• Published 29th Dec 2012
  • 2,685 Views, 143 Comments

Sonata de Equestria - MyHobby



Equestria's history is catching up to the present. When Twilight Sparkle uncovers a dark crystal heart in King Sombra's tomb, she and her friends find themselves on the run from timberwolves, windigos, and Sombra himself.

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First Movement: Part 6- Like Wind Through a Reed

Like Wind Through a Reed

No train tracks led to their destination. Nor were there any roads, paved or otherwise. It was nothing but miles of forest and field. The three ponies trekked alongside the two griffons; Rainbow Dash in the air alongside Martial Paw, Twilight and Lyra cantering beside Gilded Wing. The scenery was lovely, the power of the Crystal Heart drove away every last bit of the Equestrian Waste’s eternal winter. Aside from the occasional protruding crystal spire, it was almost like a gentle stroll through Whitetail Woods.

Except that it was much, much bigger.

“So, all day trek, you say,” Rainbow Dash spoke to nopony in particular. “How all day are we talking? Sunrise to sunset, or just noon to night?”

“Dash,” Twilight replied. “We left an hour before sunrise. We have lanterns in our saddlebags. Think about it.”

Rainbow scrunched her face up, looking as though she was downwind from a buffalo. “Bummer.”

Lyra smiled up at the pegasus. “Just relax and enjoy the journey! Take in all the new and interesting sights! The wonderful smells! That amazing sound of new bird songs!” She stopped to sniff at a fruit sitting in a nearby bush. “Even the oranges are bigger here!”

Twilight gave a double-take when she saw what Lyra was sniffing. “Heartstrings, oranges don’t grow in bushes.”

“Then what is th- YAAAH!” The minty unicorn took a mighty leap backwards as a flight of fruit bats flew out of the bush. “Bats! Bats!”

Rainbow began to laugh, but immediately had to duck her head as the orange bats flew overhead. “Geeze, I didn’t know that the Crystal Empire had animals from Equestria.”

“Imports,” Lord Gilded Wing interjected. “Meant to stabilize the ecosystem while it’s still recovering from a thousand years in limbo.” He kept his eyes forwards as the swarm of rodents fluttered around him. “It’s anyone’s guess how long it will be before they must bring in another species to keep this one’s population in check.”

“Oh, yay,” Rainbow rolled her eyes. “Another exciting lesson about politics and nature.”

Gilded eyed her with one steely orb. “You asked.”

Rainbow held his gaze for a long moment, eyebrows lowered. “Yeah, whatever.” She fluttered on ahead of the group.

“I hate bats,” Lyra shuddered. “I hate bats, I hate bats, I hate bats.”

Twilight rolled her eyes. “They were just fruit bats, they’re more afraid of you than you are of them.”

“I don’t really care,” Lyra said. “They’re still creepy.”

“Your fear of them is completely irrational,” Twilight huffed in annoyance. “If you just think it through…”

“Yeah, I know,” Lyra replied. “But that’s the thing about phobias, they aren’t rational.”

Twilight twitched at the mention of irrationality. Things should be logical: ordered and naturally progressing. What’s the matter with her?

She shook her head; those were not good thoughts, they were not nice thoughts, and she helped nopony with that kind of attitude. Think positive, be nice.

Twilight smiled, if a bit forcefully. “So, Lyra, how’s the song coming along? Gotten any further?”

“Eh, not really,” Lyra shrugged. “There’s not much I can come up with about walking.”

“Well, do you have anything?” Twilight’s smile turned annoyed. “I mean, maybe I could help you with it. I’m told I have very good rhythm.”

Rainbow Dash snorted with laughter, wobbling in the sky as she remembered her friend’s attempt at dancing. Canterlot was gossiping about it for weeks. The words “poor dear” and “four left feet” kept floating around.

“Err, I guess.” Lyra took a deep breath and began to sing.

"The journey long, the ponies stomped their feet
Something, something, something, birds flew through the wheat
The bats were fierce, the wind they pierced
Twilight’s magic has evil beat"

She was met with several unreadable stares. “What? You just put me on the spot, what was I supposed to do?”

“Your job?” Twilight spoke under her breath, but Lyra was still able to hear it.

“I said I was gonna write more when we actually did something.”

“I’m sorry,” Twilight sighed. “I’m just… still stressed.”

Rainbow suddenly dropped between the two unicorns. “Relax while you can, Twilight. It’s not often that we get to travel without a giant monster trying to eat us.” She smiled, showing all of her teeth in a predator’s grin. “That part comes later!”


