The guards outside Luna’s lair were surprised to see him as he exited, which when he thought about it later was a reasonable reaction, considering they hadn’t seen him enter her lair at any point. His battered, bloodied, frosted appearance, mane still dusted with snow and ice cracking in his coat with every step, was certainly out of the ordinary. But to their credit the guards reacted calmly – the one even sheathed his sword after Vermilion apologized for startling them.
“Sorry,” he said, easing the enormous wood door closed behind him. “Just passing through.”
Starry Night stood at her reception desk at the end of the hall. It was a long run from the Day Court to Luna’s office, and she was winded, panting for breath. As soon as their eyes met she trotted to meet him.
She took in his condition with a quick glance and grimaced. “She’s angry.”
“Was angry. She was,” Vermilion said. He realized he was dripping on a beautiful sable rug that ran the length of the hall, and he stepped to the side where the floor was bare marble. The droplets that stained the stone beneath him were tinted pink. “Sorry, do you have, like, a towel or something?”
They had an entire washroom, it turned out, and Starry Night peppered him with questions while Vermilion rinsed blood, sweat and the dust of ages from his coat. Apparently Luna’s dramatic exit from the court had caused something of a scene, though Princess Celestia carried on as though nothing was out of the ordinary. The shadows had barely settled from Luna’s departure, and Celestia was already pushing forward with the next business of the day, presenting a certificate of achievement to a group of unicorn foals who raised money to rehabilitate a rundown botanical garden in one of Everfree’s rougher earth pony neighborhoods. Maybe she was used to that sort of behavior from her sister.
“What about my friends?” Vermilion carefully dried his coat, avoiding the torn patch on his chest. It was angry and red and starting to weep blood again.
“They were with that captain Celestia was honoring,” Starry Night said. She frowned at his injury and vanished for moment into one of the washroom’s many walk-in closets. When she emerged a small roll of cotton bandages floated in her magical grasp, and she offered it to Vermilion. “The pegasus mare – Zephyr, I think? Yes – looked a little upset with how things ended. Oh, I wish Luna would think before doing fool things like this!”
“She…” Vermilion unravelled a hoofful of bandage and pressed it against the wound on his chest. Although only skin deep, for a moment it stung more than some of the serious injuries he’d received lately. “This happens a lot?”
“More than I’d like, lately.” She collected the wet towels he’d used and deposited them in a hamper by the door. “Celestia has a way of needling her. I’m not sure she even realizes what she’s doing, sometimes. They’re so different, I’d never have guessed they were sisters.”
“Have you tried talking to her about it?” Vermilion pulled the bandages away. The bleeding had stopped, but there was no easy way to bind the wound without wrapping a dressing completely around his chest. Perhaps Rose Quartz would be able to help.
“Luna? She just says it’s trivial and unimportant and we shouldn’t worry ourselves with it.”
“I meant Celestia.”
“Oh.” Starry Night laughed. “No. That would not go well. You saw how Luna reacted to Celestia’s interest in you. If we went to Celestia, behind Luna’s back…” Starry Night shook her head. “We’re not all as sturdy as you.”
Vermilion tossed the stained bandages in a rubbish bin and inspected himself in a bronze mirror set above the sink. A bit of tussling with his hoof set his mane back in order. Much better.
“Is that your way of saying you want me to speak with Celestia?” he asked.
She sighed. “I don’t see that it will do any good, but if you ever find yourself making small-talk with Celestia sometime, perhaps mention it. I wouldn’t hold out for a miracle, though. Would you like a tunic? Something to wear over your chest?”
He did, and they found a Night Guard Poet’s shirt, cut for a pegasus but otherwise fitting him perfectly. The empty wing-holes looked a little odd on an earth pony, but with his saddlebags back in place they were barely noticable. By the time he found his way back to the court and his friends, he’d almost convinced himself to forget why he had a wound on his chest in the first place.
* * *
It was a long walk back to the Day Court. Without one of the pegasi to remember the way, he resorted to asking for directions periodically. It took nearly an hour to reach the Solar Wing of the palace, and by the time he found the court again Celestia had adjourned. Back in one of those executive offices, perhaps, and conspiring against her sister.
The court was still packed with ponies. None recognized him as he passed through, and most of their eyes seemed to glide over him. As an earth pony wearing a guard uniform he was simply beneath their notice.
