Heart of Magic

by TheCrimsonDM

Chapter Nine: Forest Forecast

Twilight stood in the map room of the castle, her throat burned from vomiting food and alcohol but she didn’t care. Luna was sitting on Twilight’s chair quietly behind her. Starlight and Rainbow Dash had already left, though they were on call just in case Twilight needed them. Right then she was focused less on if she might need them, and more on what she might need them for.

Luna’s voice came out gentle and soft. “Twilight, you’re going to burn a hole in the floor from pacing so much.”

Twilight threw her head back and groaned. “Already did that, twice.”

She was going to have to tell the other elements of harmony eventually… but when was the right time to drag them into this. Her strongest weapon, her most powerful tool, was the power she had when her friends were with her. Of course the question was, if the power wasn’t enough to stop an army of alicorns, how could she best use the power against her newest foe.

“Twilight,” Luna’s spoke the name as if it weighed as much as a train.

Twilight stared at the map as she let out a sigh. “Yeah, Luna?”

“About what I said before.”

Twilight shook her head. “It’s fine, you just were speaking your mind.”

Luna appeared by Twilight’s side, her head nuzzled into the bottom of Twilight’s chin. From this position Twilight couldn’t see Luna’s face, but she felt the warmth of the body pressed against her side and neck. “Twilight… I didn’t mean what I said.”

“It’s fine.”

“No, it’s not. Twilight, I’m…”

“You’re just being honest, and now you’re trying to make me feel less stressed out.” Twilight stared at the map. “Truth is, until we find out how or even what the alicorns did to the changelings there’s no way we can stop them. This could be a battle we lose.”

A shiver ran down Luna’s body making her press tighter against Twilight. “Scared.”

Twilight shook her head. “Not particularly, I’m used to world ending threats by now. I am concerned, worried, and very frustrated,” not to mention angry, “but I am not scared.”

A choking pained sound escaped Luna’s throat. For a moment Twilight held there, worried that Luna was hurt somehow. Luna’s body was shaking against her and starting to droop. It took a moment but Twilight recognized the almost alien sound that had come from Luna. It was a sob.

Twilight wrapped her legs around Luna and pulled her into an embrace. Slow and gentle strokes through Luna’s hair helped calm the shaking a bit. Twilight sat there for a long minute just holding and petting her other half. “Luna, I’m here for you.”

Luna pulled back only just enough to meet Twilight’s eyes. Tears were running down Luna’s face making her cheeks damp with sorrow. “I’m scared.”

Those two words froze Twilight’s heart in place. For all the years she’d known Luna. From the moment she first appeared as Nightmare Moon, and then became her small self stealing away Twilight’s heart, all the way past the windigo war, and until now with the loss of an alicorn soldier. Twilight had never seen, nor heard Luna be afraid. As in honest to goodness fear. Quaking terror that was much better suited for a young Fluttershy than it was Twilight’s heroic, champion of the night.

Twilight didn’t know what to do. How could she prove that things would be okay, especially when she knew that would be a lie. This threat was so large that she was already anticipating the worst possible outcome. She was already considering the idea that she might lose someone close to her during the coming months.

The only thing Twilight could think of was a simple one. She leaned forward, pressing her lips against Luna’s. She pulled back only a fraction, just enough to whisper, “I promise I will make everything better. I’m Twilight Sparkle after all.”

It wasn’t much, but Luna’s eyes seemed to relax a little. Even if that was all Twilight could do at the moment, she’d take it. Sometimes a small victory was all she could get, but it was still a victory none the less.

Three days.

It had been three whole days of traveling through the woods, fighting monsters, and trying not to get eaten. Amber was sick, and tired of it at this point. She was also exhausted, beat up, and covered in muck. Fluttershy didn’t actually look much better with her hair being a tangled mess filled with sticks and mud. They both looked like wild savages, more than ponies.

Fluttershy glanced back at Amber. The look of fierce excitement in her eyes mixed with a bit of a sad distant look as if she was seeing past Amber. This look Amber had anticipated meant that Fluttershy was about to take her on another challenge, but one that was going to be sad at the end.

