“I have to say, I thought it would take longer than a single night’s practice for you to get the hang of this.”
Prevarius’ compliment made Thermal Draft smile, fighting down a yawn as she gave the phistophilus a grateful look. “Says the guy who not only gave me the ability to do this in the first place, but then was nice enough to stay up and train me.”
“What can I say?” The devil gave a theatrical bow, chuckling deeply. “I pride myself on providing excellent customer service.”
“Well, let me know if there’s anywhere I can leave you a good review,” giggled Drafty. But her smile lost its teasing tone a moment later, becoming a look of gratitude. “All kidding aside though, I really do appreciate everything you’ve done for me. I know you said you can’t help anyone out for free, but you still gave me an awful lot in exchange for nothing but-”
“THERMAL DRAFT! GET AWAY FROM THAT CREATURE IMMEDIATELY!”
The voice that roared at her from across the clearing made her jump, pain flaring across her mangled wing as she tried to take to the sky on reflex. But even before her hooves returned to the ground, her tired brain reminded her that the voice was one that she knew. The realization was enough to make her heart speed up, excitement rushing through her as she turned to look at the stallion whom she’d never doubted would come looking for her.
“Lex! I’ve been w-”
Her greeting died on her lips as she caught sight of the black-clad, skull-faced pony who stepped out from the trees a moment later.
The image was scary enough that she took an involuntary step back, fright causing nearly causing her to stumble, and it was only belatedly that she recognized the bright red horn and green eyes with purple flames sprouting from their outer edges. Even then, she felt a shiver run down her spine as she looked him over, bringing with it a rush of anxiety rather than the usual warmth that she felt whenever she laid eyes on him. It was enough that she barely noticed Solvei pad out from alongside him a moment later, followed by the winged wolf who’d brought her here to begin with. The latter winced as she glanced at Prevarius, leaning over to mutter something to Solvei before turning and running back into the woods.
“Interesting,” murmured Prevarius, one hand coming up to rub his chin. “You said he wasn’t like other ponies, and you weren’t kidding.”
The phistophilus’ unconcerned reaction – along with the sight of Solvei, who Drafty knew was kindhearted, standing next to Lex – were enough to make the pegasus shake off the last of her fright. What was she doing? She’d been waiting for him to come find her so she could surprise him, and now she was embarrassing herself! Huffing in consternation, she tried to recover her poise, glancing up at Prevarius. “I’ll be right back, okay?”
“Take your time,” grinned the devil, looking bemused. “I’m sure you two have a lot to talk about.”
That’s putting it mildly. But Drafty kept that thought to herself as she trotted over to where Lex and Solvei were. “Hey you guy-uys!” she called, deliberately putting a lyrical lilt into her voice as she stretched out the syllable. “You don’t need to worry, everything’s okay! Although I gotta admit, you really gave me a fright just now!”
She directed that last part at Lex, close enough now to see that the skull was actually a wooden mask, one that contrasted sharply with the black outfit he’d put on and the dull robe and cloak swirling around him. “Seriously, what’s with the Nightmare Night getup? Are you-, wait! Is that stuff ma-gi-cal?” She sang the last three syllables, then made a show of concentrating for a moment, hoping that he’d pick up on the hints she was dropping. She knew Lex wasn’t exactly the smoothest pony when it came to picking up nuance, but between the way she looked now, the way she kept injecting tonal elements into her words, and what she was actually saying, surely she was making it clear enough even for him? “Oh my gosh! It is! Wow, I guess we’ve both gotten an upgrade!”
“Thermal Draft,” rumbled Lex, his voice practically thrumming with tension. “Did you sign a contract with that monstrosity?”
Drafty fought the urge to slump, discouraged by both his open hostility toward Prevarius as well as his needing to ask. “C’mon Lex, don’t be like that. Prevarius is really nice. I mean, I know he looks ferocious, but so do you and you’re a great guy.”