Which was fine. He threaded his way between the rocks and shoals of noble conversations toward the head of the room, the last place he’d seen his friends before Luna snatched him away. It took a moment to sift through the bobbing ocean of pastel coats, but eventually he found them. Rose Quartz and Zephyr sat beside each other, islands surrounded by empty space. They were whispering to each other, heads together, and didn’t notice him until he was close enough to touch.
“Cherry!” Zephyr jumped to her hooves. “You had us worried there. What happened?”
“Just a, uh, conversation,” he said. He looked around, but none of his other friends were present. Electrum and Buckeye seemed to be gone as well. “Where’d everypony go?”
“Back to Osage.” Rose didn’t stand immediately. She eyed him up and down, her gaze pausing on the tunic for a long moment. “Celestia laughed it off, said Luna must’ve wanted to congratulate you ‘privately.’ Cloud Fire just said you’d come back whenever she was done with you.”
“That, uh…” Vermilion cleared his throat. “That makes it sound a lot more fun than it was. Just a talk, really.”
“Mhm.” Rose finally stood. The circle of empty space around them expanded by a hair, and for the first time Vermilion noticed the looks on the faces in the crowd. They stared at Rose, while trying not to be obvious about staring at Rose. “Well, as much as I enjoy being back here, shall we head out?”
He did, and the trip back to Osage was uneventful. For all that it felt like they’d spent hours in the palace, it was easy to forget they’d started before dawn, and the rest of the city was still just starting its morning as they walked through the streets. Shops were open now, filled with merchants and customers. The sights and sounds and scents of the city came alive in all directions.
It was already hot, too. The sun and the river were slowly conspiring to steam the city to death. His sweat soaked through the gray tunic in patches, and even Rose’s coat was starting to glisten. Unicorns hated that. Sweat was a sign of physical labor.
Zephyr was worse off. Her wings, though straggly and featherbare, were still like a pair of hot blankets on her back. By the time they made it to Osage she was panting, strings of her light mane plastered to her neck. She pushed them out of the way as they reached the apartment and barreled inside. Dimly, Vermilion heard one of the cats hiss.
Vermilion held the door open. “Want to come in? I can make some real breakfast.”
Rose paused at the threshold, then shrugged and stepped into the apartment. “I guess I’m free today.”
They made their way through the dim sitting room. Vermilion paused by the window to open the drapes, and the morning sun flooded in to light the room. A gray shadow on the floor meowed at them and scampered up to Rose, who leaned down to lightly touch the tip of her muzzle with the cat’s nose.
“Which one’s this?” she asked.
“Frigate. He’s a big softy. Likes to ride around on ponies and steal their food.”
“Mhm.” Rose’s horn lit, and a gentle green aura surrounded the cat, lifting him up off the floor. His legs paddled ineffectively at the air for a moment before Rose set him on her back. “He’s a heavy one.”
“Zephyr says I feed them too much.” Vermilion led the way to the kitchen, where Zephyr was waiting. She already had a half-a-loaf of bread out on the table, and was struggling with a jar of ruby apricot preserves. Vermilion took the jar from her, twisted it open effortlessly, and hoofed it back. “Cloudy says we should stop feeding them entirely.”
“He’s not wrong,” Zephyr said. She gave the cat on Rose’s back a long, narrow-eyed stare, then proceeded to ignore it, slathering her roughly torn chunk of bread with the apricot preserves and devouring it in just a few bites.
“His judgement is compromised when it comes to cats,” Vermilion said. He regarded the remaining half-a-loaf of rye on the table, then selected a serrated bread knife and cut it into thin slices, the way unicorns liked it. The oven was still warm from hours ago, and he stoked the fires into a hot burn. The slices he set directly on the stovetop.
“So, what’d you and Luna do after she snatched you?” Zephyr asked. The words came out in a bread-inflected mumble.
What indeed? Vermilion decided to start at the end. “We have a new mission.”
Zephyr blinked, and her expression crumbled. “Already? I thought we would have some time.”
Oh, right. Chinook was visiting. “We’re not leaving immediately. It’ll be a long trip, and Luna has to arrange passage for us from Huracan—”
“Huracan?” Rose looked up from the toast. “Are we sailing somewhere?”
“Eventually,” he said to soothe Zephyr’s concerns. “We won’t leave for a week or so.”
