They marched in silence.
Two by two, the thirty unwilling recruits were kicked and rousted into columns. On their backs, mountainous bundles of supplies, gear, weapons, and of course, their ‘burdens’. Solid and heavy, the resin clasped packs chafed their aching flanks. Everypony in the formation was forced to don a collar marked with various runes.
Each pony carried some unique items as well as packs measured to match the level of strength Mordane expected from each race.
The earth ponies bore the heaviest specialized gear: a large copper shield and short sword. Differing from conventional wisdom, they did not have saddles for mounting crossbows or spears, opting to incorporate only the shield and short sword into their equipment. This confused the militarily experienced among them as this would force them to stand their ground and limit their attacking options.
Pegusi wings were bound firmly. They were primarily armed with thin spears twice as long as they were, and a very light crossbow barely strong enough to kill an unarmored pony. A few carried a specialized flying blade meant to be dragged behind them in the air.
The unicorns were fitted with horn nullifiers synced to Mordane's own magical signature. They did not carry any weapons, but they were instead loaded with extra provisions. Their equipment was lighter than the earth ponies but still heavier than the pegasi's, despite being the weakest of them all.
Then they marched, marched, and marched some more. Each carrying their assigned weight. The miles pounded like nails into their skulls, he dragged them over the mountains and onto the great plain of Heridon.
It was clear One Eye would hound them over every rock, nipping at their every step.
His hooves, like short javelins, would find the gaps in between their burdens to jerk and stab them back into line. His flighty eye darted between each rank as he ran with short breaths, all for the purpose of keeping them in proper form.
That was not the worst of it.
Worst was their silent leader, the necromancer Alicorn. He stepped firmly down the road, eyes fixed and brow furrowed, scowling forward as if at some disgusting artifact towering before them, an apparition only he could see.
Ivy Green considered herself a fit mare. Years of farm labor had seen to that. Still, like the others, she was starting to pant under the relentless and unforgiving sun. The sweat streamed down her hooves, unable to cool her ever-fleeting constitution.
She wanted nothing more than to sit, rest her weary legs and never get back up. However, she knew what the price would be from One Eye. For the first hour, Ivy thought she would not be able to push her weary legs forward any longer. She cursed herself for following this Alicorn, pleaded for the night mother's blessing, thanked her father for forcing her to work the fields even as a pegasus, and her mother for every harsh word that had forged her work ethic into a stubborn snapping cragadile.
Already two of the unicorns had collapsed from exhaustion. They were draped over the backs of two earth ponies chosen by One Eye. They had been hyperventilating, the relentless pressure of One Eye having driven them to the ragged edge. A pony was ordered to step out of line, pass out water, and carry the collapsed ponies to those assigned to carry them.
Ivy looked up at Stronghoof again in exasperation. His back straight and eyes forward, he appeared steadfast in his mission to nowhere. He carried twice the load everypony else did, his own as well as One Eye’s, giving the blockhead the freedom to practically float around the whole formation. Her wings itched so badly it felt as if ants were crawling over them.
“Company halt!” Shouted One Eye, causing the ponies to stumble to a stop.
A slight reprieve from the grueling march.
“Eyes forward you bird brain!” he trotted up beside Ivy, poking her with his hoof threateningly.
“Sir yes sir!” She squealed.
She had learned quickly the price of forgetting the first rule firmly established by Mordane and firmly reinforced by One Eye.
All sentences addressing a superior are to begin and end with sir.
The line had started to take on a curve over the last half an hour, but at One Eye’s bark to stop, the ponies jumped back into a straight line.
Mordane did not bother to observe the column correction. Instead, he simply waited, keeping his eyes down the path.
Ivy kept looking at Mordane the whole time. Trying to understand what she was seeing. Mordane wasn’t exactly the most well built, but even a strong earth pony stallion would have wanted a break by now. Yet he was as dry and relaxed as if they were on an evening stroll.
“EYES FORWARD!”, One Eye roared. Causing her to snap back forward again.
“SIR YES SIR!”
He didn’t look tired either. She started to wonder if it was some kind of magic.
“All right! Move out!”
An hour later, a full day from the beginning of the march and forty miles from Herridon, Mordane suddenly stopped.
No slowing. No change in posture.
He just simply came to a stop.
It was so sudden that she didn’t react in time. Stumbling to a stop before being run into by the pony behind her, who was then ran into by the pony behind them.
Instantly the formation dissolved into a jumbled pony pileup.
One Eye started shouting and pushing ponies onto their hooves.
“Line up,” Mordane spoke softly.
At first, Ivy thought she had misheard him. One Eye caught it though and quickly started to push ponies into two lines.
After a few minutes of shouting, uncertain looks, and ponies shakily stepping into formation, the two lines finally formed.
Mordane stepped slowly in front of them, passing back and forth until coming to a stop at one one end of the line and focusing on the pony there.
“Lower your chin,” he said after looking at the mare over for a few moments. “Loosen your tail. It's riding too high. Tighten your jaw. Eyes forward.”
He looked her over as she tried to obey, straining herself even further before he moved onto the next one.
“Ears up. No, straight up. Don’t lock your head in place. No, keep it still-”
And so it went as he moved down the line correcting the ponies into the same exact stance. After going through all thirty he walked a few steps away and then back up and down the line nodding until he spoke up once again.
“I have little regard for what passes as soldiers in the southern lands. Even less than I do for Celestia’s ‘guards’. Mockery of that term that they are, her golden royal guards can at least look the part, march in line, and stand still.” He stopped, eyes turning to a mare who had just slightly adjusted her back hoof.
Instantly she snapped back into stance, but Mordane still stared her down for a few moments before continuing.
“Those ponies were fighters, warriors,” He sighed, shaking his head before looking at them again. “They were the closest thing to soldiers I have seen in this world. If they were the epitome, then the ponies of the southern lands barely count as an armed militia.”
He frowned and looked at the ground for a moment, seemingly unsure of what to say.
His brow furrowing as he seemed to find it.
“Tonight you will swear the following oath: ‘Tomorrow I will do better than today.’” He said before going quiet. His eyes scanning over them demandingly.
“I-I will do better tomorrow than today.” stuttered out Ivy.
Quickly several others followed, then the rest stuttered along. Mordane’s eyes scanned them all, his ear twitching slightly. Then his eyes locked onto a single pony.
Ivy Swallowed, Realizing her mistake. His glare seemed to weigh if he should force them to resay it correctly or worry if they would just say it worse.
Coming to a decision he stomped down the line. Sliding through their vision like a granite block. Grinding down the line to stand in front of a single stallion.
“And what of you, Firm Stride?”
The pony stood, his head arched back, chest puffed out, blown up like a puffer-fish.
His eyes wavered as he looked Mordane in the eye. Seemly uncertain if it was safe to do so.
“Or do you forget again so easily?” Mordane whispered.
Suddenly they were there again. In the warehouse.
Power arching over the room, Mordanes eyes boring into each of them and they felt as unnatural spindly things wrapped around their minds.
“I will do better!” Firm Stride shouted suddenly “I will do better tomorrow, better than today! I will do better tomorrow than today, I swear it!”
“Good.”
And then the presence was gone, the air was once again clear and Ivy could feel herself breathing again.
Mordane turned and looked over to the side of the road. Seeming to measure the sun's distance from the horizon.
“Prepare our defenses. We camp here tonight.”
Everypony jumped to obey. An image clearly in their minds they quickly worked out who would do what jobs as One Eye shouted his brand of encouragement.
It wasn’t until half an hour later, deep into digging a hole that Ivy realized she hadn’t heard Mordane speak.
Mordane stood in his tent reading a letter written on the finest paper. Horn bright as he floated over a pen. Arches of energy occasionally slipping out of his horn fracture.
He looked up at his horn, eyes narrowing. He gives a short snort before looking back at the paper.
It was a list of expenses and estimations from the guild in Heridon, sent to him by Trixie two days before. He looked them over again before setting down the paper and revising his data table.
He checked a note before he stood and walked over to the small chest and went through several letters before finding one that matched with the date marking on his sheet. Confirming the original sum written there.
Nodding in affirmation he followed with a sigh, rubbing his temple.
The expense of this expedition would break him. The costs for fielding even a small force such as his were astronomical. The necessity though was undeniable if his plan was to succeed.
”Still,” he thought as his eyes wandered back to the total column. ”I am not sure we will make it.”
The flap on the tent was opened and One eye stepped in. His ears were wilted and his eye darted around the room.
“Uhh, Mordane.”
“What do you want, One Eye.” He replied curtly, his eyes still scanning the notes.
One Eye shifted from hoof to hoof. He didn’t look at Mordane as he spoke, instead seeming to focus on the small fold-out table.
“The fire is built. The pon-” He caught himself as Mordane turned to glare at him. “-Soldiers have finished setting up camp.”
The silence hung for a moment like a heavy blanket on a pocket of air before Mordane looked away again.
“Good. Go stand at attention with them.”
One Eye swayed on his hooves before tightening his jaw and furrowing his brow.
“What… Why are you angry with me.”
Mordane stopped reading. Looking off for a few moments before setting down the paper. He turned toward him lazily ending with a flick of his tail and a raised eyebrow.
The silence seemed to boil between them.
“Why?” Mordane asked, blinking a few times. “Are you really asking me why?”
“Well, I-”
“Don’t” Mordane cut him off raising a hoof. “Just...don’t.”
Mordane’s sigh turned into a half snarl. Rubbing his forehead he looked back for a moment before continuing.
“Why?” Mordane's brow furrowed and nostrils flared but he seemed to pause, taking a moment to reach over to a canteen of water and swallow a few gulps before beginning again.
“Why,” he said again, firmly this time. He rubbed the base of his horn, turned and squared up against One Eye, raising his hooves to gester.
“One Eye. We both know why you followed me here.”
One Eye nodded. His jaw tightening His ears folding back slightly.
“When we fought in that arena...I rose above my limits. It was like being birthed by fire.” Mordane paused for a moment, lowering his head before looking up intently into his single eye. “You wanted me to give you the same push, right out of your complacency.”
One Eye leaned back letting out a dismissive tiss and a quick smile. Shortly followed by it falling away as he saw only a serious look in Mordane’s eyes.
