Silence fell around the camp as the five paladins sat down to rest, disrupted only by the crackling of the campfire. Which was fine with Arthas, at least for the moment; the trek back to the ruins of the tower after his fight with Commander Hurricane, with all the bruises he had gained, had been taxing. Even if he were to ask the Light to heal and refresh him, which he didn’t intend to, the few dents in his armor would still continue to irritate him whenever he moved.
“Guess that’s what I get for challenging the strongest warrior this world has ever known,” Arthas thought; now there wasn’t any doubt in him that Commander Hurricane fully deserved that title.
His musing was interrupted by a bright flash of light next to them. Slightly startled along with everypony else, Arthas turned to look as the glow of the teleportation spell faded, revealing the two familiar echoes.
“That took longer than expected,” Hurricane’s echo commented as they trotted over to the fire, sounding almost nonchalant. “Sorry, had to see the landfall through, then make some plausible excuse for flying away. The few times I did things too differently from the first time, well, the others never took it too good,” he explained, noticing Arthas’ raised eyebrows. “One time they even tried to restrain me, thinking I lost my mind.”
“Thou should hath talked with me,” Clover said at the two sat beside the paladins. “Perhaps I would have broken free of the spell as well.”
“I did talk with you, you were the one who tried to restrain me,” Hurricane deadpanned at her after removing his helmet, a hint of amusement in his tone. As the unicorn echo blushed in embarrassment, he chuckled, and turned back to Arthas. “You’re not too sore about losing I hope?” he asked with a grin, now clearly amused.
Even though he knew how it sounded (not to mention that he would have almost definitely lost if their fight had continued) Arthas still replied, his pride stung, “It was a draw.”
After Hurricane and him had resumed their battle, it hadn’t lasted long. They had exchanged a quite a lot of blows, but only Hurricane’s had reached his opponent’s; all of Arthas’ heavier attacks had been either blocked, parried or dodged. Of course, Arthas, knowing that he was the slower of both of them, had focused on defending his vital areas, resulting in a few of Windtear’s strikes landing on his legs and shoulders.
However, after several minutes, the two of them had clashed they weapons for the final time, and Hurricane’s Windtear had cut through his hammer. Realizing that he was wielding a hammer with only less that half its head, Arthas had taken an immediate leap back; Hurricane hadn’t pressed his attack though.
“Disappointing,” he commented, lowering his weapon and staring at Arthas’ hammer. The pegasus then shrugged and sheathed Windtear on his back. “We’ll have to pick up where we left off when you get a better weapon.”
And with those words, he had disappeared. The magic that bound all the echoes on the island reset them, and Hurricane and Clover were returned to wherever the real them had been at the start of this battle two thousand years ago, leaving the paladins alone in the hurricane-desolated area.
Now back in the present, Hurricane chuckled. “Sure it was,” he said, smirking.
Arthas shrugged. “Well, I suppose since you were the one to stop our duel, one could say that you had surrendered,” he said, smirking back in kind.
Hurricane neighed with laughter. “Oh, I am going to enjoy our next bout. What do you think?” he asked, turning to the other paladins. “Who won, me or him?”
As Storm at the others quickly glanced at Arthas, he found that he couldn’t help himself. He had to give the four paladins a stern look, daring them to try and answer that question the way he might not like.
The eyes of all four immediately widened. “Um…” Storm began, hesitantly, looking from his Grand Master to the echo of Pegasus Commander.
Arthas raised an eyebrow at him, waiting a few seconds to see if he, Serenity or any other would come up with an answer, then finally turned back to Hurricane, exchanging a look with him… and a grin after a few heartbeats, then a chuckle.
“Your subordinates need to grow more spine,” Hurricane commented in good-natured tone. “They seem quite afraid of you and me.”
“I believe it’s more that they respect us that much,” Arthas countered, shrugging. Smirking, he added, “Still, you better not torture them with such questions.”
“Bah, fine,” Hurricane said, shaking his head in amusement.
“If I may…” Serenity spoke up suddenly, taking the opportunity that they finished their conversation. She hesitated slightly as Hurricane turned to her, but then quickly recovered and continued, “I must say, Commander Hurricane, sir, I-I’ve read about you in history books, about your feats and best known battles, and, well, I have to say that all of them hardly do you justice,” she summed up, slightly awkwardly.
“Read about me in history books, huh?” Hurricane repeated, looking at her questioningly.
“Yes, well, I happen to find history very interesting,” Serenity explained, brushing the back of her head in embarrassment.
“Guess that explains why you were the one answering my questions about the end of the war.” Hurricane tilted his head. “Out of curiosity, then: how did I die? The real me, that is,” he amended, rolling his eyes.
