Truthseeker

by RB_


In Search of Truth and Justice 3

The fire cast long shadows which floated and twisted along the cliffside.

“So,” Lyra said around a mouthful of bread, “you’re dead?”

“As a doornail,” Silver Shot nodded. “My ticker hasn’t kept time for some twenty years.” He reached across to her with a foreleg; she touched it with hers. He was just as cold as the night air.

Lyra shivered. “That’s… unnerving.”

“I’ll say!”

Lyra took a calming drink of her stew. “So, how did you, uh… y’know.”

In response, Silver pulled down the red bandanna he wore around his neck. A series of angry grey tracks marred his flesh.

“Strangled,” he said. “I was chasing an outlaw out of Dodge Junction. Followed him out to the edge of the badlands before he got the better of me. Wrapped a lasso around my neck and pulled it tight until I was gone.”

He snorted. “Imagine my surprise when I woke up just fine the next day with this fella standing over me.”

Lyra looked over at Painted Scout, who was sitting quietly on the other side of the fire. “So, he brought you back?”

“Who, Scout? Hardly!” Silver laughed. “He’s a fine mystic, but he’s no miracle-worker!”

“Then how…?”

“The Griffon’s Claw,” Painted Scout spoke up. “It holds on to him. Holds his spirit close in its claw-clutch. Keeps him here.”

Lyra tilted her head. “What do griffons have to do with anything?

“The Griffon’s Claw is a big circle of standing stones, somewhere to the southwest of us,” Silver explained. “The buffalo call it that, anyway; it’s hallowed ground to them.”

“Not hallowed,” Scout said. He shuddered. “The other.”

“Sorry, old friend. Unhallowed. Unholy? Either way, they avoid the place like the plague. And I,” he said, “died right in the middle of it.”

“It is a greedy, sinister place,” Scout mumbled. “It can only want. What, none can say. It twists our destinies together between its talons, his and mine.”

 “…Huh,” Lyra said.

“Oh, don’t mind him,” Scout said. “He always gets a bit somber around mid-July, but he’s been my trusty scout and faithful friend for many years. You should have seen him when he was younger! Couldn’t keep his mouth shut! Isn’t that right, Scout?”

Scout scowled. “The land is restless; I am restless.”

The crackling of the fire filled the silence for a moment.

“What happened to the outlaw?” Lyra asked.

“Oh, Big Iron?” Silver laughed. “Well, he was even more surprised to see me alive than I was!”

─────

Time passed.

“So you do this every night?” Lyra asked.

Fleur did not pause in her routine. “Every night before bed, and every morning before breakfast,” she said. “I tell Fancy it is a foreign type of yoga.”

Lyra’s eyes trailed Fleur’s body as she danced and darted about.

“I’ve never heard of any kind of yoga that involved backflips or swords.”

Fleur tittered. “Fancy is a wonderful stallion, but sometimes he has trouble seeing the trees.”

Her hooves came to a stop, her rapier thrusted forward into an invisible opponent. She held that pose for a moment, and then relaxed, letting the sword in her magic drop.

Fleur took a deep breath in, a long exhale out, and then returned her rapier to its scabbard. She turned to Lyra with a smile fueled by adrenaline. “Does Bon Bon not do something similar?”

“Oh, she does,” Lyra said, “especially recently.”

She frowned. “Come to think of it, she’s been training a lot lately.”

Fiddlesticks looked up from her place by the fire. “Well, that can’t be a bad thing, can it?”

“No, it’s not, it’s just…” Lyra glanced over towards Bon Bon, sitting with Octavia against the far rock wall. “I’m a little worried about why.

“Why’s that?” Fiddlesticks asked.

“Well… Nah, never mind.” Lyra smiled. She did her best to make it look convincing.

─────

Time passed.

“So you actually gain muscle mass when you transform?” Bon Bon asked, patting the now fully-shifted Octavia’s furry side. Lyra sat comfortably with her back against a rock not far away.

“Yes, nearly double,” Octavia said. “It’s equal parts a magical and a physical transformation.”

“Fascinating.”

“I’m surprised. Have you never seen a lycanequine before, Bon Bon?”

“Not personally,” she said. “Only what they showed us in training. I knew of some agents who had fought werewolves, but…”

“Not many who wanted to share their tales?” Octavia said with a wolfish smirk.

Bon Bon’s eyes hardened slightly. “Not many who survived.

“I’m sorry.”

Bon Bon didn’t say anything. Instead, Lyra spoke up.

“What was it like when you became a lycan?”

“Well, I don’t remember much of the actual change—I was unconscious in a hospital bed for most of it. The bite itself was terribly painful, though. Little Dela almost took my leg off! You can still see the scars, if you look closely.” She held out her foreleg for inspection. “Of course, Vinyl’s was apparently far worse, as she often feels the need to remind me.”

“How so?” Bon Bon asked.

“Well, apparently it involved her vomiting up her stomach lining and several of her internal organs over a three-day period in which she couldn’t sleep from the pain.”

Lyra grew just a little bit greener. Meanwhile, Bon Bon had a question. “Why isn’t Vinyl here, anyway?” she asked.

“Vinyl isn’t much one for violence.”

Lyra snorted. “Could’ve fooled us! She sure looked like she knew what she was doing in Manehatten!”

“I didn’t say she wasn’t familiar with fighting,” Octavia said, “only that she’s… opposed to being personally involved in it. I’m not entirely sure why that is, considering.”

Bon Bon cocked her head to the side. “Considering what?”

A slight frown overtook Octavia's grin.

“How quickly she’ll throw herself into a fight.”