//------------------------------// // Act II: Voyage of the Pearl Diver // Story: The World is Filled with Monsters // by Cold in Gardez //------------------------------// At the height of summer, Vermilion and his friends departed Everfree for winter. Zephyr’s feathers had finally grown out enough for her to fly, so she and Cloud Fire circled the rest of them thousands of feet above, where the air was cooler and not so choked with humidity that he practically chewed it with each breath. As this was not a campaign – they only needed enough supplies to reach Huracan, and there were plenty of towns and villages along their path – they had little in the way of luggage, just their weapons, some basic supplies and enough food to snack on during their trip. Like a good earth pony, Vermilion was carrying everything for the pegasi, so they were able to cavort and play. He barely noticed the extra weight. He watched as they gyred through the blue sky. Thin white strands of vapor trailed from their wingtips, marking their winding path across the heavens. From time to time they circled closer to each other, their wings nearly close enough to touch, and a faint hazy cloud would begin to appear around them. It never lasted long, and once they broke apart the cloud disintegrated like it had never existed. Afterward a cool mist would drift down to lightly caress them, teasing them with the memory of colder days, and then it too would vanish, and the hammer of the sun would return, reminding them that it was summer after all. Vermilion loved the heat. He loved the way the sun roasted his coat, burning out his sweat. He was an earth pony, and though his time with Luna had given him a greater appreciation for things that were cool and dark, he was still a creature of summer. It was his birthright, and he relished it. The heat crept into his pores, oozed through his dense muscles and sintered his bones. Quicklime grunted something beside him. He glanced over to see her trudging gamely along, her head down as though bulling through the thick air. She licked her muzzle and mumbled something again. “You okay?” he asked. “Yeah. Just, you know. Hot.” She peered up at the sky, squinting her eyes against the sun’s glare. “Wish I could fly.” “I can see the appeal,” Rose said. She walked along Vermilion’s other side, her pale pink coat shining so bright in the sun it hurt his eyes. She wore a broad-brimmed hat over her mane, with a hole cut out for her horn. Although taller and heavier than Quicklime by a fair amount, Rose’s thinner, slender build and longer legs helped dissipate the heat, and she didn’t seem to be suffering much. She hadn’t complained, at least, though now that he thought about it, Vermilion couldn’t recall Rose ever complaining about anything, except perhaps his own stupidity. That had come up more than once. Rose was also the only other pony carrying her own gear. Vermilion appreciated that. “It’s cold where we’re going,” he said. “Snow now. By the time we get there, probably worse. You’ll miss this heat then.” “Lies,” Quicklime said. “Celestia, what I wouldn’t give for snow right now. Hey! HEY!” She shouted up at the pegasi thousands of feet above them. “Make it snow!” Vermilion squinted up at the sky. Cloud Fire and Zephyr were two little dots surrounded by white trails. “Probably can’t hear you.” “Whatever.” Quicklime grunted. “How far until this town?” Vermilion looked back over his shoulders. The haze that blanketed Everfree during the summer had already swallowed the city and indeed the whole horizon. The blue sky faded into gray as it approached the earth, and sight was lost of anything more than a few miles away. Here and there, through the mist, he thought he could see the sun glinting from something high in the air, and once or twice the wind swept through, breaking apart the thick air, and he saw the vague suggestion of a soaring tower capped in gold. “We’ve made about ten miles,” he guessed. “Maybe ten more to Treemont. Luna’s already procured lodging for us there.” “Treemont’s nice,” Rose said. “Mostly orchards. My mother used to take us there for the apple harvest in the fall.” “Apples.” Quicklime blew out a frustrated breath. “I just want some shade. Cherry, why don’t they plant trees along the road? That would make this, like, a thousand times more pleasant.” And block the sun? He shook his head, and they lapsed back into companionable silence. * * * Treemont was, indeed, a nice town. The orchards extended for miles outside the sprawling cluster of houses and roads that anchored the center of the community, and for a while Quicklime got her shade. The apple trees were still flowering, and