed to it, and I knew that not a second would be wasted in doing so. What you have wrought is the epitome of why I read, and I am immensely thankful for it. Your characters, world, conflicts, and descriptions are so vivid and original, and all why being relatable and real in a way that speaks truth the the heart and mind. I am in awe, and better for what you have written. Thank you.
Nice! I figured it was inevitable, though.
Because he was pony-shaped and she was gryphon-shaped. Magic takes over from then on.
So adorable.
I love how you tied in this ending with the events of Triptych. I feel so fortunate that I finished Triptych before this, so I could appreciate it far more.
You and your sequel baiting. Tell me I'm not reading too far into this.
I find myself now in that place where one is both elated and devastated. It has finally come to an end, for which I am glad. Yet it has ended, for which I am sad.
You can bet that I will take this tale to my grave. Your evolution over the years as a writer has been a privilege to observe.
6148017 I have no sequel plans or, indeed, any particular plans for pony words in the immediate future. I really have to get back to my original fic (with lessons learned from Cartography), and I have two or three story ideas there.
The only things I want to do with the Apotheverse at some point are shorts for the Changelings and a far-far-future a la Outside the Reaching Sky. And those are fairly minor and/or difficult. I should make a group for the Apotheverse and invite people to do their own writing in it.
Why does Rose appear to be unaware of Luna's existence, if the Nightmare Winter was so recent?
6148608 That's something that's mostly expressed between the line, and understanding it is helped by my other stories discussing what Celestia and Luna really are as gods.
When Luna was banished, it ripped out a good chunk of the, for lack of a better term, physics of the way ponies worked. This included any clear memories of Luna or Nightmare Moon herself. Celestia likely didn't do anything to rectify it since that selective amnesia would be preferable to remembering her as the clear villain she had become.
Especially in a universe where there was six months without sun, with a dark and vengeful goddess stalking the dreams of any pony that dared sleep.
What I find most fascinating--and saddening--is how Aquila died. Poor guy.
6148981 I've read the other stories in this universe, but quite long ago. Celestia not trying to restore memories of Luna certainly makes sense.
6148121
Won't say I'm not sad to hear you've no plans for future horsewords; Cartography's my favorite work on the site, and I'm sad, too, that it's over. I'd love to have seen more of Gerard and Rose's relationship, but at the end of the day the story ends where it makes the most sense to you.
I'll definitely have to give your original fiction a try if it's anywhere near this standard.
This is a beautiful work, deep and thoughtful and evocative. Far beyond the standards of fanfiction, and deserving of much more attention than it has (yet) received on the site.
Fantastic story as usual, your writing really is a thing to be envied. You did a fantastic job with creating oc characters who had a lot of personality and managed to make griffins alien and understandable at the same time, for the most part.
As with all of my analysis, things will seem more negative than positive just because of the little niggling details that stick in my mind, but I can only properly care about them enough to express them if I enjoy the work. Plus, that final epilogue managed to kind of get rid of a large chunk of my issues with the story, just because it turns out that the story was memoirs instead of being directly told from the characters point of view, so some things would fall through the cracks.
My issues were that the war seemed pretty glossed over, we have no idea who started it and very little idea how long it lasted. In fact we even have no idea how the war is going aside from a few words from Gerard that Equestria will win. I feel that this kind of hurt the end of the story when Rose was planning on letting out the griffins. It seems weird to just imprison them after they surrender but we don't know enough about the conflict to really be able to judge. Plus, I kept expecting somepony to mention 'finding the kitchen' with how much the whole predator prey relationship means to griffins and how they talked about eating ponies a number of times, you can imagine what they wound find there and how they would react. I can completely see the ponies putting them in prison if they found a pony leg hanging from a hook, which I kept expecting to happen or at the very least find captured ponies waiting to be eaten.
6168476 The fact that we don't know anything about the war itself is absolutely on purpose. For a couple reasons - one is that I had to sidestep around human biases and empathy where things go. I didn't want it to be clear about who started it, or what was going on, because blame and atrocities (and there were almost certainly atrocities on both sides) engage the emotional part of our brains and short-circuit our ability to judge things. If I had made it clear the ponies were "at fault" it'd annoy a lot of people. If I had made it clear the gryphons were "at fault" there'd be a different moral weight than there would be for a completely ambiguous situation.
I wanted the reader to be in Rose's position - she wasn't emotionally engaged in all of the mess and horror of war and only because of that could she operate in a way that worked. Maybe it wasn't fair, but it worked. If I'd put the reader firmly on the pony side or the gryphon side, her motivations and actions would have been a lot more difficult to accept.
