//------------------------------// // 5. Trottingham // Story: Vampiolence // by ObabScribbler //------------------------------// 5. Trottingham “Good girl.” Voron nodded in satisfaction. Vinyl’s gorge rose. She forced it back down. “Please let her go, D-Daddy.” She tripped over the last word but managed to get the whole sentence out without pausing. “Tell me what you did to yourself to take away your powers,” Voron repeated, voice soft as a falling feather. “And I will think about it. If you are difficult, dear heart, I will maybe pluck out her pretty eyes before she dies.” Octavia’s breathing hitched. “It was … a spell,” Vinyl admitted. “What kind?” As if he would understand the difference between a curse and a charm anyway. He had never been interested in her magic beyond how it could benefit him. As far as he was concerned, telekinesis was as much as she needed to learn, since it allowed her to hold down prey from a distance. There had always been a strange dichotomy to the way he acted: he seemed so proud of having a unicorn daughter, but at the same time made no effort to encourage her magical knowledge beyond the basics. Then again, if he had thought the combination of unicorn magic and vampirism might drive her mad, maybe that explained why he had never pushed her. She hadn’t exactly pushed herself, either; not until after she said goodbye to her old life and started anew as an ordinary pony – as Vinyl Scratch. “You are not ordinary, Vanelda, and you never will be.” The memory struck like an arrow through her chest. She steeled herself against it so she could speak. “A curse.” “You cursed yourself?” “Yes. I did.” Voron snorted. “Can it be uncast?” “You can’t ‘uncast’ curses. You can undo them but it takes a lot of time and effort.” “Do not toy with me over semantics, Vanelda. Can this spell be removed, or broken, or however you wish to phrase it? Can this curse be made to disappear from you?” His eyes narrowed. “Can your true powers be returned?” Did he think they had been erased entirely? She supposed that was the natural assumption. If only it was that simple. “I … I don’t know.” Maybe in the beginning, but she had cast and recast the curse so many times over the years that the loop was the magical equivalent of titanium now. She wasn’t sure she could undo it now even if she had wanted to. But maybe she could break it; break each layer until she got to the power buried beneath them all. “You can break curses but the results can be … messy. And potentially deadly.” It wasn’t the answer Voron wanted. “Do you know how to do this?” “Not from memory.” His hoof twitched on Octavia’s head. A tear slid down her cheek. “But I could find out!” Vinyl added desperately. “How?” “I have a spellbook.” “Where?” “I can get it.” “It’s in this house?” “Yes.” Sort of, anyway. She had always worried about Octavia finding it during one of her many ‘tidying up’ tirades, so she had hidden it, only fetching it when she needed to recast the curse. She had heard too many stories of old curses decaying until the magic binding them went haywire and had unfortunate side effects. It was one of the many reasons Celestia had banned curses from Equestria – indeed, to the point where some thought there were no such things as curses. Vinyl had never wanted to risk hurting Octavia, so she had recast and recast upon herself until the tangle of overlaying magic was more a knot than a net holding her vampirism at bay. “Where is the book?” Voron demanded. “In the eaves. Under the thatch. You can’t reach it from inside. You have to climb out onto the roof and dig around for it.” “Very clever. Hiding in plain sight.” Voron smiled. It made Vinyl’s skin crawl. “So you did retain at least some of the things I taught you.” She had never thought of it like that. She pushed the idea away, focussing instead on the current moment. “Vellum will escort you to fetch it. Do not tarry. Do not dawdle. Do not play any stupid games. Remember, Vanelda my dearest.” Octavia gasped as he pulled her backwards, nuzzling the side of her face like a lover. “If you choose to play games, I have the winning card.” For a fleeting moment Vinyl met Octavia’s eyes. She tried to pour every ounce of regret and apology she had into that brief look. She wanted to speak, to say something important and meaningful like ponies did in movies when they weren’t sure they would see each other alive again. Instead, she felt Vellum shove her in the back. “Move it or lose it, big sis!” Then she and her sister were moving through the door and up the narrow staircase to the ground floor of the house. Vinyl heard Voron start to say something, but Vellum