the air was heavy not just with moisture and heat but the heady scent of pollen and the buzz of millions of bees. They formed darting clouds around the blooming canopy, and occasionally landed on the ponies to nibble at the powdery salt that built in their coat over the course of the long, sweaty day. Vermilion didn’t mind their presence, Quicklime was too tired to care, and Rose tried without much success to chase them away with flicks of her tail. The pegasi were already waiting at the inn when they arrived. Vermilion found them passed out on one of the room’s two beds, apparently exhausted by the day-long flight. Or maybe they were just napping through the last of the day’s heat. He offloaded his gear as quietly as possible, set theirs on the floor beside the bed, then rejoined the unicorns in the common room below. Rose and Quicklime had claimed a table near an open window and leaned into the gentle breeze that flowed through it. A pitcher of water and several tankards sat on the table between them, and when he took a seat Rose slid one toward him with her magic. The faint scent of lemons rose from it. “Thanks.” He took a long, thirsty gulp before continuing. “The birds are sleeping upstairs. We’ll prolly see them later.” “I might join them,” Quicklime said. She lay her head on the table and closed her eyes. “We’ve got a week of this?” “Plus two weeks on the Pearl Diver,” Rose said. She took a long sip from her water. “I’m not looking forward to that.” “Don’t like boats?” he asked. “I don’t mind boats, but two weeks is a long time to be trapped with the same few ponies,” she said. “Even friends. Ponies get on each others’ nerves, and you can’t get away from them. Especially if this ship is as small as I expect.” Small? Vermilion had never seen a real boat before, just the little skiffs and barges that plied the slow, fat river flowing through Everfree. In his mind, any ocean-going vessel must be a huge, multi-masted affair, with rows of decks above and below the waterline, acres of sails and miles of rope, like his father had described. He lost himself in memories of his father’s tales, and nearly missed the conversation’s slow return. “As long as we don’t have to walk, I don’t care,” Quicklime said. “I bet it’s cooler out on the ocean, too.” “It is, but remember, we’re not going out to sea,” Rose said. “We’re just travelling up the coast. You’ll probably be able to see the shore for the whole voyage.” “You’ve been on a ship before?” Vermilion asked. “A few times. Mother travelled as part of her practice, and that meant visiting some of the further-flung colonies.” Rose’s eye drifted down to the table and seemed to lose focus for a moment. “She took me with her once or twice a year. Things… it was safer back then. You could travel abroad without fear. If I had a daughter, I wouldn’t take her on such a voyage.” Quicklime’s ears perked up. “You ever gonna have foals, Rose?” Rose tilted her head. “I… I guess so? Doesn’t everymare want to? I’d need to find a stallion who wouldn’t mind, well, this.” She gestured vaguely with her hoof at her face. Quicklime snorted. “Any stallion who can’t see past that doesn’t deserve you anyway. Besides, it’s just unicorns who are stupid like that.” “You’re a unicorn,” Vermilion pointed out. “I know, it gives me special insight into them.” Quicklime stuck out her tongue at him. “I’m sure pegasi and earth ponies have stupid issues of their own. Actually, no, I know pegasi do. I just suspect earth ponies do.” The mares glanced at him, and Vermilion thought again of his own father – no, his whole family, how they clung to traditions like they were an iron law, how they hid from the world, tending their farm as though it were the only thing that mattered. He remembered the earth ponies of Hollow Shades, who ignored the slow encroach of Blightweaver’s children until the monsters were literally at their doorstep. He felt again the hot shame of standing next to Canopy and Electrum and his friends as they tried to understand just how backward and ignorant the earth pony villagers were. He cleared his throat. “Sometimes.” “Well, I’m not,” Quicklime said. “Gonna have foals, that is.” “Why not?” Rose asked. She seemed genuinely curious, her ears tilted forward toward the smaller unicorn. “I think you’d be a good mother. And they’d be cute.” “Uh, because they’re noisy, messy and smelly, and then you have to spend the next twenty years raising them instead of doing whatever you want to be doing.” “You’ve given that some thought,” Vermilion noted. “Yeah, my last coltfriend was like, all about having foals. As if he was the one who had to bear them!” She squinted at