//------------------------------// // 28. Fire // Story: The Name of Our Mistakes // by ObabScribbler //------------------------------// Smoke wreathed Castle Everfree like fog. Even when it had dissipated, the smell remained. After the crowd had trundled away and scattered back to jobs and guest quarters, it was discovered that Starswirl had once again vanished. Most wondered whether he had ‘teleported’ himself away the same way he had arrived. Of those, almost all agreed that he should have stayed. Regardless of his rudeness in leaving so soon and without warning, all agreed that his eulogy, though not what they had imagined, had been almost perfect. Nopony would ever forget the day they had said their first goodbye to a founding pony, and also seen the fabled Starswirl the Bearded in the flesh. The five remaining founders gathered in the largest guest chamber as the sun descended in the sky. It was too late to return to their provinces and they had not seen each other for a long time. It one counted only the times they had all been gathered together it was even longer, so they took the opportunity to light a fire in the grate and reminisce about old times. “’Tis a bad lot when one’s friends die,” Pansy sighed. “Death should be glorious, preferably in battle defending another!” Hurricane declared, shaking a hoof like she was once again rousing warriors to fight. She sank back in her chair, her old bones creaking nearly as much as the wood. “To die of old age and a failing body … an ignoble end, to be sure. Better to throw thyself on thy sword than suffer the pains and humiliations of age.” “Thy ponies would disagree, old friend,” Smart Cookie pointed out. She stared into the fire, light flickering across her face. In the shifting shadows her features seemed to move between old and young from moment to moment. “And I hazard that thy devotion to them would stay thy hoof from using thy sword upon thyself. Thou wouldst not leave thy ponies while they need thee, surely.” “Nay,” Hurricane admitted. “Though, in truth, they govern much themselves in these latest years and have little use for us.” “Our city be well established now,” said Pansy. “Several generations of pegasi do now administer weather from thence.” Smart Cookie insisted, “Such a thing would not have happened without thy guiding hooves and experience.” “Cloudsdale thrives,” Hurricane agreed sullenly. “Tis all I imagined and more. Pegasi prosper, yet live not removed from thy earth ponies, nor from thy unicorns, Platinum.” “Princess Platinum,” she corrected primly. “Equestria,” Pansy murmured. “All we did desire and more. Princess Celestia and Princess Luna hath proved our faith well placed. Under their reign the country is united and prospers in safety. Could we have beaten back King Sanguine’s army and kept his claws at bay so long? Could we have defeated Discord? I say nay.” “Though it pains me, I also say nay,” said Hurricane. “Their efforts do outshine our own.” “Come now, Commander,” Platinum protested, sticking to titles out of long habit. She held a poker into the fire, toasting slices of bread to a perfect golden brown. These she passed around, making sure everypony else had some before toasting her own. “Belittle not our achievements. Without us, Equestria would not exist at all.” “With us did Equestria almost not exist at all!” Puddinghead declared, his moustache swaying in the gently wafting heat. His coat was thinning these days and he wore a thick doublet with sleeves so puffed his forelegs stuck out nearly perpendicular to his body. “Or didst thou forget the Windigos?” Platinum shuddered. “Indeed not.” She inspected the latest piece of toast before plucking it off the poker with her magic and levitating it onto Hurricane’s plate. “Ugh, wretched creatures. How fortunate we are that they remain at bay.” “’Tis the warmth of our ponies’ hearts that protects them,” said Smart Cookie, biting into her toast. “Nay,” Puddinghead chuckled, though it was a pale reflection of his usual laughter. “’Tis the warmth of Celestia’s sun that protects us!” The other four chuckled along with him, though theirs were no brighter, nor any more convincing. The reason for their gathering hung over them the same way the pyre smoke hung over the castle. “Clover was the best of us,” Smart Cookie said abruptly, and so forcefully that nopony present doubted her words. “’Tis shameful that we live while he be gone.” “Shameful?” Pansy echoed. “Do not demean thy own worth, my friend. Thou art worth so much more than that.” She sighed, picking holes in her toast without eating any. “Life doth continue. Though we dislike death and fear what may come after, we may no more change it than we may change the flow of time that bears us toward it.” “Time,” Platinum snorted. “I daresay Starswirl the Bearded may contend with thee on that point.” “I daresay he would,” Pansy acknowledged. “Yet even he shalt one day know what doth lie beyond the gates of Tartarus. I, for one, do say it should be finest of adventures. ‘Tis best to think on death so, for it eases the fear of it. Think not of death as an ending, but as a beginning – something new to experience and learn.” “Something new to learn?” Puddinghead chuckled. “Then Clover shalt enjoy it greatly. Mayhap he shalt even meet us there and teach us as he used to. Smart Cookie, dost though recall when he did stay with us one Winter and attempt to clear snow the earth pony way?” This time Smart Cookie’s giggle was more genuine. “Oh, I do! Such a stir he did cause! I recall how stern I was with him for using magic. My face wouldst put flight a dozen mad wyverns! Yet afterwards my sides did fairly split from laughing as his rump did jut from the banked snow.” “I do recall his attempts to blow glass,” Platinum said wistfully. “Many years did pass between our first farewell and second hello. Unicornia already held its repute for fine crafts in metal and glass. Clover brought with him strong spells for weaving any material, which my ponies use still to make thy pegasi’s armour, Hurricane. Clover didst try his hoof at blowing glass and fair exploded with but a tiny blown phial to show for it. ‘Methinks my mouth be better made for spell-casting and eating’, he did say unto me.” She smiled to herself. “I possess that phial still. I shall treasure it always, now.” “Clover did cast a spell to walk upon the clouds as any pegasi may,” Hurricane muttered. “I confess, when I saw him prance upon them like a giddy foal, it gladdened my heart. I do almost wish anypony could cast such a spell and visit Cloudsdale to look upon its glory.” She smiled fiercely, in a way that might have intimidated her companions if they hadn’t known her so well. “Almost.” Puddinghead took up the goblet of drink he had placed on the floor while he ate. Swallowing his mouthful of toast, he raised it high. “To Clover. May he ever be in our hearts.” The others did likewise. “To Clover!” Unbeknownst to the occupants of that nostalgic chamber, things were afoot that were about to shatter their world forever. Far away, in a distant mountain range, a pony appeared in a flash of magic. He looked around, pawed at a split in the cliff face behind some old ruins, and vanished again in a second flash.