“Oh, um…” Serenity trailed off, clearly uncomfortable discussing something like ‘how you died’.
Arthas, obviously not having such a problem, decided to interject, “About ten years after the war, a conflict ensued between Equestria and dragons, and you took the fight to them. You’ve won, but lost your life during the fire that consumed their valley.”
“Or so they say,” he remarked privately, again reminded of what Daring Do had told him.
He watched curiously as Hurricane’s echo reacted to the news about the - alleged - death of the real him. The pegasus looked slightly surprised. “Huh, death by dragon fire? Could have been worse I suppose,” he summarized, shrugging.
“What exactly do thou consider worse than, most likely, being burned alive?” Clover questioned, looking at Hurricane with surprise.
“Being killed by Friedrich?” Hurricane replied, frowning, then looked away, an angry scowl crossing his face. “I might have dealt with my hatred for him over those eight hundred years, but still… It was annoying enough to hear that I hadn’t killed him. How did that bastard die?” he asked in turn, looking from Arthas to Serenity. Frowning again, he added under his breath, “I swear by the ancestors, if he died from old age…”
Serenity cast Arthas an uncertain look before answering, no doubt slightly put off by the rather grim nature of the conversation and Hurricane’s comment. “Um, a natural disaster had struck the continent of Griffonia, known as Sundering of Griffonia, within a little over a year since your death. King Friedrich had died, along with thousands of griffons.”
The echo of Commander Hurricane gave out sigh. “The ghost of the real me must have been angry in the afterlife for having missed seeing it,” he said, shaking his head, sounding both disappointed and a little amused at the same time.
Serenity and others looked on at the him in mild shock after hearing such a heartless remark.“M-most of those who died were innocent civilians…” she began, but Hurricane raised his hoof to silence her.
“Yes, I realize, that is tragic. But the real me… while he wouldn’t kill civilians, I doubt that he would have cared much that they’ve died in a catastrophe along with their king.”
As Hurricane snorted at the word ‘king’, Arthas furrowed his brow in contemplation. Daring Do, after finding evidence suggesting Hurricane had survived the Dragon Hunt, had suspected that he had something to do with the Sundering of Griffonia, as unbelievable as it sounded. To Arthas that also had seemed highly possible. But Hurricane’s echo just said that he wouldn’t had killed civilians; surely, he must have known that triggering such cataclysm would do just that?
“But if that’s true, would it mean that there wasn’t any connection between the Sundering of Griffonia and Commander Hurricane?” he pondered. “Or… does it mean that during those ten years something else had happened to him, something that increased his hatred for Friedrich and griffons even more than the death of Private Pansy had?”
“It took me hundreds of years of killing Friedrich over and over to get over my hatred,” the Commander’s echo continued. “The real me had some measly ten years of not killing the bastard. You’ve said you read history books,” he turned to Serenity, “surely, you know how we pushed the griffons out of Equestria. You can’t be that surprised by the real me’s mindset.”
As Serenity blinked, uncertain, Arthas caught a quick glance Clover had cast Hurricane before she looked away, her gaze full of regret.
“Um, w-well…” Serenity began after a second, “the texts I’ve read were always very vague about how it had happened-”
“They launched an all-out attack the day after they killed Pansy,” Hurricane interrupted her. Snorting, he turned his gaze to the fire. “Friedrich thought the sight of her mutilated body would shatter our morale, he thought it would break me. So I broke his entire army,” he said, his words more like a growl than actual speech. “I knew all our outposts and forts would be attacked. I gave orders and had our army prepare through the entire night. On the morning, our camps were blocked from sight of the enemy by the clouds and fog our pegasi had brought down, and the unicorns used their magic to obscure the sounds. The griffons couldn’t see or hear anything until they got really close. When they did, they saw all the thousands of prisoners we had captured during the war impaled around our camps, slowly dying.”
Arthas turned to him in shock. To say that was a brutal tactic was an understatement; it was brutal by his standards! Only the atrocities he and the Scourge had committed could be considered worse, as well as the Burning Legion’s, but here, in Equestria… Arthas glanced at his paladins. They were staring agape at the legendary Founder of Equestria, as if not believing what they’ve just heard.
“As they all stopped and stared in terror, we launched our counter-attack,” Hurricane continued, ignoring their stares; his gaze was still on the fire. “They were too shaken to fight, a lot had fled from the battle. We pressed on, took back all the land they’ve occupied, and eventually pushed them out of Equestria. All within a matter of weeks.”
Storm was the first to speak up. “They… they were prisoners. How, how could you?”