“Amber,” Fluttershy spoke as she ducked under a tree branch.

Amber had to duck lower to get under the same branch. “Yeah?”

“I wasn’t going to let you go on this one at first, but you’ve shown how strong you’ve become.”

Amber raised an eyebrow. “Oh? What is it?”

Fluttershy looked ahead and her mouth scrunched up as if she bit into something sour. “We need to… help a creature… take a nap.”

Amber felt the weight increase in her heart. “Okay, what creature.”

“One that’s going to be mad, but it’s just sick… very sick.”

“Contagious?”

“Not to ponies, but it is to other monsters.”

“What creature?”

Fluttershy’s wings pulled tighter to her body. “An Ursa Minor.”

Amber stopped dead in her tracks. “I’m sorry?”

Fluttershy stopped a few feet ahead of her and glanced back. “I… I don’t think we can afford to let the poor baby go for another few days.”

Amber shook her head. “Look, I’d love to show up my mom and be the even Greater and More Powerful Amber Light, but I will not mess with an Ursa anything with you around.”

Fluttershy blinked. “With, me?”

“You darn near killed my mom over an ursa minor!”

Fluttershy’s eyes widened. “Oh no, how did you-“

“She told me. Well okay, Maud told me, but she confirmed it.”

Fluttershy looked down at the dirt. “I see… I guess Maud would be the one to tell you that.”

“So count me out. I refuse to be killed by you.”

Fluttershy stepped forward and put a hoof on Amber’s shoulder. There eyes met. “I would never do that to you! You’re my niece, my family. I… I wasn’t very in control of my emotions when I was younger, but I’ve had many years to work on my anger. I swear, if I didn’t know we needed to do this for the safety of the entire forest, I wouldn’t ask you along. But… we don’t have time to head back.”

Amber glared at her. “And why do you say that now? Why is it only now that you bring up the fact you want me to kill an Ursa Minor?”

Fluttershy nodded to the left. Amber rolled her eyes but followed her gaze. For a moment she wasn’t sure what she was looking at. Just more forest, a clearing, and then more trees.

The clearing looked a bit strange. The ground was littered in bent over, and broken trees as if a flood came through, but it was only in this one circular area. Some of the ground had splotches of black goo. Much like the goo that had made the tar ponies Amber had faced earlier. Only the smell was different. It was sharper, more electric. It smelled like magic.

A patch of brown fur stained with crimson splotches stood out from underneath some of the fallen trees. Amber stared for a moment. Large slashes in the fallen trees made it look like massive claw marks. The brown fur seemed to be attacked to something she could only barely make out. A lump, stained crimson with red meaty gashes all over it.

“I don’t understand-“ Amber started to say.

“That was Harry’s first born, Fuzzy.” Fluttershy’s voice came out stone cold. “His family lived near here. In the cave that used to be there.”

Amber stared at the lump with new found vision. It belonged to one of Fluttershy’s animal friends. There was a mound just a bit further. The mound of rocks and earth looked like an oddly shaped bit of land. Of course if it had once been a cave…

“Okay.” Amber made her decision. “I will not be the one to make the final blow, but I will help you.”

Fluttershy nodded. “Thank you… I just… I thought there was more time before he went mad.”

“Hey, Fluttershy,” Amber asked.

Fluttershy was already marching ahead. “Yes?”

“I thought the Ursa Minors and Majors were all extinct…”

Fluttershy didn’t stop walking. “They are.”

Trixie was normally busy with school work all afternoon but she lucked out today and managed to steal away a few free hours for herself. Her first instinct was to do something she hadn’t in quite some time now. To get a spa treatment. The spa was a quiet and calm place as it always had been, with Aloe and Lotus still running the show. They were an odd pair of sisters, very friendly but never seeming to be interested in dating, and no Trixie did not try to seduce… too hard, with Maud’s approval of course. Other than that they were just as youthful looking as they had been the day she first met them.

They were busy giving Trixie the second best hoof massage she’d ever had when a familiar voice played out musically from the spa chair behind her. “Darling, I didn’t know you were here today.”

Trixie glanced back at Rarity and smiled. “Oh you know me, trying to keep myself pretty for the misses.”

