//------------------------------// // Iron // Story: The Starlit // by Tzelael //------------------------------// The navy blue figure of Onyx sailing through the sky shot straight out of Appleloosa from the inn’s second story window. She didn’t bother looking back, trying to get as far away from civilization as possible, in particular the inevitable element of civilization known as the town drunk. Having endured his flirtations far past the breaking point, she fled the city if only to prevent herself from succumbing to her urge to slaughter the idiot then and there. Her flight from the town brought her to Appleloosa’s outskirts, the stretch of desert that was technically their territory, though nothing was really done with it other than to serve as a cushion between the town, the Buffalo lands and anyone else. Onyx slowed down her movement, her wings beating at a far more steady pace while her body gradually reached the ground. She blew a jet of air out of the left side of her mouth, her eyelids sinking halfway in exasperation as she took a moment to enjoy the peace and quiet. She flared her nostrils and took in a deep breath, though stops her inhalation when her nose was invaded with a rancid, familiar stench. “The hell...?” Onyx turned to her right, finding four warped masses of flesh and bone being encircled by flies. She gingerly inched closer to the carcasses, finding on closer inspection that they were all pegasi. It was difficult to really distinguish who they were, seeing as much of their bodies have been consumed by the desert’s plethora of carrion feeders. The rest of the fetid flesh was being slowly eaten away by smaller organisms, though beneath each of the bodies were dried saddlebags. Reaching her hoof over, Onyx pulled away one of the bags and lifted the flap. Inside were several letters, addressed to Cloudsdale and Canterlot, each from the office of the mayor of Appleloosa. ”They’re all mail-mares...” Onyx sifted through all of the bags of the dead ponies in front of her, grabbing each of their letters that they were delivering and holding them in her mouth. Clenching them firmly in her teeth, she turned over to Appleloosa and stretched out her wings. She broke into a gallop and leapt into flight to head back to town. **** Twilight walked up the stairs of the inn after being given a key at the front desk. On her way up, she saw a stallion whose mouth was encrusted with salt unconscious near the door to the room. She furrowed her brow for just a moment, inserting the key into the lock and turning it, pushing the door open. On the bed was Onyx, looking up from her resting place as she looked through these letters. “Hey. Back from your hoofwork?” “Yeah, just finished taking a look at the orchard.” “Oh?” Onyx opened up another one of the letters and started to scan through it. “Do tell.” “Apparently, all of this trouble started when Appleloosa kept sending in requests for rainwater to Cloudsdale, but never got a response to their letters. When the ponies started getting restless, the Caprice guy showed up and started to rile them up, telling them that Canterlot has forgotten them. He then started doing them favors, then-” “That’s when things started getting weird.” “Yeah. He seems to be miraculously able to grant these favors, but after he does it, something goes horribly wrong.” “How many times did this happen?” “Well... Braeburn told me about four of them, including him getting the water for his orchard, then the whole orchard withering away.” Onyx furrowed her brow, muttering to herself as she considered different possibilities. “Some kind of wish-granter... Djinn? No, not Djinn, too many favors... This place would be a smoldering hole in the ground by now... That just leaves...” “Leaves what?” The navy blue pegasus furrowed her brow as she bit the bottom of her lip. “Hold that thought. You said that the letters to Cloudsdale never got to their destination, right?” “Yeah.” “I found these out on the desert... Along with the mail mares that were supposed to be carrying them.” She shoved the letters over to Twilight. Upon receiving them, Twilight sifted through each of the letters and examined them. “... These are all the requests.” “Yep.” “Well... Given the fact that Caprice started granting these favors right after the town dried up and communications with the town stopped... I think it's safe to assume he has something to do with it. What about all the other stuff? Whether or not it's him, what can cause all of that to happen?” “If it’s Caprice, then he could just be a really bad apple of a unicorn mage.” “No, I ruled that out. When I checked the orchard, I checked for a residual magic signature, and there was magic present, but it had no visible resonant frequency, which means that-” “Right, there’s magic involved and it isn’t unicorn magic. And before you ask, it was one of the things the Starlit taught us to look for when it came to supernatural phenomena in training.” Onyx huffed in frustration, blowing a stray hair from her mane away from her eye. “Now we’re back to square one.” Twilight flopped onto the bed beside Onyx’s, staring up at the ceiling. She tried to wrap her brain around the whole situation, though nothing seemed to make sense. "Maybe I should start digging through the lore books we brought... Wait, what am I saying? Onyx is here with me! She probably knows something from practical experience. She did mention another sort of creature it could possibly be...” “Hey, Onyx, you mentioned some other kind of Wish-Granting creature that might be responsible?” “A Djinn? Already ruled that out. More than three miraculous events occurred, and they don’t go out of their way for anypony. After the three wishes, they would have burned the town to a cinder.” “You were going to mention something else.” Onyx shut her lips tight, her eyes shifting to the side. She took several deep breaths while Twilight continued to