“I wanted to fight you.”
Mordane nodded, giving a small smile as he responded.
“Sure, call it that. You also wanted to take part in whatever bounty I found.”
One Eye chewed on his tongue, fidgeting before reaching under his satchel and pulling out the flask for a quick swig.
“Yeah. I did.” He kept his eye firmly on Mordane now.
Mordane leaned in close, his voice dropping low. The mirth leaving his eyes and face.
“Do you think I don’t know what you did to that bar?” His eye twitched as One Eye’s widened a bit. “Did you forget the ship? The random crew you signed on?”
He was practically snarling at this point.
“Did you think I wouldn’t count my coin? How much of my own coin have you swallowed down that gullet of yours, One Eye?”
One Eye’s ears splayed back, his ears flopping wildly as he became acutely aware of the liquid-filled flask on his side, under his satchel.
“To be frank, One Eye,” Mordane coldly said, “You are a bad investment.”
He stood stiffly. As if pulled out on a string.
“To me, you are no better than that trash out there.”
One Eye bristled. His eye and nostrils flaring with a snort.
“Now listen here. I left my cushy spot at the arena to go with you. I had mares, coin, the works! I didn’t leave for trinkets, to be treated like trash!” He stepped closer, his head going a few inches above Mordane. “Are you going to toss me now? You need me!”
Mordane didn’t reply. He simply started One Eye down. The two scarcely breathed.
“Well,” One Eye hissed, “Say something.”
“You’re right.” Mordane said softly, his eyes not breaking contact, “I need you.”
One Eye smiled, his chest puffing up.
“But not like this.” Mordane shook his head, closing his eyes. “I need you at your best, not as a fighting, hungry, piss away drunk.”
He sighed and turned away.
“Get your things. You’re done here. Go...wherever.”
One eye stiffened. His eye looked distant.
“You can’t maintain discipline.” He whispered pleadingly.
“The soldiers can’t learn discipline from a pony that shows none,” Mordane replied, looking for a piece of clean paper.
“You will lose my contacts.”
“We’ve made more,” he said, going for a pen.
One Eye thought for a few moments, still standing stiff.
“You need a strong fighter like me.”
“As I said.” Mordane flicked the pen into the ink. “I need soldiers, not fighters.”
Mordane wrote out a quick letter before signing his name. He presented it to One Eye who recognized it as an official dismissal from all vows and responsibilities.
But One Eye didn’t reach out; he seemed to rock a bit.
“Your opponents could use what I know against you.”
“You know nothing valuable. Not for my lack of telling you, but for your lack of listening. You never really paid attention. You coasted through the last month.” Mordane nodded his head to the tent flap. “And this is where we are because of it. Now sign.”
Mordane laid the paper on the table. Then got a quill and inkwell for him.
One Eye just stood there, staring at the page, his face blank.
“Sign it.”
“I...don’t want to.” One Eye replied slowly.
“Why.” Mordane curtly said. His eyes conveying it was not a question.
“I...“ he seemed to struggle with something, his head tilted a bit, “...don’t, think it would be good.”
“Continue.” Mordane lifted up a letter he had been preparing to send and scanned back over it. Seeming to fiddle over the minutiae of a word choice.
“You...what you did in that arena wasn’t possible. No pony learns that fast.”
“What I lacked was just dedication and focus. Our fight helped give me that.” Mordane said, setting the paper back down.
“It also awakened something in me, I thought…” he turned, his eye looking at the map. “I thought perhaps you could lead me to being more of something.”
“Well,” Mordane said, stepping around the short box acting as his desk, “I can’t do anything like that. Greatness comes from here.”
He poked One Eye in the chest. The older stallion frowned and tilted up his chin.
“I see greatness in here, but you have to show it. You’ve got to be more than a simple bandit. You must have greater ideals… a greater ambition than that.”
Mordane turned and moved his candle to one side of the paper before pushing the ink and quill to the other.
“Don’t think. Just do, or stop wasting my time.” He pushed past One Eye toward the tent flap, “Let me know your decision.”
Outside Mordane could see the camp was set and dinner was well underway.
There the ponies in his company were lined up. Bowls in hoof, they were ready to eat from a pot of boiling mash and vegetables. Their rations for the evening meal. Each pony looked like they were ready to collapse, held aloft only by the smell from the pots.
Even the four chosen as cooks looked ravenous and ragged. Their eyes lingering on the steaming pot waiting for them.
Mordane walked slowly, drawing the attention of the ponies there.
“Get into line.”
The ponies only waited for a few moments, glancing at each other before slowly filtering into a rough formation.
Mordane waited, looking at them with his mouth drawn taunt.
The anger in his belly still burned hot at what these ponies had done to him. It felt as if it should just rip right out of him. It was like a monster screaming in his heart, trapped in a cage of steel. Screaming into the void around it.
Those feelings stood before him, obvious as the cute boopable snoots on these foolish ponies faces. He wanted to hate them. He wanted to spit at them, punish them, feel compassion, or something, anything.
But there is nothing. Only the cold unflinching logic consuming all in its dull roar.
At the moment the general goal of making soldiers rattled around in his head. He knew the plan meant he had to put his rage aside. He only wished the ease with which he did it didn’t leave such an ache.
He steeled himself and tried to think of what to say.
As he stood there he could see as they became uncertain and confused. After a few moments, he tightened his jaw.
No time to think. Into the breach, he thought.
“This journey will be hard.” he quipped shortly, his nostrils flaring in a sharp inhale. “Our organization...needs soldiers. Not slaves.”
The crowd's ears perked up. He noted that.
Mordane turned and looked around for inspiration. His eyes settled on a spot on the horizon...
“There are the Central mountains.” He said, gesturing with his hoof. “Around it lies a swamp and untamed forest.”
He firmly exhaled. “We will go there.”
Shock rippled across the ponies, seen as folded ears and half steps.
The center of the continent had always been the least developed. Towns petered out and quickly gave way to undeveloped and difficult terrain.
The mountain and the trip there would surely be fraught with danger.
“If this seems too difficult,” Mordane continued, drawing them out of their dark visions, “then you can simply opt-out. There are many towns and hamlets around that would gladly pay top coin for a slave.”
He paused and turned back to look them in the eye.
“However, if you stay, I promise that you will become a greater soldier than has existed for millennia. I will give you your freedom, and should you still want it, a place in my service.”
A thrill ran down the ponies spines. Their hairs practically jumping off their backs.
”Freedom? Maybe redemption? Could it be true?” They thought.
“Plus,” he smiled, “I’ll let you keep the gold on your side. Free and clear. Whether you stay by my side or not.”
The crowd broke into excited chatter. A new life! Far away from this crazy death wielding alicorn.
Others sighed in relief, their eyes looking up at the mountain and deciding they would never set hoof there. Accepting the price of slavery easily in the exchange.
Still, others felt a ray of hope, and the taste of glory once again on their tongue.
“Oh,” Mordane said, his eyes hardening. “Don’t consider running away with that coin on your side, I would be rather...cross.”
His eyes flashed as they heard the last word echo in their heads.
Mordane took this moment to trot over to the pot and grab a bowl. The ponies parted to give way as he walked.
“Sleep on it. We leave at daybreak.” he chuckled before entering his tent. “Don’t expect me to make the night last longer for you.”
They began to hoot and holler, already shouting for the hope for freedom.
One eye watched as Mordane left.
He sat quietly, brow furrowed. Trying to understand.
The following morning Mordane took one step out of his tent, looked around, then ordered that the walls be taken down, tents packed, and all ponies be ready to go.
“Do not leave a trace.” he finished before dismissing them.
The ponies were able to break down the wooden palisades and bury them in the moat before covering it all with dirt. The firm stomping of the ground and the moving of a few rocks quickly hid the evidence of there having ever been any fortifications there in the last hundred years.
Mordane led his ponies with a light stretch. He then followed that with fighting form practice for an hour.
Lastly, he gave a ten minute break before they started again, down the road, toward Aton.
Over the early part of the morning the road started to wane, going from cobblestone, to gravel, and then finally to dirt.
It was about noon when they came to a small town on the Heridon side of the Aton river. Its currents were shallow, relatively speaking, with an easy ford section over the river. This would change throughout the day though, leading to times it would be difficult.
Due to its chaotic nature, the town planner dared not to place a house on the other side lest a pony be unexpectedly cut off from the town at an inopportune time.
This region was recently conquered from Niel not ten years before as part of an alliance agreement with Aton. Which of course had, even more recently, broken down.
Still, the need for food had led the king to establish this far flung settlement and even now to maintain it.
They marched solemnly, One Eye running up and down the line to shout them back into formation or to keep their eyes forward.
Even so, as they passed, the ponies in the field stopped their ceaseless toil for a moment to look them over.Most with tired dead expressions of those without hope. The chains locked them to posts nearby marking their place for all to see.
The town could at best be called ‘quaint’, however, a more apt description would be ‘thrown together’. There was a bar, what appeared to be a central warehouse with the royal Heridon seal on it, a small market, and several barracks.
For two years this settlement had been operating and Mordane was pretty sure that was at a loss.
“Halt.”
The whole line of ponies came to a stop quickly. The fact that he had not spoken glaringly clear to most of them.
“Stand at attention!”
His voice ripped out verbally and mentally. His ponies stumbled in surprise at the sudden command, their loose straps slipping and arms drooping in every direction. One Eye’s helmet was so loose it slipped right off and clanged on the rocky grounds, drawing curses out as he scrambled for it.
“Stand at attention, I said!” Mordane hissed. His mind whipping out like a whip.
The ponies snapped to, their thoughts feeling sickly unease as a shiver ran up their spines.
They could feel Mordane. Feel his breath. See what he saw. Feel the flick of Mordanes tongue as it slipped over an over-sharp tooth.
A flash entered their minds of them standing in disarray and he thought.
Why don’t I just kill these fools.
Mordane shook his head, withdrawing back into his skull. His eyes widening marginally and ear raising before he furrowed his brow again.
He watched them for a moment as they got into line before turning toward one of the largest buildings in the small village.
The recruits sat swaying like wooden stocks in the breeze, their ears drooping and eyes dull.
