//------------------------------// // Chapter 2:4.1 - Turncoat // Story: Camaraderie is Sorcery // by FireOfTheNorth //------------------------------// Chapter 2:4.1 – Turncoat Mid-autumn rain pounded down on the tents of the Brave Companions, bowing the fabric wherever it hung loose. Nearby, the South Equestry River churned, threatening to overflow its banks but never actually reaching that point. The guard keeping watch on the camp watched the river, even though it would take cataclysmic levels of rain to lift it to where the tents had been pitched. Much of the water flowing northwards drained down into the tunnels and caves of Ghastly Gorge before ever reaching them. As the rain plinked off his helmet and soaked his gambeson through, the guard considered how he’d gotten to his current situation. Twilight Sparkle had taken an interest in him and his companion again after largely ignoring them for nearly a year, except to use them as errand-colts. The two of them were undecided as to whether this was a good or bad thing, though the immediate circumstances made this guard lean slightly toward the latter. Normally at this time of night he’d be warm and dry in a tavern, either reveling in the common room or in his rented bed, perhaps with a companion. It seemed a great deal preferable to standing out in the dark and rain, watching over the encampment of the sorceress and her friends. Less than a week after the events of Nightmare Night, Twilight Sparkle had called the Brave Companions together, and they’d quickly departed on a journey to the south. She’d sensed another pony Awaken, the dormant fragment of Discord’s soul within them coming to life. The sorceress had been ready this time and pinpointed the location of this new, dangerous pony. The village of Grunstead was their destination, a small community near Ghastly Gorge just past the border between the Dominions of Cant’r Laht and the Kingdom of Los Pegasus. Tomorrow they would cross into Queen Helianthus’s territory and hopefully wouldn’t be immediately arrested by Los Pegasus soldiers as trespassers. There was a garrison near Grunstead, and the town was led by an appointed commandant. If they could convince him of the importance of their mission, it would make things a lot easier, but it still would be no cakewalk. They had to find whatever pony Discord had possessed and use the Elements of Harmony to free them, all the while withstanding the fraction of chaos magic that that pony now possessed. They had already dealt with Bitter Leaf in Onon’r Laht in a similar way, so they had some idea of what to expect. Yet, despite Twilight Sparkle’s best-laid plans, she couldn’t anticipate the complications that were to come. *** Everything will go according to plan. Clúny kept telling himself that as he returned to his home in Grunstead and removed his barding. His plans had been prepared, and now all he had to do was enact them. Tonight, during his guard shift, he’d let a local bandit gang in to pillage the village. Once everypony was dead, including the commandant, he’d find some choice loot for himself and hide it away before going to alert the garrison. The bandits would stand no chance. The thought had never occurred to him until very recently, but now he couldn’t get it out of his mind. He’d always hated the commandant and envied his (relative) wealth, but now that he was actually taking action, he found that the wealth didn’t matter as much as seeing everypony he was meant to protect slaughtered, then turning around and bringing the same thing down on the bandits he’d made a deal with. It was invigorating somehow, in a way he was only just beginning to understand. He got a fire started in his home’s hearth and was beginning to hang up his barding, still damp from last night’s rainfall, when the town’s alarm bell began clanging. They couldn’t have betrayed me and attacked early, could they? Reluctantly, Clúny pulled his barding back on. He’d have to venture back out to see what was happening, and he was going to be quite annoyed if the bandits had decided to betray him and strike during the day. He wasn’t sure exactly what he would do, go along with the plan, or aid the rest of the guard. Both were exciting prospects, though the latter gave him a greater chance of survival. Clúny hung his helm at his side before stepping out of his house. Oddly enough, there was nopony on the streets. When the bell in the watchtower ceased ringing, Clúny knew that something had to be amiss. There was no way the bandits had taken over the commandant’s residence so quickly. A snowflake fell in front of him, most peculiar. Snow didn’t usually fall here until several months later in the