closed the door behind them, sealing Octavia away with that monster. Just the two of them. Alone. Vinyl quickened her pace. Vanelda quickened her pace as she slipped through the crowd of late night shoppers, hurrying away from the restaurant window. The city of Trottingham was a rotten place. It was boring and bland and beige. Even the ponies there were all dull. They talked about humdrum things like the weather, or house prices, or the rate of inflation, or how police-stallions were getting so much younger nowadays. If there were foals, they were neither seen nor heard. There were no playgrounds, no skateparks, nothing to indicate any kind of younger generation other than a couple of schools surrounded by brick walls. Each day, it seemed the most exciting thing one could hope to happen was an extra scone at afternoon teatime. Vanelda would have loved to be bored there. She would have adored the opportunity to have so little to do that her mind could get antsy. Instead, she spent her days sleeping and her nights collecting blood for Daddy. Or at least, that was how she was supposed to spend her days and nights. In reality, she spent her days sleepless and her nights restless. She was a skilled hunter. She didn’t waste time on chances that would come to nothing, the way Vellum did. Almost a decade of practise and still Vellum made mistakes that cost her more prey than it should. She waited too long or not long enough; she missed her mark or opportunities Vanelda had been capitalising on at her age. Usually Vanelda caught up with those ponies her sister had lost and subdued them before anything untoward could come of her failures, but lately Vellum had insisted on hunting alone, determined to please their father with her own collecting. Thus Vanelda found herself walking alone instead of shadowing her sister. Five nights after they arrived, the third since Vellum started going off alone, Vanelda was stopped in her tracks by the sight of Daddy through a restaurant window. He sat across from a pretty mare the colour of old paper, whose brown mane had been neatly tied back into a bun. She was a consummate Trottingham pony: dull colours, dull dress sense and dull demeanour. She nodded politely at Daddy as he spoke. When she talked, her mouth barely moved and her eyes were often downcast, flicking up now and then to check his reaction. Voron smiled beatifically at her. Vanelda knew that this was exactly the kind of mare he liked. He was drawn to beautiful ponies, but those who were demure and showed him the proper amount of respect were his favourites. Vanelda backed away. She couldn’t let Daddy see her. He would think she had been invading his privacy on purpose, even though it was pure accident. She backed into a trash can, panic spiking inside her at the noise. Daddy raised his head, even though he could not possibly have heard anything from within the hubbub of the restaurant. He turned his face towards the window. Something pinged in her head. Vanelda realised he was feeling for his children’s minds. She turned and ran, not caring where she went. She needed to put distance between them. Daddy hated to be interrupted when he was courting. The most important thing in the world was his next generation. She and Vellum knew this as clearly as they knew their own names. Her hooves ate up the ground. There were a fair few ponies around. Winter was approaching and evenings darkened earlier and earlier at this time of year. Already store window glittered with Hearth’s Warming Eve displays. An aged couple cried out as she ran past them, knocking the stallion’s hat off. A mare drawing a cart yelled when Vanelda darted across the street in front of her. Cats scattered when she turned down an alleyway and vaulted a garbage area behind a coffeehouse, scaling the wire fence and galloping again on the other side. “Well I never! “How rude!” “Watch out there!” “Show some manners!” The heavily accented shouts followed her as she weaved in and out of the built-up area. This wasn’t working. Her instincts told her to find a place to hide, away from prying eyes. Her heart thudded and her head pounded as fast as her hooves. She almost wished the silly stories that ponies told each other about her kind were true: things would be so much easier if she didn’t need to breathe or eat or suffer any of the weaknesses she did. A coppice of neatly pruned trees loomed ahead. She darted off the pavement and into them, emerging on the other side in a garden with a perfectly flat lawn. Crossing that quickly, she dashed onto a stone walkway that opened out into a large unpopulated courtyard. Only then did