Vermilion slipped the slender, green-canvas copy of Canopy’s journal into the last of his bags. The burlap satchel, designed to wear across the shoulder and over any light armor, had a special pouch on its side meant for letters or maps. The journal was a bit larger than the satchel’s makers had intended for that spot, but with a bit of finesse and a bit more muscle Vermilion made it fit. Over time the fabric would relax, and the book would be snug and safe and close at hoof whenever he needed it.
He slung the satchel across his back and bounced on his hooves, letting the weight of all his baggage settle. Before long, he knew, he’d be carrying Quicklime’s bags too, and maybe the pegasi’s. Best to get everything in place now. He felt the straps take up the slack and grind into his shoulders and barrel, pinching like they always did. A thin saddle protected his spine from the hard knobs and edges of pots and canteens and weapons and everything else stuffed into his ruck. He closed his eyes and focused on the physical sensation of weight on his bones, letting it bend his spine and drive his hooves through the soft wood floor.
Not much different from being a private. For a moment he smelled the old barracks, their scent of stale hay and sweaty bodies and dust from the sparring salle. The astringent, oily taste of the polish he applied every night to his sabre and barding. He heard Crapemyrtle’s laugh again, muffled by the thin wood walls between the squads, high and light as though the pegasus had just played another prank on his team. Crapemyrtle, dead now for over half a year in Hollow Shades.
Vermilion shook his head, banishing the past. He took one final look around his room – drawers and closets sealed, bed turned down, with linens and pillows sacked at the head. Windows locked. He nodded, turned to leave, and stopped on the threshold.
One day I will leave this room and never return. He froze at the thought, gave the room another look, then closed the door.
Zephyr was downstairs, engaged in a standoff with Frigate. The storm-gray tabby sat by the door, busily working through his fur with a bright pink tongue and studiously ignoring the pegasus. Zephyr stared daggers at him, her feathers fluffed out and her ears laid back against her mane.
“He’s in the way,” she growled. “He won’t let me leave.”
“Uh huh.” Vermilion walked around her, picked up Frigate with one foreleg, and carried the cat into the kitchen. Frigate squirmed and meowed in protest all the way to the sun-drenched spot on the counter where Vermilion set him. He suffered through the smooch Vermilion placed on his forehead, then settled down for a mid-morning nap.
Zephyr snorted at the display. She flapped her wings a few times to settle the flight feathers back in place, then slipped out the door before Frigate could change his mind and come after her again. Vermilion her heard her muffled voice come back, mixed with that of Rose and Quicklime. Cloud Fire added something. From a distance, as always, the sound of the pegasi talking resembled birds chattering in a tree.
He shook his head free of silly thoughts. The apartment was empty again, ready for him to leave. He let out a long breath.
“I will be back,” he whispered.
Nothing answered. He swallowed the rest of his thoughts, then went out the door to join his friends.
* * *
Cloud Fire was unusually subdued as they walked through the morning streets of Everfree. Alert, almost on edge – ears dancing around like flags, head high, his steps light. His wings drafted alongside him, extended a few inches from his barrel. Vermilion had seen pegasi do that before when they were ready for action, anticipating the need to fly or fight at a moment’s notice. A flash of silver between Cloudy’s feathers was even more surprising. The pegasus wore his wingblades in the middle of the city.
Vermilion edged up beside him. “Everything alright?”
“Huh?” Cloudy shot him a quick glance, then returned his attention back to the streets. He hopped and half-extended his wings, floating over a flooded section of the cobblestones.
Vermilion splashed through the puddle. “You seem a little more alert than normal. For before noon.”
Cloudy shrugged. “Would you prefer the alternative?”
Zephyr landed on Cloudy’s other side, falling into step with them both. “We’re marching off to war, boss. Or something like war. Course it’s got ponies on edge.”
“To battle,” Cloudy suggested.
“We’ve done that before,” Vermilion said. “We don’t usually get our weapons out while we’re still in town. And what’s with ‘boss’?”
“Well, you’re our leader, aren’t you? We could call you ‘sir’ if that’s better.”
“Did we ever get actual ranks?” Quicklime chimed in. She bounced along behind Zephyr. “Am I still a lieutenant?”
“We don’t need ranks.” Time to nip that idea in the ass. “It’s just Vermilion. Come on, we’re friends.”
“We are friends,” Zephyr said. “And, you know, when we’re in town that’s great and all. But we’re on a mission again, and we’ll be with the Company. You think they’ll be fine with us just tagging along as Luna’s best friends club?”