Hurricane turned his gaze on him. “Do you have a mate?”
Taken aback, Storm hesitated. “Um, well, yes, sorta, but-”
“Well then,” Hurricane cut him off, his gaze hardening, “once your mate has been captured, tortured, then brutally murdered, then you’ll know ‘how could I’.”
Everybody shuddered uncomfortably, looking away from Hurricane. Arthas noticed Serenity casting him a sympathetic glance, but his attention was more focused on Clover at the moment. Out of everypony here, he would have expected her to show most sympathy at the mention of Pansy’s death. Instead, though, she continued to look away from the group; he couldn’t see her face, but he could see her forehoof, grasping her other foreleg tighter.
He also noticed that their campfire had began to die down. He rose quietly and trotted over to where they kept branches for the fire.
“Would you like me to list the things they did to her?” Hurricane continued, his hard gaze still on Storm.
Arthas had enough. “I don’t think we need the precise description,” he said calmly, his back turned to the echo, as he bent down to pick up timber for the fire.
Turning around, he saw that Hurricane’s gaze had turned to him. Undisturbed, he trotted over to the fire, and only when he dropped the fuel into it, he nodded towards Clover; with his back turned to the paladins, they couldn’t see it, nor could they see Hurricane glancing in her direction. Immediately, the pegasus’ expression softened, and as Arthas finished rearranging the branches on the fire so they would burn longer, he resumed staring into it.
“With the benefit of hundreds of years, I do regret it,” he said, shrugging. “Doesn’t change the fact that I did it, of course.”
“It’s still hard to believe that you had done it,” Serenity spoke out uncomfortably.
“Using shocking brutality to terrify enemies is an effective war strategy,” Arthas replied to her, reluctant, as he made his way back to his spot around the campfire. Turning around and noticing that his paladins had turned their gazes on him, he added, “Don’t give me those looks, you know now that I have done worse. Obviously, it’s not a strategy Equestria will ever use again.”
“What do you mean by ‘worse’, exactly?” Hurricane asked, turning to him, his expression calm but Arthas noted a slight frown on his face.
“I slaughtered every man, woman and child in a city of twenty five thousand citizens, denied the king’s orders to return to the country by burning our ships then blamed it on the mercenaries who fought for me. And that was before I lost my soul,” Arthas replied in a voice devoid of emotion; now it was his turn to stare into the fire. “All that came after was only worse.”
He didn’t need to look at Hurricane to know that the pegasus echo was staring at him intensively. “Well, I certainly feel better about myself,” he commented after several long seconds. “Clover had told me on our way here about how you… used to live on another world as some different creature, then died and was brought back to life as pony here. I take it’s all related to that?”
Arthas chuckled without humor and nodded. “Yes, I was killed for my sins, and brought back here for some reason. Still sounds like a boring story?” he asked, finally glancing at Hurricane.
The echo snorted in amusement, recalling their earlier conversation. “No, not really.”
The cold winds assaulted him from everywhere as he pushed forward. The blizzard seemed almost intent on stopping him, but step after step, he neared his goal, reaching with his claws and finally grabbing-
“Spike!”
With a jolt, Spike woke up from his slumber. He shook his head, disoriented by such a rude awakening, and look for the source of the noise.
“Apple Bloom?” he asked, having recognized the voice. He rubbed his eyes to clear them out of the sleepy sand, then finally spotted the red-maned filly on the ground floor of the room of the library that he and Twilight used as a bedroom, along with the other two Cutie Mark Crusaders and the golden crystal pony filly Liturgy. “What are you all doing here so early? Shouldn’t you all be at school?”
“Um, early?” Apple Bloom asked, tilting her head in confusion and amusement while Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo giggled.
“You do realize it’s already noon, right?” Scootaloo asked, still giggling.
Spike blinked in surprise, then looked over at the clock. The fillies were right, it was indeed already noon. “Oh wow, I really overslept,” he finally said bashfully, blushing in mild embarrassment. Shaking his head, he got out of his bed and stretched a little. “So, what are you guys doing here?” he asked them as he quickly walked down the stairs to join them on the ground floor.
“Well, we were sorta hoping ya knew where Applejack, Twilight and the others had gone off to,” Apple Bloom replied.
“They went to see Rainbow Dash at the Wonderbolts Academy. They’re curious how she’s doing, and they wanted to give her a care package.”
“Aww!” Scootaloo suddenly exclaimed, disappointed. “Why couldn’t they tell us? I would have totally wanted to come!”
“Probably because they wanted to avoid the three of you running around a military academy?” Spike deadpanned at them.
The Cutie Mark Crusaders deadpanned back at him, but the fourth filly calmly said, “All had happened as the Light willed it.”
