//------------------------------//
// 14 - Dominican 
// Story: Horse Of The Rising Sun 
// by TCC56 
//------------------------------//

Wakefulness returned slowly - with a flutter of the eyes and a sharper breath. Tempest felt a cold cloth dabbing at her face first, touching gently. It pulled back as she opened up her eyes - of all the ponies she expected to be caring for her, Starswirl was probably near the bottom of the list. Yet he was there, a damp rag in hoof and a mixture of relief and concern on his brow. 

Fortunately, he spared Tempest the indignity of asking the same stupid stereotypical question everypony asks when they come around after passing out. "It's been about half of a day," he related. "I presume you needed sleep no matter your condition and that compounded things."

Tempest licked her lips. "Mouth's kinda dry." 

Gently, Starswirl lifted a small cup of wine and dribbled a bit into Tempest's mouth. "I fear you lost quite a lot of water as well as your dinner, Miss Shadow. Once you're feeling up to it, we'll get something back into you so you can keep your strength up." 

A quiet chuckle snuck out of Tempest. "Better my dinner than some of the other things I could've lost."

"Yes. Quite." Starswirl's dry humor gave way to an odd hint of pride in his voice. "Foolishly going back up when you were already on the verge of collapse aside, your quick recognition of the situation means we were exceptionally lucky. A good two hundred souls owe you their lives."

That he mentioned those saved and not those lost - and with a tone of such cheer - lifted a weight that had been in Tempest's uneasy gut.

Tempest pinched her eyes shut and took a long, deep breath. One thick with the funk of unwashed pony and smoke, but clean enough. "Do we know why?"

It wasn't a good answer, as Starswirl's voice shifted from pride to grim stoicism. "The vents in the roof were iced over. These windigoes are smarter than the ones I remember." He paused for a moment. "Not that I was any use against those, either."

Slowly, Tempest nodded. "Right, that was Clover, wasn't it?" She grunted, shifting to put her hooves under her once more and rise. 

Starswirl reached out to support Tempest as she did so, letting her lean into him for stability. "Yes. And much to my shame. Clover was indeed the most clever of us and found a magic I had discarded." He frowned, the memory creeping in on him. "I would continue to discard it even after Clover vanished. It took a thousand years for me to realize my error." Shaking his head, he cast the memory away again. "If you ever doubt yourself, Miss Shadow, remember that you have picked up in a year what it took me a lifetime to learn." 

Quietly, Tempest scoffed as she shook the sleep from her legs one at a time. "You say that like you wouldn't have done the same thing." 

"I wouldn't have." Shame tinged Starswirl's voice. "It is simply... not who I am. I would have stayed below and coordinated, yes, but to rush headlong into danger like that?" He shook his head. "No. I have tried to make myself better in that way, but the lessons of the past do not allow me to deceive myself."

They started slowly, shuffling towards the distant scent of food as Starswirl continued. "Do you know why it was Clover who founded Equestria and not I?" He paused just long enough for Tempest to forego a response. "Because I sent my student in my place. Because I felt that venturing out to find a new land was foolish and wasteful. So I dispatched Clover with Princess Platinum instead of accompanying her myself, staying behind to place my muzzle in books instead." A deep sigh came with a shake of his head. "And even when word reached me of what Clover had done, the only thing I felt was pride that my teachings had obviously been used to win the day. Even forming the Pillars was selfish - they were assistants, not equals. I was a--"

"You are no fool," Tempest interrupted. "And as I have been very strongly reminded as of late, even if you were that is not who you are. If you want me to believe in my own change, you should believe in yours, too."

They paused as a flock of foals stampeded past, enroute to some imaginary adventure. Starswirl quietly chuckled. "And you use my own words to show that this old stallion is yet limber enough to put his head up his own dock."

A laugh was shared as they got in line for food - Tempest could smell cabbage and wine - before lapsing briefly into silence. Tempest broke that after a few minutes. "So. Did we have another crisis while I was out, or was fate patient?"

