Sonata glanced at the edge of the forest for what had to have been the fiftieth time. How long had it been since Flowerflower had left to go get help? Had it been hours? It seemed like it.
Looking back at Lex, she wondered for the thousandth time if she was making the right decision by not trying to carry him to a hospital. Wouldn’t they be at one by now if they’d left immediately? Or would that have made it worse?
But then, it was hard to see how it could have gotten much worse. After that pegasus mare had finished bandaging the worst of his wounds, she’d told Sonata to find a blanket to wrap Lex in. Luckily there had been one in Lex’s pack. It was only after they’d finished that Sonata had the presence of mind to ask what the blanket was for. The answer – to help keep his body from going into shock – hadn’t reassured her.
After that, the other mare had told Sonata that there was nothing that they could do but wait for help to arrive. Since then, Sonata had done nothing but hold Lex’s head in her lap, listening to his breathing and rubbing his head and glancing at the tree line, over and over and over again.
“I met him before, you know.”
“…huh?” Sonata needed a moment to realize that the mare who’d helped treat Lex had spoken to her.
“I met him,” she nodded at Lex, “a couple of days ago. Me and my hubby and a few friends of ours were on the night-watch for spiders out at the train station, and that fella there just wanders in right out of the dark, bold as brass. He about scared us out of our wits too.” She chuckled at the memory. “Ah, I should introduce myself, shouldn’t I? The name’s Tender Tree.”
“I’m Sonata. Sonata Dusk.”
“I’d say it’s a pleasure to meet you, but under the circumstances…” Tender Tree trailed off awkwardly, and for a few moments silence reigned. Then Tender spoke again. “So anyway, I take one look at this fella and I can see that he’s about to fall down, ya know? Looking like he can barely keep his head up and with big old bags under his eyes. I half-thought he was gonna collapse right there, but instead he just looks at us like he owns half of Canterlot and we’re the servants and says that he needs to speak to whoever’s in charge.”
Sonata nodded, drawn into Tender’s story despite herself. “Yeah, that sounds like Lex.”
“Well, my hubby – his name’s Lumber Jack, by the way, but I always just call him Lumber – he starts getting all kinds of suspicious, since we’ve had attacks by magic-using spiders and all, but all I see is a poor thing who needs a meal and a bed real bad. So I start taking him to the nearest place he can get them, and I’m making some conversation on the way, just real friendly-like, you know? And he suddenly flips out on me.”
Sonata gave a wan smile at that. It was becoming clear that Tender liked to talk, and she could see how that would upset Lex.
“He starts going on about how I need to be quiet and answer his questions, which is pretty weird since you can’t answer someone’s questions if you’re quiet and all, but he’s yelling and his eyes start glowing and I’m not ashamed to admit that I got real scared. I start thrashing and screaming like I’m at the gates of Tartarus itself and manage to get away and fly off, sure that I’d just gotten away from some sorta horrible monster.”
Sonata lowered her ears as she looked down at Lex again, suddenly not wanting to hear this. After everything Lex had done, after how badly he’d gotten hurt trying to protect everyone, this awful mare was going to start talking badly about him?
Tender seemed to sense Sonata’s thoughts, because she reached out to put a hoof under Sonata’s chin, gently lifting her head up until they were making eye contact. “I’m saying all this because I want you to know: I don’t think that way anymore. Your boyfriend there…he is your boyfriend, right?” Sonata nodded, hoping that she was right, and Tender kept speaking. “Your boyfriend there, he saved all of us here, me included. If it wasn’t for him doing all of that fancy magic, even if it did look really scary, we’d all be dragon-food right now.”
A murmur of assent came from the ponies around them, causing Sonata to look around in mild surprise. More than a few of them were nodding, with several looking towards the dragon’s body with a shudder. Others were looking at Lex with worry, obviously hoping that he was going to be okay.