Spike tried to not roll his eyes; since Liturgy came to Ponyville with Serenity a few days ago, he had learned that she was far more pious than even Arthas had ever been at his most pious. It was beginning to border on slightly uncomfortable and annoying at times.
“Yes, well, I don’t know about all that,” he murmured uncomfortably, then quickly changed the subject. “Now if you excuse me, I need to eat some breakfast… or, lunch, apparently,” he amended in embarrassment.
As he headed for the kitchen, the fillies followed after him. “How come you didn’t go with them?” Sweetie Belle asked.
“Twilight asked me if I wanted to come, buuut I didn’t really feel like it,” Spike replied, shrugging.
“You didn’t want to see Rainbow Dash as she’s training to become a Wonderbolt?” Scootaloo asked, staring at him as if he was crazy.
“It’s not that, it’s just…” he hesitated, reluctant to talk about the reason why he decided to stay. However, he knew way too well just how persistent those three could be. “I wanted to sleep in.”
“Well ya nailed it,” Apple Bloom commented.
“I haven’t been sleeping too good as of late,” he continued, ignoring the jibe. “I keep having this weird dream.”
“Weird dream?” Liturgy asked, her eyes all but glowing with interest. “What kind of dreams? Perhaps they are premonitions from the Holy Light?”
“Yes, well, I keep dreaming about a blizzard, so unless the Light decided that a fire breathing dragon needs to be reminded that winter is coming in just two months, I don’t think that it’s a premonition or a vision or anything,” Spike replied, barely managing to keep the sarcasm out of his voice.
“A blizzard?” Sweetie Belle asked, tilting her head in confusion. “Why would you dream about a blizzard?”
“I dunno,” Spike sighed as he entered the kitchen. Getting ready to make some late breakfast, he looked over his shoulder and asked: “Do you want anything?”
As the fillies all asked for sandwiches, Spike started making food for all of them. “So what are you doing today?”
“Well, we’ve showed Liturgy about everything there is ‘round Ponyville,” Apple Bloom replied, shrugging. “So… maybe we should go hang out by the lake? Ah mean, it will start getting colder soon,” she added, glancing at her friends.
“Sounds like a plan to me,” Scootaloo said, smiling, with Sweetie Belle and Liturgy nodding. Turning to Spike, she asked, “Spike, you wanna come?”
Spike hesitated for a second before replying; on one claw, it wasn’t everyday that he had the library to himself (even if about the only thing he would want to do that he couldn’t while Twilight was home was watching television). But on the other, going out to hang out by the lake sounded quite fun… as long as the fillies wouldn’t try doing something that would get them their cutie marks. He was still annoyed at having to clean the mess they’ve made in the library about two years ago.
“Sure, why not,” he finally said, placing a plate with sandwiches for them on the kitchen table.
“Guess this is it, then,” Hurricane commented after a few seconds of silence.
Arthas nodded, looking at the ship that awaited them almost longingly. Though he enjoyed the company of Hurricane and Clover, he would be glad to be back in Ponyville with his friends.
He, his paladins and the two echoes had just arrived a few moments ago at the port, having trotted and often fought their way through the battlefield through the better part of the day. As they signaled to the ponies at the ship that they were back, they had paused before the pier, saying their goodbyes to Hurricane and Clover.
“It was an honor meeting you,” Storm said, with the others nodding in agreement.
“The honor was ours,” Clover had replied. “Especially because thou broke me free from this magic. And after seeing what are thou capable of and hearing about the Princesses and friends of thee, we can rest easy knowing Equestria is in good hooves. We thank thee,” she added, nodding respectfully, with Hurricane joining her.
After exchanging a few more pleasantries, they began to leave, with Storm, Guard and Tucker already heading towards the ship. Only Serenity stayed behind talking with Clover about something, and Arthas, giving the fortifications behind them a last glance.
“Are you thinking about breaking more of them free?” he asked Hurricane, recalling the look both he and Clover had given the echo of Smart Cookie when saw her in the distance after reaching the fortifications.
But the pegasus’ echo shook his head sadly. “Free them to this existence? Of not being truly alive, of being stuck on this island, repeating everything we do every few days? Nay. Even if Clover were to figure out a way to break us free… I don’t think they would be capable of dealing with this. Of knowing that everypony they knew and loved is long gone, that the world they knew is long gone.”
Arthas nodded thoughtfully, understanding his reasoning. “We will be bringing new paladins to this island in a few months, hopefully,” he said more briskly, hoping to lift the mood a little.
“Maybe by then you will get yourself some good weapons and we can finish our duel,” Hurricane replied with a chuckle and a smirk.