"It kept us busy, but nothing of note." Starswirl dismissed it - then revised his explanation. "There was a brief spat among the kitchen staff. Apparently much of the food that was brought is not as immediately usable as hoped - unmilled grain instead of bread, for example. And having to work without water is a great limiter. They are making do, but not without complaint. There was also a small fight after one of the foals was caught stealing another's doll, causing their parents to turn violent." He waved it off. "All resolved."

Something in the back of Tempest's head jingled, and she looked at Starswirl with narrowed eyes. 

He shifted uneasily for a few moments before sighing. "There was a brief but spirited discussion by some of the more stout locals. They had the stunningly foolish plan to dig downwards from the wine cellar and try to break into the catacombs below the churchyard." Starswirl scoffed quietly, then hesitated as a bowl of steaming cabbage and onions was ladled out for him and then for Tempest. As they broke from the line to find a place to eat, he continued. "With losing the second floor, things have gotten rather cramped. It would be a grim space to sleep, but space none the less. Of course, once we entered into it we would have mere minutes to seal the outer entrance up before the windigoes found their way inside. And the plan was discarded as well once the prospective rock-breakers realized that the digging would take longer than your deadline for attempting to escape, rendering the entire idea moot."

Finding a place in the crowded throng, the pair sat beside each other and started to eat. Eyes downcast into her cabbage, Tempest half-heartedly denied his words. "It's not my deadline."

Her denial was deflected by a passive-aggressive chuckle from the old sage. "You were the one who set it, Commander. Everypony else has attributed it to you - you may as well own it yourself."

A few more slow chews. A swallow. And then a reluctant question. "How long before it now?"

The best answer Starswirl could give was a shrug. "Not long, I suspect. But then we'll be packing up for some time instead - a herd this large cannot possibly move at night, after all." 

"They'll have to." Tempest set her jaw, stone-faced and grim. "If we're going, we can't afford to do anything less than our all. Forced march through the night and we should be able to make Stirrup Hill in two days."

Starswirl glared at Tempest, expression uncomfortably halfway between incredulity and frustration. "You can't possibly expect to force-march nearly a thousand untrained townsponies for two days. Particularly since not a one of them has ever been more than a ten minute gallop from where they were born."

His words hung in the air as Tempest went through two more mouthfuls of cabbage. Then, direly, she responded. "I don't think they're going to have much choice." 

A spike of anger flashed through Starswirl's eyes and he opened his mouth to give a fiery retort to her foolish idea. But the words died as Scribble came weaving through the crowd to them. "Starswirl! Starswirl!" There was panic in her voice that instantly derailed the two outsiders' discussion. She got as close as she could to them before delivering her message, voice taut as a violin. "Prioress Heart needs you in the library immediately. There's a problem."

Bowls discarded, all three rapidly picked their way out of the throng and to the library. Their entry was delayed slightly, pushed back by a small herd of ponies moving out at a pace slightly faster than any casual shift should have been. That was the first hint that things were seriously awry. The second was that the library was almost entirely clear of ponies - unlike how the rest of the priory was packed nearly to bursting. 

The only pony present was the Prioress herself - and Reliquary paced back and forth in the central reading area of the room. Hooves on flagstone drew her attention in short order. "I said everypony is to leave imm-- Oh thank Celestia, you found him." Reliquary gave Scribble a quick hug as thanks before turning her eyes to Starswirl. "We were lucky."

The old stallion raised a bushy eyebrow. "It's a problem and we're lucky?"

"Lucky because a keen-eared foal discovered the problem before it became a catastrophe." Reliquary pointed towards the roof. "The foal innocently asked his mother what the scraping noise was. She brought it to my attention and it only took a few minutes of listening to catch it." 

All four of them stopped, ears pricked as they waited for the sound that had caused so much trouble. There was nothing but silence for more than a minute - then Tempest's ears swiveled as she caught a slight scraping noise. They all focused on it a moment later as there was the howl of a gust of wind, followed by a slightly louder scrape. Another gust; another scrape; then one last gust and the rapid clatter of stone bouncing on stone. 