“Oh.” The pegasus frowned down at the table for a moment, then nodded. “That’s… enough time, I guess.”
“When’s Chinook’s unit arriving?” Rose asked her. “Soon, right?”
“Tomorrow by mid-afternoon,” Zephyr said. “Oh, hey, Cherry. Do you mind if she stays here while she’s on leave? Otherwise she’s gotta room in the barracks.”
“That’s fine.” He flipped the toast. It was nearly burnt, just the way Rose liked. “Are you two allowed to do that? Before you’re married, I mean.”
“Sleep together? Sure.” Zephyr’s tongue flashed out, licking her muzzle clean of crumbs and jam. “Long as neither of us gets pregnant before the ceremony. Pretty sure that won’t happen, seeing as how neither of us has a cock.”
Rose ignored the vulgarity and took a seat beside Zephyr at the table. Frigate jumped from her back at the last moment and vanished around the corner. “Does she know about your injuries?”
“Um.” Zephyr swallowed. “I, uh. Sort of. Yes.”
Vermilion raised an eyebrow at her.
“Okay, no,” she clarified. “I mean, I told her I got a cut on my chest. So she knows that.”
“Your chest was nearly split open,” Rose said. “She’s going to be upset when she sees you like this.”
“Ugh, I know.” Zephyr folded her forelegs on the table and buried her face in them. When she spoke, her voice was muffled. “I didn’t want to worry her.”
“She’ll be angry,” Rose said again. “Relationships are built on honesty and trust.”
“Celestia.” Zephyr set her chin on the table. “You sound like my mother.”
“Your mother’s a smart mare.” Rose magicked the toast off the stove just as it was starting to burn and coated it with a sensibly thin layer of apricot preserves.
“Anyway,” Vermilion said. “Chinook is welcome to stay here until we leave. As long as she’s a courteous guest.”
“She will be.” Zephyr stood and stretched, her wing joints popping loudly. “I’ll make sure to wear her out. Anyway, Cloudy’s got the right idea. I’m taking a nap. Come get me at noon or something.” She gave them a little wave with her wingtip, and trotted up the stairs to the dark second floor.
Rose watched her leave, then snorted quietly. “Thought she was the sensible one.”
“She is,” Vermilion said. “Ponies just do weird things to keep their lovers happy.”
“Oh? Are you an expert on lovers now, Vermilion?” The small smile on Rose’s lips blunted her question.
He flushed. “No, just… you know. That’s how ponies are.”
“Mhm.” Rose took another bite of her toast. “So, what’s this next mission? Something at sea?”
“No, we’re just catching a ship in Huracan up north.” He tried to recall the map’s exact geography. “There’s a town up on the end of the Razorspine mountains. Hasel… Haselnacht, I think.”
“You mean Hazelnight? I’ve heard of it.” Rose tilted her head. “They mine geodes from the mountains. It’s about as far as you can get from Equestria.”
“It’s where the table says we’re needed. It’s… Something about snow, even at midsummer. It’s not natural.”
Rose nibbled on her toast. It was several long seconds before she spoke. “It’ll be past midsummer by the time we get there.”
“Well, maybe even more snow, then.”
“More snow.” She sighed. “I’ve had enough of snow for one lifetime.”
Vermilion thought back to Luna’s lair and the endless chill that seemed to pervade it. “It’s not so bad, once you get used to it. It’s refreshing. Pleasant. Oh, that reminds me, can you look at this?” As he finished, he started to pull the borrowed guard tunic over his head. His hooves caught in the fabric, and he struggled to get it off.
“Uh.” Rose coughed. “That’s a little forward of—oh!” She stood and walked toward him, her face lowered to inspect the wound on his chest. “Celestia, I can’t leave you alone for five minutes. What happened?”
“I, uh…” He trailed off, realizing there was no competent explanation for his injury that didn’t implicate Luna in some sense. “Just, uh, you know. Tripped.”
Rose stared at him. Her eye narrowed, and she glanced repeatedly between his eyes and the wound on his chest. Finally a sneer peeled her lips apart, and when she spoke a hot anger simmered in her voice.
“She did this, didn’t she? That bitch! She couldn’t stand to see Celestia reward you.”
“Rose!” Vermilion hissed. He jerked back and looked toward the stairs, to see if either of the pegasi had heard her. “You can’t say that, she’s the princess! We work for her!”
