Desperate Measures
Owayn and Patsy had heard something they had heard dozens of times, yet today it was unwelcome. The air vibrating scream of a dying dragon, Venerax to be exact. And after his scream ended, the high roar of the wyvern queen reverberated across the forests and valleys.
That damn pegasus had taken too long getting one of the eggs, and with the queen on her merry way back, the dragon slayers had to do what came natural to them. Running away.
Sure, it was why they had been kicked out of the Order of the Virtuous Blade, cowardice being akin to treason and murder for that particular order of Equestrian knights. To lighten their load, Owayn and Patsy had to abandon the one pony that could have gotten them back into the order. Greyback had been hiding up here for years, out of sight and out of mind for the order that had been shamed by his failures in Equestria. Sure running away was one thing, but letting a simple squire stay behind and sacrifice himself for his knight?
"Boss! What the bloody buck are we gonna do now!?" Patsy shouted as the pair crashed through the brush, no aim or direction in mind. Dropping their facades of honorable knighthood, Owayn stopped at a stream crossing, catching his breath and throwing off some of his cheap armor. Flashy junk wouldn't stand a single blast by a real dragon, but since the Order had stripped him of all his possessions, titles, rank and holdings it was all he could afford on the meager wage they scraped together as mercenaries.
"I don't bucking know what we're going to do!" Splashing some cold stream water on his head, he shook the matted tangle of mane that his helmet had disfigured. "We can't collect on any of those damn bounties now, if either Greyback or that Klondike survived, we won't be able to show our faces in any town within a thousand miles."
"We clocked him out pretty good boss, if he even wakes up he'll have to face the wyvern."
Owayn sat on his haunches, rubbing his temples, trying to find the silver lining in this clusterbuck. "We can't collect on the wyvern, she's still alive. We can't collect on Venerax, we have no idea where his corpse is. And last but not least we can't haul Greyback to the Order and buy our way back in. We're screwed Patsy, royally screwed. And I mean that! If North Enterprise figures out we aren't the real deal, they'll put a bounty on our heads large enough to draw in bounty hunters from Stalliongrad to the Minotaurranean Sea and everywhere in between! And don't get me started on what Princess Celestia will do to us if she figures out we've been impersonating members of one of the holy Orders."
Patsy slapped the unicorn with a hoof, "Snap out of it! There's still one thing left that could salvage this whole journey."
"WHAT?! What could possibly make this any better?!"
Patsy poked Owayn in the chest, "Venerax's hoard, you jackass! Rumor says it's the largest one on the continent besides an Elder's hoard. Once we get our hooves onto that baby, we can just BUY North Enterprise! And who gives a flying buck if Princess Celestia arrests us? What's she gonna do, send us to the moon? We'll buy the damn moon!"
Owayn started to smile, realizing they indeed had a completely unguarded dragon's hoard sitting open somewhere. "You're a genius Patsy! We'll buy our own Southern Jungle nation after we get that hoard, screw Equestria!"
Patsy slung his crossbow onto his back, "At least I have two bucking brain cells to rub together." Owayn's eyes slanted at the insulting earth pony, and together they ran for the general direction of Venerax's former cave.
********************************************
It took the rest of the day and all night of blundering through subarctic wilderness to find the cave again. Since his death, the cave's stench of dragon had begun to air out, being replaced almost exclusively by the acrid scent of brimstone in the air.
Owayn took the first tentative steps into the abandoned cave. "I'll go first, see if anything moved in or if Venerax left a few traps."
"And let you whisk away the best treasures with your magic? Buck you, we go in together." Patsy stood on his hind legs, crossbow in the crook of his arm.
"Right then, after you my little squire." Owayn directed him inside. Both walked past the main sleeping area, looking for any telltale signs of treasure. Mainly little tidbits like stray gold coins or small gem fragments embedded in the floor. Both signs of a good and healthy hoard, mostly in younger dragons though, mature adults like Venerax tended to have a lot of time on their claws and would obsess over the cleanliness of their lair.
Owayn flared his horn with magic, lighting up the cave. Patsy whipped his crossbow up, aiming at the surprise lighting.
"Get that peasant weapon out of my face." Patsy lowered the crossbow, a glare in his eyes. Despite having several twists and turns, the dragon's lair was linear, with only one shaft into the mountainside.
"Where's the damn hoard!?"
"It's got to be here Patsy! A dragon like Venerax would want to protect his hoard as completely as possible. It's just deeper in!"
The pair trudged down deeper into the cavern, eventually coming to a dead end. Increasing the light in his horn, Owayn and Patsy looked at Venerax's treasure.
"That clever bastard. He's laughing at us from beyond the grave! I HOPE YOU BURN YOU GREAT LIZARD! I HOPE YOU SUFFERED!" Owayn kicked a pile of Venerax's loot, scattering it all over the cave floor.
Something inside of Patsy snapped, "I've listened to you without question for nearly a decade. I've been to hell and back and done things nopony should have to do just so I could sleep with a roof over my head! I didn't get kicked out of the Order like you did, but I followed you because you said we would be rich! And I wasted my life and left behind my wife, FOR NOTHING!" Patsy lifted up his crossbow, squeezing the lever. A soft click from the crossbow, and the lights from Owayn's horn flickered out, plunging the cave into darkness.