Vermilion. “It’s not as easy as stallions think, you know!” Rose’s eye slid over to Vermilion. “It does seem a bit unfair, doesn’t it? It’s just a few minutes of work for a stallion—” “Hopefully more than that!” Quicklime interjected. “—and then the mare has to carry around the result for most of a year. What do you think about that, Vermilion?” Um. They were staring at him again. “I, uh… I hear some mares like being pregnant?” They both snorted at that. Rose muttered something that sounded like “Typical,” while Quicklime just took another long drink. Vermilion was rescued by the kitchen colt, who brought over a bowl of boiled snap peas still in their pods and liberally sprinkled with salt and shreds of spearmint. He set the steaming bowl on the table, offered a deep nod that bordered on a bow to the unicorns, and scampered back behind the bar as quick as he could. “Ooh!” Quicklime levitated one and popped it into her muzzle, crunching down on it with a quiet hum of pleasure. Three more quickly followed, and Vermilion had to tug the bowl over to his and Rose’s side of the table just to rescue their share of the snacks. “So, we haven’t talked about Hazelnight,” Rose said. She lifted one of the pea pods and bit it in half with a snap. “All we know is that it’s snowing there.” “It’s snowing, and obviously some sort of monster is involved,” Vermilion said. He carefully plucked one of the pods out of the bowl with lips. It was almost overwhelmingly salty, and he had to take another slug of water after crunching it down. Delicious, though. “So, maybe a monster that causes snow? Quicklime?” “Sounds like a windigo,” she said. She tugged the bowl back to her side of the table and snagged a few more pods. “Solitary monsters, for the most part. They used to be like ponies, according to some gryphon legends, but you know gryphons so who knows, right? But nopony’s seen a windigo in, like, decades. Celestia and Luna killed most of them.” “Why would they attack a pony settlement?” Rose asked. “Much less a city like Hazelnight?” Quicklime shrugged. “I dunno. We’ll see when we get there, I guess.” “Assuming it is windigoes…” Vermilion reached across the table to retrieve the bowl. “What’s the worst they could do?” Quicklime stole another pair of pea pods out from under Vermilion’s hooves, and chewed on them for a bit before answering. “Wendigoes don’t normally attack ponies, you know? In fact, I’m not sure they ever have. They just fly or… kinda float up in the air, feeding on strife and hatred. But if they can make it snow in the middle of summer, I’d hate to see what they could do in the winter. Probably bury the whole city in ice.” “Okay, well, we have a time limit, then.” “I’m not wintering over in Hazelnight,” Rose said. “We don’t have time for that. Luna doesn’t have time for that.” “I know.” Vermilion popped another pea pod into his mouth. There were only two left, sitting at the bottom of the bowl in a shallow layer of water tinted green from the boiling. He passed it over to Rose. “Thank you.” She snapped one down, then lifted the last in her magic and broke it in two. She passed half to Vermilion and kept the rest for herself. Quicklime pouted at the empty bowl. “Can we—” “Sure,” Vermilion said. Luna’s secretary, Starry Night, had finally gotten around to paying them for their service so far, and though most of the bits were still back in Everfree, they had a healthy supply for the mission. By the standards of his hometown, Vermilion was a wealthy pony. So long as they were within the bounds of civilization, they never had to worry about things like food or lodging again. In fact, they should splurge now, while they could. Civilization ended at the border, and they were bound beyond that. He summoned the nervous kitchen colt and ordered a full dinner for the three of them, plus just as much food for the pegasi. Hungry pegasi were grumpy, and he didn’t want to deal with that. * * * The weather cooled overnight. Zephyr said a low pressure front was moving in, whatever that was. But apparently it meant gray weather and rain. The skies were cloudy when they woke, low and dark and threatening, and by the time they were a few miles outside Treemont the air was filled with a light drizzle. For over a week they walked across the length of Equestria. The pegasi split their time between the ground and the air, their presence or absence providing a bit of variety in the conversation Vermilion shared with his walking partners. With nothing to distract them but the slow, steady pace of their journey, he grew quite comfortable. Relaxed, as he’d rarely been around other ponies. Huracan was one of Equestria’s great cities, and