The travelers reached the edge of the Crystal Empire’s protective magical field around noon. It was uncanny how the green of the woods just seemed to stop. The abruptness of the end of summer, and the beginning of winter, came as a shock to the three assembled ponies.

Twilight stared across the frozen glaciers of the Equestrian Wastes, feeling a chill run down her spine as she remembered the last time she had journeyed into its frozen maw. How easily that dark cloud on the horizon could turn into a resurrected Sombra. How certain it was that ever last dark corner and frosty cavern held some dark relic from a long-forgotten age.

“Snowball fight!” Rainbow Dash tossed an icy globe at Twilight, smacking her square in the jaw. Twilight got up, dusted off, and proceeded to pelt her friend with a barrage of snow, giggling all the while.

Lyra ducked an oncoming projectile and launched one of her own, knocking Rainbow out of the sky. Gilded Wing looked on in bemusement, before waving an eager Martial Paw forwards. The young griffon joined the fray with an aerial bombardment, giving as good as he got.

The four young ones lay in the snow, laughing up a storm. Rainbow turned to Twilight and nudged her. “Well, feel better now?”

Twilight looked around and smiled, the fun really had managed to loosen her up. The world didn’t seem nearly as scary now. “Yeah, you’d think I’d be able to remember one of our first friendship lessons.”

Martial propped himself up on one talon. “Friendship lessons?”

“Yeah,” Twilight nodded. “The princess had me studying friendship after she found out we were the Elements of Harmony. Our first lesson was ‘giggle at the ghosties.’ If a situation seems too dark to overcome: stand up tall, face your fear, and stick with your friends.” She mused for a bit. “Sometimes, the best way to do that is to just have some fun together. It certainly made this place seem brighter.”

Martial looked around the wintery field and nodded in agreement. “With friends, a wasteland can become a wonderland.”

Gilded Wing strode forth into the snow. “Perhaps now would be a good time to rest and eat lunch?”

Lyra stood up, her chest rising and falling rapidly from the exertion. She let loose a breathless giggle. “I hear that!”

A meal was made of several daisy sandwiches and a couple of chicken wings. Rainbow Dash squinted at the food on Martial Paw’s plate. “So, what’s that stuff even taste like?”

Martial smiled cheekily. “Tastes like chicken.”

Dash hid a smile behind a bite of bread. “Ha. You know what I mean.”

“How do you describe color to a Diamond Dog?” Martial shrugged. “You can feel free to try some.”

She waved a hoof hastily. “Nuh uh, no thanks. Meat’s way too weird for me.”

“Be nice, Rainbow,” Twilight cautioned.

“Well it is!” The blue pegasus placed a hoof over her heart. “It’s fine for them, ‘cause they need it to live, but I’m not gonna eat meat for fun.”

“Hey, Dash is nicer about it than most ponies.” The young griffon shook his head. “You’d think Blueblood had never seen a carnivore before.”

He winked at Twilight mischievously. “That why, when we’re on pony soil, we make sure it doesn’t look like an animal.”

When Twilight blanched, Gilded Wing took the moment to intervene. “Martial, mind your manners!”

Rainbow Dash and Martial Paw looked at each other for a moment before busting out in laughter. The pegasus punched her new friend in the shoulder. “Yeah, you’re alright with me, Griff.”

“Is this a bad time?”

The assembled travelers looked up from their lunch to see a trio of griffons flapping towards them. The leader was a hefty-looking, grey and black, fearsome warrior. Two javelins were strapped to his back, and the scar over his left eye told tales of a hard-won life. The griffons by his side seemed equally ready for a fight; one held a rapier, and the other a curved wooden weapon that Twilight didn’t immediately recognize.

Gilded Wing stood and nodded to the new arrivals. “Not at all, we were just finishing up.”

The griffon lord gestured for Twilight to join him, and she trotted up to his side. “Twilight Sparkle, this is Crested Barbary, our lead mercenary.”

She politely extended a hoof in greeting. “Nice to meet you.”

“I’ve heard a lot about you, Miss Sparkle,” The griffon returned her offer of a shake, “I don’t believe half of it.”

The unicorn grinned nervously. I’m not sure I believe most of it myself. “I suppose I’ll just have to prove myself.”

The mercenary grunted and turned his gaze back to his employer. “We moved the camp a mile away from the cavern yesterday, the locals were getting antsy.”