“They probably won’t like us showing up at all,” Rose said. They were the first words she’d offered since their walk through the city began.
The same thought had already occurred to Vermilion. “We’re not trying to horn in on their business. Except for walking to the border, we don’t have to do anything together except talk.”
“They still won’t like it, especially if we’re not acting like we’re in the guard,” Zephyr said. “That means ranks. Or at least pretending to have ranks, boss.”
“If we’re going to pretend to have ranks, I’d like to be a pretend captain,” Quicklime said. “Captain Quicklime!”
“We’re knights in Luna’s service,” he said. The word tasted odd in his mouth. It was like trying to call himself a unicorn. The mental image of a horn protruding from his brow so distracted him that his hoof caught on a cobblestone, and he nearly stumbled. The hundreds of pounds stacked on his back wobbled dangerously as he caught himself. “That’s our rank.”
“It’s not a title, though.” Zephyr frowned. “What do knights call each other?”
Nopony answered. After a moment they all looked back at Rose.
“What?” Her brow twisted oddly, and Vermilion realized she was raising the eyebrow hidden by the coral pink blindfold across her right eye. Apparently old reflexes never died.
“C’mon,” Zephyr said. “You’re a noble, you know the answer.”
“I am assuredly not a noble,” Rose shot back. “My mother is descended from the gentry. That’s all. We haven’t held a title in generations.”
“But you used to,” Quicklime said. “Your line’s not extinct, obviously. So you still have honors.”
Rose huffed. “Yes, technically. But it is literally the least important thing about me. If you saw the size of our family’s manor you’d understand. It’s smaller than most farm houses.”
That wasn’t true. Vermilion didn’t have to see Rose’s family manor to know that. He bit his lip to keep from responding. Memories of crowded nights lying in a shared bed with six brothers and sisters all fighting for a share of the same too-small blanket assailed him.
“Okay,” Cloudy said. “But what do knights call each other?”
“Sir, if they’re stallions. Dame if they’re mares.”
Quicklime gasped. “Dame Quicklime!”
“Well, you wouldn’t introduce yourself as that,” Rose said. “Not even real nobles are that pretentious.”
“Then I will introduce you, Dame Quicklime,” Cloudy said. He smiled for the first time that morning.
“Why, thank you, Sir Cloud Fire!”
Rose tilted her head back to stare at the sky. “I already regret this.”
“Sir Vermilion, do you approve of these titles?” Zephyr asked. A wicked cat’s grin stretched across her face. “Or do you prefer Sir Cherry?”
“I was really fine with just Vermilion—”
“Sir Vermilion it is!” Cloudy flapped his wings, and bounced into the air, soaring with his hooves just above their heads until gravity slowly pulled him back down. “Dame Rose, do you—”
“Dame Rose Quartz,” Rose said. “If we’re going with this silliness, you have to do it right. Full names.”
“Apologies, Dame Rose Quartz.” Cloudy enunciated each word carefully. “Do you think we’ll fit in with the Company now?”
“Oh, clearly. I don’t know why we didn’t think of this earlier.”
“Okay, someone use my title.” Zephyr pushed between them. The load of gear on her back teetered. “I want to hear it.”
“Dame Zephyr!” Quicklime chirped. “How do you like it?”
Zephyr grinned. “You know, I could get used to it, I think. Thank you, Dame Quicklime.”
“Of course, Dame Zephyr!”
That set the tone for the next twenty minutes. They walked the rest of the way through the Osage district, kicking aside the bulbous, fallen green osage oranges, the pegasi and Quicklime bandying their titles back and forth like hoofballs. Even Rose got in the act eventually, and that of course dragged Vermilion into it. And though the sound of his own name with that alien sir before it still grated against his ears, he had to admit, at least everypony was relaxed as they found their way through the city to their old, unforgotten Company.
* * *
The Company had set their camp up a few miles outside the official border of Everfree. But Everfree, of course, extended for miles beyond the city itself – the line where cobbled streets and stately townhouses ended merely marked the start of the great fields surrounding the capital, miles upon miles of orchards and plantations and prime grazing lands. The villages here were wealthy, even palatial in comparison to the farmsteads of Hollow Shades or Vermilion’s old home. Their sanded oak sides were painted – painted! – in flavors attuned to their owners’ whims. Here, a perky yellow estate with gabled roofs and flowerboxed windows oversaw an orchard of lemons. There, past the river and the line of slender aspens, a fire-red barn filled the warm summer air with the scent of drying peppers. The road was hard packed gravel that crunched beneath his hooves and drowned out the buzzing of cicadas in the tall elms shadowing their way.