“Drafty, the Red Man isn’t your friend,” interjected Solvei, glancing between the pegasus and where the devil was still grinning at them from a stone’s throw away. “I told you how he lent his power to the wolf who killed my father, and then made my entire family sick, remember? He’s a spirit of evil.”
This time Drafty did slump, ears folding back. “You too, Solvei? Look, Lex and I both thought you were a monster when we first met, remember? Because you tore up my wing and all?” She held the maimed appendage in question out, seeing the wolf wince at that. “But we sat down and talked to you and realized that you’re not-”
“Did you make a deal with him?!” hissed Lex, his eyes flaring brighter.
“Geez, you really can’t tell?” huffed Drafty. “I thought it would be obvious: of course I did.”
Lex let out a sharp breath, looking like he’d just been slugged in the gut. “No…”
Solvei tilted her head, looking Thermal Draft over. “Are you sure? My family looked horrible when they got the Red Man’s sickness, but you don’t seem to have changed.”
Biting back a groan, Drafty made one more attempt to show off. “Are you sure?” She stood up on her hind legs then, keeping her eyes on Lex as she put one hoof on her hips and the other behind her head, tilting her neck back as she let a melody flow into her words. “Don’t I seem, just a bit, different from how, I, used to be?”
She didn’t let it stop there, silently calling on the new powers she’d gained from her contract with Prevarius. With a thought, a quartet of colored lights surrounded her, shining in different colors as they bobbed and weaved, painting her in a bright swirl of lights that lit up the dreary clearing. She held the pose as they did, letting her last syllable trail off into the air as Lex looked at her, his expression hidden behind his mask.
That’s right, she grinned. Drink it all in. Kara might have given me the power to look however I wanted, but now I know what it takes to look spec-freaking-tacular.
That was something the goddess hadn’t gotten around to teaching her. It was one thing to look like someone else, but it was another thing to understand what actually made somepony look attractive. Tastes might vary between individuals, of course, but there was a surprising amount of things that were both universal, and so subtle that your average pony couldn’t have articulated them. But Drafty understood them all now, grinning as Lex gazed at her.
Can you tell the difference? she wondered. Can you see that my lips are just a tiny bit plumper? That my eyes are a little rounder than they were? That my waist is trimmer, my plot is bubblier, and my back legs are thinner? Because it’s all for you…you and Cloudy, once we get home.
“Thermal Draft,” breathed Lex a moment later, his voice no less tense despite having lowered it. “What did that thing do to you?”
Drafty sighed, mentally ordering the colored lights to fade out of existence as she dropped back down onto all fours. “Really? You’re the smartest pony I know, Lex. Aren’t the looks, the voice, and the magic enough to clue you in?”
Solvei glanced back and forth between the two ponies, finally letting her eyes settle on Drafty. “You had the Red Man make you into a pretty singing seidrmadr?”
“Close,” murmured Drafty, taking a step closer to Lex, leaning in to nuzzle him.
“I had him make me into a Siren.”
It had taken only a few minutes for Turid to lead them to where she’d delivered Drafty to the Red Man, whom Lex now knew was a phistophilus devil named Prevarius.
That she’d been so close made Lex want to scream in frustration. Now that he had her location, it was even easier to second-guess the actions he’d taken since her abduction. But those thoughts had temporarily abated when he’d caught sight of her, apparently none the worse for wear, even though she was standing alongside that red-skinned creature who’d engineered the corruption of Solvei’s family.
But the faint hope that she’d somehow not fallen into the same trap as the winter wolves had been dispelled almost immediately.
“I thought that would be obvious,” huffed Thermal Draft. “Of course I did.”
She delivered the news casually, as though commenting on something that hardly mattered in the least, but at that moment Lex felt as though the ground had fallen out from under him.
You failed her.
His tulpa’s condemnation was simple and direct, lacking the barbs and invectives it usually delivered. But that was no surprise; there were no words that could have made the truth of the situation harder for him to bear. No words except for one.
You failed her again.
