We picked up on the thief pretty quickly, the trail he left was pretty apparent once we got close. The throne fragment the thief was dragging carved a deep gash in the dirt. We tracked it towards the lake on my map; he couldn’t be far ahead now. The sun, low in the west, shimmered off the lake as we drew near, the golden light filtering through the trees.
“I saw him!” Dash zipped back; she was scouting ahead. “He’s just ahead, on the edge of the lake.”
“Applejack, Dash, Pinkie. I want you to stay as far from him as you can, out of sight in you can.” I immediately started planning ahead.
“He’s got some dangerous magic, and he’s willing to use it. Distance is your only defense against him.”
“Starlight and I will go first; if he doesn’t know you’re there, you can take him by surprise if you get the chance. Remember, the priority is getting the Alicorn Amulet away from him, even if he gets away that’s still a win.”
“Can do!” Pinkie smeared her face with leaves and mud; it did nothing to disguise her. Dash saluted and darted up into the treetops, Applejack and Pinkie galloped off into the forest.
“Ready for this?” Starlight took several deep breaths. I felt my pulse rising. As one we darted out into the open, looking along the shore for the Unicorn of blackened charcoal. I spotted him quickly; he was dragging a large oblong and jagged black crystal behind him. Hoofs pounded the dirt, and the thief looked back. “Stop!” It didn’t look like he was wearing the Alicorn Amulet, thank Celestia, it must have been in the saddlebag over his shoulder. He looked down with a scowl at the stone he was dragging, there was no way he could escape with its weight holding him back. It was clear he knew that, and he dropped into a fighting stance, horn down and legs wide, the rope he was carrying fell to the ground. No magic sprang from his horn, he was too close to the throne fragment to use magic.
“Surrender the Amulet!” Starlight demanded it as we slowed to a stop, hopefully far enough away that we weren’t within the anti-magic field generated by the fragment.
“Not a chance.” His voice was low, and I saw his eyes flicking from one pony to the other. “Turn away, now.”
“What do you want it for? It will corrupt you, drive you insane if you use it!”
“I know what it does.” I had the strange sensation I’d heard him say that before. He started to back away, gaining distance from the throne shard. Starlight cast a simple light spell, sending it forward until it disappeared only a few meters from the stone. I noted where it vanished, tracing the circle in my mind where spells would function. The Thief’s ember red eyes narrowed, he must have been doing the same.
“Don’t make us hurt you.”
“Go ahead then, try it.” The thief took another step back, just out of the anti-magic ring, and a wall of fire erupted around us, hemming us in towards the stone. Starlight erected a barrier behind us, keeping the blaze clear, we only had a few inches of clearance before we reached the edge of the anti-magic field. I leaped into the air, snapping my wings wide, firing a beam of my magic towards the thief. He jumped back, the laser charred the ground where he had been standing. He returned the favor, repeated glowing orbs of light exploded in front of me, blinding me. I ascended higher, blinking against the afterimages.
I heard Starlight exchange magical blasts with the thief, and then the crackling of crystal forming. The spellfire ceased, I darted out over the lake in time to feel the heat of a lance of fire pass just below. I couldn’t fight back still blinded and flew in erratic circles and patterns, more lances of heat passed nearby. Blinking again cleared enough afterimages that I could see what happened. Starlight was trapped within another crystal prison; she hadn’t had time to escape the firewall, which had died out. The thief was on the shore, still firing at me. I spotted something blue in the trees behind the thief, Rainbow Dash.
I predicted what she was planning and fired weak but fast attacks on the thief. His attention was so focused on me that he didn’t see when Dash rushed towards the crystal, pushing it towards the throne fragment. In a moment Starlight would be free.
I stopped evading, placing a barrier around myself. The thief concentrated, firing a bright blast directly at me. I braced, and it flared against my shield. He poured more power into the beam, but the barrier held. The crystal dissolved, disrupted by the throne fragment, and Starlight was free. Dash fled back into the treeline, where the thief couldn’t see her, smart. Starlight shook her head, clearing it, while I continued to hold the thief’s attention.
Starlight backed away and started to cast her crystal prison spell, an easy win if it worked. It did not, the thief simply turned his beam towards her, cutting a line of fire across the lake. I panicked, teleporting with my shield in front of Starlight and shaking her concentration. I needn’t have bothered; the lance fizzled out when it reached the anti-magic field. The fire continued regardless, why was he wasting all that power?