It took the ponies a few moments to recognize a slave market. Several strands of hair stood up as they realized just what kind of slavery was practiced this far out from the city.
What comforts and dulling that had taken hold in the city had not reached out this far.
Mordane walked in, leaving the ponies alone in formation. The lot of them stood still, not daring to letup as he was gone. The group could not help but notice the ponies in the nearby field. A taskmaster hovering over them.
Later he came out with a well-dressed unicorn. Her wig and makeup would place her at the highest echelons of Heridon society. Her eyes glazed over the two columns, a small giggle drifting out from behind her fan.
“Oh, you do have many don’t you.”
“Indeed,” Mordane replied. “It's as I said. I’m going to be putting them through the paces. When some wash out I want to be able to drop them off easily and have a set price.”
“Hmm.” The unicorn Mare walked down the line, drawing flinches and shuffling hooves. “Not very disciplined.”
“But strong. And discipline can be taught.” Mordane replied. “They are rather new slaves.”
“Indeed.” The Mare trotted up and down the line.
“They all seem healthy. I’ll give you two hundred bits apiece.”
“Three hundred,” Mordane replied.
“Hmmm,” She turned and smiled largely at Mordane, “Acceptable. If they are still in good condition after they arrive.”
“They will likely need some rest and a wash, but outside of that we are agreed.” He replied firmly. “The rest I’ll sell at half that.”
They exchanged a few pleasantries before Mordane turned back to the group. He continued as if he had not just negotiated their purchase into slavery.
“Beyond the river is untamed lands. The kind only the strongest willed ponies can traverse. If anypony wants to give up now, you will save yourself a great deal of discomfort.” He paused for a few moments, no one volunteered. So he continued. “Since the land is uncharted we need to have patrols, both flying and on hoof.”
A few ponies ears twitched.
Mordane’s eyes scanned the group before locking onto one pony in particular.
“Ivy.”
“Sir!” She shouted, struggling in vain to stand a little straighter.
He trotted up to her and looked her up and down before speaking.
“You will do air patrols,” he said reaching down and pulling off her wing binding buckles.
She blinked in surprise. Her wings almost instinctively flapping for a moment before she forced them back to her side.
“Uh, sir, yes sir.” She said swallowing and looking off to the side.
He reached up and twisted her head to look straight into his eyes.
“Don't run.”
“...I won’t.” She swallowed before forcing a scared smile, “I swore, didn't I?”
Mordane didn’t respond, choosing instead to walk down the line. The mare watched him for a moment before spreading her wings and flying into the air.
“We march.” Mordane said turning and getting away. The ponies followed unevenly. Though more in pace than the previous day.
They moved to the ford. The rushing water kicked up over rocks.
“Step carefully.” He said stepping into the water up to his barrel.
He moved forward steadily, ignoring as the water rushed around and over him.
The ponies behind him gawked at the crazy display. Mordane was acting as if the river was not in full surge. Walking with what must have been a hundred pounds of water pushing against him.
They hesitated, but with a buck from One Eye the lead ponies began to make way. The earth ponies charged right in having no issue getting through. However, they quickly found themselves holding back the pegasi who were washed into them.
The Unicorns panicked, with their horns bound they couldn’t do anything to save themselves and were overcome by the other bodies and pounding water.
Mordane came to a halt on the other bank, turning to look back he frowned, then spread his wings and stepped back into the water, reaching for his war magic.
After a few strides, he beat his wings and a great gale struck up. The water, sparking with arcane energy, pulled back from the shore as Mordane stomped back to their side of the river.
The ponies who had been struggling in the waves suddenly found the water draining away. The wall of water sliding around them and down the river. Mordane now stood one-fourth of the way across the ford on the slimy stones. His eyes ablaze as he glared at the ponies standing gobsmacked in the muddy riverbed.
“Back onto the beach you dimwits! Back! All of you!” he roared.
Scrambling, they moved to comply with his demand as Mordane stomped up to them. Taking only a moment to push on the chest of one unicorn stallion laying still. He spat up water and sat up only to see Mordane thrust a hoof to the shore and wait for him to scramble there.
Standing on the river edge with the ponies forming a crescent around him, Mordane released his magic. The water rushed back through the temporarily diverted river.
“You will regret that later,” Mordane stated, pointing past the gasping unicorns and pegasi to the group of earth ponies standing nonchalantly to the side.
“What?” asked an earth pony with a mohawk, glaring at him.
Mordane flared his wings, stomped, scraped the ground, and snorted as he glared back.
The earth pony jumped back. Eyes wide at the naked display of aggression.
“You will see.” He said, pulling his wings back before pointing at the recovering non-earth ponies. His eyes firmly focused on the stallions, “If they don’t make it then you won’t make it.”
Mordane stated firmly before turning and plunging back into the river.
The ponies took a moment to consider what he meant.
Then they collectively realized that finding out was not in their best interest.
Most stood back and waited, looking to others who stepped forward to make suggestions. First, there were a few plans. Then disagreements.
Then the shouting began.
Several ponies insisted that the unicorns could surely be able to make their own way. Others suggested a bridge, stones be thrown, or even a raft be built.
Mordane did nothing. He sat on the other end and watched. Listening to his gut and silencing his tongue. One Eye waited with him and the few earth ponies that made it. They were glancing at Mordane uncertainty.
When the ponies began to shove each other One Eye just shook his head and dove back in to cross the river again.
As he came out of the water he pulled out a rope and scanned the group, selected a unicorn pony, and trotted up to her.
Walking up behind the mare he dipped down and ran her up onto his back drawing out a yelp of surprise. Before she could react he quickly threw the rope over with his hoof. Throwing it to catch and wrap around him and the mare a few times.
Her teal fur glowing red with a blush as he pulled the rope tight. Her hooves dangling on both sides of him.
“Put your head to the left, Missy.”
“W-what?” She said before sputtering as One Eye charged into the water.
The mare was coughing again as they got to the other side.
Grabbing the rope knot in his teeth, he pulled it loose and let her slide like a sack of grain onto the muddy bank.
With a whip he bundled up the rope before giving it a toss over the river. Aiming to have it land at the other ponies hooves.
“That's how you do it. Now get to it!”
Stumbling, arguing, the earth ponies helped the other kinds across. Their eyes flicked up to Mordane who watched silently. Staring at them. Unmoving as they went through the laborious process.
The whole affair took longer than it should. Even allowing time for ponies from the village to come out and watch. Some jarring and laughing as the initiates emerged gasping on the other side.
Thirty minutes into the exercises Ivy came flying back, landing unsteadily beside Mordane.
“Mordane.” She said panting, her eyes wide.
“Sir,” Mordane replied curtly.
Ivy stopped for a moment before swallowing.
“Sir. Sorry, sir.” She said before standing at attention. “Sir, I have patrolled the nearby area. This place is….”
She trailed off her eyes darting a bit.
“Speak, Ivy.”
“Sir, this place is… completely untamed. I’ve never seen a place so wild. I think no pony could have seen this place in a thousand years, sir.”
Mordane exhaled heavily. Hearing the pony catch all for ‘a long time’ irritated him more than he had expected. A thousand years? Nine hundred years? He guessed that the real number was closer to six hundred.
“It is what I expected.” He said. “But I need to know more details. What kind of creatures did you see?”
She scrunched her nose, but leaned in and whispered to him.
Mordane waited until most of the villagers had left before ordering his ponies back around him.
After their ordeal, they were irritated, tired, and not ready to hear him prattle on about anything.
Still, he waited until their murmuring stopped before speaking.
“That was terrible. No organization, no honest assessment of what the best idea was.” He shook his head “It's clear that the ponies talking cared more about being right than getting across the river as quickly as possible.”
He turned and looked at One Eye.
“Your solution was workable but limited.” he turned back to the rest of them
“What if you had to move not thirty ponies, but thirty thousand. What would you do then.”
“But we don't HAVE thirty thousand.” quipped Firm Stride
Mordane pointed at him.
“That is not an excuse!”
The pony wilted under the hoof. Ears only perking up a little when Mordane started speaking again.
“Do not forget! This is the purpose of standard practices! You should NOT have to discuss how to cross a river. You should know and use the universal method for crossing difficult terrain.”
Mordane snatched up a rope with his teeth from the ground where the last pony across had let it drop.
He trotted over to a nearby tree and quickly tied a hitch knot around the tree then himself before crossing the river. Once on the other side, he tied the rope around a stump.
Then he loosened his strap buckle and wrapped it around the rope before going back into the river.
Halfway across he let himself be carried by the current. Floating on his back before lightly kicking his way to the other side, disassembled the rope, and flew back.
He stomped to the silent crowd. The water sprinkled off him.
“When the terrain is difficult and you have a large group, you need to make the way easy.” He tossed the rope to Firm Stride who caught it with a slight stumble.
Mordane walked through the crowd stopping for a moment before letting out a little chuckle.
“It's always like this when I leave ponies alone. It's like you can’t do anything without a herdmaster.”
He shook his head and continued trotting before shouting.
“Fall into line!”
Mordane’s ponies hopped back into line, and just like that, they were off.
The firm ground near the river quickly gave way to rocky outcroppings and dusty earth. Grass became mold and sparse shrubs. The white stones reflecting with glares like liquid sunlight pouring into their eyes.
“Squint.” Mordane said loudly. “It will help.”
The ponies behind him complied as Ivy took to the air to fly around.
Almost thirty minutes passed before something broke up the landscape.
Mordane came to a stop. This time, the ponies behind him reacted quickly and avoided a pileup. Their ears twitching as they tried to sneak glances at what he was looking at.
Beneath him, broken and half-buried, bleached white and cracked by the high sun, was a road.
The stones were not clean cut but instead they were cobblestones roughly placed on gravel and packed tight.
Rain and time had done a lot to hide the road. Looking up and down its length, he could see the short section he stood next to quickly disappear under nearby brush. Indeed, this was the only part that even vaguely resembled a road.
Then his eyes caught onto a right angle. A stone here, a corner there, and it became clear he was standing in an abandoned town. His eyes moved around seeing the signs of raised ground and outlines of buildings.