she pause to take in her surroundings properly. Unlike the shopping area she had just left, here there seemed nopony else around. The light cast by a single bulb above the door was minimal, but Vanelda’s eyes drank it in and saw everything as clearly as midday. A large statue of a rearing pony stood in the middle of the courtyard, bordered on all sides by benches and pretty trash receptacles. The same symbol was emblazoned everywhere: the rearing pony encircled by stars, moons, suns and scrolls. Below was the relief: Trottingham University. She had stumbled right into the university grounds without realising it. Trottingham University was renowned across Equestria for its high-class education. Ponies from all over almost fought each other to gain entry. Well, earth ponies did, anyhow. There were a few unicorns and pegasi who also came here, but most of those aimed for Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns, or Cloudsdale College, so places on courses in magic and flight-based careers did not fill up as quickly as those for earth ponies. The unwinged and non-magical of Equestria vied for the acclaim of a degree from Trottingham University and woe betide any who did not pull their weight once they got here. The culture of ‘all work and no play makes a Trottingham U student’ was not just vernacular – as evidenced by the lack of anypony wandering around enjoying their evening. She had only seen the university from a distance before. Turning, she looked up at the vaunted buildings that made up the central campus. They ranged from squat square boxes to actual towers, complete with spires and weathervanes. Most of them were dark inside. She trotted carefully alongside them, peering inside curiously. This one held tables and science equipment. This one was a small seminar room with chairs around a chalkboard bearing mathematical equations. This one was filled with books. It held her attention for a few minutes. Some offshoot of a library maybe? Or a lecturer’s office? The next one held a disparate collection of things she didn’t recognise, having no knowledge of theatre, costumes or props. In truth, Vanelda could only read and write because of lessons from her long-dead mother, and her learning was far removed from any books that might find their home in a university like this. She once stole a set of saddlebags from a house Daddy had claimed when Vellum was still tiny. They had stayed in Canterlot for a short time, and the owners of the house had been on vacation. On the day Daddy said they were to leave, Vanelda remembered stuffing both saddlebags with books that jabbed into her sides as she walked. The bedroom she had been staying in clearly belonged to another filly whose heart and soul lived through page and ink. She had textbooks all about spell-casting and how to use one’s horn correctly. Most of the books Vanelda had taken were beginner magic books to help refine her telekinesis – simply worded things meant for foals a fraction of her age. One, however, had been grabbed from a shelf filled with storybooks. The Trottingham University emblem looked rather like the cover of that book. What had been the name of the character? Tearing Through? Blaring Clue? Something like that. She had thought to read it to her new sister, but Vellum was more interested in chewing it than listening to it. Vanelda had persevered, reading it aloud of an evening and to herself while daylight reigned outside wherever Daddy had chosen to rest that day. She had almost finished the storybook when Daddy returned to their lair in a foul temper and showered her with torn pages before tossing the cover into a tree. It had snagged there, dangling morosely, and still been there when she left on the following night. To this day, she still didn’t know how the story ended. She hoped the explorer main character had successfully beaten the villain and saved the day, but knew this was by no means a certainty. The day could not always be saved, after all, and sometimes instead of defeating the villain, you had to settle for appeasing him so you could live a little longer. She was struck by the unfairness of this place. The ponies here had bright futures ahead of them. They were forging their own paths. What path lay before her? More of the same that lay behind her. Or worse. She shuddered to think what Daddy planned to do if he could actually create more foals and raised them to maturity. There had been a few others after Vellum. They hadn’t lasted long. Twice, Vanelda had looked into cribs and found tiny bodies that had just stopped moving for no reason other than they couldn’t cope with being