“Huh,” Cloudy said as they reached the wide pasture the Company had commandeered for their bivouac. “Found ‘em.”
The Company had moved up in the world. Which is to say, it was bigger. Much bigger. Row after row of wagons, loaded with supplies, parked alongside the road, tended by a small herd of earth ponies. Hundreds of tents ranged out into the grasslands, each large enough to hold a dozen ponies with space for their belongings. A flight of pegasi wheeled overhead in loose formation, spears dangling from their legs like stingers from wasps. They had made a parade ground out of a massive field, and as they watched a sergeant ran his squad through the same sabre exercises Vermilion remembered from years past. And in the center, surrounded by banners and sentries and scurrying messengers, was a towering pavilion. A pair of flags whipped in the breeze from atop its pinnacle – Celestia’s sky-blue standard, and below it Luna’s black, star-spangled field.
It was a far cry from the wagon train Vermilion remembered, or the few dozen tents the Company had been able to muster during their march to Hollow Shades. “Somepony’s been recruiting,” he mumbled.
“Celestia wanted a force that could defend Equestria,” Rose said. She came to a stop beside Vermilion, close enough to touch his shoulder with hers. “The old Company wasn’t large enough. This is a full battalion, or even two.”
“Electrum got promoted, right?” Zephyr asked. “This must be why.”
They passed through the rows of tents. The smell of field living – unwashed ponies, trampled grass, countless pieces of armor and weapons all needing oil, the oat porridge preferred by earth pony cooks, and of course the faint stink of shit from the distant slit trenches – all assaulted Vermilion’s nose with familiarity. Quicklime wrinkled her muzzle and pressed closer to Rose’s side. A few soldiers spared them a glance as they passed, but they were nopony Vermilion recognized. All strangers.
Finally, as they approached the pavilion, a charcoal earth pony sentry stopped them. He leaned on his spear, relaxed, and gave each of the mares a long, head-to-hooves look before grinning at Zephyr.
“Sorry sweetie,” he said. “Off-limits. No civvies allowed.”
Quicklime drew in a breath. Before she could explode, Vermilion took a step forward. “We’re expected. Would you please let Brigadier Electrum that Vermilion and his team have arrived?”
The sentry peered down his snout. He was at least a half-a-head taller than Vermilion, and muscled like an earth pony should be. A moment of silence stretched out, then finally he snorted.
“Brigadier’s busy. I’ll see if there’s an officer around. Wait here.” The stallion spun and walked into the shadows of the pavilion without looking back.
“Friendly bunch,” Zephyr muttered.
“They’re in the field,” Cloudy said. “We’d have acted the same way if a bunch of strange ponies walked up out of nowhere and asked to see the major.”
“Still.” Quicklime scowled at the pavilion. “Did you see how he looked at us? Might as well have asked to peek under our tails.”
Before that line of thought could continue, the sentry emerged from the tent with an even larger stallion at his side. Buckeye stopped, squinted at the sun, squinted at the five of them, then leaned over and whispered something in the sentry’s ear. The charcoal stallion took off at a gallop down one of the tent city’s rows.
Buckeye, whispering! The world really had changed since Hollow Shades. Memories of their old sergeant swarmed out from the back of Vermilion’s mind like a plague of gadflies, and he shook them away with a snort.
Ponies changed all the time. He ought to know that.
“Lieutenant.” Vermilion gave Buckeye a polite nod. He could actually feel Buckeye walk toward them – each step of the massive stallion’s hooves sent little tremors up Vermilion’s bones. “Congratulations on your promotion.”
“Thank you,” Buckeye said. He stopped a few paces away. “I’d say the same, but I don’t know what rank that witch gave you. Zephyr, Cloudy.” He gave each of the pegasi a nod in turn.
Witch? Vermilion stared at him, confused. Obviously that wasn’t what Buckeye had said. His tongue had slipped. Luna was a princess, co-equal to the ruler of Equestria, the closest thing to a god that had ever walked on four legs. Rose said something beside him, followed by Quicklime and Zephyr, but he couldn’t understand them. A low roar drowned them out. It ebbed and flowed, deafening him and then retreating, leaving the world in silence. It was his pulse.
“Knights,” he said. The world returned in a rush, and everypony’s gaze snapped back to him. “We’re knights in Luna’s service, thank you.”
