Branded by Friendship

by redstone

Chapter 4 : Mès

I don’t know how it happened. I did not mean to do it, but, despite the punishment, I do not regret it. At least now I have a great view; I can even see the great lighthouse when there are no ships in the way. The gigantic structure has always fascinated me, you cannot see it from the slave district, the quarters I share with other young sorcerers is dark and enclosed, a basement where the sun doesn’t shine. I have a feeling that today will be a good day.

Like a curious beast brought from a faraway land, I’ve been chained to a mooring post at the entrance of Alexandria’s great harbor. This will be my fate for the next couple of days, left to bake under the merciless sun...

At the thought of baking under the sun I look at the fisher’s stands near the walls. They all have a large quantity of fishes on display, hanged with hooks to dry under the sun. Just like me. I prefer to compare myself to those fishes, most of the beats chained in the port are feral and mean looking. Fishes are cowardly and funny looking. I suddenly wonder what life as a fish would be for me. I imagine all the adventures I would embark upon, the dangers of such a life. Then it hits me: I would most probably end up on one of those fisherman’s hook. I can’t help but grin at the scenario. Then my imagination goes crazy with other outcomes.

The busy port is quickly filled with my laughter. The locals have grown used to my weird behavior, so they just go on with their business, saying to one another: “It’s just Mès being Mès.” On the other hand, the merchants, travellers and soldiers just arriving in the city stop to stare at me, wondering how a young slave could be so happy while sitting under the sun on the burning stones, resting against a splintered wooden post. The truth is, I’m not truly happy, but I just love to laugh, to smile and find joy in the littlest things! That’s why my masters couldn’t break me, that’s why I don’t care about the sweat constantly stinging my eyes, why I don’t mind the enchanted chains binding my wrists. I even find beauty in the runes etched on my iron restraints, courtesy a fellow sorcerer: they may be there to suppress my powers but I can’t help but admire their colors, shapes and glow. As my giggles subside, someone breaks from the crowd of onlookers, getting closer with a quick and graceful pace. My blurry eyes have no time to focus on its face before the figure is standing right above me, features hidden by the midday sun.

“I’ve never seen a slave laughing so much.” Surprised, I realize it’s a girl, wearing a merchant’s gown, her voice is full of curiosity. “Did the sun fry your brain, I wonder? With all that dirty black hair, I’m sure it must be cooking up in there.” She pats my head like she’s addressing a child. From what I can see, she seems just a couple of years away from being fully grown, so really we are about the same age. “Maybe you’re just a simpleton?” Her cheeky tone somehow triggers a sense of indignity that I never thought I had in me. I open my mouth to retort. Retort what? I have no idea, but I feel compelled to respond. Before any sound crosses my lips she continues, “Or maybe...” She lowers her voice and starts to kneel down. “...you are just happy about breaking into that house and setting it on fire, hmmm?”

Her face is right in front of mine now, and I can’t tear my gaze away: a delicate nose, soft brow, rosy cheeks contrasting with her pale complexion, cute dimples and sharp jawline, all surrounded by a shower of shoulder length chestnut hairs. She is beautiful. And her eyes... Unlike the clear-sky blue eyes I’m used to seeing, hers remind me of night sky just before the dawn, the dark azure reminiscing of the purest sapphires. I would not be surprised if stars began to shine in those irises.

She cocks her head to the side, waiting for my response, but I am completely under her spell, frozen by awe as if Osiris himself had stepped in front of me. The time goes by, the crowd of onlookers starts to disperse. Losing interest, the goddess shrugs and starts to rise, maybe thinking that it is best to leave the clearly deranged slave to his own designs. Not wanting to see her go, I react without thinking, instinctively grabbing her wrist with my bound hands. She stops and locks her gorgeous eyes with mine; they show no fear, just the same curiosity as before. I try not to fall in the depths of her gaze as I sputter the only thing I have in mind.

“What... What is your name?” I feel like a starving peasant asking the pharaoh’s daughter to share a sacred meal.