year. As the snow picked up, Clúny realized what was going on. Shouts came from the left, in a tongue he didn’t recognize, and he turned to spot two centaurs galloping toward him. Hastily, he drew the sword at his side, but it did him little good. The first centaur was upon him before he knew it, and his blade glanced off the sturdy, otherworldly armor. The centaur’s mace came down heavily on his unprotected head, shattering his skull. Clúny’s lifeless body crumpled upon his doorstep. A fine, glowing mist drifted out of the ruins of the pony’s head as the centaur who’d killed him pulled up short. The mist quickly made its way to the centaur’s head, which he shook as his companion overtook him. It was nearly impossible to see with his helmet, but the centaur soldier’s irises shifted to crimson and his sclera yellowed, just as Clúny’s had appeared for the past couple days. ¿Mænäth, hü vitta rün ïlæsh?[1]” the centaur’s companion asked as he slowed and looked back where he stood in a daze. “Öu, vitta hü rün ïlösh[2],” Mænäth replied before leaving Clúny’s broken form behind. Something felt different, strange to the centaur. He couldn’t say why, but he had the sudden desire to bash his companion’s head in while he wasn’t expecting it. *** “Do you think they’ll just let us into the town and start poking around?” Rainbow Dash asked, mostly rhetorically, while she hovered near the rest of the group. “I doubt that greatly,” Twilight Sparkle admitted, “If we cannot convince Grunstead’s commandant to appreciate the importance of our mission or charm him into allowing us to go about our business, we may have to make some sort of bargain.” “What kind o’ bargain?” Applejack asked warily. “According to the merchants that take the southern route to Los Pegasus, the commandant is not opposed to accepting bribes. Hopefully that is all he will request,” Twilight replied. They were nearing Grunstead now, and the dark clouds that could be seen in the sky ahead were looking more and more ominous. A chill wind blew over the hills, and Rainbow Dash frowned before darting up into the sky to get a better view. Pinkamena rushed ahead to the next crest, and the rest of the Brave Companions followed. Grunstead was invisible, obscured by a wall of blowing snow. The blizzard thinned the farther it got from the village, but frost still coated the ground and scattered trees for half a league in every direction, coming up almost to where the Brave Companions were standing. “The White Procession,” one of the Cant’r Laht guards, Baldavin, if Twilight remembered correctly, said, “Madame sorceress, we should withdraw until they depart.” Twilight paused to reach out with her magic toward the town. With all the White Procession’s magic swirling about, it made a bit of a mess of things, but she could still detect the fragment of Discord’s soul. It would be risky to charge into a White Procession invasion, but the safer option of waiting until they’d left entailed its own risks. The pony chosen as the vessel of the fragmented chaos god was getting stronger every second and better at controlling the powers bestowed upon them. There was also the danger that the possessed pony might be subdued by the White Procession, and one of their wizards might take them back to Judd Caradain as a curiosity. While that would remove one of the soul fragments from this world, it would also place it beyond the Brave Companions’ reach and might return with the White Procession someday, more powerful than before. “No, we must find Discord’s soul fragment before it is too late,” the sorceress decided. “But, ma’am, we don’t know how large a force the White Procession has brought,” Baldavin objected, “It would be prudent to wait or to seek out the garrison nearby.” “The garrison has already entered the fight,” Twilight said, reaching out with her magic, “I have made my decision. We will leave any unnecessary baggage here and enter the blizzard. We do not know what piece of Discord’s soul is possessing our target, so everypony stay close and keep your Elements on you.” Soon a pile of saddlebags and bedrolls formed beneath a wizened old tree nearby. All unnecessary encumbrance removed, the eight ponies (and one dragon), set off towards Grunstead. Soon, the blowing snow surrounded the companions, making it difficult to see ahead of them. Twilight tried to protect the group with her magic, but she found it difficult to shield them all from the snow and wind in addition to detecting Discord’s soul. She was leading them in the general direction of it, but because it was possessing a pony, it wasn’t standing still. Twilight wondered what would happen if the possessed pony were to die. Would the