“Fair enough. And the weather?”

“It’s clear today, but the storm last night left the terrain nearly impassable.” He looked to his wingmates. “I brought Steller and Masai to carry the ponies, it’ll be much quicker that way.”

Lyra leaped into the conversation. “I’m gonna fly!? Really!?” She poked the sword-wielding griffon in the chest. “I pick first! How’s it going, big guy?”

The other mercenary chuckled when his comrade pulled a face, but soon found himself staring into two very intense purple eyes. “If you drop me, I will transmogrify you into a parakeet.”

Crested Barbary raised a black talon in Rainbow Dash’s direction. “Well, what are you waiting for?”

Rainbow smirked. “Oh hi, my name’s Rainbow Dash, you may have heard of me.”

The griffon shrugged, a bored expression on his face. “Can’t say that I have, what of it?”

Rainbow Dash spread her wings and gave a few quick flaps. “Oh, nothing. I’m just the fastest pegasus alive, is all.”

Crested grimaced. “With those tiny wings? What are you trying to-” He didn’t finish his sentence, however, because in the time it took him to speak, Rainbow had flown into the sky, spun three clouds into tornados, caused them to snow flurries, and returned to face Crested with a smug look.

“And I’m not even breathing hard.”

The griffon mercenary only just managed to close his mouth before rolling his eyes and flying away. The other mercenaries placed the two unicorns on their backs and carried them off after him.

Rainbow trotted up beside Martial, extremely pleased with herself. Martial eyed her and chuckled. “You know, if you’re feeling left out, I could carry-”

The pegasus placed a hoof on his beak, silencing him. “I’m gonna stop you right there, before you say something I’ll regret.” She grinned. “Race yah to the camp?”

Martial extended his wings with her. “You have to ask?”

Twilight was no stranger to flying, hot air balloons were the way for the Canterlot elite to travel, but travel-by-griffon was most certainly unheard of. The wind rushed past her, chilling her and whipping her hair into her eyes.

It was awesome.

A new wind whipped past as the combined forces of Rainbow Dash and Martial Paw flew by, breaking numerous speed records and laws. The purple unicorn leaned down to shout in her steed’s ear. “Hey, Masai, you gonna let them show you up like that!?”

The griffon smirked and shot off like a cannonball. Lyra similarly egged her companion on, and the whole group flew off, each flyer attempting to one-up the others. The grey-faced mercenary leader frowned severely at the display. “What in the seven seas are they doing? Waste of energy.”

Gilded looked over to the other griffon. “Come now, Barbary, surely you remember being young?”

“That was a long time ago.” Crested pointed at his scarred, whited-out eye. “Several lifetimes ago, though not all of them were mine.”

“Still,” Lord Wing looked ahead to the playing flyers, “Let them live while they’re young, give them time to grow.” A dark pit opened up in the core of his being as he watched them soar. “Those who will have time, at least.”


The mercenaries turned an eight-hour walk into a three-hour flight, with Rainbow Dash just barely beating Martial Paw to the center of the camp. The ponies spent the rest of the day setting up their tent and getting acquainted with the layout. There were a fair amount of pony archeologists mixed in with the griffon researchers, and they all seemed to have opinions on what was behind Sombra’s door.

“It’ll be the bones of his long-dead pony army.”

“There’s a mountain of gold, the inscription was just to ward off intruders!”

“Sombra’s childhood memories, man! It’s gonna be deep!”

For the most part, Twilight rolled her eyes at the guesses, and attempted to steel herself to use the dark magic.


The sun set and the campers ceased their labors; collecting around several campfires spread across the campsite. Twilight, Rainbow, and Lyra found themselves at the same fire as Gilded, Crested, and Martial. Crested Barbary was poking the wood, churning up the coals to keep the fire hot. “Tomorrow’s the day, huh?”

Twilight nodded in affirmation.

“It’ll be nice to get out of this cold.” The dark griffon ruffled his feathers. “I’m never coming up here again if I can help it.”

With that cheery thought, silence pervaded the circle, save for the crackle of flames. Hoping to break the ice, Martial pointed out something that had caught his attention. “Doesn’t it hurt to sit like that?”

Lyra looked across the fire. She had taken to sitting on her rump, rather than her stomach. He front legs propped her up as she leaned back. “Naw, I’m fine. This just helps me think, that’s all.”

Twilight raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

“Yeah, just kinda helps me to focus, you know?”