Buckeye snorted. “Knights. Haven’t been real knights in centuries, and she decides you’ll be the first? ‘Bout what I’d expect from her.”
Vermilion took a step forward, stopping when the tip of Cloudy’s wing touched his shoulder. “What does that mean?”
“You know what it means.” Buckeye’s gaze swept across them. “I was there when she snatched you up, remember? In the throne room? That mare’s loose in the head and everypony knows it.”
“She’s your princess!” Vermilion hissed. “Show some respect!”
“Respect is earned.” Buckeye turned aside and began walking down one of the arrow-straight paths between the tents. The grass here was not yet trampled into mud, and the dew caught in it washed away the dust on Vermilion’s hooves as he trotted to keep up. “Princess Celestia is defending Equestria while her sister throws temper tantrums and plots in the shadows.”
“Princess Luna is trying to save the entire world,” Rose said. She trotted at Buckeye’s side, head high as she spoke. The wind kicked up her mane, exposing her eyepatch and the savage edges of the scar above and below. Ponies fell silent and stared as she passed. “There are ponies outside Equestria who don’t have armies to defend them against the new darkness. That’s what she’s doing… what we’re doing.”
“Uh huh.” Buckeye didn’t seem impressed. “And how’s that going so far?”
“Very well, thank you!” Cloudy floated above them, tilting his wings to balance the load of gear on his back. “We saved Maplebridge from Dreamoras, and…”
Buckeye slowed. He tilted his head up. “And?”
Amidst the summer heat, a tendril of cold found Vermilion’s heart. It wound around his spine and filled his lungs with frost. It was not the pleasant chill of Luna’s embrace – this was the touch of fear. For a moment the bright sun faded, and in the sky he saw an endless, depthless night, and the night was empty, for the moon had devoured all the stars, and when it was sated the moon looked down to peer at him—
His knee locked, and he nearly stumbled. The sudden motion shocked him back to the warm summer day. Buckeye squinted at him, still waiting for an answer. Cloudy dropped several feet and nearly crashed. Rose and Quicklime both froze, eyes wide, focused on something only they could see.
Zephyr recovered first. “We… there was a town…” She trailed off and looked to Vermilion for help.
“We found the source of these attacks,” he said. “The heart of the new darkness. It destroyed a town we were trying to defend. A few… many ponies died.”
Buckeye grunted. He slowed his pace, letting them all catch up. “Worse than Hollow Shades?”
No point in sugar-coating it. “Yeah.”
Another grunt. “Two disasters, both hundreds of leagues outside Equestria. And do you know how many attacks there have been within our borders?”
Vermilion shook his head. “I haven’t heard of any.”
“Because there haven't been any,” Buckeye said. They reached the massive parade ground at the center of the camp. Thousands of hooves had trod the grass into a soupy mess. Out in the center, sergeants barked orders to row after row of drilling soldier. Bales of hay marked with targets dotted the far end of the field, and as Vermilion watched a spear fell from the sky to impale one just shy of the bullseye. A wave of cheers echoed from the pegasi overhead.
“Look at this,” Buckeye continued. He stopped by a rack of sparring sabres, so familiar to Vermilion that he felt the ghost of their impact against his bones again. “There are two thousand trained soldiers here. That’s ten times more than the old Company had. No monsters have attacked Equestria, because what monster would dare? If we’d had this many ponies at Hollow Shades...” It was his turn to trail off.
“Then what?” Vermilion pressed. “What could this many ponies have done against Blightweaver?”
Buckeye spun, much faster than a pony his size should have been able to do. He loomed over Vermilion, his eyes filled with a wild intensity the likes of which Vermilion hadn’t seen since that fateful night in Hollow Shades, when blood streamed down from the cut on Buckeye’s scalp where now rested a scar.
“Them? Maybe nothing.” For all the intensity of his expression, Buckeye’s voice was as quiet as Vermilion had ever heard. Just for him. “But what if we had you, too? If you were with us, Vermilion, and your friends, we could destroy any monster that threatened Equestria! We could be safe forever. An entire nation, millions of ponies, free to live out their lives without fear.”
Vermilion skipped back, out of Buckeye’s shadow. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying, join us.” Buckeye turned his head and added the others to his address. “All of you. Electrum would make you his senior officers in a heartbeat. Vermilion, you could be his deputy, the first earth pony general since the Age of Migration. Zephyr, you would command his air corps! Electrum would do anything to have you at his side, and not just him! Princess Celestia herself has asked about you, Vermilion. She could give you true noble ranks, not this… knighthood, or whatever Luna calls it.”