Thermal Draft had been one of the ponies who’d died during the disastrous mission into Vanhoover that he’d ordered. Then, just like now, a devil had outmaneuvered him, hiding its presence until it was too late, and Thermal Draft – along with several other ponies – had paid the ultimate price for his lack of ability to discern the lurking threat and shield them from it. And now history was repeating itself again, the same way it had ever since he’d gotten here, with another one of those misbegotten abominations showing once again that he was powerless to protect her, just like he had been back in Vanhoover. Just like with Block Party. Just like with the others in Las Pegasus.
Except this time, Thermal Draft was facing a fate far worse than merely dying.
But he was snapped out of his recrimination as something completely unexpected happened a moment later: Thermal Draft used magic.
There was no gesturing or chanting on her part, but he could feel the magic taking effect as a quartet of colored lights appeared around her. It was enough to make him call upon his circlet, looking her over via the magical spectrum…and finding nothing out of the ordinary. But that wasn’t too surprising for a scan that only detected active and recently-faded spells.
For a brief moment he was tempted to forcibly augment the device, allowing him to peer deeper into the magical channels throughout her body. It might give him some insight into the specifics of what the phistophilus devil had done to her…
But Lex abandoned that idea almost immediately. Augmenting a magic item that way put strain on his body, and he couldn’t afford that now. He’d already had Solvei heal him of the wounds he’d taken during his fight with Bolverk on the way here, using another application of divine authority to do so, and while he still had plenty of uses of that power remaining, he didn’t want to spend them when there was another, much easier way of finding out what had happened to the pegasus.
“Thermal Draft, what did that thing do to you?”
For some reason, the question seemed to upset her. “Really? You’re the smartest pony I know, Lex. Aren’t the looks, the voice, and the magic enough to clue you in?”
Solvei chimed in then. “You had the Red Man make you into a pretty singing seidrmadr?”
“Close.” Drafty stepped in closer, nuzzling him for no reason that Lex could tell. “I had him make me into a Siren.”
That answer made no sense whatsoever. The Sirens weren’t simply pretty mares who could sing and cast spells; their agelessness was proof enough of that. But there were more important things than correcting Thermal Draft’s mistaken impression of what made Sonata and Aria different from other ponies. He needed concrete answers, and he knew where to find them.
“Show me the contract,” he demanded icily.
Thermal Draft blinked, giving him a blank look. “Huh?”
“The document you signed,” pressed Lex. “Show me your copy of it.”
Behind Thermal Draft, Prevarius’ grin grew larger.
The pegasus herself seemed a bit put off, but after a moment her smile returned. “If that’s what you want. Check this out!” She closed her eyes for a moment, and Lex felt another mild surge of magic, as she reached her wing into thin air and produced a rolled-up piece of paper. “Pretty neat, don’t you think? I can’t store more than one thing at a time with that spell, but it’s-, hey!”
Lex ignored her babbling, instead snatching the scroll with his telekinesis and scanning it furiously. It was written in the same unfamiliar language as the wolves’ contracts had been – he’d gathered the rest of them, alongside Bolverk’s, from Kaja as they’d left the den – but the potion he’d taken was still in effect. As such, it only took Lex a few seconds of looking the document over before he found what he was looking for, gritting his teeth as his shame and regret over allowing this to happen suddenly vanished, swallowed up by the feeling that washed over him then. The same emotion that had always saved him whenever anguish or despair or sadness had threatened to drown him.
Rage. Overwhelming rage.
“You know, I kind of thought you’d be happier about all this,” grumbled Thermal Draft. “I mean, I’m glad you were worried about me, but everything turned out fine! You’re okay, Solvei’s okay, and I’m better than okay! So what’s the big deal?”
“The big deal…” hissed Lex, black crystals beginning to sprout all around him as he looked up from the contract, glaring at the smirking creature standing across from them.
The creature whom he was about to utterly destroy.
“…is that you sold that monster your soul!”