“My name is Aurora.” She doesn't hesitate at all. I let go of her, both ashamed of my actions and exhilarated by her response. Aurora. I engrave that name in my memory, determined to never forget it. She looks at me for a few more heartbeats before turning away and walking towards the city. Before being engulfed in the tide of passersby she calls one last time. “We will see each other again, Mès Fire Starter.” I don’t even care about the snide comment about the incident that got me into these chains; I just feel unprecedented happiness that she knows my name. Nothing could ruin this moment. Then...

“I mean, it’s not like it will be easy to avoid you and your huge feet, right?” With that she plunges into the sea of people, leaving my shocked face behind. She snakes between the compact mob like a cat, rapidly finding a way through -- but not quickly enough to escape the barrage of angry insults I throw at her. Now the locals turn to me, astonished: they know me as the calmest among the peaceful, after all. And here I am, cussing up a storm, tugging at my chains like a mad guard dog.

In the moments that followed I felt like a complete fool for yelling at her, thinking I must have hurt her feelings. That thought was a worse torture than the sun and chains combined. But now I’ve had years to know her better, and I can tell that when she disappeared into that crowd she was smiling or outright laughing at my reaction. This is one of my most precious memories, and the gods know how bad I am at keeping them.

---ΩΩΩ---

Silence had fallen in the gloomy, hollowed tree, the voices of both pony and human having respectively reached the peaks of the highest and lowest octaves. They were now staring at each other with open mouths.

Twilight was lost in thought, the implications of turning an animal capable of speech into a familiar were staggering. Woodland critters and other wild beasts were said to benefit from the Familiar Binding, so, even if forbidden, the spell could be understandable and maybe even forgivable. However, applying it to any talking creatures, ranging from sheep, cows even up to dragons... ponies... It was unthinkable, unethical and, worst of all, cruel.

Mès’s thoughts were totally blank. Out of all the strange creatures he had seen in Alexandria, like the striped great cats brought from Asia, the wolves from Galia, or even a rare white bear from the distant frozen lands, none of them compared to what he was seeing now. At first glance he had thought it was a little horse painted into a color he had never seen before (some people like to dye their horses after all) but then he noticed the horn (was this some sort of gazelle?), the huge intelligent eyes and the other features that were strangely human-like. He had screamed out of surprise when he had realized that the thing’s horn was glowing slightly, before properly bawling out of fright when the thing had started to give a definitely human female squeal.

He was now looking at the strange creature’s head, trying to imagine what the rest of its body, concealed by a pile of books, looked like. The setting they were in made his imagination fly. Could there be a lion’s body hidden from view? Maybe even a pair of wings? That thought almost made him despair.

“Oh gods...” The unicorn almost jumped out of her fur when the human whisper broke the silence. “I am truly awful at answering riddles!” He looked scared beyond his wits, almost as if he feared Twilight was about to devour him. She was compelled to find what he was babbling about, her internal debate on magical ethics momentarily forgotten.

“What are you...” As soon as she had opened her mouth, the frightened man closed his eyes and placed both of his hand over his ears, apparently too afraid to hear what she was about to say. “Hey! I’m talking to you!” It’s amazing what indignation -- and a little madness -- can do against fear. Twilight focused on the man that had decided to sit down and rudely turn his back to her. “I know you understand me, so don’t you ignore...”

“Talk all you want, sphinx! If I don’t listen to your question, I don’t have to answer it.” Mès was resolute to best the mythical being by all means. He had heard rumors about strange creatures roaming the depths of Alexandria’s great library, but never had given them any value. At least he had heard of this tactic to beat a sphinx from... from... He couldn’t remember who had told him. He could recall that this person had been mocking him about his lack of thinking. He (or she?) had suggested that going deaf was the only way Mès could beat any riddle. Mès could remember the advice but not the one who gave it.