“We will stay here tonight.” Mordane said loudly, his eyes looking up at the sky before giving a firm nod. “Set up camp, use what you must, but don’t disturb the mostly intact structures.”
The ponies behind him scrunched up their noses and looked around. Many of them quickly realized what the stones were and pointed it out to the others who reacted with fascination and awe. Their eyes trailed the ancient architecture hidden among the trees.
He looked down again, his eyes rolling over the road before resting on a large angular stone covered in frail moss. Mordane walked up to it and pushed the moss away with his hooves.
The stone sat near the old road’s edge, pushing away the moss revealed a worn and tattered, but still recognizable, image.
Two princesses curled around the symbol of harmony.
“I-is that,” Ivy whispered, looking down at the picture.
“Luna and Celestia. Symbol of the Equestria Diarchy.” He said matter of factly. He tilted his head, “they got the proportions wrong. Celestia is a bit larger than Luna.”
Ivy’s ear stood up and several ponies nearby suddenly found that their work would require them to stay within earshot.
Mordane turned and took a seat on the stone, leaning back he let his head rest on the bunched up moss. Folded his hooves behind his ears and let his wings hang loose.
“Could you tell me about them?” whispered Ivy, sitting down with her hooves planted between her legs. She leaned in, her ears cocking forward.
“Well.. they both are large ponies. Luna was twice my height. Her fur is several shades of blue.” He closed his eyes, remembering the towering mare standing in his doorway, the feeling as her magic took the book from him, and the spike of power as the book disintegrated. “Both sister’s hair flowed with the ethereal wind. Lunas sparkled with starlight. Her eyes would look into you and then just keep going.” He chuckled, “ That's how I saw her mostly, when I saw her, she wore a frown. It was as if she looked at something far away. Some kind of distant truth.”
He sat up, brow furrowing.
“Celestia wore a smile. Constantly. It didn’t matter the situation I saw her in... she always wore a smile. Portraying herself like a loving mother.” He twisted his face into a snarl “Fucking bitch.”
Ivy’s ears stood up, her eyes opening slightly as an absolute silence fell across the glade.
One Eye, a short distance off, looked troubled. His ears splayed back and many of the ponies with him.
It was Ivy who broke the silence with another question.
“What...did she look like?” she whispered.
“It changed. Celestia's hair was like a rainbow, but an ever-shifting one. Her coat is the purest white you can imagine. Like bleached bones. The sun emblazoned on her flank.” He sat up and looked her in the eyes, “The only time her hair changed, it blazed like her sun.”
He sighed and leaned back again.
“You’ve got a defensible position to build. Get to it.”
The ponies around him jumped, quickly getting to work.
He watched them move, slowly coming to lose focus. The image of Celestia and Luna dancing in his head.
Holding up a hoof, he examined it. The brownish chitin from his youth was gone now. It had begun to change recently he knew, but he couldn’t recall when the change had started, only able to guess it was during the latest growth spurt.
His fur had darkened as well. Over the past month, he had grown like a weed, and with it his hunger. The quantities of food he was consuming daily had led to more excursions to supplement his diet with wild game in secret. A fact he made sure to keep from everypony.
”It feels good to stretch out my mind again,” he thought. ”Though I must say it is far easier here in this world.
He felt for the anchor of his soul in his body. The roots were deep inside, but he knew he could detach if he had to.
“For the first time in a long time, I am starting to feel like myself.” He frowned at the thought before shrugging. He licked the sharpened canine in his mouth with a small smile before turning back to watch the rest of the ponies.
______________________________________________
Firm Stride watched as Mordane seemed to examine his hoof. His nose scrunching at what he had heard.
He didn’t trust the stallion. Having seen him grow over a foot before his very eyes made the pony seem all the more unnatural. Surreal even.
It was like the fight with the dragon had taken him from strange to otherworldly. Especially with his blue eyes and now pure white Mane.
Still, Firm Stride reached into his pack and pulled out the rope. His hoof playing over the surface, troubled.
He looked over to a group of ponies weakly pushing some stones around. The mare at the center of the group looked at him. Her eyes lingering a little longer than needed.
Slowly, Firm Stride shook his head ‘no’ before looking away. Instead going to another group that was arguing over whether or not to move a rather large building foundation lined with stone.
“Hey! Let's make this the corner.” he said, pointing at the corner closest to the ruined road. “We can move the stones from the other two walls to get started.”
He started laying down the rope where he thought the wall should be, several of the ponies just nodded and started working.
Others looked, uncertainly, at Mordane and One Eye before moving to help.
One Eye watched and gave direction, occasionally helping before setting up his own tent in the camp center .
Mordane had already assembled his and retired there before the evening.
Just before the ponies lined up to have dinner, Mordane came out of his tent demanding they fall into formation.
As they all stood, their bowls sitting in front of them, he stared into the fire.
“I swear to be better than I was yesterday,” the ponies chanted quickly, distracted by their bellies.
So as soon as they thought he was done, the ponies started for the line, but Mordane spoke up again.
“For the whole, each pony is responsible.”
Firm Stride straightened at this. His jaw setting.
“For the whole, each pony is responsible,” replied the crowd.
“A pony, a unit, an army, a nation. None of these can survive without taking responsibility. Without each pony pulling their weight, together, toward a common goal.”
Mordane looked down and reached toward the kindling bundle near the fire. He raised a single stick in both hooves in front of him, and with a sudden flourish it snapped it in two.
“A single pony, a single stick, can be broken.” Mordane casually tossed the two halves into the fire before reaching down to pick up the whole bundle, “But a bundle of sticks held together in common purpose...” Mordane heaved bending the bundle over his back. A few of the twigs snapped and cracked, but even as he shook with exertion the bundle did not break.
“But the whole cannot,” he gasped, letting the sticks thud to the ground. His eyes misting over.
“I let my army and myself be broken. I’ve not unified my conflicting will with a purpose my whole life. Perhaps I thought myself strong enough to not need others, or to allow discord in myself. But like any twig standing against the sea, I was broken.”
He tapped his horn which sparked. “And for that, I paid a price.”
The silence hung in the air. The sky turned rapidly red with the sunset.
“I swear that tomorrow I will do better than today. My brother's burdens are my own.”
The ponies entoned back in unison, many with eyes troubled.
Mordane retired again, not waiting for a response or to dismiss them. Leaving that instead to One Eye who barked the orders. Though his own eyes spent more time looking at the ground than the ponies around him.
Only then did a group of four slip unnoticed into the night. Their hooves pointed north and their eyes set far away from this madpony.
Ivy woke in her tent early the next morning.
The fabric smelled of old barns and barrels normally used for barley. The floor was covered in a thick pad of tightly woven cloth and fibers.
She tried to flip to her side, but just as the night before, she was pushed onto her back. The packs of hardtack and coin that bit into her side were well on their way to forming bruises.
So instead, she opened her eyes to stare at the brownish cloth of the tent above her once again, wondering if it had actually been made from rags and used to clean the streets of Heridon.
”Is this what an adventure is?” she thought before shaking her head.
She sat up and stretched her wings, popping them audibly.
The stallion to her immediate left groaned. Sitting up, he looked across the tent at a still sleeping mare. “Come on, Stream. Mordy’s favorite has gotten up. Rise and shine. Time for another day of marching under this Luna forsaken sun.”
The other mare in the tent let out a cough and a groan, flailing her hooves futilely into the air as if hoping to beat away the day.
“Can’t I just die? I can’t even wipe my arse like a civilized unicorn,” she said, flicking her own horn. It drew an immediate wince from her. She cradled her head in pain. “Bloody hell this thing. Did that mare have to choose such a good bind?”
The stallion perked up looking down at the mare.
“Did you figure out its classification?”
“Yeah,” she groaned. “And it's a combination of one and three.”
The stallion groaned loudly while rubbing his own head as he sat fully up. His hair immediately springing back into its mohawk shape.
“And so we're stuck.”
“Yeah…” The mare groaned, sitting up slowly. “The first binding is a simple feedback loop. If I draw too much my horn shatters from the feedback. Then on top of that is a spell that interferes with the frequency of the energy being created, degrading any small energy matrix and making small spells impossible.”
She threw up her hooves.
“Guess we're stuck here.”
“It's not that bad,” mumbled Ivy, her ears splayed back.
“It's not bad? No, it's the worst.” She scrunched her nose before glaring at Ivy ``It's easy for you to say, at least you get to fly. What is a unicorn worth without their horn?”
The stallion snorted and with a grin replied, “You? I’d say at least two ponies.”
“Aww,” she pawed at him, “you big softie.”
“It's not like I have it easy,” Ivy insisted. “Mordane has me flying constant patrols. My wings feel like they are going to fall off.”
“Hey, you swore to the stallion.” the mare giggled “Can’t believe you did that, honey. I at least wanted to get some coins from the guy.”
Ivy wilted a bit under the unicorn mares gaze and looked down at the satchel on her side.
The mare grinned and stood up.
“My, my, you seem to have something on your mind. What was it you were hoping to get from him...perhaps a little struggle snuggle?” She emphasised, turning to give a little shake of her rump.
‘What! No.” Ivy shouted, her cheeks blooming red.
“Ah, too bad,” the mare laughed. “I certainly wouldn’t mind. You would as well if you saw him at the Lunar Fortress.”
Ivy's ears twitched and perked up. She had heard about that battle.
She knew about the ancient fortress. The largest, legendary, still active fortress of the Lunar Princess herself! Protected by tradition and fear from everypony in the southern lands. Untouchable.
Well, at least until Mordane waltzed right in and shattered the princess’s spell single hoofed.
Hearing the street story hawkers tell it, he had stood on the roof of the highest tower, his mane wiping about filled with the shrieking souls of his thousands dead. His horn drenched in black ash crying to his moon mother to save him.
“You were there?” she asked the mare, dumbfounded.
“Yeah,” cut in Snarl, sitting up as well. “We sat in the last tower to fall with him as the Irona military elites beat down the door.”
“Saw him get real antsy about something,” the mare cut in. “Then his horn glowed real bright. Like a bonfire.”
She looked at Snarl, giving a firm nod.
“Then his horn blew and we found ourselves standing near the forest edge. So we booked it,” he quipped.
River gave him a playful punch. He shrugged it off with a grin.