Chuckling as well, Arthas was about to respond in kind, but at that moment Clover approached them. “Sir Lightbringer, may I have a word?”
“Of course,” he said, frowning; the unicorn echo was levitating beside her a piece of paper. Intrigued, Arthas nodded at Hurricane. “It was an honor to clash blades with you, Commander. Until we meet again, Light be with you.”
As Hurricane gave him a curt nod in reply and turned to Serenity, who followed after Clover and now came over to the other echo to exchange a few words, Arthas trotted after the unicorn a few steps so they could talk.
“Could thou arrange for the ingredients on this list to be delivered here?” she asked, passing him the piece of paper she was levitating. “Dame Serenity hath been kind enough to offer me something to write them upon.”
“Um, sure,” Arthas said, accepting the list in confusion. “But wait, what do you need them for?”
“Hopefully, with those ingredients, I should be able to free myself and Hurricane from this island.”
Arthas’ eyes widened. “Really? Such a feat would require a powerful ritual…” he said, trailing off as he looked over at Clover’s list.
Being the former lord of the dead, Arthas was far too familiar with bound spirits and other specters. Breaking their bounds was almost always a complicated matter, and in most cases it resulted with the spirits being free from the world of the living and allowed to move on. He was curious how exactly was Clover going to free them from the magic that bound them to the island.
His curiosity quickly turned to confusion as he read the ingredients she wrote down. Water, carbon, ammonia, lime, phosphorus, salt, saltpeter, sulfur… Arthas wasn’t an alchemist, but a lot of the dead under his control as the Lich King were, so he was fairly familiar with alchemy, enough at least to deduce what certain ingredients could be used for. However, nothing came to his mind as he looked over Clover’s list.
“How exactly will those help you break the magic that binds you?” Arthas finally asked, turning back to her.
“Oh, I am not going to use these to break our bounds,” Clover replied, shaking her head. “I need those to create physical bodies for us. When we’re no longer echoes the magic of the island will no longer bind us.”
Arthas once again gazed at her with surprise. “I see your name is well deserved, Clover the Clever,” he finally said. That was definitely a sure way to break free from the island’s magic. Of course, the execution of this plan… “I’m sure you know though that just creating physical bodies won’t work, for you to no longer be echoes you’d have to actually… well, be alive.”
Clover nodded. “I am aware. But I hath a theory that should make this work… though just for myself and Hurricane. I won’t be able to do the same for any other echo, even if we’d free their minds,” she added, saddened. “Hurricane agrees with me that it’s for the best to leave them as they are, unaware of… everything. But it still doesn’t feel right.”
“I wouldn’t expect it to,” Arthas replied, unsure of what else could say.
Trying not to dwell on the thought - as he had enough souls on his consciousness that he could do nothing to help that he was actually responsible for - Arthas focused on the aspect of Clover and Hurricane being returned to life; or rather, turned into life, as odd as that sounded. Equestria would certainly benefit from the two legendary heroes returning to them. Having fought both of them, Arthas couldn’t help but consider that ponies could learn a lot from their ancestors.
“And yet…” he thought, concerned, as he glanced over at Hurricane’s echo and Serenity talk. Though the crystal pony was, as always, very polite, and was talking with the Commander with respect, but Arthas noticed the slight unease in the paladin. “No doubt because of what he said he had done to the griffon prisoners during the war… or what the real him had done, whatever,” he amended; he was starting to find this distinction more and more annoying.
This observation gave him pause. He had fought with Hurricane, and knew first-hoof just how dangerous he was. After hearing the story, and knowing what he knew from Daring Do… a slight seed of doubt crept to his head regarding Hurricane’s return to Equestria.
“One would think that giveth what thou hast been through thou wouldn’t hath such worries,” Clover’s soft voice broke him out of his musings.
Arthas looked back at her. The unicorn echo had spoken quietly, so that Hurricane and Serenity wouldn’t hear them; she maintained a calm demeanor, but there was a certain steel in her gaze that almost made Arthas back away.
Reaching to her shoulder calmingly. “I’m worried because of what I’ve been through,” he told her kindly. “Do you think I’m not worried about myself?”
Clover’s gaze softened, then she closed her eyes. As Arthas brought back his hoof, she opened them and said, “For all his… failings, and temper, I trust Hurricane with my life. The real me trusted the real Hurricane two thousand years ago, and his echo… is so much calmer. He resembles him from before the war much more. You have nothing to fear, I promise.”