The bald man concentrated, trying to fill the blank in his mind. In all of his recent memories there was a missing piece, like a mosaic partially covered in sand. He persisted, doing his best to blow the sand away, staying in his meditating pose for a short while. He would have gone longer if a very aggravated unicorn had not teleported out of her book fort, reappeared in front of him and forcibly removed his hands from his ears with surprising strength. Feeling the hooves on his arms, Mès’s eyes shot open, only to find Twilight's amethyst irises inches away. She was about to lecture the rude creature into submission when it uttered the most pathetic plea she had ever heard.

“Don’t eat me...” Mès’s voice cracked mid sentence, this could be his last instants on earth after-all.

This was too much for Twilight. Drained by the misuse of magic, exhausted by mental collapse and on the verge of a nervous breakdown, she couldn’t resist the absurdity of seeing such a muscular creature so afraid of her that he would feel the need to beg for his life. She tried to hold it in, her cheeks about to burst, then she sputtered, her body starting to shake heavily, before finally surrendering to the most powerful fit of laughter she had ever experienced. All the accumulated tension was expelled in seconds, leaving the lavender mare with every burst of laughter and every tear, exhausting all of her strength.

Mès was more bewildered than ever. When the supposed sphinx had moved her head away, he was able to take in the rest of her body, discovering that it was devoid of any lion’s paw or eagle’s wings. The proportions were unlike any other horses he had ever seen, but it was familiar enough. She then started to shake and make raspberry noises with her mouth before exploding into a furry ball of hilarity. Mès couldn’t comprehend most of what had happened since he had awakened, so he welcomed the laughter, comforting himself in the familiar sound; after all, he had been an expert on the subject, long, long ago.

However, he quickly felt that the mad cackling coming from the painted horse was not a joyous sound; it made Mès shiver, chills constantly running up his spine. Suddenly his ears twitched. The man had learnt to read his body’s reactions, so he instinctively reached out for the laughing equine, just in time to catch her as she lost consciousness. Holding her as gently as he could, Mès carefully laid Twilight on the ground, resting her head on his forearm. She barely opened her eyes and, once more, unicorn and human locked gazes. He didn’t know why, but Mès had a sensation of déjà vu, as if he was reliving a dream. The words came out of his mouth without his permission.

“What is your name?” Mès suddenly felt nervous, as if the answer was truly important.

“My name... is... Twilight... S...” She looked about to add something, but passed out before she could. It made no difference to Mès, but he could not understand why he felt so disappointed by her response. It was like he was expecting something... Something he held dear to his heart.

Still holding the passed out unicorn, the man took time to examine the room more carefully, locating a flight of stairs and, on the opposite side, a door. Judging by the rays of light around it, the gateway led outside. Freedom. The thought was exhilarating. Mès was, by nature, a kind man, but living as a fugitive for the last months had beaten an exacerbated sense of self-preservation into him, even if he couldn’t remember most of it. That instinct was now screaming for him to run, to get away as fast as he could. He would have bolted out if not for the strange female creature he was carefully cradling, handling her as if she was made out of glass.

This care went beyond the compassion his old self would have shown anyone, let alone an unknown living being. He tried to convince himself that he was doing this because she apparently was very young, only a foal in the eyes of a man used to the great dark horses of his land.

Battling against the strange bond pulling him towards the unicorn, he rested her head on a book and approached the wooden door, opening it just enough to spy through without being seen. The sight he discovered through the crack was far from the Alexandria he expected, or the clay villages from his home, or even the roman stone cities; the houses were tall, up to three floors, and were entirely made out of wood. Strangely, they were not unfamiliar to the Egyptian man.

“I have seen buildings resembling these ones before... But where?” Mès tried his hardest to remember, knowing his location was vital information. He started to recover some pieces of memories. “A journey by boat... Long treks through endless forests... On the other side of the Roman sea... Galia?” How could he remember a country he had never been to? Had he been to these barbarian-filled lands? Why? He remembered with a start that he was now a fugitive. Mès tried to clear his murky thoughts to find out why he had chosen to go north and not east to flee the empire. Was he following someone else's lead?