Reliquary was ahead of them because she'd been listening before. "It's the roof tiles. The windigoes are peeling them off, one by one."

Starswirl's grey face paled. "The belltower's fall must have damaged the roof."

A nod from the Prioress confirmed his theory. "It created a weak point and they're chipping away at it little by little." She ignored Tempest cursing under her breath. "As I said - we were lucky. If that foal hadn't identified the sound and spoken up about it, the windigoes could have broken in. Now we have enough time to reinforce the roof and prevent that."

"Impossible." Starswirl dismissed the idea with the same ease as refusing extra salt on his meal. "The amount of work it would take to reinforce a room this large would be ridiculous, even if we were staying. The windigoes could break through at any time, and keeping a few dozen ponies in here working would put them at risk for very little gain. Better to seal the door and be done with it. We shall likely have to do so with the upper level rooms nearby as well - they may have also been compromised. That will be dangerous, but we cannot leave them open."

He likely interpreted the silence that followed as dour agreement rather than the shock it really was. It took several seconds of open-mouthed gawking before Reliquary could find the words. "No!" Her gasped exclamation pulled Starswirl's attention back. "If it were anywhere else I could accept that, but not here!" She waved a hoof at the tall shelves around them, each packed tight as Moondancer's own with books and scrolls. "This is the accumulated knowledge of fifty generations - we can't just abandon it!"

"And yet we must, and we will." Starswirl looked to the shelves, regret seeping into his tone. "I am loathe to abandon it but saving it is beyond our means. All we can do is hope that the roof's inevitable collapse and the snow leave most of the volumes relatively intact."

The Prioress stomped forward, shoving her face into Starswirl's and nearly smashing their horns against each other. "You cold-hearted spawn of a windigo! We are not just going to throw away the House's entire history!" She jabbed him with a hoof, sending his bells jingling. "And you should say the same! Look what you went through just to get access to it!"

He didn't flinch - didn't move. Starswirl stayed stoically still, barely even looking at Reliquary's desperate face. "As I said, I am loathe to say it. We must have our priorities straight, however. This is an extraordinary situation and we must face facts. This knowledge was lost before - losing it again--"

"Not to us," Reliquary snapped angrily. "Maybe it was lost to you, but not to us! This is the backbone of this House and our lives - you can't dismiss it as if it were nothing!" Hurriedly stomping to the nearest table, she grabbed a book off it - a fairly generic brown tome, distinguished only by the ancient yellow of the pages. She threw it at Starswirl, falling short but still managing for it to bump against his hoof. "That treatise by Nail Puller includes techniques of long-range telekinesis that you told me have been lost for generations!" She threw another book - this one going a bit too high and to the right. "Or that one! That's the one by Evergreen you said could revolutionize recovery time after magical exhaustion!" She grabbed for another book before stopping herself. Instead of hurling a book, she just glared at the sorcerer. "I could easily find a dozen volumes that you praised and talked about how important they were. And now you want us to walk away from them without a fight?"

Legs rod-straight, Starswirl didn't move. "None of this is without a fight, Prioress." She winced as he hissed her title at her. "The last two days have been nothing but a fight. And as part of that, we must make sacrifices. Losing this knowledge is a tragedy, but a portion of it will survive and the resources needed to save it are too high and the task too risky. Knowledge can be recovered, but lives cannot."

Shame pushed down Reliquary's gaze, forcing her to look at her hooves. But she wasn't beaten. "I'm not suggesting trading ponies for books. But we can't just surrender all of this without even trying. We have to try and save it, Starswirl."

"We can't." Starswirl's ire finally gave - he crossed the space between them, setting a hoof on her shoulder. "Even if there were no risk, we will be leaving soon. And then the library shall be left to the windigoes' fury no matter what is done to the roof. I don't wish to see these things lost, but our only options are to leave them or to take risks with no gain."