Hearing such declaration, Arthas couldn’t help but smile. “I’m really glad to hear that, then. I’ll make sure those ingredients will be delivered here,” he added, hiding Clover’s list into his saddlebags. “And I’ll look forward to introducing the two of you to the Princesses.”
Spike gave out a long sigh of content as he laid down the blanket he had set up, reaching to his bag for a comic book. The five of them had just arrived by the lake, and while the Cutie Mark Crusaders decided to go and cool off in the water, the young dragon was mindful that it has been less than an hour since he had eaten; he didn’t want to get cramps.
Liturgy apparently shared his worries, as she was sitting beside him, reading Arthas’ Order’ libram. Or she just preferred studying the Light over swimming, Spike had no idea.
“The girls had a good idea to come here,” Spike thought, lazily turning over the pages of the comic book. “It’s nice to relax on such a warm day and do nothing, just enjoy the peace and quiet… I just hope the three of them won’t start any ruckus-”
“Well well well, look what we have here!”
“I knew it,” Spike sighed in annoyance, but the next second a realization hit him. “Wait, those weren’t their voices.”
Raising up to a sitting position, Spike followed the source of the voice. It came from one of the two fillies that were now approaching the lake, one gray and the other pink, and both the same age as all four of his friends.
“Oh brother,” Spike though, already knowing trouble was brewing. Well, maybe not trouble, but annoyance. The pink filly, easily recognizable by the tiara she wore (and the slightly arrogant way she talked and walked) was Diamond Tiara, who, along with the other filly - Silver Spoon - were in the same class as Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, Scootaloo and Liturgy. Like pretty much everypony in Ponyville, Spike knew the two fillies and the Cutie Mark Crusaders weren’t exactly… fond of each other. To put mildly. “Well, there goes peace and quiet.”
As he didn’t really know either Diamond Tiara or Silver Spoon, Spike didn’t bother greeting them; besides, the attention of the two was focused on the Cutie Mark Crusaders, who were playing in the lake. The three fillies had by then realized that they had company, of course, and were already waddling up the lakeshore.
Diamond Tiara was looking at them with dismay. “The Cutie Mark Crusaders, and the crystal weirdo,” she said, continuing and glancing briefly at Liturgy. Spike had no idea if he should be offended or relieved that she apparently hadn’t included him in… whatever this was. “Just what are you doing here?”
“Hi Diamond Tiara, Silver Spoon,” Apple Bloom greeted them politely, although her voice was completely lacking any sort of cheer. She quickly shook herself to dry her coat and mane - causing Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon to back away as droplets of “What do ya think we’re doin’, we’re havin’ fun on probably the last warm day for awhile.” She paused for a second, then, hesitantly she asked: “Ya guys wanna join us?”
“Ha!” Silver Spoon snorted, “as if we’d spend time with blank flanks like you.”
“Good, she was just trying to be polite,” Scootaloo retorted, standing beside Apple Bloom. “And on that note, what are you doing here?”
“I don’t-” Diamond Tiara began to reply, but Scootaloo cut her off.
“Just to clarify; I mean what are you doing here without your butler carrying all your stuff,” she said with malicious grin.
Indeed, instead of using the poor old pony Spike had seen in passing once or twice in Ponyville, the fillies themselves were carrying some bags (with Silver Spoon carrying a distinctively bigger share of the baggage), most likely containing blankets, drinks, maybe an umbrella, because what else could the two fillies be planning to do at a lakeside than relax and have fun like they were already doing?
Diamond Tiara’s frown deeped and she replied after a second, “Not that it’s any of your business, but Randolph has a free day today that he requested a month ago to buy new suits after I threw away all his clothes.”
Spike shook his head, not sure if he had heard her properly. Apparently, he wasn’t the only one confused, as Sweetie Belle soon asked, “Why would you throw away your butler’s clothes?”
“It was his punishment for ruining my breakfast. Honestly, how hard is it to poach an egg properly?!” Diamond Tiara snorted and stomped, then shook her head.
“Yikes, not gonna complain when Twilight has me working overtime again,” Spike thought, feeling pity for the old pony.
He could feel Liturgy tense slightly beside him. “The Light teaches us to be considerate to others,” she said, looking at Diamond Tiara disapprovingly.
“Yeah whatever,” the pink filly replied, glancing at her briefly before turning back to the Cutie Mark Crusaders. “Anyway, you guys are in our spot, so I’m afraid we have to ask you to leave, now,” she said, waving her hoof dismissively.
“Your spot?” Scootaloo replied, ridiculed, all but throwing herself at Diamond Tiara’s face. “Funny, I don’t see your name on it.”
“Funny, just how nopony can see cutie marks on your flanks,” Silver Spoon chimed in, with a mock surprise. “Oh, that’s right, it’s because you don’t have any!”