one of the furthest from Everfree. Almost as far by hoof as Hollow Shades, though the kingdom’s borders extended further here and encompassed this province. A day out from their destination, the dirt road beneath their hooves began to soften, slowly turning to sand. Salt lingered on the breeze blowing from the east, and seagulls soared above them, squawking at the pegasi and harassing them when they flew too low. They took a break a few miles out from the city gates. Hardy sedge grasses grew along the sandy road, and Vermilion nibbled at their tips, more out of curiosity than hunger. They were salty and bitter, and he gave up any thought of using them as a snack. Cloud Fire and Zephyr landed to join them, shaking our their wings and spraying the ground-bound ponies with chilly droplets of mist brought down from the clouds high above. Rose scowled; Quicklime seemed to enjoy their cold touch. “Huracan, huh?” Zephyr looked up, and up, and up at the city before them. “Impressive.” The buildings of Lower Huracan weren’t particularly impressive. A few towers rose up near the center of the city, outlining the horseshoe harbor where ancient ponies had first planted their flag. The tallest of them, the ones that rose hundreds of feet into the air, would barely have merited notice in Everfree, whose soaring golden minarets pierced the very clouds. But it was not the towers of Lower Huracan that impressed visitors. Above the city, above the port, far above the earth ponies’ heads, High Huracan covered half the sky. The great pegasus city stretched out for miles, a spinning disk of clouds that sent spiral streams arcing across the heavens. The air buzzed with a tangible energy around them, and the thin hairs on the tips of Vermilion’s ears stood straight up. Soundless flashes lit the churning clouds from within. A phalanx of dark dots – pegasi flying in serried ranks – shot across the clouds, tearing the dark gray tufts into shreds as they passed. Rose peered up at the chaos as well. Her side brushed against his, and little sparks of static popped when the hairs of their coats touched. “Ponies… live here?” Quicklime asked. Individual strands of hair from here mane were starting to float free, forming a faint golden halo around her head. She brushed them down with her hoof. “Thousands,” Cloud Fire said. The static-filled air didn’t seem to be affecting the pegasi – their coats and feathers lay just as flat as always. “About half-and-half, pegasi and grounders. It’s the only pegasus city that has any Thunderforges left. Derecho’s were bigger, but after the pact was signed they were all decommissioned.” “There’s not much left of them,” Zephyr said. She had a far-away look on her face, and Vermilion recalled the dream they had shared with her in the fantastic, impossible, titanic flying city of her birth. “They’ve all evaporated or turned to ice.” The flashes must have been the forges. Vermilion stared at the mass of thick clouds that formed the nucleus of the pegasus city. It seemed to brighten and darken in some regular pattern, like the slow beating of a giant’s heart. Lower Huracan was the first port city Vermilion had ever visited. The streets were abnormally wide and clogged with wagons loaded with goods, all heading to or from the waiting ships tied up in the harbor. He could taste the salt in the air and feel it beginning to build in his coat. Though the day was still hot and not yet noon, High Huracan blotted out the sun so completely it might as well have been approaching twilight. Far out over the ocean, darker clouds drifted past, trailing cloaks of rain beneath them. They passed through neighborhoods filled with working ponies. They walked through the vast markets for which Huracan was famed across the world, surrounded by countless stalls and battered by a ceaseless hail of merchants’ banter in a dozen tongues. Ponies, zebras, gryphons and deer all hawked their wares, and the crowds grew so thick that Vermilion had to bull his way through, breaking a path for his friends to follow. Nearer to the harbor the market vanished, replaced by vast warehouses that held the bounty of foreign lands. The scent of exotic spices and oils and incense stung his nose; inkworks filled the air with steam from boiling vats; acres of textiles lay in folded piles beneath tarps to protect them from the ever-present ocean mist. Finally, they reached the harbor itself. The curve of the horseshoe bay extended for miles in each direction, and the water was choked with sails. Pegasi soared above the masts, ferrying goods up and down from High Huracan. Vermilion paused on the wooden boardwalk and gawked at the ceaseless frenzy