The Stereotypical Necromancer

by JinxTJL

Chapter 44 - The Realization (Retitled)

"You're going to what?"

The hot words as they came off his tongue felt perhaps a bit cliché, maybe a bit oblivious; but they were from a very genuine place. He wasn't sure if it was run of the mill skepticism, or some other sense telling him to disbelieve that shadow-like figure turned away from him, or if he was just too deep in a whole other throe to accept an entirely new surprise...

But Light Flow was going to hold his reservations very close. At least until it was actually happening.

Nightmare Moon, standing and staring at him over Her shoulder: met his dull question with an absent hum. Her eye turned back, followed second by the rest of Her head as She seemingly lost interest; or maybe something else out there was just more captivating.

He leaned to the side to peer out towards Her, but he couldn't quite manage to look out after Her face. Only a useless leer at the heavy strap of metal over the back of Her neck. The anonymity was beginning to hatch squirming, crawling caterpillars in his stomach, though; he wasn't sure if he could take it much longer.

Was it a devious smile? Was it a coy hooding of the eye? Perhaps a disappointed grimace? Maybe he was freaking out for no reason, but was it really that inappropriate to think that She might be any sort of mad at him?!

He'd let loose, let his emotions just spill all over Her like disgusting shame. Maybe not the worst sin in all the land- certainly not as bad as asking Her outright for a hug- but it was still gross, squishy emotionalism.

It didn't seem like that was okay unless She initiated it. It was obvious She enjoyed Her control of the situation, Her control of him; and to have him suddenly break down crying unprompted and without Her influence might've been...

A sudden swallow turned into a silent choke as saliva met something heavy in his throat. Maybe rising vomit, or tangible, nervous anticipation. Tasted bitter; though it fell back down on a second attempt.

Now he felt it in the pit of his stomach, and he didn't really want to sit around to let it fester with the crawling bugs.

His hooves felt a little weak as he rose up into all fours, but time was saying he'd been sitting like a good little colt for long enough.

He'd been told in a look to stay still, but now, unless he was understandably misreading things, he was feeling a sort of unspoken summons to him. Her body language was certainly saying something, but what was he if not an amateur?

Nightmare Moon's position at the window was directly away from him, and firm in its balance. She wasn't leaning off, or glancing away. Her hooves were solidly placed, and Her back smoothed and straight. The black fur of Her sides wasn't rising extraneously with the exertion of any kind of preceded motion, and overall: She seemed altogether relaxed.

She was absolutely set to stare out that window; and unless She had forgotten him, She probably wanted him to come to Her. Besides, he wasn't just gonna let 'I'm gonna teach you magic' sit and stale like a drooling idiot.

If there was any chance, he was going to get Her to make good on this.

His first step was a purposeful stomp, and he carefully watched as Nightmare Moon's head just barely quirked left. She'd heard him, he wasn't sneaking up on Her, She wasn't going to tear his legs off; everything was fine.

It was a bit of an odd feeling. He'd been spending most of his time idly thinking about the possibility of fleeing madly away from that dark figure whose black fur seemed to actively absorb the scant light floating in from the window.

So, so funny in that odd, stomach-tearing way that he was now stepping low with obvious motions towards Her.

It actually reminded him of some of the dreams they'd used to 'share.' The relative 'sharing' of the dreams being a questionable concept, as She'd more rather than less forced Herself on him.

With the forgotten and likely uncountable number of times She'd come to him, it obviously varied; but there had been those dreams.

Dreams spent alone in a murky abyss, wading through endless mud towards a wavering, black shadow of a figure with a mouth in the recess of an open smile. Tearing his way through the veil towards that long, dark horn, those huge, encompassing wings, that wide, piercing eye.

That intense, godly figure.

It all became a lot less dramatic when the shadow and the haze pulled away and it was just Her standing there again. And then he'd remember where he was and what was happening and from there it would be business as eventually forgotten usual.

This wasn't much like that. For one, while She looked a bit like a shadow: the wisping ends of Her ethereal tail that wreathed and clipped around Her leg was pretty telling of Her general solidity. Unless, somehow, Her tail was solid and She was the intangible one.

She also didn't-

His gait skipped at the same time as his mind, and he stumbled slightly over his hoof; stopping with his eyes conveniently on the clear profile of Her visage for a moment as something... occurred to him.