turned so early. One adolescent pegasus had arrived wild-eyed, staring around himself and asking for his mother like a colt half his age. Vellum hated him on sight and only smiled again when he was found hanging from a tree a few nights later, wings drooping uselessly. None of them had been successes. Each time, Daddy had grown cold and angry for a few days, and soon after they had moved on so he could go courting again. Courting was important. That was an ingrained truth. When Daddy was courting, neither Vanelda nor Vellum were to bother him. Unbidden, newspaper articles about Lady Philharmonica’s murder glimmered through Vanelda’s mind. Her steps quickened, though she was now far away from the restaurant and the doomed paper-pale mare with the shy eyes. Vanelda’s ears flicked forward. Voices? Her hoof-falls became soft. She pressed herself into the shadows and adopted the slinking pace of something hiding in plain sight. The voices grew louder as she reached the end of the building, but something else came with them. It was a low, vibrating sound, muffled as if coming from inside. As she grew nearer, higher sounds joined it, resolving themselves into a tune. Music. She could hear music. She liked music. She didn’t get to hear much of it, but what she had experienced, she had enjoyed. She paused, trying to locate the source of this tune. Was it a radio? No, it was a single instrument she didn’t recognise. Her ears swivelled this way and that, pulling her attention to a rectangular building labelled ‘Music Block’. One of the windows on the second floor was open. That was where the music was coming from. As if the player had heard her, the music stopped. Vanelda, already straining to hear, picked up a few choice curse words. Whoever it was had made a mistake and was chastising their own playing with high vigour. “Blast it all! It’s not rocket science! I should be able to do this by now! Argh!” The music started again from the beginning. Vanelda listened, tilting her head to one side. Some sort of string thing. Very deep. She wished she knew the names of more instruments. It had never been important enough to learn about – “Hey, wait up!” She froze. Had she been spotted? “Dash it all, Walnut! You know I can’t keep up with you on this!” No, the voice wasn’t calling for her. However, its owner was getting closer. Instinctively, she swarmed up one of the large oak trees lining the path and hid herself in its branches. The leaves barely moved at her passing. Peering through them, she watched as a brown unicorn stallion trotted into view. He paused, turning to wait for an equally pale yellow unicorn whose insipid mane made him look like a glass of lemonade in need of more juice. “Come along, Bass Note,” said the brown pony; Walnut, presumably. “Please excuse me for having a broken leg!” the yellow one replied, gesturing to a calliper he was leaning heavily upon. One front leg was swathed in a plaster cast. Vanelda found herself assessing how slowly he could get away if she jumped him. She shook the thought off. If he were alone she might risk it, but not with his friend right there and an unnamed number of ponies still making music nearby. “This makes it dashedly difficult to get around.” “I’m carrying your books,” Walnut pointed out. “Ponies invented saddlebags for a reason. Though why they invented gravel paths, I’ll never know. It’s dashedly difficult to use a crutch when it keeps slipping out from under you.” Bass Note jabbed the ground with the calliper’s rubber tip for emphasis. Walnut rolled his eyes. “We are going to be late. You know how Professor Orchid gets. I don’t want to have to stand on the stage again while she tells me off and everypony laughs just because you can’t hold your drink.” “I was not drunk!” “Come off it. You tried to levitate yourself. Off a balcony! After twenty-one shots!” “It was my twenty-first birthday! Everyone gets twenty-one shots on their twenty-first birthday!” “Not everyone tries to fly!” “Well somepony has to put those cheeky pegasi in their place.” “Ugh! Just come on or I’m leaving you.” Bass Note grumbled to himself as they walked. “Stupid evening classes. Whose idea was it to keep us here this late anyhow?” “Oh do stop whining,” Walnut said tersely. “I have a lot to whine about. I can’t play my cello like this, I’m going to lose my seat in the orchestra to that ugly upstart who wouldn’t know a bow from a stick off the ground, and to top it all off, I’m losing my evenings to bloody magic catch-up classes! Why should I have to stay here so late just because Professor ‘I’m So Clever’ Orchid makes our midterms so tough that nopony could