soul flee across Equestria as it had when Discord was imprisoned? A crossbow bolt shot out of the snow, directed at Twilight Sparkle, who was leading the small party. The guard to Twilight’s right, Ream, jumped in the way, and the bolt punched into his shield. The sorceress cursed herself for not being alert, for allowing her mind to wander. While she’d been considering hypothetical scenarios, they’d entered the village, where a group of bat-ponies were lying in wait. “Falan otha Fluttershy![3]” Twilight yelled as she spotted a bolt bound for the druidess. Grunstead’s buildings allowed the snow to clear some, enough that the Brave Companions could see their foes. Rainbow Dash, her sword already out, darted toward the nearest bat-pony. Twilight drew a magical semicircle in the snow at her hooves and threw magical arrows toward many of them, before erecting a shield around the entire party still on the ground. With the bat-ponies in the sky or perched on the rooftops, the only pony in the group who could reach them to fight was Rainbow Dash (and Fluttershy, though she wasn’t much of a warrior). The rest were trapped on the ground, unable to help except for Twilight; the now near-continuous hail of crossbow bolts kept her from attacking with her magic, however, since it would require her to drop her shield to use any of the really effective spells. There had been ten bat-ponies when they’d arrived. Rainbow Dash had cut down two and Twilight’s arrows had pierced a further three, but that still left five overhead. Rainbow was fighting one, and another tried to take her from behind while the others fired on the rest of the Brave Companions. One of them landed near the group to grab the bolts dropped by one of her dead companions. A centaur appeared out of the snow behind her, a mace in one hand, a sword in another. The bat-pony paid the centaur little mind, other than lowering her guard as she trusted him to protect her while retrieving ammunition. When she looked at him again, though, his mace was already bearing down on her. She spread her wings to try to take off, but the mace shattered her spine. The centaur swept his sword up and decapitated her as she fell. Everypony stared at the centaur in shock, except for Rainbow Dash and the bat-pony she was still sword-to-sword with. The guards at Twilight’s side hesitated; was this centaur a friend or a foe? Twilight Sparkle stared down the centaur and wondered whether she should lower the shield now that they weren’t being fired upon. What is going on here? The centaurs and bat-ponies of the White Procession have always been unified. Could there be a civil war going on between the races? If so, it would have to have begun here, since the bat-ponies seem just as shocked as us. Unless . . . ! The magical shield waned as the sorceress reached out with her magic. The fragment of Discord’s soul was within the centaur, possessing him, turning him against his comrades. Paying no mind to the Brave Companions, the centaur galloped toward the nearest bat-pony. He fluttered away, loading a crossbow shot and firing at the centaur. The bolt deflected harmlessly off the heavy armor that centaurs of the White Procession wore, but he was still out of range of the traitor’s weapons . . . or so he thought. The centaur stabbed his sword upwards and the blade glowed as its length tripled, spearing the bat-pony through. Twilight felt a surge of chaos magic as it did, and a ripple seemed to pass out from the sword, turning some of the snowflakes into marbles. A stairway of bubbles formed as the centaur charged toward another of the bat-ponies, who frantically loaded his crossbow. He was knocked from the air by a strike from the centaur’s mace, his broken body crashing against the nearby building. The bubbles popped with the sound of thunderclaps and the centaur jumped to the roof of the nearest building, where another bat-pony perched. Miraculously (or chaotically), the thatch held his weight. Weapons from Judd Caradain clanged against each other as the bat-pony and centaur fought. The bat-pony got past the centaur’s defenses several times, but never was able to get to a weak point in his armor. The duel came to an end as the bat-pony’s sword was turned into a very confused carp, which didn’t have long to think about its new existence before the centaur severed it and its wielder’s head in half with a downward sword strike. The centaur threw his broken foe aside and searched for new enemies. The last bat-pony landed on the roof with him, bleeding and unable to fly, and Rainbow Dash emerged from the storm after him. The Hunter finished off the bat-pony with a thrust of her sword before drawing the