The actual details of each meeting with Nightmare Moon were hazy, and said details mostly completely evaded him until something specifically brought them into focus. And right now: something was coming into decently clear focus right in front of him.

She'd always worn Her armor. In every meeting where he could remember Her physical appearance- all of them meshing together in messy blurs and out of focus pictures- She'd had the exact same appearance as She did standing right there.

Never changing. Never scuffed. Never casual. Right down to the strange lack of back protection.

Maybe it meant something. Maybe it was just Her everyday wear.

He reinvigorated his slow trot across the worn stone floor, making his way past the maze of crumbled stone pillars, up to the side of one Nightmare Moon who oddly hadn't done anything to acknowledge his holdup. Not a jeer, not a laugh, not even a grin quirked his way.

His hooves slowed to a cautious, yet loud walk as he came up on Her left side. He eyed Her still back hooves out of the corner of his eye as he passed them, sliding up along Her cutie mark, the motionless wings folded perfectly at Her long sides, and finally coming to a head at... Her head.

He stopped, staring up with a furrowed brow at the focused expression entirely zeroed on the window's horizon. Still not doing anything to acknowledge him.

He could pass the pricks and the pokes and the torment and all that: but ignoring him was just plain rude.

He shook his head at Her half-reproachfully, before he turned his own attention to the window.

It was... the night sky. A beatific, starry expanse painted across by a few stray, wispy clouds; all a side to the moon of course. Big and bright and whole and sans a couple craters in the vague shape of a face. Just hanging up there in the sky as it did every night.

Kind of weird to think that it might just be a permanent... fixture, now. Less painful to look at; but maybe a little grating if it was just going to be there for the rest of time.

Really not much to look out at besides the usual sights of the sky, as well as the slightly more interesting rounded edge of a castle wall to the left that only barely curved into sight. The castle itself sure was something to behold, if largely imposing as a structure.

Even stretching out on his hooves to peer over the edge only afforded him a very distant view of trees and general country landscape far away and far below. The tower they were in must have been up fairly high, and probably not in the large courtyard the castle was built around: otherwise there would be more rubble to see.

They were in the throne room, weren't they? But reason dictated that they had to be in one of the towers built off the outer walls, with the associated sights and all.

Why wouldn't the center of the kingdom be in the center of the castle?

He took a peek up at Nightmare Moon's peering face, then back to the plain sights of the window, then back to Her. "Um... What're you... looking at?" he questioned, as his face tilted to itself in a confused frown. Was it the moon? After a thousand years trapped in it, he didn't think he'd be so keen on staring it down.

Made Her 'eternal night' doctrine seem a bit... masochistic.

The immediate movement to his side sent him jolting, jumping away in the paranoid panic that She had somehow heard his thoughts. But he calmed as he realized Nightmare Moon hadn't made a grab for his throat; She had simply taken a single- albeit loud- step forward, accompanied by the eye-catching shimmer of blue magic.

He seemed naturally predisposed to fear the very sight of magic by this point, but watching the tension on Nightmare Moon's face as Her horn glimmered and Her eyes twinkled into the night made it pretty clear She wasn't going for him: so he felt decently safe to step back to where he'd been.

He stayed focused on Nightmare Moon's grimace of a face as She continued to leer out the window, but something was amiss. There was nothing out there, so what was She-

His breath caught as he turned to look, and his eyes widened.

There- not twenty hoof-lengths away, caught like a fly in a shimmering, incandescent net of magic, and slowly gliding its way towards them in the most unnatural astrological phenomenon he think he'd ever seen- a bird.

"You caught a bird?!" The words came in a disbelieving rush of pure, genuine confusion, but more for the action itself rather than any real question of events because he'd have to be blind and dumb to miss the bird flying toward them without the aid of its wings!

Nightmare Moon nodded out of the corner of his incredulous eyes, as the intense look of concentration finally bled away into a satisfied smile. "I caught a bird," She affirmed with a nod, completely missing his point. Was that a proud tone in Her voice?!

Before his eyes that he still wasn't sure weren't malfunctioning: the captive creature was brought up to the inner rim of the window. There: it floated; casting a shadow on the stone that proved its true authenticity, which he stared at for perhaps a moment too long.

The moment was quiet, and felt largely surreal: with him looking up at it in disbelief as Nightmare Moon looked down on it with clear satisfaction.