“Well, it's true. We booked it,” he continued. “Don’t know how we made it out. Eventually made our way to Tietus. Hit High Rise for our pay and paid to watch Mordane’s game. Then he was away on a ship before we could get close. So we caught another one. When we saw the recruitment party we thought… Well, I was excited to be under him for real this time.”
Ivy was leaning forward intently, but her brow was furrowed.
“He didn't recognize you?” she asked.
“Apparently not. His eyes just glazed over us. Just like the rest of you ponies. Guess we are just background characters to him.”
“Roll Call. ”
The fourth pony in their tent, Boundless, bolted straight up. His eyes wide and coat pail.
“Creeps me out,” said Riverside, shivering and hugging herself. The room calmed down again.
“Me as well,” Ivy whispered. The other two ponies nodded before Snarl's ears perked up again.
“I didn’t know unicorns could do something like that. Hey River, can you do that?”
She shook her head, hugging herself even tighter instead.
“That isn’t a unicorn spell,” she said quietly.
“What?” Boundless croaked.
“It's not a unicorn spell!” she hissed. “I can’t feel anything, no gathering of energy, no bending of the rules, not even a twang on the ley lines.”
She shook her head.
“It's like he already is a part of our minds and just speaks.”
Ivy sat quietly. Her eyes on the ground. An unspoken question bouncing around her head for the last minute finally working its way to the surface.
“Do you two plan to stay?”
Snarl and Riverside stopped and looked at each other. An entire conversation seemed to happen between them.
“... We probably shouldn’t keep him waiting,” replied Snarl.
The group of them got up and adjusted their burdens before trotting outside into the already forming columns.
Once again, Ivy felt a little shocked at the variety of ponies here.
Earth Ponies, Pegasi, Unicorns, and even a Nightwing. Some were tall and scarred, years of experience written in the universal tongue on their flesh. Others were all curves and pudge in all the right places. Their eyes weary and sick from the sudden endless exercise. Looking like models or precious concubines. Still others stood tall, their horns and noses pointed at the sky. Some minor noble son who had thought to have an easy pa13rty with the rabble.
She had heard his name was Ivory Star, a powerful Unicorn from the Firelight family. His blue eyes seemed to be focused on one of the quickly fading stars as the sun rose with the breath thrum of the ethereal weave.
At least, that is how Unicorns explained why they all seemed to wake up at the same time.
What drew her interest most of all was the four bundles of cloth laid neatly in front of the fire. She, and most of the others, were looking at them curiously. She looked over at Snarl who shrugged.
“Attention!” One eye shouted, her rump and heart jumped to attention.
Ivy stood up tall with the rest of them as they heard a pony step across the ground. She resisted the urge to turn and look, instead waiting for him to pass into their line of sight.
Mordane Stronghoof.
He stood taller than most ponies but claimed to be younger than almost any of them. His fur was brown as wet dirt, his mane the palest white. What stuck out at her most, though, was his eyes: tired and glassy. Their blue surface seemed to slide over the world as if in a haze, looking at something beyond the horizon.
His wings laid flat against his back, in a position that made Ivy's own wings itch despite their aching. His saddlebags hung loosely along with a thin sword too small for his size.
The camp was like half a dozen others they had built. Dirt and wood walls, tents to one corner, a large fire in the center. Mordane walked in front of this fire right now before coming to a stop and turning to face them.
“Four ponies attempted to leave last night,” he said softly. His voice carried unnaturally on the wind so that all could hear.
“They did not make it.” He gestured to the five bundles. “Their things are for you to split.”
He nodded once, something he seemed to do as a tick. As if confirming something with himself.
“We move out in two hours… Dismissed.”
Mordane’s eyes looked at Ivy seemingly to say ‘not you’. So as the rest of the group rushed off to begin the deconstruction of camp, she made her way to his side.
Only a few ponies went over to the bundles. Surprised to find even the coin filled straps there. One particularly greedy pony snatched up two and threw them over his own back before trudging off to finish his work.
“We are going south west today,” Mordane said with no fanfare.
“Uh,“ Ivy said, trying to remember what the land looked like, “That would lead us directly into the swamp.”
“Yes. I need you to map our route,” he confirmed, “Can you do that?”
“Yes,” she replied quickly, her heart jumping into her throat.
“Good.” Mordane turned and trotted toward the mess, “Good work.”
Ivy widened her eyes and her mouth opened a bit but only managed to stutter out, “Thank you, sir.”
Before she could leave though, Boldness trotted up. His ears drooping as he neared, “Uh...Stronghoof?”
“Yes,” he replied without looking at him.
“I’d like-.” He swallowed. “I don’t think I can do this.”
Mordane did not visibly react save to look him in the eye. Ivy's ears stood up and her stomach did a small flip on hearing this.
“Are you sure?”
“Y-Yeah,” he replied looking down at the ground.
“Okay. Follow me.” He turned back to Ivy. “I’m going to need that report when I return.”
Mordane led the pony over to the fire and helped him pull off the bag of coins. Then the other tools, bits of armor, and other valuables.
When the stallion went for his cotton undershirt Mordane raised his hoof and shook his head. Turning, Mordane looked at One Eye who snapped suddenly to look at him before giving a firm nod. Some kind of communication passing between them.
Ivy waited as several ponies stopped to see what was going on.
“You ready?” Mordane asked.
“Y-yeah.”
Mordane took to the air and flew over to pick up the smaller stallion, wrapping his hooves around the ponies barrel.
Then he took off.
Ivy watched for a bit as he flew toward the village a day's march away, or twenty minutes by wing, before shaking her head and taking to the air in the opposite direction.
From the river, the land quickly degraded in quality. Soon becoming a thick canopy that forced her to fly in a tight flight pattern. Circling to get a better view of the ground and foliage below.
She winced. The path was not clear at all. The place was a swamp at best. A death forest at worst. Still, Mordane did not seem ready to change his mind. She bit her lip and planned out the next day's travel.
Thirty minutes later she had her map, but before returning she looked off into the distance.
There she could see the mountains, and particularly a large mountain jutting out of the range.
Mordane had explained that reaching the foot of that mountain was their goal.
A goal that filled her with dread as she looked at dozens of miles of forest turning slowly into a swamp. Out here at least she could be sure that she was alone with her thoughts.
Now that her task was done, questions started bubbling out of her subconscious.
Why were they here? What was Mordane planning?
What was at the mountain?
More so, Mordane was an alicorn. She had believed it almost as soon as she saw him, but believing and knowing it as fact are two different things. She had found herself marching into the wilderness with someone who might as well be out of a fairytale. One who claimed to have spoken to both Luna and Celestia.
Just how old was he?
She didn’t know the answers, but she had a path to deliver. So after a few moments of rest she headed back.
In the distance though Ivy saw Mordane approaching and went to meet him.
When she got closer Mordane angled upward and headed to a small cloud. She hesitated a moment before heading up to meet him.
Mordane sat just short of the clouds’ wispy edge. Close enough to the center to not sink through. In the distance, a large blackness was rushing toward the mountaintop. Its bottom rolled as it neared the snowy peaks.
“Report.”
“The region is not something you want to move anything through,” she said bluntly, her ears drooping.
“And?”
“...and I have found a route,” she replied. “It trails a little south. There is an impassable area of water pits. I think I saw something in there, probably a hydra.”
Mordane turned, raising an eyebrow.
“What is it that you saw?”
“Just some odd movement in the trees. Too fast for a pony.”
Mordane turned and looked back down.
“I see,” he mumbled, “and in the direction you sent us?”
“Still covered in water pits, but I can see snaky bits of land that are not big enough for something like a Hydra.”
Mordane nodded.
In the distance, the cloud clapped with thunder. As it splashed against the mountain the water quickly became a downpour.
“This region is unique in the world,” Mordane said
Ivy didn’t comment, instead deciding Mordane only wanted to speak and not hear her opinion.
“A mountain range this tall would normally turn one side into a desert. The weather manipulation by Equestria prevents that though. An unnatural negative space draws two different wind fronts coming from two different directions to meet here. Because of that it is green on both sides. The world’s wind is split by the mountain, flowing in two great circles that eventually return. “
He turned back and gave a smile
“Equestria needs its water I suppose. The region around Canterlot and Baltimare can’t naturally support the population of ponies living there. Even so, the pulling of the stream has had global effects. Now there is too much water here, making the land unusable. About a thousand years ago, this used to be the breadbasket of old Equestria, and now it is a swamp.” He inhaled deeply, holding a moment before giving a long slow exhale. “The other side I’m told is not as wet but just as green. Courtesy of currents from further south coming and hitting the mountain from the other side.”
“Is that why-” she cut herself off, ears drooping.
“Yes?” he said, turning to look at her.
“Is that why it's so windy atop Aton?”
Mordane slowly nodded then turned back to the scene taking in a deep breath of the wind blowing past. His eyes closed.
“It would take a team of two thousand pegasi to stabilize this wreck of an ecosystem. Someponies would have to pull moisture north, over the craggy midlands of Tietus. This would dry up the land here and turn the north greener. Maybe even ending the storms cutting us off from Northern Equestria.”
“...No city would be able to field that many pegasi,” whispered Ivy. “Not even Aton. It's a nice idea though.”
“It is a nice idea,” Mordane agreed. “Well, let's head down again. From up here it looks like they are finished with the camp.”
Mordane looked back at her again, stepped onto the wispy edge, and started to sink.
“Try to play nice with the earth ponies and unicorns. You're going to need each other to get through this.”
He let himself tilt back over the edge before twisting into a dive angled to fly back toward the camp.
Ivy followed shortly after in a glide. Her brow furrowed as she quietly followed, eyes locked on the enigma before her.
Muddy and hot.
That is how Firm Stride would have described this place. He briefly considered if Mordane had chosen this path to specifically punish him personally for challenging him. However, no special treatment had come his way.
He hated it. The air. The sweat matting his fur and these Luna forsaken horn heads and feather brains.
The place smelled like the wrong end of an ass that had been shoveling dung its whole life. Its trees seemed to be treating life as a lost cause, clawing toward the sky even as they were drenched in moss and filth.