I got my answer when the thief slammed the beam down, striking the ground just below the edge of the field. The throne fragment didn’t block physics. The resulting explosion flung dust and stone into my face, knocking me back into Starlight and both of us to the ground as my shield fizzled out. I tried to reform it, but nothing happened. I blinked the dust out of my eyes to find the throne fragment standing nearly upright, directly in front of us. Frantically I tried to get back to my feet and back away, but the thief erected a new barrier dome, just a tiny bit larger than the anti-magic bubble. We were trapped within the fragment’s field, unable to fight back.
“That's better.” The thief stepped closer to the barrier. “Now, I still need that.” He gestured to the throne fragment. “So I’m going to have to ask you to surrender.” For the moment we were safe, and I saw a chance to get some answers, while simultaneously spotting Applejack in the trees getting ready to fight.
“What are you planning? Why do you need the Alicorn Amulet?” Hopefully, Applejack wasn’t going to attack too soon.
“Really, that's the best you can come up with? Is this the part where you expect me to tell you my grand plan?” He snorted derisively. “I’m not that stupid. I’ve read this story before.” He banged one hoof on the shield. “I’ve sacrificed everything for this chance!” Déjà vu again. “I’m not going to waste it all just to satisfy your curiosity. Somehow you might still be able to get out.” Out the corner of my vision, I spotted Pinkie and Dash conversing with Applejack in the treeline, out of the thief’s view, I tried very hard to not look directly at them.
“So now what? You’re going to have to drop that shield eventually If you want to get this back.” Starlight moved to the other side of the throne fragment, thinking when the bubble dropped we could both dart out, so he couldn’t stop us both.
“True enough. But then again, you need to breathe eventually, don’t you?” He settled down, staring at us venomously. “I can wait.” The other three ponies stayed low, mostly out of sight, probably trying to come up with a plan.
“Why don’t you talk to us? Tell us why you want to do this.” I quickly calculated the volume of air inside the bubble, we had a few hours at least before that would become a concern.
“Twilight, what are you doing?” I shook my head towards Starlight, trying to point to the trees where the others were hiding with my eyes. Starlight got the message, it was a stall.
“You wouldn’t understand. You can’t understand.” Why did that sound so familiar?
“Then why not tell us, help us understand?”
“Oh, you want my sob story?” He rolled his eyes. “Oh, if only we could reform him.” A high, mocking tone. “Befriend him, and everything will turn out for the better!” He snorted and dropped his voice back to his previous low solid tone. “Let’s just say being special isn’t always a good thing and leave it at that, shall we?” He stood, pacing in front of the shield, but fortunately kept his eyes focused solely on the two of us. Now I could see his cutie-mark. It was hard to make out, covered in scars much like his face. It seemed to be a black circle, surrounded by a ring of rising fire. It sort of reminded me of a solar eclipse.
“It can’t have been all that bad. I have a friend who suffered something similar, and he’s doing alright.”
“Are you sure about that? Ask him then, what happened to his family.”
“You know Sable Stardust?” I had not expected that. He stopped pacing, standing right outside the shield relative to me. He was almost exactly the same height as me.
“Yes, I know him.” He laughed, hollow and false. “I know him better than you ever will, better than anypony ever could. I know what drove him to despair, and I know what that despair did to him, what it’s still doing to him.” He chuckled at this, mirthless. “In the end, his own despair will kill him.”
“You’re wrong! He’s stronger that!” He laughed at me again, mocking and hateful. “He’s getting better.” Even to me, it sounded hollow. After today’s display, I wasn’t so sure anymore.
“Such fire!” His eyes flared, did I just see his scars glow? “So certain are you? I would pity you if I cared. But if it keeps you talking, and wasting what little air you’ve got left, I’ll let in on a little secret.” He turned away, towards the lake, eying me over his shoulder. “I know what happened to his family.”
“What? Tell me!”
“No, no. Not that easily.” He rolled his eyes again, now looking out over the water. “I’m going to make you guess. So ask yourself, what did he do that surprised you most?”
“What? I don’t understand.”
“Come on; you’re smarter than that.” He sighed, annoyed. “Aloud, Princess.” I saw no reason to fall into that trap. But still, what did he mean?
“He…” What has Sable done that surprised me the most? The attempt on the friendship map came to mind, but this thief couldn’t possibly know about that. There was the moment when he vowed to walk forward into the future without fear, but I knew it isn’t going as well as he thought. The time when the map called them? “I don’t know.”