It was a crow; no big surprise there. Scavengers and carrion feeders alike: there weren't many other kinds of birds that would dare venture anywhere near the Everfree. Not any that would live, anyway.

Its somewhat dull, black coat of feathers was in some disarray, feathers jutting out in odd directions as Nightmare Moon held it in a tight grasp around the lean bulk of its body. Its wings were- in a manner somewhat reminiscent of an anatomical diagram- stuck straight out; enveloped at their bases and their tips by the magic that had plucked it out of the air mid-flap.

Its head... He winced to see it.

Its head with its dark, glassy eyes seemed set at a... kind of weird angle. Not snapped, and it hadn't died- he could see the skin of its throat rise with its breathing- but it was still just jerked to the side in an unnatural tilt. He leaned in with his eyes narrowed: staring questioningly as he searched its relative eyeline to...

"You broke its wing." The blunt words came faster than he made the realization, but it was undeniable as he took in the decidedly wrong shape of its right wing. It wasn't as egregious as being bent backward or anything so gory as to be immediately noticeable; but it just...

He'd seen birds, and- more importantly- he'd seen pegasi: and he knew that wings were just supposed to arch more. It wasn't supposed to be that ramrod straight.

His uncertain eyes carried to Nightmare Moon's face as She, too studied the bird still held in Her grasp. Her eyes were wide with much of the same analytic scrutiny, though he wasn't having much luck of catching even an ounce of regret.

Just idle curiosity for the held creature suffering through what he imagined would be its coming end.

"Yes," She mused, as Her eyes darted to him momentarily; quickly returning to Her quarry as it lifted closer to Her face. "It will not have a chance to fly away in this state."

Her tone was primarily thoughtless as She turned the creature over to inspect its underside- a motion he was sure the crow very much disagreed with- but there was a surprising lack of pure malice. Her eyes, as they roved about the indecent parts of the bird's body, weren't rough and fiery- the crazed eyes of a monster.

She had the look of someone inspecting a ripe piece of fruit. Casually indifferent, and perhaps a little bit of a squint to check for bruises.

It was just a crow.

He shook his head, and heaved a sigh through his nose as he peered up at the helpless creature. "I suppose that's... necessary," he muttered, in a downtrodden tone that he was trying to lighten. He shook his head again, just to make sure; then focused his eyes past the crow, to Nightmare Moon's face. "And this is all well and good for you, I'm sure; but why did you catch a bird?"

His question finally seemed to truly capture Nightmare Moon's attention away from the bird- or maybe She had just finished looking at it- and it levitated up and to the side in one motion as Her caught attention focused on him.

Her eyes narrowed as Her head leaned in, and She pursed Her lips for a moment as a wave of scrutiny washed over him. Maybe he was just oversensitized with the bird there and everything, but the stare was setting him on edge like he thought it wouldn't anymore. His hoof raised up in the beginnings of a retreat, and- perhaps subconsciously, or out of a strange desire to comfort himself- his tail curled down around his leg.

He swallowed the saliva in his mouth as it began to noticably pool, and sucked his face back into a soft grimace as he tried to not, not match the stare. He did not enjoy being leered at; especially by Her!

Thankfully, it soon ended; and he was set back at relative ease as Nightmare Moon leaned back with the slightest of smiles on Her face. "You are not so lost as to forget my stating of just scant minutes ago, are you?" The bare intention in Her voice immediately hatched the caterpillars in his stomach into butterflies, and his mouth opened into a small pit as She raised Her head, and nodded to the bird floating above Her.

"I have no need of somepony so despondent, who would so willingly waste away any hope they may have at competence. So, I am going to rectify the matter." She turned Her head to stare with a sharp smile at the posed crow as it dipped down to level with Her head, and he stared up with wide eyes. "Magic is a science, and Necromancy is no different. Dues done: we shall need a subject to test upon."

The bird then flew down to his face, to wave obviously about as blue blocked his vision, and the musky scent of picked up dirt filled his nostrils. "And thus: the bird. You see my reasoning, now?"

He stared widely into the wet, black eyes of the crow, while his mind struggled to keep his mouth in pace. "Y-Yes- Yes, I understand," he stuttered out, raising his Head to Nightmare Moon's waiting stare; having only barely managed to catch any understanding through the many mixed emotions running through him.