This was the first time Firm Stride had ever set foot in a swamp, and he hoped it would be his last.
“What does this feathered bastard think he’s doing? ‘They didn't make it.’ What in the buck happened though? Did they fall down a well? Stub their hooves!?”
Beside him, an over greedy earth pony with three bags of coin was panting already, his hooves shaking as he pushed himself over the terrible terrain.
It wasn’t like he couldn’t figure out what Mordane was doing. Pulling the wheat from the daisies was standard practice among mercenaries.
They moved in a straight line along a slither of land between two mud pits. Their legs covered up to the knee in the muck. Already their hair had snatches of twigs and briars. The vines snaked everywhere, wrapping up the tree and spilling from the land into the water.
As he had a hundred times already, he forced himself to step over the next root.
This time though he slipped, his leg riding the space between the two roots and slipping on the moss in between.
His hoof rode straight off the edge of the embankment along with the rest of him.
He sputtered and tried to stand up. However, he sank into the mud immediately. It curled around his legs like a great beast.
The more he dug in his heels the more it snarled and dragged him down.
“Help!” he shouted, frantically looking around. “Help me!”
Mordane swooped down and hovered a few feet over him. His eyes scanning the situation before turning to the group.
“Well, you heard the stallion,” Mordane said, crossing his hooves.
“You bas-” Firm Stride got a mouth full of mud as he began to slip under. Panic starting to claw at him.
“We got ya!” shouted one of the other earth ponies as a group of them tried to shuffle past the other two races to get closer.
It became very clear he was not going to get any help as no pegasi nor unicorn moved to assist. Their eyes still gleaming with anger. Just standing stock still and watching as he drowned. Some even turned and trotted away, not caring to wait and watch him die.
As he began to dip under Firm Stride thought back to the day before, and how he had ignored the two other struggling races and Mordanes warning.
‘You will regret that.’
Well, he was regretting it now. In a last desperate struggle, he pointed his snout up and whispered.
“Please.”
A hoof met him.
“Hold on!”
He recognized that voice.
Ivy.
Mordane’s favorite. He could feel as she futilely pulled on him. Only stopping his descent.
“Luna's tits, I’ll help too!”
Firm Stride heard some grunting as a rope was tossed out for him to grab.
“We got you!”
The ponies heaved and soon the mud began to give away.
The first pony he saw was One Eye, leading the pack as they pulled and yanked.
*Shunk*
He slipped out suddenly and was pulled straight onto the bank. The ponies pulling him fell onto their behinds.
Firm Stride flopped, gasping on the spindled shore of the swamp strip. Sucking in the dank air and sputtering ‘thank you’ to all the ponies that helped him.
Soon though, he sat up and looked at Mordane who hovered above. His eyes coldly looking down.
“Were you just going to let me drown?” he hissed.
Mordane’s lip pulled back showing pointed teeth. His eyes lighting up like little embers as he let out a bellowing laugh that trailed off quickly, leaving behind the grin.
“If it's any consolation, I would have thrown in the ponies around you that didn’t help.”
The nearby standing pegasi wings ruffled, the unicorns instinctively tilted their horns at Mordane who only grinned a little wider at their reactions.
“Any place on a march is dangerous. There are things all around that will kill you. Animals, the ground, the air. Things both magical and mundane. All this before you ever meet an enemy.” Mordane stopped flapping his wings and fell a few feet.
Twisting in the air Mordane swept a wing through the air, a glow shimmering off of them.
A huge gush of clean water swelled like some beast out of the muck.
The ponies had no time to reach and quickly several of the pegasi, unicorns, and earth ponies were washed off.
Gasping they struggled against the muck. Some are just close enough to grip a vine or rock to pull themselves out.
Others, though, were not so lucky.
This time the pegasi and unicorns panicked. Trying to grab at anything they could. Even the ropes thrown for other ponies.
But the earth pony who threw it simply gave it a whip and it slung back around him.
The groups of ponies glared at each other, rushing and working to save their own and getting in each other's way during the process.
Firm Stride saw Ivy and One Eye jolt forward to help, but both suddenly stopped and swiveled to look at Mordane who hovered, staring at the crowd.
“Are you going to do anything!?” Firm Stride shouted. Drawing only a grin from Mordane and a wince from Ivy.
He turned and shouted at his fellow earth ponies who had already pulled out the few of their own who had washed in.
“Help them, you dunderheads!”
Several looked conflicted.
The one who had thrown the rope though sneered.
“Why should we, they didn’t help you.”
“Because we didn’t help them! Don’t you get it?” he spat “We can’t do this without them! Mordane won’t let us!”
The earth ponies looked at each other.
“DO IT YOU DIRT PONIES!” He roared.
The group jumped. Most rushing over to help. Still, three sat to the side. One being the stallion who had used his rope to save him.
The pegasi and unicorns were fished out. They thanked everypony, some gripping the other in shaking hugs.
Mordane waited a moment for them to settle before making his move.
With a twist over he impacted behind the three earth ponies. Causing them to jolt and swerve to face him.
“You're done. Strip.”
Two of them immediately wilted but the center rope carrying one sneered.
“How am I supposed to help some horn heads and feather brains that won’t help one of my kind when he's dying.”
“They aren’t pegasi or unicorns. They are your fellow soldiers.”
“You’re kidding,” he laughed, crossing his hooves. “They aren't my comrades.”
“Any of you feel that way about earth ponies?” Mordane asked, turning to the group.
At first no one responded, then two unicorns and a pegasus nodded.
Mordane frowned and motioned the three to come closer.
“You six are right. They are not your comrades. If you can’t accept that then there is no place for you here. Drop your things and I’ll take each of you back.”
The pegasus glared at the earth ponies and reached for his knife to take off his assigned bag.
One of the unicorns followed, keeping his nose pointed toward the sky. However, the other one bowed his head and said.
“I can...learn.”
“I don’t have time to let you learn. Drop your things.”
“Well, I won’t go! I don’t want to,” cut in the large earth pony from before.
He lunged at Mordane, both hooves aiming for his head.
Mordane sneered as he reared up and met the earth pony.
Their impact set a crack through the air. Mordane’s cloak billowed out behind him.
But the stallion didn’t get long to even think.
Mordane spread his wings and with a mighty pump sent a blast of air into the earth ponies chest. The pony stumbled back a step but Mordane didn’t give him a chance before he turned and gave a big buck into his chest.
The pony was lifted from the ground a few feet as a loud snap split through the forest.
“Shit!” Mordane shouted as the pony before he crumpled to the ground.
A gurgling sound escaped the ponies lips as he smashed onto the marshy ground.
“Damn it, I hit him with everything,” Mordane shouted. His eyes glanced over the unicorns. “Do any of you know any healing?”
The ponies shook their heads.
Mordane cursing trotted over to the downed stallion and roughly threw him over his shoulder. Drawing spittle of blood to smack against Mordanes flank.
Mordane didn’t wait to give an explanation, instead rocketing off into the air with a blast of wind.
One Eye tracked him as he went. His eye then turned to the rest of the group, thinking for a moment.
“Grounds uneven. We should use a rope while we walk,” he said. He stomped over to the dropped rope and trotted up to the largest earth pony.
“Move to the back,” he barked before tying the rope to himself and heading to the front of the line. “Strap yourself to the line.”
He stopped, turned, and sneered.
“No pony left behind,” he let that hang for a moment with no reaction before shouting, “DO YOU HEAR ME PONIES!”
“Sir, Yes SIR!” they shouted
Firm Stripe hurried like the others to tie himself to the rope.
He kept a brisk pace with the group as they headed off.
Soon, another pony slipped but was quickly caught and pulled out by their neighbors.
Firm grew more sure of his footing and observant as they walked. He found himself watching the pony in front of him.
A tug on the rope made him immediately glare back, but the pegasi only pointed at a soft moss patch at his hooves.
Realizing she had saved him from a tumble Firm Stride gave a quick nod of thanks before turning back to the mare in front of him. Watching where she stepped.
There was little regard for bruised hooves or popped joints as Mordane returned again and again. As their number decreased one by one the remaining grew quieter.
As they pushed the day forward, Snarl came to understand just what separated unicorns from other ponies.
His friend was abnormally fit for a unicorn, her sword skills were great and her knowledge of the arcane made her a great mercenary.
They had traveled from battlefield to battlefield together for years.
Riverside had sworn to always stay with him, ever since they had left their village together all those years ago.
Every step deeper into the woods really drove it home to him though.
Each step warbled, and between the saddlebags and supplies she looked exhausted.
Mordane, though, had ordered that everypony must carry their own supplies.
Snarls ears perked up. He glanced back at the two gold packs already on his back. He had even picked up another bag. Enough to start a new life out of this hell hole.
But what about his friend?
Pursing his lips he pulled up behind her and tugged on the extra gold pack quickly unclipping the thing and flipping up onto his own back with a grunt.
She stopped and turned, blushing as she panted, glaring daggers at him.
“What...” she gasped. ”What are you doing?”
Sweat rolled down his cheek but Snarl smiled. Bumping into her and forcing her to keep walking in the Congo line.
“Turns out I’m just too greedy. I don’t want to let you have any of the gold.”
“...oh,” she replied softly. Her face buttering up from stone to something more akin to leather before her eyes lit up again, this time a smile cracking underneath. “You were always a bit pincher.”
“Have to be with how quick you spend them,” he chuckled.
Mordane trotted away from the last bigoted pony. Not looking back as he went down the street of the small town.
He went past the mill, the blacksmiths, and eventually the general store. Ignoring the slaves all around him, he went straight to the ‘courier office’.
In such a small town, far from the defense of Herridon, this little box on the edge of the town represented the furthest reach of the unicorn princess and king.
Even here, the divide could be seen. Two guards stood on either side. One a royal pegasi guard and the other a unicorn city guard.
Mordane trotted up giving a nod to them both, only the pegasi returned it while the other only turned up his nose.
Flipping through the letters he was quick to find one listed for him from Trixie.
He took a moment to read it. Then chew over the words. His brow furrowing as he chewed absentmindedly on his quill.
“I’ll just have to trust her.”
His horn sparked, and with a grimace, he wrote back his reply.