of activity. He gazed up. A great eye opened in the center of High Huracan above the harbor. Slanted rays of sunlight shone through, illuminating the murky, emerald waters. Dark shapes with long fins and tails soared between the shafts of light, dancing in tune with the tides and the waves that lapped at the wood pilings of the piers. One shot toward the surface and breached, and for a moment Vermilion saw something like a mare suspended in the air, floating gracefully amidst the spray. In lieu of hind legs she bore a leviathan’s body, scaled with emeralds and spines and ending in a wide, fan-shaped tail, all twisting gracefully as she leapt. Her mane was the green of kelp, impossibly beautiful, and her coat was bright as coral. He had to touch it – drag his muzzle through it, drink her scent, and for a moment her eyes met Vermilion’s. A sound like a melancholy song, composed of haunted notes, filled his ears. Her eyes were hard like diamonds, and they drew him in, seizing him with a desire he had never felt in all his life. His legs jerked, dragging him forward toward the water’s edge, and the mare’s face lit with a smile that grew and grew and grew until her jaws opened as wide as a snake’s, exposing a shark’s treasure of teeth, and he dreamed for a moment of embracing her, welcoming those teeth to his freely given throat, and the edge of the water was beneath his hooves, and— “Whoa, careful there, lover.” Rose’s voice shocked him out of the trance, and he felt her magic clenching him hard about the barrel. His front hoof dangled off the edge of the pier. Out in the harbor, a flash of color and splash was all that remained of the mare as she crashed back into the water and vanished. He jerked back. The sudden return to his senses shocked him like a bucket of cold water. Beside him, Cloud Fire seemed equally bewildered, his wings flared out for balance and his eyes wide and startled. “What…” His voice died in a breathless croak, and he gasped for air. “What was that?” “Siren,” Quicklime said. She stared out at the waves thoughtfully. “She was probably just toying with you… They’re not supposed to take stallions in Equestrian waters. Celestia gets mad if they break the treaty. Causes problems.” “Uh, yeah.” Cloud Fire shook himself again. He danced away from the water’s edge and circled behind Zephyr. “How do sailors deal with them?” “You get used to it, supposedly,” Quicklime said. She trotted up to the water’s edge and leaned over. “I wish… meh. I don’t think she’s coming back.” “Uh… Good?” Vermilion said. He took a fair step away from the pierside. Rose pressed her side against his, and her warmth and scent gradually calmed him. He felt his pulse begin to slow back to normal. “Be neat to talk to her,” Quicklime continued. “Just to study, you know?” “Maybe when it’s just us mares,” Zephyr said. She nudged Quicklime’s side with a wingtip, then turned back to Vermilion. “So, where’s this boat supposed to be?” “Well, uh.” Vermilion forced his breathing to slow, and he looked around. The boardwalk extended to the left and right for miles, wrapping around the horseshoe-shaped bay. Every inch of it was clogged with ships, turning the water into a forest of masts and sails and lines. “Maybe we should ask.” They did ask, and after an hour or so of walking, asking some more, walking back the way they came, and finally asking a constable pony for help, they reached the Pearl Diver’s wharf. The ship was smaller than Vermilion expected but larger than he had feared might be the case, based on Rose Quartz’s descriptions. It was nearly eighty feet from bow to stern, with two masts and a dozen-some sails of various sizes and shapes. It had two decks fore and aft above the hull, and from the series of portholes along the sides, Vermilion assumed another deck or two below. A steady stream of earth pony stevedores with crates and barrels lashed to their backs walked up the gangplank connecting the ship to the shore, and several colorful pegasi perched in the rigging, their wings stretched out to catch the late afternoon sun that shone down from High Huracan’s eye. A sea-green pegasus mare with a clipboard and a scarred face stood at the gunwale beside the plank, making little marks as each earth pony came aboard with their load. She looked up from her paperwork with a squint as Vermilion stepped onto the plank, and she spat out a wad of tobacco into the waters as he approached. “And who are you?” she asked. Her voice was rough, scratchy and harsh on his ears. “Vermilion,” he said. “This is the Pearl Diver? I have passage for myself and my friends to Hazelnight.” “Oh!” Her countenance changed in a moment, suddenly