Okay, this was happening; he was going to practice Necromancy. Hangup: Necromancy involved living creatures, like the breathing bird being held close enough to his face that he could probably lick it. Follow-up: Necromancy usually involved making the living creatures not-so-living, and he...

Well... he had never done that, before.

He tried to keep the excitement he only half felt clear as a smile on his face- as the bird levitated somewhat thankfully away so that Nightmare Moon could continue grinning at it- but the ends of his face kept annoyingly quirking down.

It was fine, he was fine: he could handle this. He'd touched plenty of dead animals in his lifetime, and even a pony corpse once! He could handle- what? Just a little bird?

Easy. Little league. Foal stuff. He would've killed for a chance like this as a kid. Literally; haha he. was. so. funny.

He'd been a lot more disturbed as a kid.

Nightmare Moon must've been too caught up in the moment to catch his grotesque half-smile, or maybe She just didn't care to comment on it as She turned away. "It is time you learn something of souls and of how you relate. Follow."

The command to 'follow' came as he was still half-thinking about maybe pledging a vow of pacifism; so he was left blinking and focusing in as Nightmare Moon was already walking away, bird toted along with Her.

He shook his head to clear whatever misgivings were weak enough to be shaken off; and set his hooves to following.

Trotting after the retreating form half-shrouded by the mist of Her own tail was a strange enough schism to momentarily distract him; allowing him to listen intently as words floated out from the figure making Her way to what seemed to be the center dais where She'd recently been perched.

"You will have to bear with my skills as both a teacher and a mentor, for I fear I fall too callous for one side and too impatient for the other. Perhaps my worst qualities, but rarely recently have they come to haunt me." Her gait slowed for a moment as Her head turned, and he caught the flash of a wide smile shot over Her shoulder moments before a long, rolling cackle.

Yeah, ha ha. Recently, he got it.

He coughed out a short, unfelt laugh to fit in as Nightmare Moon practically howled at Her own joke; before he cleared his throat as the sound of emphasized chortling petered off. "How- uh, how would that affect us here, though? Are you not... Do you not think you can teach me?"

He finished out his question right as they came up to the center dais, and it was when She began to step up onto the platform that Nightmare Moon stopped, and looked over Her shoulder at him. She eyed him with a curious tilt to Her head, before She hummed, then nodded. "If you speak of my callousness, then I believe I could supply you an answer, of sorts."

Her last hoof made the climb, and She turned about-face to him in a very familiar tower. Her chin rose proudly, and he nearly lost sight of Her face in the difference as She smiled in sharp teeth down at him.

"You have no idea of how your Necromancy works," She announced loudly, as some measure of felt confidence seemed to die in his heart.

Strength gave out like a cheaply bought knock-off, and he hung his head limply as a tired sigh tore from his throat. Why had he asked? He already knew She was plenty callous and impatient.

"Thanks for the vote of no confidence," he muttered lowly to the floor, before raising his head just enough to stare up at the extremely vertical figure in front of him. "Is it really nothing, though? I mean, I thought I had picked up a few things from the books-"

"Those 'books' are worthless," Nightmare Moon loudly interjected, and his head rose in a confused shock to see a disgusted frown on Her face, as if the mention left a foul taste. "Those of which you speak are nothing but ignorant, egocentric, nonsensical works of blind hubris that pertain in no way to you."

The harsh rhetoric battering his ears left him momentarily speechless, but a sense of affront to the denouncement of his high-held books was quickly filling him. "But- but they are helpful!" he shouted vainly, his head shaking as he took a step onto the lowest stair of the dais. "I wouldn't know anything about Necromancy if not for-"

Nightmare Moon's disdainful scoff cut him off before he'd started, and he retreated off the step as She advanced one. Nervous heat began to fill his chest as Her voice began to rise. "And what do you know? You know of the existence of souls and the bare basics of their theology; but what else? What perspective have you been so lofty as to gain while I was unawares that you could attest so grandly to their use for you?!

Nightmare Moon's eyes burned with some kind of righteous blaze as She took another step down the dais, nearly on level with him now, though still obviously towering over him. "For every 'answer' you gleaned from the uncomprehending pages of an old fool's last trick, you lost just as much valuable perspective on a situation that he knew nothing about! Nothing about a Necromancer, and nothing about you!"