“We serve her, but that comes with obligations.” Rose’s horn lit, and he felt her magic poking at the raw margins of the wound on his chest. Teasing it open again. “She should be using her power to guard and aid us, not engage in fits of temper. Tell me she apologized, at least.”
“She, uh…” Vermilion’s memories flowed back to the cold touch of Luna’s tongue as she lapped the blood from his cut. “Yeah, she did. She didn’t meant to do it, she just lost her temper for a bit. It’s how she is.”
A low rumble answered, and Vermilion realized Rose was growling. A dangerous light glinted in her eye, and she abruptly spun away, opening up her saddle bags and pulling out a small canvas kit marked with a red star. She set it on the table and opened it like a book, revealing bandages, tubes of ointment, tiny scissors, needles, patches and thread.
“She’s a princess.” Enough heat remained in Rose’s voice to singe his ears. “She ought to be ashamed. There’s no excuse for a mare her age to hurt a stallion. I’ve half a mind to…” She trailed off, exhaling loudly. “I’ll give her a piece of my mind, the next time we meet.”
“Don’t.” He shook his head. “It won’t change anything. She is what she is. You might as well argue with the tides.”
Rose snorted. “You’re too agreeable for your own good. Now, hold still.”
The next fifteen minutes or so were unpleasant but necessary. Rose dragged him over near the kitchen window, where the bright morning sunlight streamed in. She bent down close enough for her breath to stir his coat, and carefully trimmed away the cinnamon hued hairs from the edges of the wound. Then she rinsed it with a saline solution that stung worse than the initial injury, applied some clear gel that smelled like vinegar and lemons, and used a curved needle to expertly sew the cut shut. She snipped the edge of the thread and leaned back to inspect her work, mutter something under her breath, just below the range of his hearing.
“Good enough,” she pronounced. “Tell me if it turns tender to the touch, or becomes inflamed.”
“I will.” He rotated his shoulder, feeling the odd tug of the stitches in his skin. “Thank you.”
She sighed, and for a moment he was reminded of his mother whenever he’d done something silly or stupid. “You’re welcome. Just be more careful. You get hurt enough for three normal earth ponies.”
“Good thing we have you around, then.”
“Quite.” Rose leaned forward to brush his cheek with hers, a casual gesture but one that somehow felt weighted in his mind, though it was hardly more intimate than she’d been a minute before, peeling apart the layers of his skin and sewing them back together. Her touch against his face, her lingering scent, the bright flash of her shell pink mane all suffocated his senses for a moment, and before he realized it she was packing up her medical kit. She fastened it shut and paused for a moment, giving him a long, one-eyed sideways glance.
He cleared his throat. Her scent – sea salt, cotton and the faint peppery flavor that all unicorns seemed to carry with them – lingered, and he shook his head to dispel it. He walked around her to his side of the table and took a seat.
“Any plans for yourself this week?” he asked.
She shook her head. “I need to secure some more supplies. The Academy should have most of what I need, and with Luna’s endorsement I’ll be able to take whatever I like.”
“I meant, like, for yourself. You know, visiting friends?”
Her muzzle wrinkled. “No.”
Oh. His gaze strayed to the eyepatch clinging to her muzzle, then glanced away before she could see. “Well, you must be doing something else, then.”
“I appreciate your concern, Vermilion,” she said. A sarcastic twist inflected her words, and in her tones he thought he heard something hidden there, something buried deep, and his mind cast itself back to their shared dream in Maplebridge. But then she was sitting at the table across from him, a stoic expression on her face, and her words were as even as ever. “I assure you, though, I am quite fine.”
“I didn’t mean you weren’t,” he said. “I just meant, uh, you know, you’re welcome to come over here any time you want. Me and Cloudy and Zephyr are usually here, and I’m sure Quicklime would be happy to come over too, and, uh…” He cast about, desperate for something to anchor his rambling. “I got a book!”
She blinked at him. “A book.”
“Yes!” His saddlebags were still draped over the back of his chair, and he leaned back to pull Canopy’s journal out of them and set it on the table. “It’s a gift from Luna. An apology, for what she, uh, for what happened.”
Rose leaned back, staring down her muzzle at the book like it might bite. Her horn glowed, and a hesitant light surrounded the slim tome, lifting it into the air. She floated it closer, opened the cover and ingested the few words on the first page. Her eyebrow rose, and she set it down to look at him again.