There's also the fact that I was pushing hard the fact that this is not modern day. This is a time when a hundred miles was a hell of a long way, and communication was vastly difficult over any distance at all. Maps won or lost wars. Nobody, possibly aside from Celestia, knew the extent or expanse of the war, what went on, and I'm sure an immense amount of that was lost subsequent to cessation of the hostilities.
In the end the story wasn't about the war itself so much as why there was a war, and how to keep that why from recurring. And of course, Gerard and Rose.
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I got the feeling you were trying to be kind of mum on the issue of how it started but considering how the two races view things, its pretty hard not to view it as the griffins fault, even if the ponies did "fire the first shot." Mostly because of the whole seeing ponies as prey and food thing, its kind of hard to view anything that sees one species of clearly intelligent creatures as a food source as not at fault for a conflict.
This isn't really an issue when its just Rose and Gerard, but it becomes more of one when we start introducing other griffins and ponies because we see a bit of how they view each other but without much context. Like we see that some griffins just hate ponies, it seems like that would be because of casualties inflicted by the ponies in the war since with how you established the way the races think, I don't really see any other context for it. We see it again when the ponies have encased a village in a shield and imprisoned the griffins after they surrendered. From a few snippets of conversation it kind of sounded like even after the surrendered there were still issues with griffin violence against ponies, I would assume from this village since its the one surrounded by the bubble and given the somewhat confusing sense of honor the griffins have I can see them taking offence to strange things and going after someone. But, considering they just lost a war, it seems like a strange view to have. I don't know, as I said, knowing so little about the war, how it was going and how it ended just makes some of the interactions at the end feel very strange. If you like I can try to elaborate on them a bit more but its late so I can only think about it so much at the moment.
Oh, this does raise one point that I forgot in my initial post, Rose's maps. She didn't destroy her maps, those would have been worth more than her weight in gold. I know you had Gerard mention that they could have tipped the war if griffins had them I think a year ago (I really liked that scene too, wish you had gone further with it, like having him be more shocked at how big Equestria is and talking about how griffins thought it was just a large island, not a huge continent.) , but it still seemed strange that Rose wasn't more guarded with them and destroyed them before they walked into the griffin encampment. I would have thought that would have been a standing order, ensure they do not fall into enemy claws.
In the end though I do realize it was a story about Rose and Gerard. It did bug me that you had them end up together, but not because it didn't work, it worked great. Its just that it is kind of a well worn path, that ending seems very common for the kind of story where 2 characters get stuck in a forest or something together and are opposite genders.
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That's because you're applying human concepts to gryphons and ponies. And modern human concepts at that - for most of history, humans were far crueller to other humans not of their tribe than the gryphons have been here. And the entire point is that gryphons aren't human, nor are they pony. Not that I blame you! Not everything is defensible, but it's also not meant to be entirely workable from the human point of view.
I did consider that, but ultimately rejected it for two reasons. One is by that time it didn't matter. If she trusted Gerard's appraisal of the war, all the maps in the world wouldn't have made a difference at that point. The other is that up until the moment that she started sailing for Eyrie (and perhaps even a bit afterward) the maps were still potentially useful to her. And it's entirely possible Rose didn't quite grok the value of the maps, even after Gerard's reaction.
It sounds like ultimately most of your issues arise from my not satisfying your desire for a proper moral weighting of the situation. Which is fair enough - that's not something I provide so your immersion is going to derail when I don't have a stop for that particular train of thought.
A tale as old as time! I didn't know until the scene at the island whether or not they were going to end up together. I wanted it to be so, but didn't know if I could swing it. Really though I feel that the only other way I could go with Rose and Gerard was a tragedy and that's just not my cup of tea. Either way, yeah, it wasn't exactly the most original plot, but I hope being executed well enough makes up for it.
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I was more of thinking from a logistics standpoint. First they would have needed to gather the griffins together to imprison them (unless they literally just encased the whole village, but they would still need to make sure they didn't miss any fliers.), then they would need to worry about feeding them and sanitation. Unless the ponies didn't care what happened to them and were pretty much ok with them just dying off, which could happen, but it sounded like they wouldn't really be ok with that. it just seems like a huge pain to do.
I don't think the whole "eating ponies thing" is really too based on human morals. Rose expresses horror when Gerard seems to be taking an interest in her friends corpses for food before she buries them, so we know that ponies are not ok with being eaten, its probably on a level higher than just being killed.