She thrust Her head towards him in one quick motion, lending force to Her words that somehow took second place as one small drop of steaming spit landed on his taut cheek. "You have been sabotaged, Light Flow! You have been dealt a fake deck! Do you not see that?!"

He was cowed. He was frightened. He was undeniably, unacceptably, uncomprehendingly confused.

For one- if now was a good time to take mental stock as he leaned away on three hooves from the figure approaching and shouting at him- Nightmare Moon did not look right with Her face twisted up in offense for a cause absolutely not Her own. It was too close to Her being on his side, and he didn't like it.

Secondly: what in the deepest hellpit of Tartarus was She talking about?!

Bending and pressing himself low to the floor as a much larger, much more confident speaker literally dwarfed him wasn't the most powerful position to have; but he swallowed: and licked his lips to try to say something anyway. He had to act; he had to interject.

It was a difficult prospect: trying to find the right approach in his head to preempt Nightmare Moon, who was now just standing widely in front of him with flaring nostrils and threats of violence in the snarling lines of Her face. Cower, defy, appeal: they were all good choices in their own ways.

He had very nearly worked up the courage to stand up- really just scant seconds away from showing gumption- when, somewhat predictably: Nightmare Moon's face... changed.

The fury painted into the lines of Her face jerked, then gained perspective in a quiet moment of softening. And some kind of light caught in the precipice of Her eyes as the rage in them seemed to freeze.

Her hoof, tensed and prepared to stomp forward: stopped in the air, and slowly receded. It was with a wave of slightly unnatural, spastic motion that Nightmare Moon slunk away, retreated up the dais; to return to a tense, upright posture with two wide eyes above a slightly parted mouth.

Somewhat like going in reverse; and he knew he wouldn't have felt okay making that joke if this hadn't already happened once or twice. Experience really made all the difference in the world, especially when it came to weathering bombardments and near-bruisings from insanely unhinged Goddesses.

His tense muscles that had been prepared to ferry him backwards for as long as Nightmare Moon moved forward gradually relaxed. Not having used the tension to escape felt a little sore, but he tentatively reached one hoof one to take one step closer to the dais anyway.

Nightmare Moon's wide eyes snapped to him as the noise of the motion echoed in the hall; catching on his face for a long moment of silence before they closed, and She breathed a deep sigh. As if She had suddenly realized he was still there.

"Forgive me, child. I'm... It seems that I have once again allowed myself to become compromised," came the halting assurance, along with noticeable easement in Her tight-knit muscles that set his racing heart just that bit at ease. Enough, at least, to make him feel safe enough to close the distance between them, so he was once more standing at the hoof of the dais.

"It's... fine. I've... seen it before," he replied through a furrowed brow, as he tried not to sound too obviously awkward. He was getting the relative hang of riding the waves that were Her emotions, but it was very tricky to not just succumb and freak out.

But he'd get the better of his instincts. He always did.

He licked his lips, just to feel the cold air as he swept his eyes blankly across the room, before he turned again to stare at Nightmare Moon's tightly closed face. "So... sabotage, huh?" His mouth felt a little clammy as he spoke, and smacking his lips wasn't doing as much as he'd expected. "Is that... I guess- apropos? I mean, is... whatever you're talking about really so... deliberate?"

He really didn't want to believe it, and he was going to hold tight to that ship until it was kissing a bank.

Nightmare Moon seemed to have been taking a brief rest against the metal of Her chestplate, but Her ears pricked at his question, and Her head raised slowly after. Eyes still closed: but only for one more deep breath before they were fluttering open and resting fully on him.

She looked a bit distant, as he was learning She sometimes did: but awareness looked to be coming through in spots. Slow realization that She was still there, still talking to him.

It was through one of those spots that She caught on something, as Her hooded eyes flickered up lightly: and Her head raised barely to look over him. "Perhaps... not." She whispered, almost too quiet to hear: even as he angled his head towards it.

It was times like these that he sincerely began to wonder if She was... all there. And then he'd hate himself that much more for showing concern, and wasn't that just Her fault in the end? A terrible cycle of resentment, but what was he going to do to stop it? He certainly wasn't the bigger pony.

He let Her take Her time, though: staring off into space for that long moment. A long moment counted in seconds; as Her eyes only then closed in a blink, as She drew in a deep breath. Her chest pulled forward as She arched Her back, showing very well the rise to Her chestplate as She took evenly spaced breaths.