“And who would defend the rest of the world?” Rose asked. “There are ponies outside Equestria. Entire nations of zebra and griffons and others we don’t even know. What will happen to them?”
“They’ll defend themselves. Or not.” Buckeye shrugged. “Our first responsibility is protecting our own lands and our own ponies. We can’t do that if we go abroad, seeking monsters to destroy.”
“You don’t care about them? At all?” Vermilion stepped out into the field to face Buckeye. The grassy mud squelched beneath his hooves. “After everything we went through in Hollow Shades?”
“Especially after Hollow Shades!” Buckeye roared. All around them conversations died. The drone of the camp fell silent. The marching formations stumbled to a stop. The wheeling pegasi overhead shifted their courses to orbit this new curiosity. “I lost friends there, Vermilion, and for what? For ungrateful ponies who chose to live out in the wilderness, a thousand leagues from the light of the princesses? What did you lose?”
Vermilion stared at him, so affronted he couldn’t think. Of course he’d lost friends. He knew ponies who’d died… Crapemyrtle, for one. He tried to remember the pegasus’s face, and found the memory hazy. But there was Triticale, that earth pony cook who sometimes helped Vermilion wash the pots after breakfast. They’d been friends, of a sort. They just never talked much.
Well, there was the major! Not a friend, precisely, but her death was a loss to the entire company. He opened his mouth to say so, and found he couldn’t speak. Her name lodged on his tongue.
Buckeye stared at him. He snorted. “I thought not. You all survived. And then, when the Company needed you most, you all left. You know what ponies here think of you, Vermilion? They don’t think you’re a hero. They think you’re a—”
“Buckeye.” Rose spoke so quietly Vermilion barely heard her. But the almost-whisper sliced through Buckeye’s rant. She stepped around to stand beside Vermilion, neverminding the muddy stains it left on her pale coat. “We all lost something in Hollow Shades.”
Silence. Vermilion stared at Rose’s eyepatch, then let his gaze fall to his hooves. A fragment of that long, delirious march back to civilization from Hollow Shades dredged itself out of the depths of his mind. He remembered nights, wrapped in bandages, thinking he was drowning at sea. The waves crashing over his head. The constant pain of labored breathing. He remembered snow, and ashes that were like snow, and hopeless despair. Canopy, impaled on Blightweaver’s claw, telling him to run. And then a fire so hot that nothing remained of her but memories.
Gods, how had he ever thought that was a victory? He fumbled with his hoof for the hidden pocket on his saddlebags, searching for the reassuring shape of Canopy’s journal.
Still there. He let out the breath he hadn’t realized he was holding.
Buckeye was staring at them. Nopony had spoken after Rose. He wasn’t sure how anypony could dare. Certainly, nopony who’d been at Hollow Shades could. Quicklime and Zephyr and Cloudy looked just as lost in their own recollections. Only Rose had the strength to return Buckeye’s gaze.
This silent truce might have continued indefinitely, had not the charcoal sentry returned. He trotted up to them, stopped, gazed at the tableau uncertainly, then whispered in Buckeye’s ear.
Buckeye grunted. “Brigadier’s on his way.”
“Well.” Vermilion swallowed. “Good. It will be good to see him again.”
“If you say.” Buckeye walked past them toward the weapon stand. The crowd of privates and NCOs that had gathered during their talk scurried away from him like bugs revealed beneath a log. “I meant what I said before, you know. He’d give anything to have you rejoin the Company. No recriminations, no hard feelings. Any job you wanted. Hell, he’d let you go back to being a camp cook if you wanted, though that’d be a waste.”
Vermilion shook his head. “Sorry. We have a…” Mission? No, it was more than that. “A duty.”
“Thought you’d say that.” Buckeye reached out with one of his enormous hooves and plucked a sparring sabre from the rack. It was one of the larger swords, nearly as long from pommel to tip as Vermilion’s entire body. It seemed tiny in Buckeye’s grip. “Say, you been practicing? Not getting rusty, are you?”
Ah. He remembered the sharp sting of the sparring sabre on his flesh. At the time, it had seemed like the most painful sensation possible. Now… He shook his head again. “No. Not rusty.”
“Uh huh. Feel like a little sparring session?” Buckeye grinned, and for a moment Vermilion thought he saw a bit of the old drill sergeant in him. The stallion who’d taught him everything he knew about swords.