“This is Canopy’s. Luna gave it to you?”
He nodded. “It’s her journal.”
“I didn’t know she kept one.” Rose brushed a few stray breadcrumbs littering the table away from the book, as though to preserve a space around it. “How did Luna come by it?”
“Electrum gave it to her. I’m not sure how he got it.”
“Hm.” Rose stared at the book, then snorted quietly. “It’s a nice gift. She still shouldn’t have hurt you.”
“I know, but… it’s what she is, Rose. You might as well be mad with a thunderstorm for making you wet. She just is.”
“She’s still a pony. She can make decisions, hopefully good ones. Otherwise, why are we serving her?”
Vermilion scooped the book back up and held it against his chest. “When it comes to monsters, she makes the right decisions. Maybe she just has trouble with ponies.” Or sisters, he silently added.
“We all have trouble with ponies. We don’t all go around hurting them.”
“We don’t. Look, I get it. If you want to be mad at her, fine, but please don’t let that get in the way of our duty. This is just a scratch. It’s nothing.”
“You shouldn’t be so deprecating,” she said. But there was no energy in it, and she turned to look out the window at the slow street running through the Osage neighborhood. A few earth pony foals were trying to climb one of the eponymous trees that shaded the road.
He expected her to follow up that remark, but nothing came. The silence grew between them, and he struggled to fill it. For her part, Rose seemed content to watch the street outside. The weight of the silence grew on him, and just as he was about to crack, Frigate came to the rescue. The gray tabby hopped up onto the table and rubbed its head against Rose’s shoulder, purring loudly for attention.
“Heh, sorry, he likes attention.” Vermilion reached out and scooped the cat up, pulling it into his lap. “Enough, you. Don’t bother Rose.”
“Not a bother.” Rose stood and circled around the table. She sat beside him, her shoulder brushing his, and leaned down to let Frigate rub his cheek against her muzzle. His bright pink tongue flashed out, laving at her nose, and she giggled.
“Scratchy,” she said. She wrinkled her muzzle, then turned to the side and sneezed loudly.
“Allergic?”
She shook her head. “Just tickled. I don’t understand why pegasi don’t like them.”
“I think it’s an affection. Just a way to set themselves a bit apart from the rest of us.” Frigate squirmed in his grasp, and he let the tabby drop to the floor with a graceful, soundless landing. Something caught the cat’s attention, and he darted off into the shadows, leaving the two of them alone again.
“Hm.” Rose tracked the cat’s escape, then turned back to him. As always, her single eye seemed somehow more piercing for the fact that it lacked a mate. “And what will you be doing this week?”
“Reading, I guess. And, I dunno… I’ll find something. I’m sure Cloudy and Zephyr will want to do things.”
“I think Zephyr might be a bit preoccupied.”
Oh, right. They probably wouldn’t see much of her, except at meals. And he’d have to make extra for Chinook. The thought distracted him, and he was already thinking of what else he had to buy from the grocer when Rose’s quiet cough brought him back to reality.
“Sorry.” He blushed, and hoped it wasn’t visible beneath his rusty coat. “Just, uh, thinking. About dinner.”
“Don’t apologize. It’s cute.” She leaned in to brush her cheek against his again. It was the same gesture as just a few minute before, but now unprompted and suddenly weighted with meaning. What had he done to deserve it? The thought snared him, baffled him, and her scent tied itself around his mind like a noose, and he barely noticed her stand and move toward the entry.
“Thank you for breakfast, Vermilion,” she said. “On second thought, I think I might take you up on your offer to come by more often. Besides, we’ll need to plan our trip to Huracan. I guess I’ll see you soon.”
“Uh, yeah.” He managed to get out. He stood and took a hesitant step toward the entry. “You, uh, anytime. We’ll be glad to have you!”
She didn’t respond. But she did smile, dipped her head in a polite nod, and vanished around the corner into the foyer. He heard the door open and close behind her. A moment later, a rush of fresh, summer-scented air breezed through the house.
* * *
The next few days were the closest thing Vermilion had had to a vacation since before Hollow Shades.
Chinook arrived on the afternoon of the second day. She and Zephyr burst in the front door, giggling, laden with canvas satchels and armor and canteens and saddlebags and all the things he was eminently familiar with carrying on a campaign from his time with the company. They made it a few feet into the foyer, teetered under their respective loads, and collapsed in a pile of laughing pegasi. By the time Cloudy and Vermilion reached the bottom floor, the mares were engaged in what he could only describe as a combination tickle fight and make-out session.