Rarity let out a small laugh. “Oh do I know that feeling. Spike loves it when I come home from the spa. I suppose it also doesn’t hurt that I usually come home with some energy to burn if you know what I mean.”

Trixie rolled her eyes. “I think my youngest daughter might have said it best once with, ‘dragon sex, ew’.”

They both laughed for a minute after that. Rarity added, “I suppose I can cancel plans to set her up on a date with this young dragon I know.”

“Rarity,” Trixie said slowly, “I don’t think Spike would like knowing that you have other dragon contacts.”

“And Maud would be upset to find out that your letting beautiful mares all over your hooves.”

For a moment silence passed between them before they both broke out into another fit of giggles.

Trixie giggled. “Ah, jealous lovers, the best, worst thing in the world.”

“Agreed.”

Trixie looked up at the ceiling. There was a painting of a beautiful sky filled with stylized pegasi flying through the clouds and weaving rainbows together much like giant ribbons. The image was new, painted on here by commission a few years ago from an earth pony that Trixie was related to.

Speaking of artistic earth ponies, a female voice broke the silence of the room. “WHO PUT BLACK CRAP ON THE CEILING?”

Trixie and Rarity both looked over to see a peach colored mare standing on her rear legs as if she was some kind of minotaur and pointing at the corner of the room. Her rainbow colored hair flowed around her shoulders going down to the small of her back. Her tail ended in a black paintbrush like tip.

Aloe, or was it Lotus, it was the pink one, went over to speak with Color Splash who was as her name would imply, making a splash. “It was a tar spill. This is why we called you to come and fix it.”

Color Splash groaned, put her head into her hooves and complained, “Do I look like a repair pony to you? I was busy painting the barn again when I got the message someone had ruined my work here.” She glared up at it and growled. “And it’s covering up dad’s face!”

Trixie let out a sigh. No wonder Color Splash was mad, it wasn’t just that her painting was damaged, she could fix that easily enough. It was that Soarin’s face was being covered by the tar. Color Splash really did love that father of hers, even though he was usually too busy helping Rainbow Dash with military stuff. Speaking of which, this made Trixie curious as to how much involvement he was going to have in the upcoming conflict. It really shouldn’t be that hard to deal with, have Twilight and friends blast away a few alicorns with magic friendship powers, and the world would be safe like always.

A bright pink earth pony bounced in next to Color Splash. Her blond tail was curled up at the end almost resembling a lollipop, and her mane did much the same at the ends. She spotted Trixie right away and hopped over to where Trixie was.

Trixie began, “Hey, Sophie, how are-“

Sophie interrupted, “I’m doing great! Did you see Color Splash get mad over there, she’s so silly.”

Trixie noted that Sophie was wearing her sky blue saddlebags with a bumblebee plushie sticking out from the side. The stuffed animal had a small tear in the side with a bit of stuffing coming loose. Sophie followed her eyes and shrugged. “Mrs. Buzzy got a little hurt when I was out playing earlier. She’ll be fine, I’ll fix her up like a real doctor.”

Trixie nodded. “That’s good, I know you two are inseparable.”

“Pfft only because I saved her. You wouldn’t believe the trauma the poor dear went through. Some days, she still smells like bread.”

Trixie blinked. “How… did you get her again?”

Sophie laughed and turned around. “My brother found her for me. He thought I should fix her up and give her a home, he also thought I should give her to Twilight but that didn’t work out so good.”

Trixie found herself wanting to ask more, but she remembered the number one rule. Don’t ask Pinkie and Fluttershy about how they did something weird, and that rule applied to their kids as well. Sophie’s smile faded a little when she looked up into the ceiling. “You know mom has to do something really sad right.”

Trixie sat up. The argument in the background was quieting down but Color Splash was still yelling even with her starting to use her tail to repaint the ceiling. She was standing precariously on a ladder as she did so, but Trixie trusted in the mare’s balancing skills.

“I’m sorry, what does your mom have to do? Can I help?”

Sophie looked back at her. “I dunno, have you ever had to make an Ursa Minor take a forever nap?”