Well, not everything. If Vermilion was being honest, he’d picked up a few tricks since Hollow Shades. He stared at the rack of practice swords, trying to remember what they felt like to hold. What their grips tasted like.
“Ah, you just want to beat me up again,” he said. Still, he leaned forward and selected a suitably sized sabre from the rack. The supple leather grip surrendered to the press of his teeth, and he felt the stern wood tang beneath. A spin and a thrust at an imaginary foe. The sabre’s wood blade flexed nicely. Rattan, or something similar. Much better than the felt-wrapped hickory rods he remembered.
“Naw. Well, maybe a bit.” Buckeye took a practice swing. The air whistled around the tip of the sword. “C’mon, I’ll go easy on you. Besides, we’ve got a medic right here.” He tilted his head at Rose.
She rolled her eye. “I’m not doing anything to encourage this foolishness. You want to beat each other up, you can suffer the consequences.”
What would Canopy do? Walk away, of course. It was clear as day when Buckeye wanted – to bloody the hero in front of all these eyes. Show the new Company that the pony they’d heard about, that this strange, small, foolish Vermilion wasn’t so tough. Canopy knew better than to care what ponies thought. She let them know her strength through the power of her example.
So, Canopy would not approve. Vermilion considered that, tried to let its logic persuade him. But he was already loosening the straps on his bags, letting them slide onto the dry straw matting beside the weapon stand. He gave the canvas satchel a gentle pat, to make sure Canopy’s journal was still snug inside, then stepped out into the field with Buckeye.
“A few rounds wouldn’t hurt,” he said around the handle of the sabre. It muffled his words, but earth ponies were used to talking with objects in the way of their tongues.
Buckeye didn’t move for a moment. He just stared at Vermilion, eyes widened, and then he chuckled. “Huh. Didn’t think you’d say yes. You used to avoid sparring like the plague.”
“Yeah, well.” Vermilion shrugged. He set his hooves into the mud, getting a nice, wide stance. Around them, ponies began forming in a circle. Apparently there weren’t any duties so important they couldn’t be interrupted for a bit of entertainment. “Ponies change.”
“That they do.” Buckeye leaned back, then slid forward with deceptive grace for a pony his size, his sabre straightened in a stab at Vermilion’s heart. It was slow, almost gentle. A questing thrust, more a question than an attack.
Vermilion parried it with ease. The wood swords let out a loud crack as they connected, and he reset his stance. “Do they let you fight much?”
“Every day.” Buckeye swung low this time, aiming for Vermilion’s knee. It was faster, and if it had landed it might’ve left a real bruise.
No need to even parry. Vermilion stepped back and began to circle. The crowd moved with them. “Not like this. Real fighting. Killing monsters.”
Buckeye frowned around the sword. He pressed forward again, meeting Vermilion’s sword with another crack. “I told you, there’ve been no attacks inside Equestria.”
An opening! Vermilion lunged forward, swinging the sabre around at Buckeye’s exposed neck. The larger stallion turned in time and managed to catch the sword, and they strained together, their cheeks just inches apart. The tip of his muzzle brushed Buckeye’s ear. He dug his hooves into the mud and slowly forced Buckeye backward.
“You could,” Vermilion managed to grunt. Buckeye was so close he could smell the sweat in his coat and hear the whistle of breath around the sword’s grip. “You could join us. Luna said any of my friends could serve her, and that includes you.” His hooves slipped, and he scrambled to stay upright while still whispering. “There are two thousand ponies here, you said. Let them defend Equestria, while we destroy the enemy.”
Buckeye’s weight shifted suddenly, the only warning Vermilion had before an enormous hoof clipped his jaw and sent him sprawling backward. The world spun, and his hooves left the ground for an instant before he crashed back to the mud with a wet thud. A raucous cheer went up from the ponies surrounding them. A hot, wet trickle dribbled out his mouth and dripped from the sword’s grip.
“You gonna gab or fight?” Buckeye asked.
“Sorry.” Vermilion pushed himself up and shook out his legs. His jaw ached for a moment, but the pain was fading already. There wouldn’t even be a bruise in the morning. “Bad habit.”
“It’ll get you killed someday.” Barely had he finished speaking, but Buckeye was already attacking. Another thrust, but faster; the huge stallion crossed the empty space between them in a blink.
Vermilion snapped his sabre around in a parry. The loud crack of the wood swords as they connected filled the air. The circle of ponies around them expanded as the attacks became more violent – nopony wanted to catch a spare swing in their teeth.