Anyway, the architecture was certainly reminiscent of the villages he had seen in Galia, but still different; here everything was more colorful. Even in the setting sun he could tell that the few houses in sight were colored in various shades. If he had been moving west of Galia then Mès had an idea where he was. The Iberian peninsula was known to host a peculiar population that loved to produce different dyes and paints. Apart from that, not much was known of them, the empire having conquered the region through diplomacy. Only the coastal regions had been properly occupied. Protected by several mountain ranges, the Iberians were said to hold many secrets, and the talking horse behind him could be one of those mysteries.

Mès didn't want to find out how the locals dealt with strangers uncovering what they were hiding, so he readied himself for a sprint. The dying sun was a perfect setting for an escape; most people were getting home, and the guards were not yet on night patrol. Hopefully those rules applied to these northern barbarians’ land, Mès could be easily mistaken.

Though they were not sympathetic to the empire, there was no way to know what they would do with a fugitive slave: one that had seen too much, at that. Mès turned one last time towards Twilight, still curious about such an extraordinary being. The fading light coming through the crack in the door made her coat shine, highlighting the mark she bore on her flank.

Mès recognised the mark instantly. He was dumbfounded for a moment, but the surprise he felt was quickly replaced by a familiar feeling: hatred. His face turning to cold fury, the man quietly closed the door, plunging the library in darkness; leaving was now a second thought. He had something, or someone, to deal with first.

---ΩΩΩ---

The golden chariot was zooming through the beautiful azure sky, two strong white pegasi pulling it towards an unknown destination. Twilight enjoyed the fresh air blowing through her mane; she couldn’t enjoy this feeling of freedom often. She turned to her right, marveling at the sight of the regal alicorn sitting at her side: Princess Celestia was looking confidently ahead, a gentle smile dancing on her lips. The lavender unicorn then turned to her left, watching over Spike as he clung to the golden carriage. Her heart soared. The two beings she loved most, her second family, were with her on this ride. She couldn’t be happier.

However, something was wrong. As she lovingly watched over her adoptive brother, she realized the little dragon was scared, gripping the golden rails as if he was afraid to fall. Looking for an explanation, Twilight turned to Celestia only to find that the immortal was glaring at her, her eyes blazing with unmistakable anger.

Confused, the unicorn twirled around to ask her brother what was wrong, but Spike was gone. In his place was standing a strange bipedal creature. With a shiver of terror, she remembered that he was her familiar. He wore the same worried expression. When a wave of guilt hit Twilight, the chariot was suddenly jerked by a strong turbulence... No, not turbulence, Twilight realized as she looked around. The carriage no longer soared through the sky; it was now rolling on a desolate arid landscape, the wheels bumping on the rough terrain as it was pulled by two dark furred earth ponies.

She heard a yell. Looking to her left, she realized that her familiar was no longer at her side, a glance back revealing that it had fallen from the ride. Remembering one the rules binding a familiar to his master, Twilight tried to tell the earth ponies to stop, but no one was pulling the cart anymore. The terrorized face of her familiar was quickly disappearing in the distance. On last resort, Twilight faced her mentor to ask for help, but Celestia was no more. The unicorn now faced her mother, the older mare bearing a look of sadness and disappointment, her greyed mane flat with shame. Twilight couldn’t bear to look at her, so she turned her gaze one last time towards her familiar, just in time to see a rainbow colored lightning bolt striking the distant figure -- figure that strangely resembled a baby dragon before being pulverized. Tears flowing, Twilight tried to embrace her mother to escape the grief, but she only grasped at air. With an overwhelming sense of despair Twilight realized the golden chariot speeding through the void was empty. She was alone, forever.

---ΩΩΩ---

Twilight awoke with a yelp of fright, eyes streaming with tears and breath ragged from crying.