Gradually, Her posture eased along the wave of a particularly deep breath, and it was only then that Her eyes opened again. Hooded and soft, but clear and focused, and most importantly: not violent. She was back, and he was honestly glad to see it.

He set his jaw, and let the mask of a smile fit onto his face. Easy enough to make the motions when he didn't have to make it reach his eyes.

But he wasn't here to comfort Her, and She knew that. That was why She returned his smile with one of Her own that he couldn't begin to decipher for authenticity; before clearing Her throat, and letting it fall into a terse frown.

"On reflection: I believe you may have misconstrued my using the word. Perhaps, of my own fault. If I had not been shouting at you, I believe you might have caught the intended subtlety behind it. For being unclear: I am sorry."

The business-like tone and the shortness of Her words was somehow only second to the half-deflection of blame lamely hidden between a big word and an apology. An apology that he wasn't really feeling, thanks very much.

He didn't need Her comforts. Currently.

He nodded, just as professionally. "Thank you," he spoke, nodding his head; before fixing Her with the most dull eyes he could manage. "I imagine you now have a better word to use, now that we've moved past the incongruence?"

Rule one or so of getting on ponies' nerves: use big words that barely pertain. She'd done it with 'misconstrued', and now he'd thrown it right back at Her. His own little way of stringing Her up for Her actions in the way least likely to get him maimed.

A way that She must have approved of: or maybe the curling smile She met him with as She tilted Her head was also ingenuine. Could've gone any way; She had cause for either.

"Your imagination is a wonder, child, and yes: I would like to supplant my original wording." Her smug tone was made only harsher as his smile waned, and a soft grimace replaced it.

He'd never heard the word 'supplant' before.

As if sensing his failure and thus his loss: Nightmare Moon's smile widened. Wide enough to show off sharp glimmer of Her teeth as Her eyes swept up to Her side, to stare off into the wall. "I believe the word I had meant to use was... oh, what was it?"

Her eyes fell to him: one moment of quiet, gloating victory as She took in his frowning face. "Ignorance."

If he'd been frowning before, then it must've been a very weak expression with how hard his face fell at that. "Ignorance?" he repeated, as he searched the laughing lines of Nightmare Moon's face for exposition that wasn't there. "You're saying... Are you saying that- that the ponies who wrote those books were ignorant? That they didn't know Necromancy?"

He blinked rapidly to clear the buzzing sound of confusion from his sight as Nightmare Moon shook Her head. The coy little act She'd been putting on seemed distant as She sighed, and some kind of worn, tired look came over Her.

"I did not say that. Far from it. In fact: I imagine the pony that wrote all of those books knew more about Necromancy than any normal pony could have ever known." She sniffed disdainfully, Her tone dipping frequently between both disinterest and disgust.

He sucked in a breath, and narrowed his eyes. He let his teeth explore the back of his teeth as he stared down at the floor for a long second, before returning up to the silently dour face. "Great, they were wise beyond belief. So what, then? They did know about Necromancy, but not about...?"

He let the end of his sentence bleed off to see if Nightmare Moon would catch it, and She only eyed him from under the hoods of Her eyes for a second before She did. She sighed, and threw Her head back in a long groan that ended with Her staring at him with fierce eyes. "He knew nothing of you, child. Nothing of what you are capable of. Nothing of what any pony was capable of."

His face twisted in confusion as Nightmare Moon's face... puckered. A sour, muscle-clenching expression of lines melting together that he only got a short look at before She was tilting Her head up to stare at the ceiling. Was She pouting?

What kind of personal relationship had She had with this... 'he'?

Well, what was he supposed to do now? His books were... not helpful to him in some nondescript way that he sincerely hoped they'd be getting to soon. And it wasn't like he could up and ask anything; not with Her looking like... that.

He felt... a little limp. It could've been the general atmosphere of the room, with Nightmare Moon simmering over some long dead pony that apparently also had no awareness whatsoever; but it was more likely just... the disappointment.

It wasn't much that he felt badly about the box pony. If he'd ever felt anything for them, it had been a gross cocktail of awe and fear: one that he would have never ordered at a bar. It was more about... well...