possibly pass them?” “You can really go off some ponies, you know.” Walnut’s voice faded as they made their way along the path away from Vanelda’s tree. “Even friends.” She watched them go, her insides clutching suddenly. Bass Note’s leg would make him easy prey if she could catch him alone. If he continued complaining so much, it was entirely possible Walnut would abandon him, too. She scuttled down the tree, making sure nopony could see her, and trailed after them. They stayed together until they reached a tall building with lots of steps out front. Bass Note groaned, whined, moaned and complained up every single one, but Walnut waited patiently at the top. Vanelda watched, eyeing the building warily. The front entrance was too open. If she was recognised as not being a student here, she would be too exposed to escape. Bass Note would have been wonderful prey, but she should abandon this hunt. She should. It made sense. She didn’t want to. They had gone to magic catch up class. She didn’t know quite what that meant, but she realised with the kind of jolt that came only a few times in every lifetime that she had been fooling herself. Bass Note had not been the only draw here. A hint of an idea germinated in her mind. She tried to shake it away. No, it was stupid. She was supposed to be collecting blood for Daddy. Yet … couldn’t she do both? Maybe there would be somepony else suitable at this class. Or maybe Bass Note would work out after all. And maybe she could pick up a few tips about her own magic while she was there. Maybe. Maybe … The restroom window would have been a squeeze for a normal pony but she slipped catlike through it. She had long since learned that if you emerged from a public bathroom, ponies assumed you were meant to be in the building. It was always easy to locate restrooms by scent, too. The building wasn’t huge inside. She spotted a sign bearing an arrow and the legend ‘Theatre’ and guessed from the number of ponies streaming that way that this was a good bet. Even better, she could hear Bass Note’s voice echoing from somewhere ahead. She merged into the crowd, trotting along as if she had every right to be among all the shifting, warm, juicy bodies – No, she couldn’t think like that! Her belly growled. She resisted the urge to punch it. “Didn’t have time for dinner, huh?” She whirled to find a washed out pink mare walking behind her. The urge to bolt rose and fell like a swelling wave as the mare’s smile curved her square muzzle and she jogged up alongside. She was a plain creature but the smile made her masculine features almost pretty. The mare’s horn glowed and she extracted an energy bar from her saddlebag, moving aside a huge red braid to reach the clasp. “Me either. Here. Have some of this. You won’t be able to concentrate on one of Orchid’s classes if your blood sugar is low.” Vanelda saw her gaze flick over her own back bag and realised too late that she was the only one in the crowd not wearing saddlebags. “Boy, you must have rushed out of the dorm in a real hurry if you forgot to eat and you forget your books!” The flap of the pink mare’s saddlebag opened again and a notepad and pen floated out. “It’s a good thing I always carry spares. Here. I forgot mine the first time I took this class and Orchid ripped me a new one.” Vanelda was floored by the unexpected generosity. Her steps actually faltered, causing the pony behind her to knock into her. “Hey! Watch it!” “Sorry!” She hurried ahead, her own horn igniting in a meagre glow to accept the gifts. “Th-thank you. I don’t know … what to say.” “You’re welcome and it’s fine. We’ve all napped in the afternoon before.” The pink mare winked. “I’m Scarlet Harmony.” Her eyes traced the line of Vanelda’s bare spine to rest on her flank. “Oh!” she said, clearly before she could stop herself if her subsequent contrition was any indication. “Sorry. I try to guess names from cutie marks but…” But Vanelda had none. Her cheeks flamed. Somehow being a blank flank had never made it onto her list of concerns before. Right now, however, with the eyes of this pretty mare fixed upon the empty space, self-consciousness slid through her. Her dark tail twitched as if to cover it. “It’s fine!” Scarlet Harmony said a little too quickly. “I’m sorry! Oh gosh! I’m s-” “No,” Vanelda interrupted. “The fault is mine.” “It’s nopony’s fault if they … uh …” She shook her head. “We … will be late,” she said at last. “Yes. Uh. Yeah.” It was difficult to tell whether Scarlet Harmony was blushing too, though she tone indicated she was. Vanelda allowed herself to be swept into a huge room filled with descending rows of seats set in