blood-stained blade out and whirling toward the centaur. “Rainbow, stop!” Twilight called out, and the pegasus pulled up short of striking the centaur with her sword. The centaur observed her, weapons held up defensively, but making no other move as she hovered out of his range (though that could change in an instant). The centaur turned his head to look down on the rest of the Brave Companions, and the cottage he was standing on flattened itself to bring him down to their level. He trotted over to them, weapons still at the ready and Rainbow Dash anxiously hovered over the group. He seemed more concerned with killing the other members of the White Procession (the bat-ponies at least) than fighting them, but Twilight still didn’t want to lower the shield. She wondered what he would do if she told him they needed to extract the soul of a Great One from him. She didn’t get a chance to say anything, as a crossbow bolt shot out of the snow and found a weak spot in the centaur’s armor, punching into his flesh. The bolt was larger than those the bat-ponies used and had been propelled with greater force than their crossbows could manage. A group of ponies emerged from down the street, a couple of them armed with the weapons. The centaur grunted before taking off in the opposite direction. Another bolt flew toward him, but he swung his sword through the air, turning the projectile into a horde of moths. “What was that about, Twilight?” Rainbow Dash asked after sheathing her sword. “He is the one possessed by Discord. We have to go after him!” the sorceress explained. “Hold it! You’re not going anywhere until I get some answers!” one of the ponies that had recently arrived demanded as the others encircled the Brave Companions, “I’ve never seen you before, so why did you come here in the middle of an invasion by the White Procession!” The stallion addressing them was clearly the leader of the band, which seemed composed of a mix of the town guard, the nearby Los Pegasus garrison, and random townsponies and peasants trying to defend their homes. His barding, while not necessarily high quality, was still finer than anything anypony else was wearing. Icons on his helm and chestplate further set him apart from the others. “Commandant Greenspring?” Twilight asked, and was met with a suspicious nod, “I intended to meet with you and explain our purpose here on our arrival, but the situation has changed. We do not have time to stand around when there is a chance that that centaur could escape back to Judd Caradain.” “Let him, and let him take all the rest with him,” the commandant said before spitting on the frozen ground, “You lot are going to come back to my residence and explain everything, though.” Twilight looked around at the band of ponies surrounding them. They could probably overpower them, but it could get ugly, and there was no reason to give Queen Helianthus a justification for war. Rainbow Dash could probably get away and maybe find the centaur, but the chance of that was dwindling with every second he fled and they didn’t pursue him. Besides, even if she found him, she wouldn’t be able to extract Discord’s soul without Twilight and whoever possessed the Element that counteracted the soul fragment. Twilight relented and motioned for Greenspring to lead them to his residence. She hoped it would be a short conversation, and that he’d let them go on their way when it was over. *** “Out of the question,” Commandant Greenspring said, and Twilight Sparkle frowned back at him, “For one thing, I ought to imprison you for violating the territory of her majesty Queen Helianthus. The only reason I won’t be doing that is because I need all the help I can find to fight off the White Procession. I can’t spare the ponies to guard you, and I’m not going to leave a sorceress here alone without dimeritium shackles. So, you can either come with us to fight the White Procession, or we can execute you.” The wind howled outside, shaking the shutters, the sound filling the silence between the commandant and the sorceress. Commandant Greenspring’s residence was a manor house built in a hodgepodge manner over the years by previous residents. It boasted six stories, not counting the watchtower, but the uncommon height had its own drawbacks. While most of the buildings of Grunstead were protected by the others around them from the blizzard winds, the commandant’s residence was exposed, and shook back and forth ominously, floors and rooms twisting as if they could pull free and bring the structure down at any moment. “Fine, but we will also be looking for this possessed centaur, and my friends and I will seek to capture him. If anything were to happen to him, I