I know that at that point in the story it didn't matter, but considering how cut off she was from news about the front, it still seems like a major oversight on her part. She does trust Gerard, but shes heading into the proverbial wasps nest and there was always the possibility that Kree would have just tried to kill him then they would have some very valuable maps.
I'm not sure if moral weight is the correct term. I tend to be the kind of reader that looks for connections. Technology really rubs me the wrong way in a lot of stories since its based on tech that came before and some stories have high tech stuff but with no obvious path to how they got there. Guns in stories are a big offender... I'm not sure if that makes sense or not.
As I said, it worked well. I don't think that tragedy was your only other option. I fully expected them to end up together, not necessarily as a couple, but at least together working as ambassadors for each others races. After all, we know that while griffins do have their own 'kingdom' in the show they also live in cities in equestria too so the races are somewhat integrated.
I had no idea there was a sequel. And dang, this was a great look at opposing cultures and viewpoints interacting.
I remember reading the first chapter of this ages ago, and not really reading any more of it.
I'm so fucking glad I came back to this. It's an incredibly well-crafted adventure story. I'm in awe of your ability to put together such a compelling plot.
Fucking solid, lad. I'll have to consider adding to your Apotheverse, although I feel as if I wouldn't be doing it any justice.
(side note: i found the epilogue really cheesy but it nearly made me tear up regardless, so i can't find it in me to dislike it)
I would just like to say that you're a genius and probably my favourite writer of all time.
These 4 stories, which I read in quite rapid succession, kept me interested from begin to end, always some adventure to be had, and when there was no adventure, genuine and well written dialogues. Cartography of War is my favourite of the bunch,but the others follow soon after.
While reading these stories there was always one thought in the back of my head: "I feel sorry for brony haters, that they can not give great stories like these a chance.", because really, this is better than a lot of actual books I've read.
Anyway, thanks for providing us with these great stories and I hope to see more from you.
Lovingly crafted story with a just the right amount of action. I love the world you have set here. 11/10 will read again.
6262651 Haha, well, I'm glad it worked for you! Yeah, it was kind of a touchy thing to make the end here with Gerard and Rose work not only from a character standpoint, but from a culture one. It's kind of a quiet crescendo of what was being presented as The Way Things Work.
Wonderful story, Daetrin. I've had it on my "to-read" list for a while now, but it wasn't until you put that 'completed' tag on it that I finally cracked the first chapter. Now, I wish I had done it earlier.
Your knack for storytelling is inspiring, and has me thinking of ways to improve my own writing. I can't wait to see what you put your hand to next.
6265802 Coming from Cold in Gardez, that means a lot! Cartography is, I think, my best work yet, and I'm supremely happy with most (not all, but most) of the narrative and thematic beats I put in it.
A while back I took the time to reread Off the Edge of the Map and Apotheosis because it had been years since I last read them. You've certainly grown a lot as a writer, Daetrin. This story was solid pretty much the entire way through.
I may not be able to express it properly, but I want you to know that I
really likedloved all of your stories.Very much...
This one is my favourite. I'm so glad I gave it a try even though it's OC-centered. I already knew it was going to be amazing because I had read all the prequels, but even so, I was a bit reluctant to start reading it. But I did, and thank the stars for that.
Thank you for writing these wonderful stories, Daetrin.
6964686 It's my favorite too! I'm glad you enjoyed it all, that's all a writer wants!
So I was listening to Two Steps from Hell and this song came on, and I suddenly found myself imagining various scenes of Rose leading Gérard through different landscapes and across waters. "Hmm, nice song, I'll have to download it later," I thought. I switch to the YouTube tab to see what the name of the song is...
Two Steps from Hell - Compass
"... Huh..."
There are only few stories, that leave me truely satisfied, and with a feeling of completion. This is one of them. I was right to fave this only 4 chapters in. I loved it from beginning to end. Although the feeling of completion does not mean I don't want more. I would really like to see more stories in this verse. You have so much talent, it is amazing. I am currently working on my own historical adventure story, partly inspired by Triptych, and although it is not nearly ready for publishing, you have given me lots of ideas, so thank you!
6971970 Synchronicity! Those sorts of little coincidences are always great
6972232 Glad to hear it inspired you. Really the ultimate goal of any writing for me.
7370645 wait a minute I replied...wait wrong comment thought you were replying to the the comment about the tree exploding in a later chapter
I deserve an army of those facehooves
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Highly unlikely that you're going to remember me this time around. And to be quite honest... I feel... kind of ashamed. I read the first of these four parts waaaay back and although I couldn't see Fluttershy and Rainbow starting a healthy relationship, you made it work. Then I came around for the second and third part and fell in love with those almost instantly. By the time I finished the third one, Cartography was still unfinished. I don't start reading what's unfinished - because you never know if the writer pulls through. There are more than 160 stories in neatly sorted bookshelfs I'm still waiting for, all unfinished.