a semi-circle. It reminded her of an actual theatre, especially since a raised dais sat at the bottom. On it stood a tiny white mare with a severe bun on the back of her head. Every wisp of mane had been plied into it, until even her ears seemed pulled taut. Her expression didn’t seem much more forgiving. Though she would wager nopony else could read it from across the room, Vanelda saw her nametag bore the words ‘Professor Orchid’. Everyone settled into the rows. There appeared to be no assigned order. The mares and stallions edged from seat to seat, whispering to friends, giggling together and eying their professor from behind raised notepads. Every single pony here was a unicorn. When Vanelda slid into a seat, put down her borrow pen and pad, no-one raised a complaint. She spotted Bass Note and Walnut a few rows forward but her attention snapped beyond them when a sharp crack sounded from the front. As one, everpony fell silent. “Well now. Another midterm goes on by an’ another evenin’ class fills up. Anypony’d think I was askin’ too much of y’all or sumthin.” Professor Orchid, in a contrast of expectations, had a broad southern drawl that reminded Vanelda of a single summer when she got to taste molasses and watch a huge family of farmponies till soil and plant saplings all day in the burning sun. Their work ethic had been hypnotic and she had watched, spellbound, from the shade of a nearby forest, until a pretty green filly wandered too far past the treeline and got chased by timber wolves. Vanelda had ripped the wolves apart when it looked like they would follow the filly out of the forest, but the damage was done. Every one of the earth ponies stayed away from the forest after that and she eventually moved on as she always did. Another sharp crack brought her back to the present. Professor Orchid levitated a bamboo cane and struck the chalkboard next to her one more time for emphasis. “Let’s get one thing straight here, fillies an’ gentlecolts: just ‘cause y’all made it into this here university don’t mean diddly squat now. You wanna rest on your laurels? Fine. But y’all can rest on ‘em on the other side of them there front gates. I ain’t got a lick of time for anypony arrogant enough to think that half measures are good enough in my classes. If you think you can socialise five out of every seven night of the week an’ still get a passin’ grade, Mister Malachite, then you are sorely mistaken.” Titters broke out a row above Vanelda. She turned to see a grey unicorn sinking lower into his seat. “If you think you’ll be able to pass one of my exams with minimal studyin’ because you were busy practisin’ your musical instrument, then I’d suggest you change your major, Mister Bass Note.” “That’s not fair -” Unlike the grey stallion, Bass Note tried to speak up, but Professor Orchid cut him off. “Life ain’t fair, Mister Bass Note. Better get used to it. An’ finally, if you think I have any patience for absence from my classes without the strongest of excuses – and a cider hangover AIN’T one of ‘em – then you might wanna think about settin’ your alarm earlier in the mornin’ an’ actually livin’ up to your lofty claims of bein’ the first of your vaunted farmer family to take magic classes instead of bein’ the first to fail ‘em, Miss Crab Apple.” The spine of a bright green unicorn at the very front became ramrod. “These are just some of the reasons I see so many faces before me. Quite frankly, you all have your reasons for wastin’ class time, but let’s be frank here: this is your chance to redeem yourselves. If’n you slip, slack off, shirk this class or otherwise shilly-shally an’ waste my time, you will live to regret it.” Professor Orchid’s horn sparked slightly. “Am I makin’ myself clear?” A chorus of defeated assent went up from the students. Professor Orchid nodded briskly and turned to the board she had set up behind her. “Right then, Hermann von Hoofholtz’s Law of the Conservation of Thaumaturgical Energy states that magical energy can be neither created nor be destroyed, only transformed from one form to another …” Vanelda listened, enrapt, as the lecture unfolded. It was several minutes of open-mouthed wonder before she remember about the pen and notepaper Scarlet Harmony had given her. She began hastily scrawling down as much as she could, enthralled by the lilt of Professor Orchid’s voice as she explained several theories that underpinned the very fabric of magic itself. Around her, other students also made notes, but none of them tried to transcribe every word out of their teacher’s mouth. Vanelda, unused to such a lesson, was shocked when Professor Orchid set