would be most displeased,” Twilight said as she caused sparks to crackle along the length of her horn. (Thes were entirely for show, but the Grunsteaders didn’t know that, and some of them backed away.) “Once we have what we want, we will leave.” The sorceress had lost all sense of where the possessed centaur was. He had learned, as Bitter Leaf had, to hide his chaotic essence. The only time she would be able to detect him now would be when he released the chaos magic. Seeing as how one centaur looked largely the same as any other to her (especially since they completely covered themselves in armor), she was counting on that alone to distinguish him. The best way to find him would be to seek out other members of the White Procession and hope that he showed up to kill them. From what they had seen so far, that seemed to be his only motivation. Going along with Greenspring’s plan was actually beneficial to them, so long as the Grunsteaders didn’t kill the possessed centaur and allow Discord’s soul to escape into a new host. “Once the White Procession is defeated, then we can discuss escorting you back to the Dominions of Cant’r Laht,” Greenspring said, counteracting Twilight’s last statement, “So far as I’m concerned, this ‘possessed’ centaur of yours may as well be left alone. He is helping us, after all, though we’ll see how long that lasts. Do what you have to, but don’t let it interfere with fighting the rest of the White Procession. Everypony, get ready to leave. We’re headed to the grain stores.” “We do not know what anti-Element has possessed this centaur, but we can narrow it down,” Twilight said to her friends as the commandant was busy with other matters, “Treachery, Deception, and even Cruelty all seem possible, so Rainbow Dash, Applejack, and Fluttershy, you will need to try to subdue the centaur.” “Twi’, I think y’re overestimatin’ our abilities,” Applejack pointed out, “I doubt e’en Rainbow Dash could hold a centaur immobile on ‘er own. No offense meant.” “No, you’re right,” Rainbow admitted, “Twilight, didn’t you restrain Bitter Leaf?” “With my magic, but I cannot both hold the target in place and extract the fragment of Discord’s soul at the same time,” Twilight explained, “We may need to get creative.” *** The storm hadn’t let up one bit while they’d had their chat inside with Commandant Greenspring. If anything, it’d become more intense, especially around the commandant’s residence. The ponies of Grunstead had been holding out here, and the White Procession’s soldiers had largely given up on assaulting the building, choosing instead to hammer it with their unnatural weather. There were a few windigos outside the doors when they departed, but they had been cut down without much trouble, Twilight using her sorcery to burn them away. The grains stores at the southern end of the village were a likely place to look for the White Procession. What ponies tended to remember of these otherworldly invaders was that they came, ransacked their homes, and threw the seasons off balance, but there was one other thing the White Procession always did. Every incursion by the centaurs and bat-ponies resulted in them confiscating food, either from storage barns or straight from the fields. Exactly why they did this was unknown, since they didn’t explain their motives and nopony who’d ever gone to Judd Caradain had come back. Some sorceresses suspected that Judd Caradain had a food shortage, but it was equally likely that they just raided food stores because it disadvantaged the ponies they were attacking. The blizzard became less severe as they neared the grain stores, a good sign that they were onto something. Bat-ponies were soon spotted perched atop the granaries, sentinels with crossbows at the ready. In front of the grain stores were a couple squads of centaurs, having finished their rampages through the town and now helping to transport the grain back to Judd Caradain. A portal blazed nearby, two centaurs with glowing staves guarding it while carts were trundled through with the White Procession’s spoils. One of the ponies with a crossbow fired, the bolt striking a bat-pony and knocking it from the roof. Others sounded an alarm, and the centaurs gladly dropped the grain to draw their weapons. Greenspring’s forces charged ahead with a shout, their voices silencing as they drew swords, axes, and pitchforks. Centaurs and ponies clashed while crossbow bolts whizzed through the air in both directions. The ponies had greater numbers, but a large number of their band was untrained, and the centaurs already had an advantage in height and armor. “Stay here and protect them,” Twilight Sparkle ordered her guards. Of the nine