filled with surprise. “Sorry, Lord Vermilion, I didn’t realize you were, uh, well…” She paused for a moment and looked him up and down again. “Well, an earth pony. But anyway! Welcome to the Pearl Diver! She’s the pride of the White Star line, and I am Captain Peridot, at your service. Please, come aboard!” Lord Vermilion? He almost tripped on the ribbed gangplank. Behind him, Cloud Fire snickered. “Oh, uh, please, just Vermilion. I’m an officer, not a noble.” Peridot shrugged. “I have a letter signed by Princess Luna that says otherwise. Anyway, whatever suits you. Your cabin is ready, if you would like to stow your gear. We’ll sail tomorrow at first light, should the weather be fair.” They followed her back toward the rear of the ship, down beneath the decks. Their cabin turned out to be Peridot’s cabin – she’d moved her own belongings out to make room for them. It stretched across the entire deck, from port to starboard, and a huge picture window looked out the rear of the ship. It was nearly as large as Vermilion’s shared space back in the barracks with Cloud Fire, enormous for a ship, but a tight fit for five ponies, even small ones. A single bed was wedged up against the wall, sharing nearly all the cabin’s space with a writing desk and a few chests. “Um.” Quicklime squeezed in beside Vermilion. There wasn’t enough room for all five to stand, so the pegasi sat on the bed. “Cozy.” “About what I remember,” Rose said. She leaned over the bed and pushed one of the window panes open to let in the evening sea breeze. “We’ll get to know each other very well on this little trip.” “Two weeks, huh?” Cloud Fire peered around the room. “Bigger than a tent, at least.” “On a campaign you can get away from other ponies, though,” Rose said. She squeezed past Vermilion toward the door and propped it open. “You’re always out on patrol or working around camp or whatever. Here? This is it. Just this ship. And we don’t even have jobs to keep us busy like the crew.” “Hey,” Vermilion said. “We’ll have each other. It’ll be like a vacation.” * * * They sailed at first light. The vacation ended before they even made it out of the harbor. Looking back, Vermilion wasn’t sure what he expected from their voyage. Something like the riverboats that plied the Everfree, probably, gentle little skiffs that skated atop the water, moving in time with the current and leaving only ripples in their wake. Though he’d never been on a river, it looked peaceful and placid. The Pearl Diver was a greater ship than anything that ever sailed the rivers of Everfree, but the Great Eastern Ocean was no river. Even before they reached the breakwaters, the ocean’s surface roiled with waves taller than a pony, rocking the boat with each crest and trough. Vermilion stood near the ship’s prow, mouth agape as he stared at the water crashing against the hull below. His four legs were widely spaced, bracing him against the ship’s constant motion. By the third hour, a queasy sensation began to build in his gut. He let out a great belch and felt better. An hour later, as the sun reached its zenith and Huracan was only a dim dark smear on the horizon behind them, he retched over the railing. Only spittle came up, but his mouth tasted like acid afterward. He groaned and slumped against the gunwale. A cold sweat began to dampen his coat. Just a few leagues away, the Equestrian coastline slowly passed them by. He tried to gauge his chances of swimming to it. He could walk to Hazelnight. Later – hours later? He could hardly tell time anymore – a thud and clatter of hooves announced the arrival of a pegasus beside him. He glanced over to see Zephyr leaning against the rail, the wind kicking her mane into a wild and tangled mass. They were silent for a while. He burped again and… nope, nothing. Nothing left. “Seasick?” Zephyr rubbed his back with a hoof. “Sucks.” “Please kill me.” “They say ginger helps,” she continued, unfazed. “And staying as low in the ship as possible. The swaying is what makes you sick, you know?” “How do ponies live like this?” He waved a hoof back at the rest of the ship. It was a bustle of activity, with dozens of ponies working the lines, shouting out orders and carrying out minor repairs. He could barely imagine walking across the deck, much less doing a job of some sort. “Not everypony gets seasick. And even if you do, you’ll get used to the ship in a day or so. Just, uh, try not to die until then. Hey, you want me to get Rose? She can probably help.” Ugh. He didn’t want Rose to see him like this. She already had a terrible habit of finding him at his weakest and most helpless moments. Sure, she was a medic, but stallions