push the question. “What was it?” Onyx hissed through her breath, her voice faint with exasperation. “Alright... This thing is able to perform enormous magical feats related to luck and fate, leaves behind no visible magic resonant frequency, and from what I can tell, it requires a verbal contract. This sounds a lot like...” She muttered just barely under her breath. “... A Fae.” “A what?” “A Faerie.” A silence hung over the room for a brief moment. The silence broke when Twilight burst into laughter, rolling straight off the bed as soon as Onyx finished the sentence. The pegasus mare shot her companion the kind of glare one gives somepony when they laugh at a child suffering a fatal injury. When Twilight finally regained her composure and rose up from the bed, she giggled slightly, though suddenly stopped when she finally saw Onyx’s face. “... Something tells me Faeries aren’t anything like they are in old Pony Tales.” “Let me put it this way; you wouldn’t be laughing if you’ve seen one. The Starlit have dealt with those monsters for centuries, and we've gone so far as to give out an order to kill any Fae that are spotted immediately. These things are trouble, and it's starting to look like there's one here." "Wait, if you had a directive to kill every Fae you've ever spotted, and that order was given centuries ago, how's one still alive?" "They're crafty little bastards. They're good at hiding until they decide to have a little fun, or at least, what they call fun. The Fae and Discord have pretty similar taste in entertainment, and frankly, it's pretty damn scary." Twilight considered the gravity of the statement; this was coming from a pony who's seen the likes of the Sleepless Dreamer and other sorts of monsters that she only heard of in story books. “Looks like I’ve got some studying to do. Do any of the Lore Books we brought with us have any information on the Fae?” Onyx rummaged through the saddlebags, looking through each of the tomes and flipping through them. Holding out one, she tosses it over to Twilight’s bed. “One of the old research journals. This one just has one page about the Fae, but it’s better than nothing.” The book was leather-bound, tied together with frayed, dry chords. Twilight gingerly opened the book, Onyx stepping toward the door. “Oh, and to save you some time, kid, the Fae are weak against iron. We’re not sure if steel works, but we know for sure that if they touch pure iron, they’re pretty much dead.” Twilight’s head shot up at Onyx before she opened the door. “If you knew that, why can’t you tell me what the contents of the book are?” “I only retained two lessons from reading that excerpt about the Fae, and they're the only ones I’ll ever need.” “And that is?” Twilight asked as the pegasus mare opened the door and stepped out. Onyx looked back in the room for a moment with a wicked grin on her face. “1. Iron kills Fae. 2. Don't ever make deals with the Fae. Ever.” She bucked the door shut behind her, Twilight cringing at the sound of the door’s impact. She turned her attention back to the book, concentrating her magic on flipping each individual page until she found what she was looking for. The top of the page had the words “ON THE FAE” scrawled on it. She peered down and immediately soaked in the contents of the page. Given our recent discovery that the Sisterhood of the Night used Fae Contracts to obtain strange, otherworldly power, I put together everything I could about Fae contracts based both on legends and on previous Starlit encounters with these unholy monstrosities. Twilight gulped for a second at the “unholy monstrosities” part of the page. The Fae have a perplexing power to change fate in such a way to do unbelievable feats of magic, among them being shapeshifting (which leads me to believe they may be related to Changelings, perhaps their ancestors), but they also have the ability to warp reality itself. However, this power has limits: in order to act upon something, the Fae had to have made a contract that had to do with that specific subject. To affect ponies, they need the pony’s true name before they can do anything for them or to them. These contracts are made when a normal pony gives the Fae their name and makes a request. Once a Faerie makes a contract, it has power over anything mentioned in it. Even the casual mention of a place or an object in the pact gives the creature dominion over it. “So basically, you have to be very careful about what you say when you make a deal with them. Braeburn must have mentioned the orchard when asking about the water, and the pony who was crushed by the sign probably mentioned that he wanted to win the poker game at the Salt Block specifically.” Twilight pursed her lips while she continued to read down the page. “Also explains why the Starlit are careful about names... One of these things hears your name in conversation, they can kill you if they wanted to.” She gulped, realizing just how deep in trouble she was in. She wasn’t just known, she was famous... Then again, if the creature here was a Faerie, why hadn’t it attacked her sooner? It would have known her name already. She kept reading... The Fae are compelled to obey the terms of a contract in the same way any normal pony is compelled to eat and breathe, but once the contract’s terms are fulfilled, the creature will almost immediately turn on the pony who it made the pact with. Fae Contracts always end in outrageous tragedy, so my advice to all Starlit who encounter these creatures (which given that the Sisterhood is making contracts with them, they certainly will) is this: do not make any deals with them if you value your life. The Fae will make fools of all of you, if you live to tell of it. Iron is the bane of all Fae, and they can’t survive its touch. It must be pure iron, however. Anything else, anything mixed into it will render the weapon useless. Twilight slowly closed the book, sliding