individuals in their party, only Rainbow Dash, Twilight, and her guards were truly equipped to fight the White Procession. Applejack was capable, but she had no weapon to fight with other than the axe she’d taken from the commandant’s residence, and she wasn’t familiar with it. The rest would need protection from the battle, and the guards Celestia had provided the sorceress with would provide it while she helped fight off the centaurs and find the one possessed by Discord. “Cant’r majia ita Ye’r atoc![4]” Twilight incanted, and lightning shot down from the sky, striking the centaurs and frying them in their armor. “Occosparis, renolla diel’r oxelle’i![5]” she followed up as some of the soldiers tried to reach her, throwing snowballs that exploded into ice spears. Two bat-ponies tried to gang up on Rainbow Dash. Disengaging the one she’d locked swords with, the Hunter flipped backwards, over the second, and kicked her into the first. Both went tumbling down, and Rainbow speared one with her sword. The second recovered but was off-balance when the Hunter reached her. She only deflected three of Rainbow’s blows before a slash landed across her neck. Rainbow tried to take off, but was forced back down as a sword swung over her. As the centaur it belonged to reached for her with his other hand, a crossbow bolt struck his forearm, barely piercing the armor but touching his flesh all the same. Dash threw a bomb into his outstretched hand as he recoiled from the strike and instinctively clenched, before winging back a step. The explosion tore off the centaur’s arm and part of his chest armor, and Rainbow shot back in with her sword to pierce his exposed chest before flipping away to avoid his dying sword strike. Meanwhile, Twilight had engaged one of the centaur wizards while the other looked nervously at the portal behind her. Lightning, fire, ice, and stone flew back and forth between the mages as they tried to strike each other, defensive spells flaring up to block each attack. Twilight tried to keep from hitting any of the ponies in between them, and her adversary sought to do the same for the centaurs. “Ye seni cavan’r doros’i![6]” Twilight yelled, and glowing chains rose up to grab her opponent’s limbs. Focusing her magic, the sorceress pulled the bonds tighter, dislocating one of the wizard’s arms. He cried out in pain and slammed down his other arm, the one holding his staff. A ripple passed through the ground, and Twilight was thrown off her hooves. While her spell was weakened, the centaur broke his arms and two of his legs free. Propping up his dislocated arm with his staff, he cast a fireball at Twilight. “Eren’r oxelle’i soretta Ye’r mathis![7]” the unicorn yelled as she rolled out of the way, and her opponent was impaled from below by spears of earth, unable to leave his position because of the shackles still holding him in place. Twilight turned her attention to the other centaur wizard, but another centaur galloped between them. With one arm, he swung a mace into the faceplate of a centaur about to spear Commandant Greenspring through. With the other, he swung his sword at the centaur wizard. She gasped in surprise, but was quick to recognize the betrayal. The wizard swung her staff into the possessed centaur’s sword and it shattered, leaving only the handle and hilt in his grasp. Moving her fingers in a rapid pattern, she also sent the traitor flying through the air, and he came to rest near the Brave Companions not involved in the fight. Applejack leapt into action, as they’d planned in case their quarry showed up. Rainbow Dash had made a few traps, and she threw one at the centaur as he tried to rise, anchoring one of his hindlegs to the ground. A bat-pony flew overhead, and the centaur raised what was left of his sword. With the airy sound of trumpets, his sword regenerated itself, though it now looked more like a large slab of metal than a sword. The blade sliced the bat-pony in two, and the centaur searched for more targets. Praying this would work, Applejack launched herself onto the centaur’s back. He paid her no mind as his mace transformed into a flail with an impossibly long chain and it flung it out at the fighting centaurs, striking several before turning the flail back into a mace. When he tried to gallop toward the rest of the White Procession, he finally found himself caught in the trap, and severed the line with his sword. Fluttershy now took her turn, uncertainly hovering toward the centaur as Applejack jumped off. She threw a trap ahead of the centaur, and it tripped him up, entangling both his forelegs and causing him to faceplant. As he pushed himself back up, the druidess got as close as she