“You give up? How sad, and here I thought you never gave up. Fine, have another hint.” He turned back to face me, tapping the side of his head. Silence, punctuated only by the wind through the trees and the setting sun on the lake glinting into my eyes. Then he growled and pointed to Starlight. “What about, to her?” I looked at Glimmer, who had been watching the exchange silently. “What? Did he do? To her?” And then I understood.
“Memory magic?”
“There it is.” He smiled cruelly and approached the shield bubble. “Get it now?” A twig snapped, he glanced at the trees, his grin vanished. “Clever vixen.”
That’s when the rock hit him, hard, in the side of the head. Applejack kicked another stone at him from the treeline as Dash charged him from above. He shouted in pain, stumbling backward. The shield faltered, Starlight and I both rushed it, slamming ourselves against the weakened barrier. It held us back, barely, and I felt it starting to give way.
Rainbow Dash slammed into him, carrying him out over the water. The barrier bubble failed entirely, and we were free. Dash screamed as lightning exploded over the lake and the Pegasus started to fall, the thief had vanished. I took to the air, grabbing Dash before she could hit the water. She was stunned but still breathing. Thunder cracked behind back on the shore, I looked back to see Applejack hauled into the air via his magic and flung out over the lake. I grabbed her too, taking them both a ways down the shore and setting them down. Spells clashed back at the fragment, where the thief attacked Starlight.
“Thanks for the save.” Applejack tipped her hat quickly. “Is Dash alright?” The blue Pegasus could barely open her eyes or stand on her own.
“She will be, but she’s out of the fight for now. Where’s Pinkie?”
“Waiting for her chance. Didn’t want him to see us all at once in case things didn’t work out. No more time to talk, let's go!” The orange Earth Pony charged down the shoreline towards the fight, and I teleported myself there. Starlight darted from side to side, getting as far from the throne fragment as she could, not wanting to get pinned in again. I flanked the thief, firing from the opposite direction as Starlight.
I gave him this: he was quick and agile, hard to pin down. Magic flashed and crashed, fire flared, and lightning boomed as we traded spells and volleys. Whenever he tried to teleport to a better position, I would get around him again. At last, there was a lull in the fighting; it was clear we had the upper hand over him. He couldn’t get out from between us, and I could see him breathing hard, he couldn’t keep this up for much longer.
“Surrender! If you give up the Amulet, we won’t have to hurt you!” He glared at me, continually moving along the rocky shore so we wouldn’t pin him. He glanced back at his saddlebag, face pensive and worried, he must have been considering using the Amulet. It must have been that he was afraid of the corrupting influence even considering the boost in power it would have granted him. That must be the only reason he hadn’t used it yet.
Movement over at the throne fragment drew my attention. Applejack was there, readying to deliver a mighty buck to it. The thief saw this too, and his mind was made up.
Everything happened at once. The thief reached into his pack, drawing the silver and red amulet from within. It was clear he was going to put it on now. Applejack’s kick landed, and the fragment spun through the air towards him. I fired a beam, matched by Starlight.
“Shoryuken!” Pinkie appeared from underneath a large rock, directly beneath the thief. No one got a chance to react as Pinkie uppercut the thief hard under the chin and forced them both off the ground. Starlight’s and my beams collided where the thief had been, right under the two ponies. Magic exploded, sending Pinkie and the thief flying apart.
The throne fragment spun through the space where they had been; I heard something like the sound of crystal cracking. Just before its flight took it out of my view the sun glinted off the red gem of the Amulet, now embedded in the dark stone. The changeling throne shard skipped off the water twice before vanishing beneath the surface of the lake in a tremendous splash somewhere out towards the middle.
“Woo! I’m OK!” Pinkie had landed on the beach, upside down.
“No, no!” The thief reappeared with a lightning crack, not far away. “Where is it, where is it?!” He spun and turned; searching blindly for the Amulet. Eyes flared with rage as he spun towards us when we approached. “To Tartarus with you all! I will see Equestria face despair!” Lightning cracked, more violent than before, and he disappeared. I heard him reappear somewhere nearby, out in the forest. I tried to pursue, teleporting in the direction he had gone where I thought I saw a flash of light. But he was nowhere to be seen. Thunder crashed, further away, and I knew he got away again.
“Way to go, Pinkie!”
“Phew, I was holding my breath there for a minute.”
“That’s three times now I’ve ended up in those crystals! How does this keep happening to me?”
“If it makes you feel any better, that didn’t happen again.”
“…It’s because something worse happened, isn’t it?”