The sight brought him up short, freezing the question he’d been about to call out when he heard them barge in. Beside him, Cloudy froze too, and they both stared for longer than was absolutely necessary.
Finally, Zephyr noticed them. She rolled off of Chinook, pulled the still-giggling mare to her hooves, and made a show of brushing the dust off her shoulders and wings.
“Cloudy, Cherry! This… hehehe, sorry, this is Chinook, my fiance. Chi-chi, these are the stallions I was telling you about!”
Chinook fluffed her wings to settle the feathers and turned to regard them. She was a brilliant green mare, with a bright blue mane and piercing yellow eyes. Colored bands decorated her feathers, though Vermilion couldn’t tell if they were natural, cosmetic or some sort of unit-marking. The combined effect was of some tropical bird, a macaw or parakeet, though huge enough to look down at him with inches to spare. She was possibly the biggest pegasus he’d ever met; only a few earth pony mares and stallions from the company were taller.
He opened his mouth to introduce himself. She beat him to it.
“Cherry, right? I mean, Vermilion?” Her face was suddenly inches from his. He could smell a lunch of fish and seaweed on her breath. Her wings flashed out for balance, and then he was being hugged with four different limbs. “Zephyr told me so much about you! You’re, like, a hero!”
“Uh, well, yeah. Hi.” He hugged her back, trying to remember that this was his friend’s fiance, and not some random mare wrapped around his torso. “Not really, though. A hero, that is. Zephyr’s the hero.”
“Oh, pshh.” Zephyr disentangled herself from the last of the gear they’d dragged in. “I just stab the bad things with my spear. Cherry does the real work.”
“Work, she calls it.” Cloudy added himself to the conversation, sliding up beside Vermilion. His wings fluffed out, and Vermilion could’ve sworn he was striking a pose. “Cloud Fire, at your service. You may have heard of me.”
“Mhm.” Chinook’s eyes flicked up and down his form. “I may have. Zephyr said you two’ve helped pull her ass out of some bad spots recently. Like, maybe she’d even be dead without you. That true?”
Like she’d pulled a raincloud out of nowhere, that put a damper on the group. The grin faded from Zephyr’s face, and she bit her lip. Vermilion glanced at Zephyr, at the mottled coat covering the scar on her chest, at her ragged wings. Chinook stared at them, still smiling, but only with her lips – her eyes tightened and bored into them. Only Cloud Fire seemed unfazed by the sudden drop in temperature.
“We’ve all been in some tough spots lately,” he said, his voice as calm as Vermilion had ever heard. “We did for her what she’d have done for us, if things were reversed. She’s the bravest mare I know, and you’re very lucky to have her.”
Chinook stared at him as he spoke, and her eyes didn’t waver after he finished. The silence extended, and for a terrible moment Vermilion thought some strange pegasus point of honor might have been violated and they were about to attack each other. Even Zephyr seemed nervous, glancing between them, her wings starting to rise at her sides. She opened her mouth to speak and—
“Ha!” Chinook’s visage cracked, and a huge grin broke out on her face. “You know, you’re right! I am lucky as hell! Ah, come here, you!” With that she swooped forward, embracing Cloudy as firmly as she’d previously hugged Vermilion, all but swallowing the tan pegasus in her huge green wings.
Beside them, Zephyr let out a quiet breath. “Chi-chi’s unit is on leave in the city for a week or so. It’s still okay if she stays here, right?”
“Of course.” Vermilion glanced at the pile of gear and supplies covering the foyer floor. “I’ll, uh, bring this up to your room, if that’s alright.”
“Chi-chi?” Cloudy managed to extricate himself from the mare. “Can we call you that?”
“Only if you’re rutting me!” She elbowed him in the side with enough force to make him stumble. “Ha! I’m kidding. Maybe. Hey, speaking of, where’s your room Zephyr?”
“Oh, uh, upstairs!” For perhaps the first time since they’d met, he saw Zephyr blush. She danced on her hooftips and darted toward the stairs. “We’ll, uh, we’ll be down for dinner. Maybe!”
“Maybe!” Chinook echoed. Then, apparently deciding Zephyr wasn’t making good enough speed up the stairs, she planted her forehead against Zephyr’s rump and shoved her up toward the second floor. “C’mon, go, go!”