it off to the side. She leapt off the bed and looked out the window, scanning the town for a moment. “Well, Twilight, I think now’s a good time for your very first trip to the blacksmith...” **** Walking in front of the town’s smithy, Twilight took a quick glance, specifically at the walls; countless tools were hanging off the walls, including hammers, tongs, molds, and many other items that she couldn’t readily identify. The sound of metal pounding on metal rang throughout the interior of the shop, her attention turning to the back of the room. There she saw an earth pony, orange mane and yellow coat pounding away at a glowing, super-heated piece of metal on an anvil. She stood outside for a few moments, not sure whether or not to go in. "Iron is the bane of all Fae... Its touch is deadly to them. That's what the book said. I guess it's good to have a weapon but... Do I really have to kill it? I suppose it isn't really a pony and it's hurting ponies, but..." Twilight gulped and shook her head. "Do I really have a choice? This thing is a monster. It's already killed other ponies before, and nothing is stopping it from killing more. I'm doing the right thing... Aren't I?" She took a deep breath and slowly trot into the blacksmith. She cleared her throat, trying to grab his attention. “Excuse me, sir?” He kept pounding away, clearly not hearing her the first time. “Excuse me... HEY!” The blacksmith stopped for a moment, turning around to face Twilight. A pair of tired, brown eyes examined Twilight for a few seconds, sweat pouring off the stallion’s brow before he reached down and dabbed his head dry. “Somethin’ I can help ya with, ma’am?” “Hi there, I’m just looking for some tools, preferably something in iron?” The blacksmith grunted and turned back to his work. “Fresh outta luck there, kiddo. Ever since the drought, I had to sell all o’ my iron ore.” “And who bought it?” “Don’ rightly know. I mentioned to Caprice that I was low on bits and it’d be nice if I could sell somethin’, even my ore. Caprice said he had a buyer, he brought me bits, so I sent it off where he told me.” Twilight kept her smile up, though cursed to herself. “Should’ve known he would’ve done something like this... Way to get your hopes up, since, you know, the creature you were hunting would definitely keep the components to something that could kill him instantly within hoof’s reach.” “Where did you get the iron in the first place? Not much gets shipped to Appleloosa.” “The gold mine we found a while back. When we got done prospectin’ it, we found out that there was some iron ore in it. Only got a little bit before-” “Before the mine collapsed, right?” The blacksmith’s eyes fixed on Twilight for just a second before he nodded. “That’s right.” The pieces fit together all too perfectly in Twilight’s head. Caprice seems to be covering his bases fairly well, doing a good job of hiding a weakness that nopony, save for those that might be hunting him, would be looking for. “Could you tell me where the old mine is?” “It ain’t safe there, miss.” “Just so I know.” The blacksmith released a breath from flared nostrils, looking at his handiwork before setting his hammer on the anvil, then sticking his current project into the forge, walking to the bellows and working them in to fan the flames inside. He turned over to Twilight, then looked out the door. “The mine’s southwest of town, buried under a pile o’ rubble. Can’t miss it.” He went straight back to his work, Twilight bowing her head toward him. “Thank you, sir.” She turned and walked away. The blacksmith pony’s work suddenly stopped when a hammer from the wall-rack fell off of its place and struck him across the leg, causing him to fall on top of the bellows and give it far more pressure than it needed. Twilight quickly turned around and cast a protective spell around the forge, seeing chunks of superheated coal nearly fly out toward a can of oil, though when they hit the magic forcefield, they bounced back inside the forge. The blacksmith stallion picked himself back up, his jaw hanging limp when he finally processed what he just saw. “Ma’am... Sure was lucky you were here. Thanks.” Twilight’s eyes widened halfway through the sentence. She smiled and nodded slowly. “Yeah... Lucky... You’re welcome, sir, and try to be more careful.” She bowed quickly before running to the door, though she stopped for a second, then turned around. “Sir... If I were to bring you some iron ore, would you be able to make something out of it?” “I could. It’d cost you a few bits and time that it’d take to melt down the ore and meld it with some coal to make ste-” “I want to keep it pure iron, and I’d prefer it cold-worked.” The blacksmith raised a brow, his next sentence lined with apprehension, as though he was speaking to someone who didn’t know that sticking your hoof in a fire was a bad idea. “Miss... Do you realize that if iron is just cold-worked and pure, it’s going to be brittle, right?” Twilight’s head grew hot as her eyebrows creased together, her teeth gritting at the sound of being talked down to. She avoided making eye contact with the smith though, trying not to give him the impression that he made her angry. She asked quickly in turn, “Can you do it or not?” “... Yes, ma’am. Don’t expect a masterpiece from me though, a blacksmith is only as good as his tools.” “Speaking of which... I’ll be off to get your ore.” Twilight walked out the door, looking to the southwest before the blacksmith called out to her. “Ma’am, that mine’s collapsed. You’re going to need help clearing it away.” Twilight stopped for a second, then turned back to the blacksmith with a smirk spread across her face. Her horn began to shimmer with energy as she gave one final response. “Oh, I think I can handle it.” A flash of light burst before the blacksmith’s eyes once the magic around Twilight’s horn reached its zenith, sending her to her destination.