A sickening thud echoed through the cave, a pool of blood forming at the base of a massive pile of books. They had found Venerax's treasure alright, but what Venerax treasured most was knowledge.
************************************************
Klondike muscled open the door to the dockside warehouse in Windshear, several miners and Tweed Suit lighting their horns to light the dim warehouse.
Shaking off the dust, Klondike looked around at the various crates and barrels. "Alright, what do we have on inventory?"
Tweed flipped open his ledger, meticulously kept and updated every time a shipment came in. "Um, let's see. Sixteen barrels of lantern oil, four crates of cloth, six crates of mining equipment and a few unmarked boxes."
Klondike nodded to the miners. "Get every single barrel of oil and take it out to the clearing out front. The diggers there will know what to do."
"Hey chief! You gotta come see this!" somepony shouted. Klondike trotted over, the miner throwing a tarp off a small stack of boxes.
The pegasus inspected the cargo, "What am I looking at here?"
The earth pony smiled, his grin ear to ear. "Check this out." He dragged out one box, prying it open with a crowbar.
Klondike's eyes grew wide with childish envy, "Sweet mother of Celestia.... Hearth's Warming just came early this year. Is that the only one?"
"Unfortunately yes, but it sure gives us a bang for our bit!" Inside the padded and reinforced box sat six sticks of mining explosives; those beautiful red sticks of dynamite with the white wick taped to the side. Klondike had to control his masculine urges to light one and chuck it at something.
He grinned, "Keep these safe, and for hay's sake don't pick today to take up smoking."
Seeing that the warehouse was taken care of, Klondike took wing outside to oversee the other preparations. Stopping by the saloon, he spied a teary eyed Pinch Penny sorrowfully liberating his entire inventory of alcohol to the effort. Hovering hear him, Klondike patted the barkeeper on the shoulder.
"Hey, if it makes you feel better, I'll pay for every drop."
Pinch wiped his eye with a kerchief, "Really?"
"Absolutely, now make sure it all gets to the clearing outside the front gate." He gave him a slight punch to the shoulder, flying off.
Fluttering to a more moving sight, he landed next to Aurora, the surprisingly gung-ho mare had taken over a portion of the militia and was now overseeing a platoon of crossbow ponies and a pair of arbalests practice.
Pacing next to her charges, she adjusted a militia pony's stance and hold on the crossbow. "Suck in that gut, and remember not to breathe right before shooting, it destabilizes your aim. You there! Eyes on the target and not on my flank."
Klondike sidled up close to her, "You know, the natural soft tone of your back and the fine curve of your leg do tend to draw the eye straight to that wonderful flank." She gave him a punch on the shoulder, still smiling. "How are preparations going here?"
"Arbalest units are ready to go, archers need as much time as you can give us."
"I'm afraid I'm not in control of that, that monster decides when and where to show up, we just have to be ready."
Aurora shuddered at the thought of the wyvern being in control of this situation, "Just do me a favor, make sure she suffers for what she has done."
"She'll pay for everypony that she took away in blood." Spreading his wings he flapped off to another section of the preparations, the actual trap in front of the town gate. Miner ponies dug furiously, placing the barrels of lamp oil and alcohol in the pit.
Once finished, they tamped a thin layer of dirt over the top to conceal the trap. Not needing to stop here, Klondike continued out into the wilderness.
Stopping in a clearing, he inspected the work of several woodcutters and miners. "Excellent work clearing those trees, make sure to stack those logs dead center, and pile them high."
"Yes sir." one pony said, using his magic to strain and levitate a downed tree onto the pile in the center. There were going to be five such woodpiles, all in a line leading to Windshear. When lit, they would make a path of flame straight into their trap. And from what Klondike understood, the wyvern queen would follow it like a mouse on a trail of cheese.
**********************************************
Unlocking the door to the library, Klondike pushed his way in. Though it was less than a week since he had been inside these walls of parchment, it felt like a different life for him. A past that was unreachable; personal growth, the pain of loss and strength of a born warrior all coming together to free him from his old prison. Drawing his wing feathers over the old stacks and bookcases, he lovingly caressed these memories of a simpler life, one where ponies only relied on him to keep rarely checked out books in order.
Lighting a lantern, he sat down at his front desk, setting down a small stack of letters. They were all addressed to one 'Mint Fresh' of Fillydelphia. Looking at a picture included with the letters and taking a quick glance at some of the letters themselves, Klondike nearly broke down as he looked at Pine's sister.
Such a happy, pretty face. Her world would fall to pieces after she received these letters. The letters that told a story simply by existing, of life on the edge of the known world and in the realm where the monsters ruled. Pulling open a drawer, Klondike fished out a bottle of whiskey. Fillydelphia Reserve, Pine's favorite.