"But without this, what do we really have left? We've already lost our homes and our livelihoods, now we're to lose our history and culture in an escape attempt that will lose most of us." Reliquary sagged. She turned her head to the other two - Scribble would be no help. She was simply watching, face locked in the frown of a child seeing her parents argue. So instead the Prioress looked to Tempest. "Commander, please, say something. You came all this way - are you ready to abandon everything?" 

That was an iron barb into Tempest's heart. Because Reliquary was right - abandoning the library meant giving up on the entire reason they came to the House in the first place. Starswirl hadn't found anything yet - nothing firm. But he had implied a promising hint or two. Without the library, even that thin sliver of hope was lost. The chances of Starswirl finding a solution in the waning hours of the windigo siege were vanishingly slim, but Tempest had brought literal war to entire nations on less. 

And that thought slapped her across the face. 

Tempest pinched her eyes tightly shut, pushing down her welling fear. "If I said we should stay - I wouldn't be growing from my mistakes. I'd be putting other's lives at risk for my own selfish needs. As much as I want to agree with you, Prioress, I can't. Because if I did, it means I haven't learned anything." The next line was harder, forcing her to pause for a sharp breath before shoving it out. "We have to abandon the library and hope for the best. Maybe the damage won't be as bad as you're afraid of."

That blow put Reliquary down for the count - she slumped into one of the chairs beside the nearby table. "I... I'm afraid, alright?" She didn't look at any of them, instead staring at her hooves. "I guess the library's just making it real for me. We're leaving. Everything we've ever known - everything any of our ancestors has ever known - is being left behind here." She laughed - short, sharp and darkly bitter. "Some adventurer. It's a new journey with nothing to hold me back and all I can think about is everything we're losing and how much I'm going to miss." 

Inching over, Scribble gave her boss a loose hug. "Like tea in the solarium?"

"Or your blackberry patch," Reliquary offered back with a wan smile. 

"Or how Script pitches a fit whenever anything's in the wrong place."

The two laughed together quietly and continued their reminiscing in low, soft voices. 

Starswirl - standing awkwardly beside them - shifted with unease while the two mares traded fragments of memories from their lives. When they finally ran out of words and lapsed into bittersweet silence, he spoke up. "I know I can be... brusque at times. I have never been a people pony. Do not think I miss what this sacrifice means to you, Reliquary. It hurts me to give up on it and I can only imagine how badly it hurts you." He reached out, gently touching a hoof to her cheek. She hesitated slightly, then tilted her head into it. "This old stallion is perhaps a bit too used to making sacrifices and forgets that others are not. And while I won't budge from saying we must go... can you forgive me for being cold?"

Her response was to release her hug with Scribble and take Starswirl in one instead. "I can," Reliquary pronounced with a small smile. "You weren't trying to be hurtful and... you're right. I hate that you are, but you're right." Breaking away, Reliquary returned to the table they had been working at when everything went wrong two days before. She picked up one of the books remaining on it - the embossed cover declaring it Studies In Non-Unicorn Magic by Golden Rays - and idly flipped through the first few pages. "Do you think... Scribble, once we're done here? Maybe you could help me write the story of our little valley. Even if we lose these books, we could create a new one and let all of Equestria know what became of the House?"

"I'd be honored." Scribble said, head bowed low. 

Then it - and the rest of theirs - shot up as the door slammed open. Luminous Script stood there, panting and eyes panic-wide. They waited, tense, for him to reveal what new crisis had happened. 

"Listen," he finally said. 

It took a moment for everypony to realize he meant to listen rather than the lead-in for a longer statement. So they stopped. And they did. 

Scribble was the first one to key in, sharp ears catching the lack of sound. "...There's no wind." The muffled white noise that had roared in the background was gone. Silent for the first time in days. 

Tempest's eyes went wide as she realized it as well. And shoving Script aside, she bolted out of the library and into the priory proper.