They danced, and in the dance Vermilion found himself at ease. The fear of pain and the hyperactive tension that always preceded swordplay faded away, replaced by a detachment from the present, as though he were an observer in the ring of ponies around them rather than a duelist himself. His eyes followed Buckeye’s movements, and his sabre moved with the ease of thought. Was this how unicorns always felt? Their minds alone able to shape the world? He marveled at the idea. His body stretched and stepped and swung to meet Buckeye’s assaults, but it was Vermilion’s mind that fought. His muscles and bones were like the limbs of a marionette, directed by a puppeteer.
Buckeye stepped too far forward. Vermilion saw it, and before he even understood the significance of the error, his sword was already slashing down to catch Buckeye’s knee with a gentle tap. The leg folded, and Buckeye fell in slow motion to the mud. His eyes widened in shock.
Intention, again. Attack. His sword completed a huge circle to crash down on Buckeye’s head. Only a wild parry kept the blow from connect, and they found themselves locked together again. Vermilion leaned over his foe, pressing all his weight down on the huge stallion.
“We need a pony like you,” Vermilion said. He spoke directly into Buckeye’s ear. “You know me, Buckeye. I’m not a leader, but you are! The others follow me because they think I’m a hero, but you know the truth, don’t you? That I’m a weakling, a runt who got lucky a few times and had friends who could save the day! If we had a real warrior leading us—”
Buckeye tossed him off with bellow. He swung the sabre around wildly, and Vermilion barely managed to deflect it away from his skull. They settled back into ready stances a few paces apart, breathing hard.
“I have responsibilities here,” Buckeye growled. He swung again, with control again but with real power. A single blow like that would fell a unicorn if it landed. “Luna’s filled your head with fantasies about saving the world, but I don’t have time for dreams. I have a nation to defend and ponies to keep safe. My people! Not the ungrateful strangers you’re obsessed with!”
Vermilion sidestepped the blows with ease. For once, his small stature worked to his advantage; he bobbed and weaved and let Buckeye swing himself into exhaustion. “I’ve met them, Buckeye. They’re not strangers anymore. They’re good ponies. Saving them isn’t a dream. They deserve our help—”
“There is no such thing!” Buckeye shouted. He scooped up a great gout of mud and kicked it at Vermilion’s face, then leapt forward with a brutal flurry of strikes. Inexorably they pushed Vermilion back; faster and faster, like the beat of a drum crashing against Vermilion’s guard. His hooves pressed deeper and deeper into the mud with each blow.
“There is no ‘deserve’!” He continued. Another blow that loosened the teeth in Vermilion’s jaw. “There is only strength, and we must save our strength for ourselves, or Equestria will end like Hollow Shades. Is that what you want, Vermilion? Is that what you want?” Again, a blow that knocked Vermilion’s guard to pieces and forced him to his knees, and Buckeye reared up onto his hind legs, the sabre stretching high over head. He brought it down in a slashing arc so fast the air screamed.
Vermilion watched it fall in slow motion. He pressed back to his hooves, and let the sabre fall from his mouth. A pang of disappointment shot through him, flooding his mouth with bitterness. He’d hoped, at least, Buckeye would understand their quest, their reason for venturing beyond Equestria’s borders. That he would agree that saving a life, any life, was more important than who that life belonged to. That monsters left free to roam anywhere in the world would eventually threaten them here at home.
But it seemed Vermilion couldn’t even do that. He was as bad at persuading ponies as at leading them. And now he was wasting time with this silly duel to see whose balls were bigger.
He raised his foreleg and caught Buckeye’s blow with his hoof. The flexible rattan blade exploded like it had struck an anvil, pelting Vermilion and the mud and even the crowd with sharp splinters. The shards drew little lines of blood beneath his coat, but he barely felt their sting. Ponies shouted and stumbled back, crashing into the row of spectators behind them.
The disintegration of his sword and sudden lack of resistance sent Buckeye stumbling. His knees splashed down into the mud, and he slid for several feet before managing to regain his hooves. The sabre, now shattered except for a few inches of jagged, splintered blade, came apart in his teeth; the leather grip unwound and fell in ribbons to the mud, the guard detached itself from broken rivets, and the pommel and tang simply fell to pieces.
“I’m sorry,” Vermilion said. “I didn’t mean to offend you.” He reached down to pick up his sabre and walked it over to the weapon rack. It was covered in mud, and it hurt his soul to put it back on the rack without cleaning it, but the Company had privates for that, and they would be offended it he tried to do their job. “And it seems you’ve won. Just like old times.”