She took a few moments to compose herself. There was no chariot, she was resting in her bed, no lightning, the morning sun assured a gorgeous day, and there was definitely no dead baby dragon. At that last thought, Twilight hurriedly blew the covers off and took a look at the foot of her bed; Spike was there, sleeping in his basket, safe. Unable to contain her relief, she sighed and quietly kissed the top of his scaly head. The tender moment was cut short when the door of the room Twilight and Spike shared creaked open, the silhouette in the threshold reminding Twilight that not everything in her nightmare was a dream.

“I thought I heard noises. Glad you’ve awoken little one.” Mès was covered in a white sheet he had folded into a toga. “I guess that lizard is some kind of pet? Good thing I didn’t hurt him when he got into the house then. Never was one for guard duty, anyway.” Seeing the incomprehension in her eyes he elaborated, “I stood guard all night waiting for your... our master to come home, guess it was in vain.” Mès entered the room and climbed the stairs leading to Twilight’s bed.

“Did you...” The proximity of the cause of her nightmare was unnerving. “Did you carry me up here? Last thing I remember, I was downstairs in the main hall.” He was right next to the bed now, and she could even smell his strange, musky scent.

“Well, at first I looked for a cot of hay or something along those lines, but when I found this bed I knew it was yours.” Mès brought his hand to Twilight’s forehead, as if taking her temperature before murmuring, “Doesn’t work on animals I guess...”

“I am fine.” She pushed the hand aside carefully. “How did you know this bed was mine? Yesterday you acted as if I was a wild beast, not a civilized being.” As a matter of fact, he was acting strangely familiar, as if doting on her.

“I just used my nose,” Mès responded matter-of-factly.

“What do you mean, your nose?” Twilight was almost afraid to ask.

“This bed smelled like you, so I thought...”

“WHAT?” She exclaimed, outraged. “

“Then lifting such a little foal like you was no...” Mès had to jump back to avoid her hoof.

“Hey, hey what did I say?”

“You dare insult a lady and then wonder what you said?” Twilight had brought her voice down when Spike had mumbled something about trash cans in his sleep. She stepped out of her bed and advanced on the offender. “I will give you one chance to apologize!”

Cornered in the side of the mezzanine, Mès looked dumbly at the fuming unicorn. It seemed that his lack of tact would always get him in trouble with females, human or not. Wanting to express that thought, he added: “How could I know that you were a lady when I am dealing with a horse? It’s not like if I said that you stank or someth...”

Being a scholar, Twilight was not as strong as Applejack or Rainbow Dash. Nevertheless, the buck she delivered to Mès’s stomach was powerful enough to send him crashing onto the lowest part of her room. Her interactions with males, pony or not, were rare and far between, so having her neatness put in question by one was doubly hurtful.

The crash had almost woken up the now thrashing baby dragon, so Twilight approached the flight of stairs on the tip of her hooves and proceeded to stand over the man lying on his back.

“Please follow me downstairs, I don’t want you to wake Spike with your nonsense.”

Looking up at Twilight’s face as it was obscured by the morning sun shining through the window, Mès couldn’t help but feel the same sensation of déjà vu. However, this time he controlled his words and only said, “You lead, I follow,” instead of all the insults his memories brought to him.

Refastening the sheet on his shoulder, Mès started to follow the lavender unicorn, trying to decide if his wish to push her down the stairs was really directed at Twilight, or if his memories were confusing him once again. Anyway, the thought brought a genuine smile to his face. It felt good, as if he was welcoming an old friend he had not seen for a long time.

********************************************************

Big thank you to Zobeid for proofreading and pointers, without him this story would be a real mess.

Comments

[redstone]

So yeah, gonna start working on my story again, but when I tried to put my changes on the old chapters... I kinda accidentally deleted everything... View count and comments. Ops.
I worked on the old chapters and added a few things, like some backstory for one, that helps. Next chapter is done and being scrutinized for screw ups. The ones after are in draft.

[AliCentaur Br0ny]

Maybe even a pair of wings?

Nah, she doesn't have those yet.

[shira]

Twilight seems...oddly ooc here. It just doesn't feel like Twilight.