down her chalk. “That’ll be all for this evenin’. For homework – an’ yes, though this may be college, I do indeed call it homework – y’all are to read chapters one through three of Internal to External Magical Transfer by Ludwig A. Colting, payin’ extra attention to the section on various applications of internal energy to create a physical effect in the exterior world. There will be a test on these chapters next session, which is on Thursday.” Like some great amorphous animal, the rows of students broke apart and began to scatter. Vanelda remained where she was, suddenly stricken. A textbook? Her heart thrilled a little at the idea that there would be another of these lessons in only two days’ time, but a textbook? A test? She didn’t have the first and so would fail the second, thereby revealing herself as not an actual student at the university. Even if her vampire nature remained hidden, she would not be permitted to come to any more lessons. And she wanted to come to more lessons. This one has sparked something inside her: a desire to learn and apply that learning to her own magic. She wanted to rush out and do something other than the crude telekinesis she had always settled for in the past. She wanted to try out what she had learned. She wanted to come back on Thursday and learn more. For the first time ever, Vanelda felt like a proper unicorn, not a freakish blood-sucking facsimile. But the textbook … She must have spent longer pondering the problem than she realised, for the sound of Bass Note’s voice only metres away brought her to her senses. “There she is. Just look at the smug nag. Dash it all, I can hardly stand it!” “Hold fast, Bass,” Walnut advised. They were a few rows away but Vanelda picked out their muttered words easily. “She’s not worth it.” “She’s not worth anything. Filthy little guttersnipe,” Bass Note growled. “Thinks she’s so wonderful just because her family has a title. No bloody money to go with it, mind you, but you wouldn’t think it with the way she acts; all high and mighty and –” “Bass,” Walnut warned. “I’m not going to hit her with my crutch, old bean, don’t worry.” Their gazes were fixed behind Vanelda, on the door by which they had entered. She half-turned in her seat to see nothing more than a rather plain grey mare descending the staircase. The mare was unremarkable in every sense of the word, save for the huge, black, oddly shaped case strapped to her back. She paused when she reached the two stallions. “Excuse me.” Her voice held the same accent as Bass Note, though where his dripped with disdain, hers seemed crystallised with icy politeness. “If you’d be so kind as to step aside; I need to get to rehearsal.” “You can rehearse all you want,” Bass Note sniped. “You’ll never amount to anything.” “We shall see. Excuse me please.” “That’s my chair, you know. Not yours.” “I don’t see your name on it,” the mare said mildly. “I always thought First Chair went to the most talented musician of each instrument in the orchestra.” “I’ve been First Chair since my first week at Trottingham University!” “Yes, I know. And yet you’re not now.” She smiled. It was a tiny smile, barely more than a vague curve of the lips, but something about it made Vanelda’s breath catch. It should have been a cruel smile. The words suggested cruelty, but the smile … the smile was almost … playful. “You’re not even in the orchestra anymore. It was my understanding that the reason you were banned was because you insulted the conductor and stormed off the stage in a huff when he told you he was making me First Chair from next semester. If you hadn’t had yet another tantrum, maybe you could have retained your seat a while longer. He may even have given it back to you after your leg healed. I guess we’ll never know now.” Bass Note’s eyes narrowed. “You smug little –” “Leave it, Bass!” Walnut hauled him back. “Let go of me! I’ll wipe that smile off her –” “Is there a problem here?” Professor Orchid’s voice cut through the atmosphere like lemon juice through milk. She was standing three steps down from them, her expression cool but her eyes burning. “No, Professor. No problem.” Walnut hurriedly shoved Bass Note up the remainder of the staircase ahead of him. “We were just leaving.” “Glad to hear it. Orchestra practise don’t need no commentary from the peanut gallery, I reckon.” Her gaze landed on Vanelda, who froze guiltily. For a moment it seemed as though the older unicorn might be about to say something. Her gaze travelled down to the copious scrawled pages. They were covered in stains and ink smears. She raised an eyebrow, but moved off, passing by like Vanelda had every