It was enough to make fresh tears build in Sonata’s eyes, and she sniffled as she rubbed a forehoof across them to clear them. “Thank you,” she replied to Tender, her voice soft. Taking a deep breath to steady herself, she looked down at Lex again. “You hear that, Lex? You’re a hero, just like I always knew you would be. So you have to keep h-holding on, okay?” She could feel her composure breaking down again, and struggled to keep it together. “You have to keep it together until Fireflower gets back, or else…or else I’ll…” She stopped talking, knowing that if she said any more it would set off a fresh wave of tears.
Tender Tree was practically ready to cry herself, and stood up to go over and give the poor girl a hug when she noticed something moving out of the corner of her eye. Looking over, she suddenly gave a shout. “Hey! Where do you all think you’re going?!”
Jumping in surprise, Sonata turned to see what Tender had been yelling at. She was just in time to glimpse a trio of ponies, ones that hadn’t been part of the crowd before, running into the forest.
Brightrose groaned as he wiped his mouth, shakily climbing to his feet and stumbling back towards his brother now that he’d finished being sick.
“I told you not to drink so much water,” sighed Fireflower. He flicked his tail, which currently had the cloth-hole-thingy tied around it, clearly impatient to start moving again.
Brightrose shrugged, a helpless smile crossing his lips. “I was in that cave with no food or water for days. I couldn’t help myself.”
“You can’t ever help yourself.” Fireflower noted wryly, rolling his eyes as he moved to support Brightrose’s weight as best he could, half-carrying him as they made their way back through the forest.
“Ouch,” replied Brightrose with a mock-wince. “Our little Fainting Flower has gotten quite the sharp tongue since he’s been out on his own.”
“Don’t call me that.” Despite trying to sound irritated, Fireflower felt a rueful grin cross his face. “Fainting Flower” was a nickname that his siblings had given him some years ago. He’d earned it after Shadowvine had been telling them a ghost story about a monster that tied spiders up in their own webs and ate their legs off. It had frightened Fireflower enough that when Brightrose, who in hindsight had clearly been in on the whole thing with Shadowvine, had jumped out of the brush just at the scariest part of the story, Fireflower had fainted dead away. His siblings had never let him forget it since.
He’d always hated being called that before. But now, despite the urgency he felt in wanting to get back and help Lex, he couldn’t help but smile, glad to be called by that stupid nickname again.
His smile only lasted a few moments though before his face fell back into a look of concentration. Despite their best efforts, they simply weren’t making very good time. Fireflower felt exhausted, and Brightrose was in poor condition due to his time in captivity. They were basically leaning on each other to keep from collapsing, reduced to stumbling rather than rushing.
Fireflower had been telling Brightrose everything that had happened over the last few days, as much to try and take his mind off of how depleted he felt as to catch his brother up, but now that he’d told him everything there was nothing else to focus on but how badly his leg muscles were screaming at him. Or how much every breath was beginning to ache in his lungs. Or how good he was sure it would feel to lie down and rest, just for a little bit…
No! They had to keep going! They’d already left the stream behind a little while ago, so it couldn’t be much further now. Just a little more and they’d be back. Just keep taking another step. Then another. Then another…
“I see them! Hey! I found them!”
Blinking at the unexpected voice, Fireflower was caught completely by surprise as Breezyleaf ran up to them, followed by Rockwood and Shadowvine a few moments later. The three of them all but tackled Fireflower and Brightrose, embracing the pair tightly even as they all collapsed in a heap.
“Brightrose! Are you okay?” Breezyleaf had tears in her eyes as she buried her face against her brother’s white coat.
“Of course he’s okay!” Shadowvine’s grip was no less strong than her sister’s, despite her confident words. “I never doubted that you’d be fine, unlike these dummies.”
Brightrose chuckled, his voice uncharacteristically shaky due to the emotional weight of their reunion. “It was no big deal. Whenever things got bad, I just remembered how I had a duty to hang on for the sake of pretty girls everywhere.”
That brought snorts of laughter to the entire group, with even Rockwood cracking a smile. He was still wearing it as he turned his head to look at Fireflower. “You did good.”
Blinking watery eyes, Fireflower managed to smile back, giving him a firm nod. A moment later it occurred to him to ask, "How did you guys escape from that force field?"
"We didn't escape. The spell finally expired," replied Breezyleaf, transferring her hug to Fireflower as she answered.