Twilight joined Lyra in her sitting position, looking for all the world like she would slide off of her seat at any moment. Martial took that moment to be cheeky and slid off of his belly and onto his backside. Unlike the mostly-hairy tails of ponies, griffon tails are a bit more boney and fleshy. The sudden weight on his tail caused him to yelp and fall over backwards, much to the amusement of Rainbow Dash.

The blue pegasus reached down and pulled her friend up beside her. “You sure made that look easy!”

“It’s a gift.” He smoothed his tail out and turned to Dash. “So, you ready to join the adventure tomorrow?”

A smile reached the corners of her mouth as she stared at the fire. “Yeah, the temple won’t know what hit it.”

Twilight had given up on finding a new way to study and had returned to her normal sitting position. It wasn’t long before she realized that Lyra was studiously writing on a sheet of paper. “What’s that?”

Lyra proudly held the product of her work into the air. “New stanzas completed! Whoot!”

Crested Barbary glared at her with his one good eye. “Stanzas? What the heck is a stanzas?”

“A stanza,” she replied, “Is like a line in a song or poem. Or a group of lines that make up a small part.” She waved the paper dangerously over the fire. “Like these!”

She plopped the sheet into Twilight’s surprised hooves. “Hold this! I’ll be right back!”

Lyra Heartstrings returned a moment later with a large, horn-like… thing in her magical grip. The numerous openings on the front formed different-sized flared ends. Lyra looked at the instrument like it was the most precious thing in the world. “Isn’t it amazing?”

Rainbow Dash pulled a face and spoke to Martial out of the corner of her mouth. “Hoo-boy. Get ready for a treat. Or a international treaty.”

Lyra got down in front of Twilight and assumed a begging position. “Please, please, pretty please sing while I play.”

Twilight looked from the sheet to the unicorn groveling before her. “But I don’t-”

“Just use the tune I sang last night!” Lyra was already exercising her mouth and tongue. “Lou gorra… juth thing… yike I yid!”

Twilight sighed. “Oh, all right.”

Every pony that had ever heard a Crystal Flugelhorn braced for an assault on their eardrums, but the attack never came. Instead, out of a small hole floated a soft, flutelike tune. It was joined by several other instruments as Lyra twisted and pushed several hidden knobs and levers to redirect the flow of her breath. After a brief intro, Lyra gave a startled Twilight the signal to begin singing.

"Flying high, on a wind and a care
The griffons raced, on naught but a dare
They traveled forth, ‘ere heading north
To find what was waiting there

"The winds were sweeping, far across the sky
The snow was blowing, no shelter could deny
The cavern spoke with billowed smoke
When Twilight’s light fell awry"

Twilight nearly choked at that last line, but it was drowned out at the applause Lyra and she were receiving. She placed the sheet music beside the minty unicorn and plastered a smile on her face.

When the time to return to their tents came, Twilight grabbed Lyra and took her to the side. She whispered into Lyra’s ear, leaving the mint-green unicorn feeling like a filly being chastised by an overbearing parent. “You’d better not put any more of my personal issues into your song, you hear me? That’s my problem to work out.”

Lyra frowned at the purple unicorn. “But you brought me on board to record your adventure in song; your internal struggle is part of-”

“Can it,” Twilight snapped. “No more deep moody things, I’m not gonna be the mule you ride roughshod over on your road to fame.”

Lyra was the picture of offence. “I’m not some glory-grabbing pop star, you know. I’m not gonna write some sort of tell-all book to get my fifteen minutes of fame.”

“Look, I don’t care, just drop it!” Twilight whispered just a little louder than she had intended, gaining the attention of Rainbow and Martial. Rainbow stared at her for a second before the young griffon laughed. Twilight looked at her friend with a bemused look on her face.

“So, how long do you think it’ll take?”

Twilight turned to Lyra. “Huh?”

“You know,” Lyra smirked, glad that she had managed to get Twilight’s attention off of her. “Before those two are all kissy-face.”

“What are you, seven?” Twilight pouted. “They just met.”

“It doesn’t take long…” Lyra trotted off to their shared tent, leaving Twilight to wait for the pegasus as she said her goodnights.

Author's Note:

Not much to say here, except that the music is written for the first song on my upcoming "album."

The Diamond Dog's Creed will be the most simple of the songs, so I decided to do that first.

It sounds like a computer played the music, because it did, but it'll be fun.
Come to think of it, it sounds more like Super Nintendo music than anything, which is awesome.

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