She pumped her wings again, the warm wet updrafts carried her higher into the sky. Each beat trailing her heart by a moment. The crankshaft of her wings tempo setting all the bells and whistles firing. Striking from her brain to her limbs to keep the timing and adjustment needed for flight.
A swing of the tail and she veered to the left. A tilt of the wings she would fall suddenly, a being of flesh and blood again.
She caught a breath of fresh air. Eyes closed before reaching the apex of her arc and diving back down toward the stink.
She snapped open her wings and glided over the treetops. Her ears twitching at the snaps, chirps, and cries of creatures.
Far below the ground could be seen.
Over the last two days, they had come to march well.
Mordane had led them through.
A suggestion here, an instance there, and soon they had begun to change.
Thirty down to twenty. Nine quitters. One died from eating bad berries. Drowned in his own spittle while Mordane had taken the last quitter away.
The ground had given way from the spindly islands to potholes of water and mushy ground. The trees thinning and becoming craggy claws reaching to the heavens.
Her tired wings carried her back to camp.
Landing as the sun was setting, she noted Mordane was not yet back.
The ponies were well on their way to finishing camp with a few even settling down for a break around the fire before bed.
She came skitting to a landing. Folding her wings and trotting to sit with them. A conversation already underway.
“-All I’m saying is that it's making sense to me now. We had a hard day today. We lost Boundless today. The rain has been terrible. If I hadn’t been used to making the camp...I don’t know if I’d have the strength,” commented Firm Stride. Taking a sip of water after finishing.
“I guess-” Riverside conceded. “It just seems like a lot of wasted effort…”
“But you don’t know when you’ll need it either,” cut in Snarl. “You remember that night near Nato?”
The mare shivered, shaking her head before answering.
“Of course I do, and we could have used something like this that night…”
“Tell you one thing I could do without though,” spoke up Ivory Star, he laughed, “these gold bags!”
Several of them laughed. Even nodding in agreement. But after a moment a few of them stopped, looking perplexed.
“Would you?” spoke up Snarl. “Get rid of it, I mean.”
“Well...yeah,” Ivory Star agreed. “It chaffs and is heavy. I can’t really eat it. I mean, money is always good but this is a bit much to carry around.”
“But what about after this training? Don’t you want it for then?” Ivy asked.
“No. I don’t think so,” he shook his head firmly. “I’m going to ask to join Mordane’s army.”
Many of the ponies frowned, looking at each other to see how they would respond. A silence fell as they all tried to think how to continue the conversation.
“I...want to get stronger,” Ivy said suddenly. Her cheeks were a little red. “Mordane offers a way for me to do that. To...become something else.”
“I am the same,” replied Ivory Star. “Though I was hoping for a title. My brother is in line for our family inheritance. I will have nothing. I’m sure that if I serve Sir Mordane well, I will have a place in his kingdom.”
Stalwart nodded firmly.
“A kingdom?” asked another pony.
“Can you really see an alicorn staying the subject of a half throned mortal?”
The group had no response and no denial.
“Kingdom or no...I want to follow him. Me and Snarl owe him our lives,” Riverside said. “Frankly, I don’t care where he goes.”
“I think he will free the ponies of Underside,” Firm Stride stated. “He's an idiot. But he is the kind of idiot that can’t help but change the world.”
The ponies looked at each other. Realization dawning on their faces. Their eyes looking out at the collections of ponies around their own fires.
They realized they were not alone.
The next morning, while flying her patrol once again her eyes caught something in the distance.
A movement among the trees that was unnatural.
It made the fur stand up on the back of her neck.
She turned and stepped back toward the column, breaking into a dive as she approached and slamming into the ground near Mordane. Her hooves sank into the soil a few inches.
“Mordane!”
“Report,” he said eyes snapping to her.
“Timberwolves! About ten minutes out heading right for us!” she shouted before pointing with her wing. “That way!”
Mordane didn’t waste any time. He glanced over the area before pointing to a tree.
“To there. Form a half circle.”
The ponies hesitated, drawing a curse from Mordane and One Eye.
Quickly, Mordane and One Eye pushed the ponies into formation, making a half-circle near the tree. Mordane started walking down the line.
“Earth ponies, bury your shoulders into the earth, anchor against them, and use your hoof blades. pegasi use your spears, reach over their shields. Unicorns…”
Mordane frowned before giving a small snort.
“Come here then.”
The unicorns scrambled close, bending down to let Mordane release the horn rings. Their magic rushing back mixed with the adrenaline in their blood to make them giddy.
After a bit more shouting and a little prodding from One Eye, the ponies were in formation.
Silence took hold.
The chirps and creeps of the swampland called out through it.
Each pony shook from fear, exhaustion, or worse. Coats gleaming in the fog as they waited.
Mordane stood at the center. His eyes closed as he swayed in an unknown torrent.
“Don’t break. I won’t.” Mordane whispered.
He opened his eyes, staring into the swamp.
“I am here. Do not break. We live or die together.”
Snarl was giving credence to his namesake. He snapped his teeth to grab the strap on his hoof. He pulled tight, giving it a firm tug around the spear as his eyes narrowed into the fog.
The small sounds began to fade as the cacophony of small animal sounds and birds taking flight fell suddenly away, leaving only the creaking of wood and the snapping of trees swaying in the wind.
Mordane took a good sniff. His brow furrowing.
“They are here.” He wrinkled his nose. “You can smell the stench of them a mile away.”
Rotting flesh and wood, mixed with a freshly cut lawn and the flipping stomach of dark magic.
Each pony immediately committed the smell to memory, knowing it was something you could never forget.
Then suddenly, one was there.
It bound out of the fog, twice as tall as any normal pony.
“Brace your shields,” Mordane and One Eye Shouted.
One Eye leaned down glaring with his eye as the timber-wolf charged him down. It slammed into him but One Eye didn’t budge.
He grunted as the Timber-wolves scratched along the copper shield. Its sharp claws denting the copper shield. His instinct told him to step back but Instead, he thrust his hoof blade deep into its chest.
It yelped but did not stop. Only trying to claw even more furiously over the shield.
Mordane’s eyes widened.
“Tougher than the Everfree…” he muttered. “What are you waiting for, Pegasi! Stab it!”
The three nearest pegasi stabbed at the beast. Snarl carried through taking a step forward as he let out a low rumble.
The three spears stabbed in. Two going uselessly for the head. Snarl for the heart.
The pony to the left of One Eye, seeming to think it pinned, stepped out from behind his shield to strike.
“Dammit, that's not the only one!” Mordane shouted. But it was too late. The second one struck. Its claws and teeth sinking into the foolhardy pony. Two new spearmen stabbed at it. At the same time another Timberwolf pulled back and redirected, this time going for Mordanes throat.
A third wolf was closing until a fire bolt hit it, blasting the arcane creature into burning chunks of wood.
The first wolf finally disintegrated. Just in time for the rest of the pack to arrive.
A total of twelve wolves dove into the small party. A couple quickly grabbing and dragging off two ponies before the rest were pinned by shield and bow.
The two wolves dragged their still-living prey kicking and screaming ten feet away before starting to claw at their armor. Pulling back the leather to get at their stomachs.
Mordane narrowed his eyes, pausing a moment to make a decision before taking to his wings.
Ivy saw him lift off, her spear buried deep in a timber-wolf she suddenly lost interest in. In that moment she thought he was running away. Her ears stood straight, her eyes dilated, and she froze.
”No, please no,” she thought.
But then the wind began to shift.
Mordane’s eyes began to turn slightly white before he dove down to where two of the ponies were well on their way to being disemboweled.
He impacted the ground with a blast of wind throwing the wolves around him off balance just in time for a splash of dirt to slap them.
One disintegrated immediately. The other tried to recover but Mordane didn’t give it a chance.
He flipped and gave a powerful buck, his hoof shattering the core of the timber-wolf.
Four more turned to face him and charged.
Mordane stood tall, hooves together he closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, pointing his wings straight toward the sky.
One Eye threw off another wolf, preparing to stab only to have four more spears find their homes in its chest. He stepped back and scanned, seeing most of the wolves had fallen to pieces until he spotted a pony about to be overcome. He charged in to help, breaking formation.
The four wolves were almost upon Mordane when he snapped his wings down.
There was a blast and a spark.
The air in his blast ripped into flame. A ring of fire spread out from him, barely singeing the ground. The timberwolves, however, seemed to be suddenly standing in a blast furnace.
They howled in agony, falling down and struggling to put out the flames.
Mordane then bent down and scooped the stallion and mare before jumping back to the circle with a beat of his wings, delivering him to their sole healer.
Just as suddenly as it had begun, it was over.
The last of the timberwolves were falling to pieces. Their howls continued long after their wooden jaws fell uselessly to the ground.
“Gather them up! Burn them!” Mordane shouted. Looking at the unicorns as he pointed emphatically.
The ponies rushed forward and began to throw the bodies onto a large pile which the unicorns quickly set alight.
With pegasi fanning the flames it was not more than a minute until the entire attacking pack was set ablaze. Their ghostly howls reached a crescendo before fading into the crackling pine.
“Casualties,” Mordane said, standing next to the open flame. “Casualty report.”
‘“One dead here,” shouted One Eye.
“M-My leg is broken,” spoke up another pony through clenched teeth.
“These two are wounded badly. I don’t think one is going to make it,” stuttered out their only healer.
“Focus on who you can save,” Mordane replied to her.
Mordane trotted over to the two downed ponies and motioned for the third still being untreated to be brought over.
“Who else here knows healing spells, anything, even first aid”
“I do, sir,” spoke up Riverside. “But only some first aid.”
“Good. Come here.”
She complied, stepping up to the towering stallion.
“I can only do-”
Mordane put his hoof over her mouth and she felt something. A sudden presence where it was not wanted, tendrils reaching out to her mind.
Her eyes widen and for a moment she wants to jump back, but her body is frozen in place.
In her head, two eyes burn into her. A five-fingered appendage wrapped around her brain, its fingers sinking deep into its wrinkles.
Her nose flared and her heart quickened. Her eyes drained of hope as the mountain looms up before her. Behind her, she hears the stamping of feet and a great weight grinding down on this… creature’s mind. While something else bubbled up in black ooze.