"I was going to save this. Save it to celebrate the day we finally could live out our dreams. I'll miss you Pine." He uncorked the bottle and took a swig, pouring out a shot for Pine Fresh. Holding the bottle in his hoof, he thought about the world he lived in, so far removed from the safe and easy life back in Equestria. No, there couldn't be any weakness, everything he did now he did for his survival and the survival of the ponies who relied on him. Corking the bottle with a rag, he did the same for four more bottles he had stashed around the library.
This whole operation relied on him, he was the only one fast enough to light all of the beacon fires to lure the wyvern in, and the only one who knew her weakness.
With his five cocktails sitting in front of him, Klondike had a thought. Reaching into another desk drawer, he pulled out a black and white picture of Pine Fresh and himself, seated at a table in the Goldrush Saloon. They both smiled at the camera, each lifting a drink, toasting life itself. Pine's hoof was around Klondike's shoulder, giving the earth pony a silly appearance. Klondike smiled at this good memory, so many good times with his friend, but nevermore. He tucked the photo into one of Pine's letters to Mint Fresh, sealing it with a wax stamp.
Standing from the front desk, Klondike again paced through the stacks of books, looking for one in particular.
He passed by several technical manuals, a partial series of Daring Do books, and even one of the library's most prized possessions, an unedited copy of Starswirl the Bearded's Essays on the Origins of Magic. The thing had nearly an inch of dust on it, nopony had ever bothered to touch it since it had taken its place here, not even the librarian. But he passed it by, not being a unicorn meant that ninety percent of that crap wouldn't make sense to him anyways.
"There you are," he pulled the book from the shelf, taking a seat in a musty reading chair near the front.
It was a book on Cloudsdale, the cloud city of the pegasi. Even though he had read it almost a hundred times since his colthood, it never failed to bring a smile to his face when he read about the place that was his tribe's home. And at this point in his life, with so much riding on a plan where so many things could go wrong, it looked as if the only way he would ever see Cloudsdale was in the illustrations of this book.
"Every dream of mine has shattered right in front of me. I have no family, no friends, no job, no mentor, I have nothing except revenge." He closed the book, setting it aside on the table next to the chair.
"You have me." Aurora stood in the doorway, coming inside she flipped back her hood. Gently tracing a hoof on his chin she stroked his face. "And when I have you, I don't need anypony else in the world."
He stood from his chair and wrapped both of his wings around Aurora, the feeling of connection being like ambrosia. But he was not content with simply embracing Aurora. Leaning to her lips inside of their feathery realm, he kissed her without hold. Pulling away, he gazed into her amethyst eyes, feeling something he had never felt with a mare, passion.
"I love you. I've always loved you." Closing his eyes he nuzzled the mare of his dreams, drowning himself in her delicate scent, taking in every single drop of this beautiful mare's love. He nibbled experimentally on her neck, his lust driven to new extremes as she moaned her approval.
She craved his touch and lust filled every inch of her body. But she pulled back from his embrace, "Klondike, wait."
He folded his wings back, wondering what he had done wrong. "What? What is it?"
Her horn glowed with magic, the blinds shutting themselves and the door locking with an audible click. Her smile could only say one thing, come hither. "Now, where were we?" Klondike had to control his urge to pounce her, instead taking things more slowly.
*******************************************
Whew, that chapter ending, gettin' a bit warm in this room of mine. I think I need some air. Not really, I don't subscribe to the school of clop, but I also do not discriminate against those that do.
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Klondike be pulling' the moves...
Eh, all our OCs do. Its a proven fact our imaginary characters are better at life then us...
Another, more volatile, note: EXPLOSIVES! Does my mention, and use, of TNT have anything to do with their advent in this story?
575284 I kind of figured that since a pony can have a demolition cutie mark, and that TNT isn't too high tech to be out of the limits of pony technology, that it would be logical that a mining operation would have a couple of sticks laying around.
575289 But only 6 seems, inadequate if you ask me (But I am a crazy lunatic so my opinion is fail). Another good chapter and I hope those bastard 'knights' get their asses handed to them on silver platters by a fancy butler.
575315 I figure that they would have stored the bulk of the explosives near or in a separate shaft of the mine, which has since been destroyed and completely collapsed. And dude, the knight is dead. He took an arrow to the back. I don't know what to do with Patsy at this point, maybe have him get eaten by wolves or something?
575563 Wow,things just seem to shoot right over my head. As for patsy, make so he goes completely nuts and is still wondering around at the end of the story. Thats always funny.
575563 He could always go up for redemption and perform some kind of obligatory heroic sacrifice (like say, jumping down the queen's throat with a lit stick of dynamite). Or if you just want to off him, have him stumble into the queen's warpath once they get that fire lit.
575688 Intriguing, a chance for redemption for the literal patsy.
575700 Well, that or he could follow Klondike around while banging coconut halves together.
575788 That was the intent originally, and the pun intended.
575802 But how would you get coconuts up in Northern Equestria? The coconut is a tropical fruit.
Also, what is the airspeed velocity of an unladen wyvern?
575809 Well a wyvern could have migrated and carried a coconut back!
And what do you mean? Male or female? (Still in character)
575867 I don't knooooooooooooooooooooooooow!
574420 It's okay... I don't even have a marefriend... Forever alone...