But Cartography GOT finished. More than a year ago. And I feel like an idiot for waiting so long. After those first three parts? I should've given you more credit. I never should've doubted your talent and skill. The OC-tag was my excuse for... far too long. And I sincerely apologize for that.
With that embarrassing bit out of the way: I'm totally confused by the fact that this brilliant piece of yours doesn't get nearly as much attention and praise as the rest. (And, honestly, not nearly enough as it should...) And I actually can't understand why. Your characterization of those two were brilliant, the story was captivating, I couldn't afford to put it down for more than a few minutes for a quick bathroom-break or 'ah b***, I gotta eat something!'
As others already pointed out: You improved. From one part to the next, with this one being the best so far.
Heh, I'm about to get angry with myself again.
I try to explain why, since I can't explain anything else properly: I myself write quite a lot. Not in English, but hey. I still don't exactly feel 'at ease' using this language. (Though, reading it is just fine...) So after reading an excellent story - like this one -, I usually find myself in quite the emotional turmoil. I'm used to being able to express myself with a good variety, but I feel that my vocabulary is just... lacking. As if putting to words what I wanted to express wasn't hard enough, there's gotta be a language barrier of sorts, too.
I want to tell you how much stories like these mean to me. How much this story means to me. But I can't. I'm ill-equipped to do so.
So instead, I'm trying to cut this short. (Harr harr, waaay to late for that, I know...)
I am truly sorry I got around to read this only now. I should've read it waaay earlier. Part of that sorrow stems from the fact - fact! -, that this story is downright beautiful and a masterful craftswork.
As for those who might try to gauge if they should start reading a story by reading some of the latest comments, like I sometimes do: GO READ IT, IT'S AWESOME! (And honestly, don't make the same mistake I did and wait for eons to do so.)
Thank you oh so very much!
Thinking about it for a few minutes - hey, I'm not done yet!
As a good friend of mine put it: Some stories need time to breathe, to settle down, to be digested. This one's, once more, so rich with your excellent world-building... oh how I love that!
Oh and not adding a romance-tag? You sly little-...! I wondered, assumed, hoped, feared... it was glorious! And heartwarming once the conclusion came...
Thank you so much, once more!
7370645 Yeah, the point is that even without direct war between them, the resources available to the powerhouse of the pony economy and culture would let them outcompete and marginalize the gryphon civilization, flood them with pony culture and goods, deny them access to expansion by surrounding them long before they could establish their own claims, and general reduce them to irrelevance.
7375345 7375404 I do remember you! And yes, I know this story doesn't get as much attention because of the OC-only tag. And possibly the Adventure-only tag. I didn't add any other tags because they'd spoil the experience (though I know people reading the comments probably have already had it spoiled for them). I'm glad you like it though!
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Huh... I'm surprised. Actually, genuinely surprised. But hey, it's the good kind, so, yeah, that's that. It's... kind of nice. To be remembered, somehow. Thank you.
As for tags... I didn't see it coming. I read a few comments - the latest ones, as mentioned - but they don't spoil anything and I didn't bother to read further, since I'm actually here for the story and not for the comments. (Though I tend to upvote those I find myself agreeing with from chapter to chapter, especially with long stories like this one.)
absolutely loved this story, one of a few that have left a void when they ended, very well done and many thanks!
Okay, so, I tried to find the answer in the comments as well as in the blog, but, uhm,whendoes it play? I mean, it plays in the Apothe'verse but does it play before or after the events of the trilogy andhowlong before or after? If it's in the story, then a vague pointer would suffice. I'm currently at Chapter 5 (yeah, I'm late to the party).I now read the fifth chapter and take back my question..
I'm not sure if I'm sad or not that this isn't a big sprawling universe. On the one hand, it's a great story. On the other, there's already a thing that might get people confused...
Well, I'm through. And it was magnificent. Once more you've woven a tale of absolute beauty. I read that you did this more for fun and haven't put your all into it, but that just shows what an amazing artist you are. And fun is definitely a great motivator.
And I also started reading your blogs on dehumanizing ponies and am fascinated with it.
Anyway, great work. When you're releasing the other stories you've got planned I'll be there.
~Nightjar Brigandine