After a few moments, they disentangled and stood up. Seeing how exhausted their siblings were, Breezeyleaf and Shadowvine moved to support Brightrose, while Rockwood moved to help Fireflower. Fireflower was about to encourage them to get a move on, when Shadowvine spoke up. “Okay, I think we should head south. From what I heard in town, this forest expands quite a bit down that way, so we should be able to hide out there for a while if we go far enough.”
Fireflower frowned at that, and it grew more pronounced when Breezyleaf and Rockwood nodded. Only Brightrose didn’t immediately concur, looking to Fireflower with the same confused expression that he knew he was wearing.
Shrugging off Rockwood’s support, Fireflower stepped closer to Shadowvine. “What do you mean ‘go south’? We have to go back!”
Shadowvine blinked, an incredulous look spreading across her face. “You can’t be serious.”
“Of course I’m serious! Lex is hurt really badly! He’ll die if Brightrose doesn’t heal him!”
For a moment, Shadowvine looked confused. A moment later her lack of understanding changed into disbelieving comprehension. “You mean that wizard who killed the dragon? No way! Let him die! It’s better for us if he does!”
Fireflower gaped. “How can you say that? He killed the dragon that killed Lily!”
“He killed the dragon because it was threatening those ponies, which means that he’ll probably kill us for threatening them too! You might not have realized this, but it was keeping Brightrose alive so that we’d have to lead those ponies it almost ate into its trap. I don’t think your wizard friend is going to be too keen to forgive us for that.”
“He won’t do anything.” Fireflower forced steel into his voice, hoping that he was right. He still remembered how Lex had lashed out when he’d thought Fireflower had threatened Sonata. If he was at all inclined to punish the others for their part in what had happened, there wouldn’t be a thing that they could do about it. A spellcaster that could kill a dragon would have no trouble defeating a couple of araneas.
“You don’t know that!” shot back Shadowvine. “We just got what’s left of our family back together. Do you really want to go and risk our lives to help some pony wizard that we don’t even know?” Her eyes narrowed. “Why is this so important to you?” The other three were watching the exchange silently, eyes sliding back and forth as the argument progressed.
Fireflower grit his teeth. He could understand Shadowvine’s position, and he knew that it made sense. The rule of their family had always been “family first,” and one of the ways they’d practiced that was by avoiding anything that could bring harm, even potentially, to the rest of the group. Telling her that he wanted to do this because he’d fallen for a girl, a girl he knew he had no chance with, wouldn’t convince his sister of anything except that he’d taken leave of his senses.
Despite their having just reunited, Fireflower was seriously considering having to fight to make Shadowvine stand down, when Brightrose suddenly spoke up. “He’s right, Shadowvine.”
Her head snapped around, eyes wide with shock. “Are you kidding me?!”
A nod was her response. “Fireflower’s been telling me about what he’s done since we scattered, and about the ponies he’s met.” He glanced over at Fireflower, who suddenly realized that, even though he’d downplayed how he’d felt about Sonata when he’d relayed what he’d been through, his brother had seen right through him. Returning his gaze to Shadowvine, Brightrose continued, “If he wants me to help that wizard, then I want to help.”
Shadowvine looked apoplectic, but before she could speak up Breezyleaf beat her to it. “I think that we should help them.” She bit her lip as Shadowvine’s glare turned towards her, but didn’t back down. “After all of the bad things we did, we owe it to them to try and make up for it.”
Her expression changing into a bitter one as she realized that she was outvoted, Shadowvine turned her gaze to Rockwood in a silent question. A nod was his response, and she let out a disgusted sigh. “Fine. We’ll throw away this golden opportunity to make our escape and go back to help the wizard. I’m sure that he’ll be so grateful that he’ll kill us nice and quick instead of slowly and painfully.” Despite her grumbling, she returned to Brightrose’s side, gathering him up and heading back in the direction they’d come from.
As he moved to follow them, leaning on Rockwood again, Fireflower smiled. Although nothing could fill the hole that Waterlily’s absence left, it still felt good to have his family back.