He'd never exactly felt smart, or knowledgeable when it came to Necromancy; but he'd thought he'd known some things. But was he wrong about those things? Were souls not what they seemed? Could they have some other purpose, rather than being the immaterial core of being? The building blocks of the ego?

But... everything he'd ever observed... Souls definitively changed based on mood, and varied for personality! He'd corroborated that fact repeatedly throughout his life! With such a large data pool, the chance for observational error or the muddling of random chance was practically zero!

He braced his hooves, and lowered his backside to the ground. He let his head lower, to stare down as his hooves came up.

A wistful feeling crept over him as he took in the sight of them. His fur was dirty, stained with dirt and worse; and the little unshorn ends of his fetlocks were too long: crumpled and worn into the hard, black surface of his bare hoof.

The soft, equally stained little patch of bare, puffy skin that sat in the middle: the tiny, near-heart shape of his frog. He tensed, and flexed it that little bit he could: and watched as tiny little vein lines pushed up against the muscles just far enough to be visible against the skin.

He'd always wanted to feel a soul. That specific dream amidst so many had been one of the most tantalizing, for whatever reason. To hold a pony's- to hold any creature's bare font of life in the intimate cleft of his hoof. Some part so exposed, that... maybe, he might be able to touch and feel the material experiences.

To be so privileged as to carry real, living warmth in his hooves... To... to be as simplistically vain to possess that little bit of being... Had it just been some fanatical dream?

Was it selfish of him?

He let his hooves fall with a clop, and sighed. Maybe it had all been some dumb fantasy of his. Maybe souls as he saw them were just some... illusion. There wasn't exactly empirical proof of anything he'd seen- outside of the books, at least.

The books he was being told were bogus.

He closed his eyes, just to see something other than gray. When was the last time he'd even seen a soul? Certainly not anytime today, and he'd been more or less unconscious for the week before. He couldn't see Nightmare Moon's, and he'd never seen his own.

Maybe he'd been knocked around so much, he just couldn't anymore.

What was he good for?

The whistle was so sharp, such a pitched, sense-grabbing assault on his ears that he would've had to have tried to ignore it. He was brought out of his mild haze in a shock of pressed ears; blinking rapidly to restore awareness as he looked to its loud source.

Nightmare Moon had evidently finished Her little meander in temperamental memory lane, now looking down on him with a stare of quirked expectation that he could only vaguely register as nearing the edge of bad. She'd been the whistler, obviously, but had that really come from Her mouth?

Maybe it was a spell. Maybe She'd teach it to him someday? Somenight.

He shook his head to chase away the thought. What was wrong with him, talking about Her in the future tense? That was like giving up in more words.

A terse clearing of the throat brought his attention circling again back to Nightmare Moon, now looking at him with both eyebrows down, who hefted an object from around Her side that his eyes widened to see.

The bird, of course: laid in a pin-up exactly as it had been before, right next to Her head. He'd... already sort of forgotten about it, which made him feel bad in a way that he couldn't tell was for the bird or for him. The poor thing's chest was fluttering unsteadily like it could barely breathe, yeah; but how had he gotten so distracted?

He let his crossed eyes wander away from the creature, to Nightmare Moon's face. It was a stoic mix of frowning anticipation, and abject disgust. While neither ever left Her face for particularly long stretches: it was somewhat uncommon to see them together.

She was waiting to speak to him, but She was also still upset about something that- strangely enough- didn't relate to him. Nice change of pace, but he couldn't deny it felt a little weird not to capture Her entire attention. Was he needy?

She cleared Her throat, and he perked to attention: somehow lightening Her expression of discontent in a strange inverse of expectations. "The books, as written by somepony who had only studied the art from afar, are useful enough for those such practitioners who have no advantage. Those who only generally till the field. The common folk of Necromancy: you may say."

Her tone had calmed remarkably from its temperament, though keeping a small edge of aggravation that somehow... diminished at its end. Replaced instead by a small, underplayed emotion that nearly bent his neck in bashfulness.

Looking down at him and speaking of him and his aptitude, Nightmare Moon's face held a soft edge of pride. "But you... You are no mere practitioner, Light. Necromancy... you need not chase after it blindly: the art tailors itself for you. It seeps into your very being. You are not dictated as those, the masses of the world would be. You are special."

Soft pressure pushed on the drums of his ears as his face warmed, and he had to force himself to drop his wide gaze from the abject praise that dripped like honey from that sweet smile. He swallowed against the nervous, unsettled energy that swelled in his throat; as his coat began to itch.