“What does that have to do with anything?” Sweetie Belle asked, confused, as the two other fillies giggled.
Spike - suddenly feeling really glad that he didn’t usually hang around with ponies that were supposedly closer to his age - decided that he would intervene; the way things were progressing, it almost looked as if the fillies were about to come to blows. Jumping up to his feet, he ran to the fillies and pushed Scootaloo and Diamond Tiara apart.
“Hey, calm down everypony,” he tried, “it’s no reason to-”
“Tell them that!” Scootaloo interrupted him, while at the same time Diamond Tiara said, “Stay out of this!” with both fillies trying to push him away.
At that moment, just as Spike was about to try and defuse the situation again, and just as Liturgy trotted over, presumably in order to help him (though by what he had seen so far, citing Light’s teachings would have little to no effect on the two unfriendly fillies), a very loud noise came from behind Spike, from the direction of the lake.
Turning around in surprised fright, he managed to see a very tall splash of water, as if something had fallen into the lake from a great height. Spike was about to ask the others (who were all also looking at the lake, their argument forgotten momentarily in the confusion) if they saw what happened, but just as the water fell back down, he realized he could hear somebody coughing and gasping for air.
In the next heartbeat, he spotted the source of said gasp, as they jumped into the air, above the water’s surface. Spike stared, utterly surprised; it was a dragon. And more than that, unlike all those other dragons he had seen before, it was more or less the same size as he, meaning it was a baby dragon too. Except where he was purple and green, this dragon was all light blue… and had wings.
That was all he managed to notice within the second after the other dragon flew above the water, because what happened next immediately captured his attention (and made him utterly forget any possible feeling of inadequacy from the sight of the stranger having wings). The dragon breathed down at the water right below him, causing the entire lake to freeze in a matter of seconds.
Spike was agape. “This dragon… breathes ice?!” he thought, shocked; he had thought that dragons only breathed fire. Sure, Arthas had told him about dragons that breathed ice (and magma and some other, even weirder things), but those were Azerothian dragons, not Equestrian.
The fillies around him had also expressed their disbelief, but Spike was too busy staring at the other dragon to hear whatever they were talking between themselves. Said dragon had landed back on the now frozen lake, still coughing, then breathing heavily after several seconds. As Spike observed the mysterious dragon, he realized - suddenly feeling strangely warm - that this dragon was a female. At least, he suspected as much; he had seen only other male dragons before, except maybe some grown up dragons in the distance during the dragon migration, but this baby dragon had much softer, elegant characteristics than any of them.
And she was quite pretty, which was probably the reason why he felt so hot; he hoped he wasn’t blushing.
The dragon, slowly recovering upon the frozen lake, had risen up on her feet… then almost fell backwards. She had to help herself with her wings to regain her balance, then carefully straightened out. Once she recovered, she began to… stare at her claws? Spike tilted his head in confusion as he then observed her pressing a palm to her chest, as if checking her heartbeat. The next thing she did, though, seemed even weirder; she began to flex her wings, then brush her arms together before jumping back into the air and hovering above the ice silently, as if contemplating something.
A snort from beside him finally made him return his attention to the ponies around him. “Great, as if this place wasn’t crowded enough, somepony else came and froze the lake!” Diamond Tiara huffed angrily, then turned around. “Let’s go Silver Spoon, I’m gonna go ask Daddy to just build a swimming pool back at our mansion.”
“Oh, coming Diamond Tiara!” Silver Spoon called after her as she followed her, both fillies utterly ignoring everypony else.
Spike overheard Scootaloo muttering “Good riddance,” but he was already not paying any attention to the departing ponies. The other dragon had finally turned her head to them, then, after a brief hesitation, flew over towards them.
As she landed near them (losing her balance again briefly), Spike realized that up-close she was even prettier. Her body was covered in light blue scales as he had already noticed, but the scales on her stomach were gray-blue, the spikes on her back even brighter shade of blue (they almost seemed to glow), and she had two sets of horns protruding from the back of her head, the higher set growing upwards with the horns slightly curving by the end, and directly below them shorter two, both dark blue. He also managed to get a glimpse of her eyes, even though she wasn’t looking directly at either of them; they were icy-blue.
“Hello,” she said slowly and with some hesitation; it sounded to Spike as if she wasn’t expecting them to answer for whatever reason.
He wanted to reply in kind, but just as he was about to he found the words to be stuck at the back of his throat. He gulped nervously, trying to say hello again, but only a quiet grunt escaped his lips.