“Do not be afraid of me, Riverside...We have ponies to heal.”
From the boiling black she felt sick understanding wash over her. For a moment she was overcome, her desire to retch catching in her thoughts as the black tide swallowed and poured into her.
A different voice whispered.
”You are mine now little mar-”
”No.”
Suddenly a rush of energy washed over her mind, banishing the darkness. The mountain poured and radiated strength into her. Its will, twisting like an iron screw into the soil.
“Focus. The ponies, River.”
Riverside opened her eyes. She turned and looked down at the three ponies. She saw their flesh and knew intimate details.
Her horn charged and she set things right. Her horn burning hot as they slowly, methodically stitched the ponies together with their spellwork.
There was nothing but work. Nothing but the understanding and will to do.
Then, it was over.
Mordane’s hoof fell from the back of her head and she blinked.
The three ponies laid unconscious, their bodies healed by her magic.
A magic she could still feel inside her. The image burned into her mind of the pony form. What it should be, how it fit together. The darkness of how and why pushed away, leaving only the knowledge.
Looking down at the bodies, she realized that it was her own magic that had cured them. Her own power, and she could do it again. Indeed, she would do it again, and that made her happy.
“Congratulations,” entoned the voice behind her. “You have found your mark.”
She turned to see a mark of a pony silhouette with a bandaged hoof. She smiled, something clicking into place in her mind before exhaustion overtook her and she fell to the dusty earth.
Mordane swayed on his hooves.
His horn was sparking from a chip that had been blown clear, striking his ear. Where it struck the skin was burned and blacked .
His eyes glared up at his still sparking horn, the energy dying down as he stared at it.
A small river of blood seeped out of the crack, sliding down to the base and over his brow.
Mordane steadied himself. His eyes came to focus on the downed ponies.
“Bury the last one. In a cloud, if you must.”
He turned and tried taking to wing, but he only made it a few feet into the air before tumbling to the ground.
Crashing into blackness.
Mordane laid in his tent. Shaking.
The pain.
A numbness followed after it, feeding into his wings as Mordane breathed pained breaths.
”It's getting worse,” his Shadow hissed.
”He can’t even hold us together anymore,” spoke Pony.
”It is driving him mad,” intoned Logic, observing what was going on dispassionately.
”You can’t escape me.”
Mordanes' eyes snapped open, sweat pouring down him, his eyes focused on something far away, and slowly the voices faded.
“Who were they,” spoke Ivy.
“W-what?” sputtered Mordane. His eyes locked onto the mare. She stood over him, dabbing a water soaked cloth against his head.
“The voices.” She reached up with her wing and tapped her head. “I can hear them, so can the rest of the camp.”
Her ears drooped.
“They are terrified.”
Mordane blinked a few times. His eyes were barely able to focus on her as he swallowed.
He sat up with obvious effort and pain.
“It was...necessary to save those ponies,” Mordane said. “You can’t be someone like me and not have some...internal conflict.”
Ivy nodded slowly, her eyes staying focused on him.
“I’ve taken two away…” She lifted her chin. “I wouldn’t sell them, but I took their things.”
Mordane’s eyes focused on her, searching for some indication before sighing and laying back down.
“I’m surprised more did not try to run.”
Ivy shook her head sharply. Her lips pushed tight together.
“The rest…are determined.”
“Gold does have its allure,” Mordane replied.
“No pony would go this far for gold,” she spat. Suddenly angry. “Nopony would sit in the dark shivering as nightmares crawl into their dreams just for...” She stopped, sucking in a sharp breath as Mordane turned to stare at her.
His mouth hung open, eyes widened at her words.
“What?” he asked
“They want to follow you.” Her voice cracked. “Those ponies you saved, the things you've done. What you will do. What you are. WHO you are.”
She looked down, tears falling down her cheek.
“They want to be part of it.”
Mordane watched her start to sob. Her wings clamped tight against her chest as she shook.
“I don’t understand,” Mordane said, staring at her.
She snapped to look at him. Her eyes burned with rage.
Rising to her hooves she pulled Mordane up, made him slip on a cloak and practically threw him out of the tent.
Mordane stumbled out, caught off guard by the sudden ferocity.
Outside, the sun was falling below the horizon. All around, ponies were hard at work. The camp construction was already underway, straight and square.
Mordane’s head swam as the light of mid-day hit his eyes. However, he drew himself together and looked around as ponies stopped what they were doing to come up to him.
He scanned over them, they seemed tired. Afraid, to him some looked ready to bolt if he so much as glared at them.
Ivy stood at his side supporting him as he had trouble standing.
Uncertain of what to say, he said nothing. Instead, waiting for a moment to present itself.
And for once, the moment came.
“Who is here for the gold?” Ivy hollered. No pony spoke up, but many in the crowd frowned. Others seemed perplexed.
Ivy took a quick glance at Mordane and seeming to find what she was looking for continued. “Mordane wanted to thank you for your work in driving off the timberwolves. After discussing what would be a suitable reward he has decided you all pass. Your crime is forgiven. You can go.”
Mordane stiffened at her words, but he didn’t say anything. Waiting to see who would take her offer.
No pony moved.
“In fact...keeping soldiers is expensive. If you don’t go, then Mordane is just going to keep the coin. He thinks you are a bunch of idiots who can’t even ford a river properly.”
Several ponies chuckled.
Mordane said nothing. His eyes flicking around the crowd as it visibly seemed to relax.
The fear drained from their eyes and smiles appeared on their faces.
“If you think what happened before is bad...oh wow, you have no idea what is coming!” She looked very serious. “He's a necromancer alicorn you know! Perhaps the alicorn of death itself! Are you sure you want to stay?”
The sun shined and Mordane felt as if he had swallowed a stone. His legs ached in all the wrong places. His horn burned and ached even more. His wings itched and felt bunched up despite laying across his back.
He swayed in the wind as no pony moved. All just standing, saying nothing.
Slowly, Mordane looked them over. Each ponies’ eyes filled with something he recognized.
Hope.
“What is it that you see?” he grumbled as he tucked his chin.
“An alicorn,” spoke up one of the two prostitute mares.
The ponies shifted, muttering agreement.
“You saved my life,” spoke up another. “If you hadn’t helped River-”
“I risked your life.”
The pony stepped back confused. The wide smile shying off of his face a bit before he spoke up again.
“Yeah, but...if I had done what you said.”
“You helped me find my talent,” whispered Riverside, looking up at Mordane. “I had never even tried to learn more about healing spells, and you just....” Her eyes turn to him full of wonder. “I'll follow you anywhere.”
Mordane sat down, his brow furrowing, wings pressed tightly against himself as he tried to make sense of what he was hearing.
“You can’t go fooling us anymore. You saved those ponies, and Ivy said you weren’t even selling the quitters,” Firm Stride spoke up.
Mordane’s eyes snapped to Ivy. His brow furrowing.
“You never came back with any coin…” She mumbled looking away.
“You really have started taking privileges,” Mordane stated blankly, making the mare blush.
“I find slavery ideologically abhorant, but that doesn’t change the fact that some ponies died. Surely you ponies cannot forget that?”
“No pony is stupid enough to think following an alicorn would be easy... at least any that are still here,” Ivy replied softly. “So stop waiting for us all to give up and start making us into these soldiers you keep talking about.”
The group fell quiet, Mordane looked toward the sky and the ponies all felt as he pushed aside his own confusion and accepted what he was hearing.
“I’d like to hear from each of you.”
The ponies formed a rough line. Sometimes approaching alone and others in small groups. He took a short while to talk to each of them and to learn their names.
Ivy was by his side. Her eyes brightened as she waited while he gave compliments, advice and confirmations to each pony. Seeming to take note of them.
It wasn’t long until Riverside and Snarl stepped up.
“My name is Riverside. This is Snarl,” she said, a giddy smile on her face. “Thank you again.”
“I am glad the mark makes you happy.” He stopped, blinked then gave them both a genuine smile. “Riverside and Snarl. Glad to see you made it out of the tower. How did you make it all the way to Herridon?”
Their eyes brightened as they broke out into grins.
“Well, it wasn’t easy. Had to practically skin old High Rise for our pay. Still, it's good to be working with you again,” Snarl replied.
“Shame what happened to Boulder,” Riverside said quietly. “I thought he was a great squad lead.”
“Stalker too. Shame to see a comrade go like he did.”
“They were--” Mordane choked, swallowing, “--my good friends.”
The two gave him a half bow, before stepping away. Leaning against each other as they did.
As he looked at each pony, uncertainty sat deeply in his mind. For a moment he thought he would hold back. Not give his trust and care to these ponies. However, he pushed that aside. Realizing that this was what he needed and what was right. Come whatever the cost.
“This is the vow I’d ask of you,” he said solemnly.
Each of their ears perked up at the change in tone.
“I swear to serve the soldier beside me, and my Lord, Stronghoof.”
Each pony repeated the oath, most eyes shining as they did. Mordane watched them eagerly swear their lives away and he felt nothing.
The oath did not ring right. Even though it was closer. He knew he needed something better, something more than simple loyalty. Uncertain, he decided to continue on with something else.
“Take out your knives and cut open your gold packs.”
The ponies frowned, some looked at each other with confusion.
Snarl though simply complied. Drawing his blade and ripping into one of the packs he carried.
A large black ingot slipped out and thudded to the ground.
Leaning over Ivy picked it up, looking over the metal.
“Lead?” She asked Holding up the heavy bar.
“Lead.” Mordane replied with a grin.
Quickly knives flashed in the light. Bags were cut and soon the clearing was filled with mirthful laughter.
Mordane watched as the ponies relieved themselves of their burdens. Sharing a hug. A laugh. Beside him, Ivy let go and allowed him to stand on his own hooves.
Mordane though was looking inside himself. Feeling how the sensation of comradery flowed through him.
Mordane felt almost...
Ivy's, his, and the others’ ears perked up and their heads swiveled to look in the sound's direction with surprise.
In the distance, shouting and the beating of drums could just barely be heard.
“What is that?” Ivy asked.
“That,” Mordane replied as he pulled his mind back into his skull. Brow furrowing as he looked toward the sound. “Sounds like our first battle.”