right to be there. The grey mare turned to look at Vanelda too. “You’re staying?” Vanelda’s jaw flapped. She had not been expecting the question. “Ah, uh, um … can I stay to neaten up my notes so I can read them later?” “Of course. Anypony can come to listen to orchestra rehearsals, as long as they’re quiet.” “Uh, thank you.” “Not my decision. University policy.” The grey mare tossed back the braids that had fallen over her shoulders. Her movements were as functional and simple as her hairstyle, yet Vanelda found herself watching as the other pony descend the stairs. The grey mare joined a group of other ponies arranging folding chairs and tuning up instruments they had extracted from more odd shaped black cases. Shaking her head to clear it, Vanelda returned to her notepad. She tore off the pages she had written and began laboriously copying them out in a calligraphic style her mother had taught her many, many decades ago. How many had it been now? She paused, trying to count. At least nine. Maybe even ten. It was hard to keep track. She used to try but eventually gave up. Each year just brought more of the same, so why bother charting the passage of time? Several sharp taps caught her attention. A mussed pony in a very obvious wig was standing in front of the group on stage. He tapped a funny little stick against his music stand a few more times, raised it, and then waggled it around. The ponies began to play a slow, sombre tune. It began simply, but as more and more instruments joined, the melody became more complex, the tempo increased, and the ponies playing were clearly exerting themselves to keep up. Vanelda was overcome. Her pencil drooped in her hoof. Her lips parted. She had never before heard anything so haunting and yet stirring. This wasn’t music the way she understood it. This was a story made from sounds: loss and pain followed by resolve and, as the orchestra came to an exultant, crashing crescendo, finally triumph over adversity. She realised only when it was over that her free hoof was gripping the desk so tightly that the wood was beginning to creak. Reality swamped her like a bucket of icy water. She leapt up, scattering her notes. Hastily she gathered them, taking no care with how they crumpled in her grasp. From the corner of her eye she saw the conductor turn and scowl at the commotion. She snatched the last sheet from the air and ran for the exit, hastening on her hind legs as she clutched her papers to her chest. Only when she had retraced her earlier steps and was ensconced in a bathroom stall did she pause to catch her breath. What in the world was that? She couldn’t explain her own reactions. She had already been struggling with her own behaviour tonight, but this was the cherry on an extremely disconcerting cake. What had she been thinking? She was ridiculous – utterly ridiculous! Wasting time in a magic class? Then frittering away what remained of the night listening to mortal ponies play wood and metal noise-makers? “I’m so stupid,” she told herself in a fierce whisper. “A complete idiot.” Yet try as she might, she could not stop the haunting melody of the orchestra’s music from circling in her head. It wormed its way into the nooks and crannies of her mind, weaving around Professor Orchid’s words until the music and the magic class sounded out together in her memory: a stupid, idiotic, wonderful commotion. Vanelda sated her hunt with a pair of drunken ponies staggering back to their dorm from a party. The alcohol in their blood tasted foul, but she knocked their heads together when one paused to be sick, slaked her thirst from him and took blood from the other for Voron. Both ponies were alive when she left and would, she hoped, put their unconsciousness down to drinking. Voron was in a fine mood when he finally returned. He barely said a word as he took his share of her hunt from first one daughter and then the other. Vellum told her sister and father in great detail how she had found an elderly mare in a care home, sitting by her window, and drained her so carefully while she slept that she did not wake even when fangs pierced her femoral artery. Old ponies died in their beds all the time and were often prone to anaemia. “An excellent piece of hunting, my sweet one,” Voron told her absently before retiring to bed. Vellum’s reactions were as though he had praised her for hours, and she bore her own huge grin to bed as well. Vanelda’s own thoughts were occupied with book shops and city maps. The next night, she set out to hunt a different sort of prey, and when Thursday night rolled around, she slipped once more onto the university campus.