dared. The centaur turned his helmet to face her but turned back after seeing she was a mere pony. His bonds turned to liquid and he stood, brushing past Fluttershy on his way to kill more centaurs and bat-ponies. So, it’s Treachery then. Twilight Sparkle had been watching the whole ordeal and trying to get closer so she could extract Discord’s soul. If Applejack’s and Fluttershy’s Elements didn’t stop him from using his chaos magic, then they would need Rainbow Dash. Twilight spotted her facing down a centaur with a glaive. “Rainbow Dash, we need you!” she yelled out to her friend. The Hunter jumped back, and the possessed centaur crashed into her opponent, nearly sawing him in half with his sword. She then threw traps first at his arms, pulling them out away from his body so that his weapons couldn’t be used. After that, a couple of nets were thrown over his trunk to anchor him to the ground. His legs held out for a bit, but he was forced down as the nets constricted, cursing the Hunter for capturing him. The centaur’s sword shimmered, and Twilight thought that perhaps this wasn’t going to work as they’d thought, and they’d just gotten lucky with Bitter Leaf. When Rainbow Dash landed on his back, however, the sword returned to its normal state, a broken weapon with no blade. Rainbow bucked the centaur’s hands as Twilight approached, forcing him to drop his swords. Twilight stared at the centaur. To think, they had here a centaur willing to betray the White Procession. If they could communicate with him, what secrets could they learn? Ponies knew practically nothing about Judd Caradain, and here was a centaur who would probably tell them everything they wanted to know. The battle was nearly over, the ponies winning. Would it hurt to just ask him a few questions? “Twilight, what are you waiting for?” Rainbow Dash asked, looking worriedly at the traps as the centaur struggled to break free, “I can’t hold him forever, and he’s still doing his chaos magic!” Indeed, the traps were struggling to hold the centaur, as the links in the chains to his arms changed number and size randomly, the shackles around his wrists glowing. The ground beneath him churned slightly, not enough for him to break free, but enough for it to be worrisome. There would be no finding out about Judd Caradain today; it was too great a risk to take. Twilight pulled a jewel from her saddlebags prepared for entrapping Discord’s soul, and concentrated. “Elf ikrin tur rei siss, hy Ye broci noya,” she pronounced, her voice ringing. A magical mist flowed out of the centaur’s forehead, drifting slowly down to the jewel at the sorceress’s side. This was a new experience for the sorceress, as she channeled the fragment of Discord’s soul into the gem. She could hear and feel all the thoughts and memories of Discord and the centaur combined in a roiling mass that seemed to come through a thick layer of cotton. Snippets here and there she was able to pick out, but they fled from her mind, forgotten as quickly as she remembered them. It was for the best, for she had to keep directing the soul into the jewel. It glowed brighter and brighter until, at last, the process was done. “¿Væris eppesanæ?[8]” the centaur asked groggily, before realizing his condition, “¡Equsïtïerï![9]” He tried to pull free, but without his chaos magic, it was much more difficult. He tried to crane his neck to see what else was going on and was appalled to see that the White Procession was being defeated, until he remembered what he had done. His body slumped as he recalled killing his own kind, his own comrades. “¡Vittaï menüttö sæ ökeffa kattaï![10]” the surviving centaur wizard commanded, and the remaining members of the White Procession made a fighting retreat back to the portal. The formerly-possessed centaur looked at first like he wanted to go and struggled again for a moment, but decided against it. Even if he returned to Judd Caradain, all that awaited him there was an execution. Better that he should die here than return in disgrace and be paraded around as a traitor, shaming his family. The portal snapped closed and the blizzard around Grunstead began to subside. This was not where the White Procession had entered originally; there were other portals, and one by one they too closed as the White Procession returned to their own world. As the last portal closed, as always, everything that had come from Judd Caradain turned to ash, including the traitorous centaur left behind. The Brave Companions couldn’t see through his faceplate, but his face was calm as he accepted his fate. Such a death, to become nothing in a foreign world, was still a better death than what traitors like him deserved.