Buckeye spat out a piece of the tang. Dots of blood peppered his face and neck where pieces of the sword had caught him, but they barely showed against his rust coat.
“Huh.” He shook a bit of mud off his legs. “Not bad, kid. You’re better than Luna deserves.”
Vermilion frowned. “You don’t know her. Not like we do.”
“Yeah, I hope I never know her like you do. Looks pretty painful, from where I’m standing.”
There was probably some good retort for that, but the barb struck a little close to home. How to explain the majesty that was Princess Luna, to those who only saw her through the lens of Celestia? Ponies blinded by the light of the sun would never grow to appreciate the subtle beauty offered by the night and its all-embracing chill. An unseen weight settled on Vermilion’s shoulders, a weight on his soul that exhausted him in a way their short fight had not. A better servant could have defended their master, but he was a poor servant, and that stung.
Before he could muster a defense of Luna’s honor, the crowd opened. NCOs barked to their charges, dragging soldiers back to their duties. Vermilion’s friends surrounded him, brushing away the smears of mud that coated him from withers to hooves. Rose gave him a quick look, inspected his hoof where Buckeye’s sword had struck, then gave a little snort and punched him in the shoulder.
“Stupid,” she said.
“Yeah.” He stretched his legs, checking for strains or hidden injuries. None presented themselves. “You expected different?”
She blew out a little puff of breath and leaned forward to whisper. “No, but maybe someday you’ll surprise me.” Her cheek brushed his, and for a moment as she withdrew her lips traced a soft line along the angle of his jaw. Then she turned, and went to inspect Buckeye.
Zephyr raised an eyebrow. He ignored it and tried to brush some mud from his chest. It was really ground in there – he’d probably have to take a bath or something. Maybe it would rain later, and he could just stand in it? He could ask Cloudy to whip up a storm—
There was a clatter of hooves, and the babble of conversations ceased. He looked up to see a new stallion joining them, a pale blue unicorn draped with a royal purple cloak. A bit of the melancholy weight lifted from Vermilion’s soul, and he found the strength to smile.
“Sir Vermilion,” Electrum gave him a polite nod. The unicorn looked older than Vermilion remembered, or at least more mature. Certainly as strong as ever, but now he carried a certain solemn decorum, draped around his shoulders like a cloak. An air of gravity and power that Vermilion had only ever felt around Lord Graymoor or the princesses themselves. The wounds on his shoulder had finally healed, leaving a mess of scars that unsettled his light blue coat.
“Brigadier Electrum.” Vermilion pushed himself to attention. “It’s good to see you again, sir. Congratulations on your promotion.”
“And yours.” Electrum smiled at him, a real smile, like Vermilion would give a friend. The honesty of it shook him. “I hear you’ve been up to great things lately.”
“Our record’s a bit mixed on that, I’m afraid. Hopefully our journey with you will be successful.”
“Oh, no doubt.” Electrum looked up and down Vermilion’s mud-splattered body, then over at Buckeye, who was in a similar state. “I see you’re already practicing with us again.”
“Apologies, sir,” Buckeye said. “It was just a quick round of fun. Like old times.”
“Mm.” Electrum’s horn glowed, and a wicked splinter of rattan from the shattered blade floated into the air before him. He studied it, then flicked it back into the mud. “Just like old times, huh?”
“Maybe a little different,” Vermilion allowed.
“Different is good.” Electrum said. He turned to face Vermilion’s friends as well. “We’ll need different ideas, different strategies in Simoom. The reports I’ve gotten from the border are unlike anything we’ve ever encountered.”
Quicklime bounced forward. “Changes, right? Things are changing and nopony knows why? Ponies and rivers and even mountains coming and going and vanishing and reappearing?”
He nodded. “The locals who’ve come back say that nothing feels solid anymore. Like the world itself around Simoom is made of clay, and if they stare at it too long or too hard it begins to bend. They say it’s like living in—”
“A dream,” Cloudy said. His gaze was on something distant, and he didn’t seem to realize he’d interrupted. “Like a dream come to life.”
Electrum nodded. “Just so. And those are just the reports from Simoom. They say Teawater is worse.”
It was the same force that had destroyed Hazelnight. Vermilion knew it as surely as he knew his own name or the face of his mother. He would have bet his life on it. An uneasy mixture of fear and anger and bitter self-loathing flowed through his veins. The same being that had defeated them so easily in Hazelnight waited for them now in Teawater.
And he couldn’t wait to face it again.