had pride, dammit. He had pride. He started to say something to that effect, then leaned over the rail and lost the rest of the contents of his stomach. Zephyr took a step back. “Yeah, I’ll go get Rose. You, uh, stay here. Watch the horizon, not the waves.” The horizon, not the waves. He lifted his gaze toward the coastline, just leagues away. They were passing a village, and he could see the colorful dots of ponies working along the beach. Little boats like those in his memory bobbed in the surf near the shore. Yeah, too far to swim. He sighed again and waited for Rose to arrive with her magic. * * * “Feeling better?” Rose asked him that night. The sun had set just an hour before, and now a clear sky filled with stars stretched over their heads. The Pearl Diver’s crew had trimmed her sails and dropped anchor for the night, and for the first time in hours Vermilion felt like the deck beneath him was a solid object. The gentle bobbing of the ship in the waves was almost unnoticed now. He had bread. It was the only thing he dared to eat. Nice, soft, bland bread. He tore another piece loose and chewed it slowly. “A little,” he finally said. “Sorry.” “Stop saying that. You can’t help being seasick. The first time my mother took me on a ship, I was sick for days. Could barely stand without throwing up.” He tried to picture what Rose looked like as a filly, but his usually fanciful imagination failed. For some reason he couldn’t picture her without that pink cloth covering her eye. Every attempt to imagine her as a smaller and cuter version of the mare beside him met with a confused muddle of images and scents. She must’ve taken his silence for agreement, for she continued. “Once I got used to it, though, it never bothered me again. It’s been… hm, almost fifteen years now since I last sailed like this, and it feels like yesterday.” She leaned over the rail to catch the breeze. It tossed her coral mane in his face, tickling his nose and teasing it with the scent of summer. He stifled the urge to sneeze. “How are the others handling it?” “Zephyr and Cloud Fire are fine. Quicklime said she felt queasy and took a nap earlier, but she seems better now. She also said she was bored.” That could be a problem. Boredom was always a problem on campaigns, but earth ponies had a special gift for tolerating it. Pegasi, of course, were the worst, but at least they could fly around and escape the ship for as long as their wings lasted. A precocious unicorn like Quicklime, however, had fewer options to occupy her lightning-quick mind, and potentially fewer ways to safely entertain herself. This was a mare who’d distilled moonfire, after all. “I’ll talk to her,” he said. “She likes drawing, right? Maybe she could do that.” “Mhm.” Rose stepped away from the railing. “Feel well enough to go inside? We can leave the window open for fresh air.” “Ugh.” He’d tried going inside a few times already. The sense of disconnection with the outside world, the loss of the horizon, with only the steady sway of the boat to remind him that they were bobbing atop the waves, all had conspired to sicken him faster than anything. But now, at night with the ship anchored securely, he could barely feel the deck move beneath him. And even that seemed inconsequential now, as though his brain had forgotten what solid land was supposed to feel like. What a terrible state for an earth pony, he mused. “That’s the spirit,” Rose said. She bumped his shoulder with hers, then walked across the dark forecastle toward the ladder leading down to the main deck. The yellow lanterns brought out the red in her mane and tail, painting them with a vivid fire that was the brightest thing in the night. “Coming?” The cabin was already crowded with ponies when they arrived. Quicklime huddled on the bed between Zephyr and Cloud Fire, using their wings as blankets. Not much open space remained, but with a bit of judicious prodding he and Rose managed to adjust the pegasi into a more compact arrangement without even waking them. It made enough room for two more ponies, and they squeezed into the mass – it should have been hot with five of them all crowded together, but the cool breeze from the window took the edge off the summer warmth. He closed his eyes, and sight was replaced by the scents of his four friends, the light touch of feathers, the softness of their coats, and even the hard points of hooves pressing against his hide. Somepony’s heart was beating next to his ear. He focused on the steady rhythm as it slowed in slumber, and in time sleep took him as well. * * * The next day was better. He skipped breakfast out of caution, but by the time lunch rolled around