With much more giggling, they vanished up the stairs, leaving the two stallions to themselves in luggage-littered foyer. Vermilion stared after them.
“Well, she seems nice,” Cloudy said.
“Uh, yeah. Very, uh, peppy. Energetic.” Upstairs, a door slammed shut. “More than I thought.”
“Yeah.” A pause. “You see those wings? Damn.”
Um. Vermilion glanced at Cloudy’s wings, then up the stairs. “What about them?”
“You know what they say about mares with big wings, right?”
Vermilion blinked at him. “No?”
Cloudy rolled his eyes. “Nevermind. Come on, let’s head to the park or something. Give them some privacy.”
“Wait, hang on.” Vermilion trotted after him, stumbling as his hooves caught in a canvas strap connected to a satchel apparently filled with bits of cloud. “What’s that mean? Hey, what’s that mean? What do they say about mares with big wings?”
If Cloudy heard, he didn’t answer. By the time Vermilion was close, Cloudy was already airborne, and it took Vermilion all the way to the park to catch up.
He never did find out what they said about mares with big wings.
* * *
In the evenings, after he served dinner and the sun had set and they’d drunk their fill and gotten rowdy and finally all retired to their rooms, Vermilion spent his time with Canopy’s journal. After nearly a week, he was still on the first page, struggling to understand what Canopy meant by her very first line:
“I am a weak pony.”
The next line was no help. It was a list of groceries: turnips, cabbage, carrots, butter and cheesecloth, all crossed out, apparently after she purchased them. Little numbers scribbled beside them indicated how much she spent for each one. In addition to her other qualities, she was a frugal mare. Her mouthwriting was also surprisingly crisp for a pegasus – Vermilion’s was better, but only just, and he’d studied calligraphy at his father’s knee.
The next few lines were similarly pointless minutia, notes about her day, reminders of ponies to meet and reports to write. It was halfway down the page that the tone changed again, and her cribbed errata shifted to something altogether different.
“Remember how lazy you were at the coliseum. Remember how Compass Call spent the night honing his steps, rehearsing the balestra hoof-by-hoof until with eyes closed he could dance from one end of the salle to the other and not brush a feather against the walls. Remember how his croisé bound your blade against his shoulder and then it was an easy tap-tap-tap and you were out. Remember how that defeat tasted, and remember that it was your fault, because you cared more for drink than for discipline. Remember that the next time you are tired and work remains to be done. And remember how gracious he was in victory and in your bed. Emulate him.”
Vermilion read the passage several times. He closed the book and turned out the window, where the moon reigned supreme over the city and the night. Only the flicker of his lantern kept its silver light at bay.
Earth ponies weren’t lazy. Pegasi were – it wasn’t slander to say so, just fact. But he’d never met a pony who slept less than the major. She was always up first at dawn, and last in bed at night. He recalled seeing her walk along the rows in their bivouacs, checking on the ponies secure in their bedrolls with Electrum by her side. Only when the guard was set, and all was quiet, did she retreat to her tent. She was not lazy. He glanced at the journal and stared at it quietly for a few minutes, letting these thoughts bounce about his head.
He must’ve dozed off at some point. Millstones weighed down his eyelids, driving them shut against all his efforts to remain awake. He jerked, nearly bouncing out of the chair, and when he looked at the table again a small scroll rested on it. Midnight blue wax sealed it shut, and when he held it to his muzzle he detected the faint scent of jasmine and frost.
He snapped the seal open. The wax sparked, releasing a bit of acrid blue smoke. When nothing else happened he unrolled the scroll and read.
My Vermilion,
Passage has been secured for you to Haselnacht aboard the cutter Pearl Diver, departing from the port of Huracan in a week’s time. Bear this missive with you and deliver it to the captain of said vessel.
Go and do my will. Destroy our enemies. Restore summer to Haselnacht.
Luna
Well. Their vacation was at an end, it seemed. He sighed quietly and rolled the scroll up, putting it back on his desk atop Canopy’s journal. Zephyr would be unhappy.
He turned back out the window. The moon had shifted along its course in the heavens, and he could no longer see it from his desk. Only stars now, and the faint lights of the city on the mountainside.
“Snow at midsummer,” he mumbled. It was going to be cold where they were going.
He found he didn’t mind that fact.