“Hi there!” Sweetie Belle greeted her instead, smiling at her pleasantly. “What’s a dragon like you doing all the way over here? We don’t see many dragons other than Spike here,” she added, nodding at Spike. “And how did you freeze the lake?”
Spike, nervously (and feeling even hotter) waved his claws at her, but the other dragon ignored him. “That’s actually a very good question. The first one,” she told Sweetie Belle, then pointed around her. “What exactly is this place?”
“Um, Ponyville?” Apple Bloom replied.
“Right, that doesn’t tell me anything,” the blue dragon concluded, almost snarling in reply. Calmer, she added, “And what exactly are you?”
“Um, we’re ponies,” Scootaloo told her, amused. “What, are you blind?”
A snort escaped the dragon. “Well, as a matter of fact…” she said, turning her sight to them and opening her eyes wide while pointing at them.
Spike covered his mouth to not gasp. Her eyes weren’t just icy-blue as he glimpsed, they were also clouded; her pupils were barely visible.
This dragon was blind.
“Oh…” Scootaloo stammered, horrified. “I’m so sorry, I, I didn’t mean-”
But the female dragon had already turned away. “Forget it, I have more important issues to deal with that the fact that I am blind again,” she said dismissively as she began pacing around, then snorted in annoyance. “Though I suppose I was blind all this time I guess…”
“Blind again?” Spike thought, sharing a confused look with the fillies.
“May I ask what those issues might be?” Liturgy unexpectedly asked, trotting over the dragon calmly. “It is my duty as a servant of the Holy Light to help those in need. Though it is beyond me to help with your blindness, perhaps we can help you with those other issues?”
The blue dragon had continued her pacing as Liturgy talked, as if ignoring her, but at the mention of the Holy Light she turned to her sharply, then stared at her with her blind eyes in surprise. After several moments she uttered a chuckle.
As Spike and the others once again exchanged confused glances, the dragoness spoke. “Oh, the irony… I appreciate the offer,” she added, though her tone didn’t quite sound honest, “but I doubt you can help me.”
“You won’t know for sure until you tell us what’s bothering you,” Liturgy calmly replied.
The blind dragon snorted again, amused. “Ok, fine. One of the issues is that for whatever reason I am about a hundred times smaller than I should be. Instead of being a giant adult dragon I am the size of a whelp,” she continued, ignorant of the surprised stares she was receiving. “Actually, I seem to actually be a whelp, although… a weird one,” she added, looking over her body despite not being able to see. “My spine, my claws, my wingspan… it’s all different. Did whatever send me here age me backwards… and mutate my body?” she hummed to herself, grimacing in disgust.
“Wait, something sent you here?” Sweetie Belle asked.
“Did you think I dived into this lake and tried to drown myself?” the dragon replied, deadpanning. “Yes, something… sent me here. One moment I was… um, somewhere else, let's say somewhere colder, and the next thing I knew I was in the water choking on said water. Which is another problem altogether, but one thing at a time…” she muttered, resuming her pacing.
With each word she said, Spike grew more and more confused. However, a thought began to form in his head. It was bluntly obvious that whatever was responsible for what happened to this dragon it was magical in nature; not a few weeks ago he had seen a mare perform an Age Spell on two ponies after all. And her being thrown into the lake from somewhere clearly far away could have only been done via a Teleportation Spell.
(Spike had also calmed down and gotten used to the presence of the pretty female dragon enough that he could speak.)
“I got an idea!” he exclaimed, a little loudly. Embarrassed, he cleared his throat and continued: “It’s obvious something magical has happened to you. We have friends that know a lot about magic,” he added, ignoring the eye roll she did when he said the earlier part. As she looked on with interest upon the latter part, Spike realized he had to amend. “Um, although, they’re both away right now, Twilight won’t be back until evening… but there’s still Zecora!” he realized in mid-sentence.
“Oh yeah,” Apple Bloom agreed. “She’ll probably have some idea as t’ what happened t’ ya.”
“It’s certainly worth a shot,” Sweetie Belle added.
The female dragon didn’t show any signs of having heard what the fillies had said though; he attention was focused on Spike. It was enough to make him nervous again, but fortunately she quickly said, “And what exactly are you?”
Spike blinked in surprise, but then quickly relaxed. “Right, she’s blind… but wait, how does she know I’m not a pony then?”
Shaking off the confusing thought, he replied, “Oh, I’m a dragon too. I’m Spike,” he added as she looked at him with confusion, extending his claws to her.
As seconds slowly passed, Spike realized that it was stupid to extend his claws in greeting to somepony who couldn’t see it, but then the other dragon uttered a soft sigh and, with some reluctance, reached for his claws to squeeze it.
“Sindragosa.”