he felt safe eating a bit more bread, this time with cheese. Everything stayed where it was supposed to, and by the first starlight of evening, he barely even noticed the ship’s motion anymore. The prospect of a two-week voyage at sea no longer filled him with quite as much dread. Rose had taken Quicklime under her wing, teaching the smaller mare as much as she could about medicine and what made the insides of ponies work as she could. It kept Quicklime busy and therefore the rest of them safe. The pegasi did what pegasi always did – fly and sleep and complain. Peridot, the ship captain, had a habit of ordering any ponies she saw who weren’t otherwise busy into doing various errands to keep the ship running, so Zephyr and Cloud Fire had taken to perching in the lines high above. Peridot could always fly up to harass them, he supposed, but for some reason the mare seemed to prefer her hooves on the deck. Vermilion had only seen her use her wings a few times during their entire voyage so far. Of all the ponies aboard the Pearl Diver, Vermilion was the only one apparently immune to Peridot’s attention. Every time she saw him, she offered a respectful nod and went on about her business. He wondered again what Luna’s letter must have said about him. By the third day, he felt well enough to read. The ship had a small library (just a shelf with a dozen or so books on it), and the unicorns had each brought a few of their own, but Vermilion returned to the slim journal of Canopy’s meditations that had puzzled him for the past week. He finally felt ready for the second page. It began with a few notes on some meeting or other she’d attended in Canterlot. A reminder to speak with the crown’s comptroller on financing for the Company. Then this: I met with Verisimilitude’s brother today. He was angry – angry at me, for letting his sister die; angry at himself, for staying silent when she asked their parent’s permission to join the Guard; angry at fate for choosing his sister’s breast to catch the minotaur’s spear; angry with the minotaurs for their warlike intransigence and barbaric ways; but most of all, I think, he was angry with his sister, for choosing the way of the warrior rather than some safe and quiet profession in the comfort of Everfree. If any of those five agents – me, him, fate, the minotaurs, and Verisimilitude herself – had chosen differently, she would still be alive. I would still see her bright smile, hear her laughter like bells, feel the joy that radiated from her like light from a candle. I let him rant in silence. He struck me across the face with his hoof. I can still taste blood. We put Verisimilitude’s bones into the fire just days ago. Her cares are over – she is the freest of us. Only the rest of us are wounded. There is a lesson here. I struggle through what I know, feeling out the hidden truth like a blind mare searching through darkness. There is a lesson here and I do not know what it is. What did Verisimilitude learn when that spear impaled her? Why did she die with a smile? I must return to this. A solid line marked off the rest of the page. Beneath it, Canopy had written the next day’s weather schedule. Vermilion read the passage again. He was lost in it for a third time when the scent of peppers and cotton and salt intruded on his mind. He glanced up from the journal to see Rose sitting beside him. “Hey.” She leaned over to brush his cheek with hers. “Little dark for reading, isn’t it?” “Hm?” He looked around and noticed for the first time that night had fallen. Lanterns hung from the ship’s timbers, casting a multitude of flickering shadows on the decks. Despite the darkness, he had no trouble reading the journal. The stars cast enough light. “Guess I didn’t notice.” Rose squinted at the journal. She leaned over, close enough to brush it with her muzzle, then snorted. “You must have better eyes than me. Anyway, the others are asleep already, and I’m about to turn in.” Celestia, was it that late already? The sun had not even set when he started reading. He sighed and closed the journal, tucking it away in his saddlebags. As he stood, the weight of the day finally settled down on his shoulders, and he yawned wide enough that his jaw popped. “Good idea, I think. Three days down now, too. We’ll be there before we know it.” “Mhm.” She sounded unconvinced as they navigated the ladder down to the maindeck. “It’s getting cooler already. We’re further north than Everfree by now.” “It’s snowing at midsummer in Hazelnight. I think it’s going to get a lot colder before it gets warm again.” They were silent the rest of the way back to their cabin. They left the window closed this time.