"I... really don't know what you're talking about," he murmured lowly, as a vague urge to somehow hide his head creeped on his neck. Wherever had his cloak gone? He was sorely missing it and the shelter it offered him from staring eyes.

A soft touch gripped his chin, and forced his head up to stare at Nightmare Moon. Her smile had dipped into a disappointed frown under that glowing horn, and he could vaguely see a tickle of blue at the bottom of his eyes as She slowly shook Her head.

"Light Flow," Her tone was a chiding cocktail of admonishment and defused anger as She let go of his chin, to leave him upright of his own power. "-there is no reason to feel shame at my words. To fill your head with empty words would do us both very little: so know that nothing I said was untrue, or even so outrageous."

She sighed, closing Her eyes for a moment. "You are special: in such a way that we all are special." Her eyes opened, and- his eyes caught- the shimmer of magic around Her horn brightening, only a second before he was tilting forward.

His right leg was raised only for as long as he was left without balance, and the danger of falling passed as soon as he looked back to see his limb released and returned to the floor. Aggravation tipped into his stare as he flicked his eyes about his leg, to make sure that the Queen of Abuse hadn't stuck a 'kick me' sign to him, or something.

But, then he saw it: and so much suddenly clicked.

His cutie mark.

His throat clenched tightly as a gasp failed to clear it; but the connections were forming too quickly for him to really care about the miniscule pain. Things were far too clear in far too short a time.

He'd been stupid. He'd been so stupid.

Special, he was special. His special talent. His special talent in Necromancy set him apart. Normal teaching wouldn't have been effective for him. He was not a general practitioner. The art tailored itself for him.

What he was capable of. Having a special talent in Necromancy allowed him to do things that others couldn't.

No, a voice seemed to outcry against his aggrandizing thread of thought: it can't be anything as incredible as that! He was just a dumb little colt from a podunk town who had long since wasted his potential away, and now he was just looking for something to make him think he had any worth at all!

But this was coming from Nightmare Moon! She was one of the least perfect creatures he had ever met, and She was far from impartial: but She wouldn't coddle him. This was coming from one of the most trustingly untrustworthy sources he could think of!

But cutie marks didn't even work like that! They didn't bestow special powers: they were just a physical proofing of a pony's most liked aptitude as was dictated by destin-

Destiny.

Both of the quarreling voices in his head quieted in an instant, with little so much as a passing insult tossed for farewell. The world trickled into his headspace like an undammed river, and he was suddenly aware of where he was again.

Nothing was certain. Destiny didn't exist.

Anything was possible.

He blinked, and Nightmare Moon's face came into focus from a blurry canvas of grey. His chest panged at him, and it was only then that he realized he was taking deep, uneven breaths.

His lungs ached as he held one deep breath in, before blowing it out slowly, and starting his breathing cycle anew. Starting anew...

He liked the sound of that.

He turned solid, steady eyes on Nightmare Moon's face, which was- Wait, who cared?

"What can I do?" The words came off his tongue in a strong tone that he hadn't heard from himself for at least half an hour, and it nearly surprised him enough to lose it. Actually: it was probably that very self-aware realization that stopped him from tensing away from his own voice; so score one for his overwrought mind.

At his question, Nightmare Moon's frown that he had noticed but pretended not to melted away: to mold upwards into a quietly satisfied smile. The tinkling sound of magic that had never really gone away grew more insistent as the floating bird lifted up, and swayed side to side.

His eyes followed it, and though he tried to keep his tough, brave face: he could feel the certainty waning. He swallowed, his throat suddenly dry. He was going to have to kill the bird, wasn't he?

"You can do many things, child; and I would love nothing more than to uselessly sit and explain each understood facet of your talent for the many hours we do not have: but I have always preferred a hooves-on approach." Her voice, teasing and tilting as it was, was quickly overshadowed by the too-loud sound of the bird floating slowly down to his face.

His first instinct was to edge uncomfortably away as the captive avian lined its way towards him, and one hoof had even begun to slide backward before he forced himself to stop. His breathing took calming center stage in his mind as the creature came level, and eye-to-eye with him.

In, and out. In, taste the cold air: out, feel the heat of his breath. Stare into the unblinking black eyes so large from instinctive fear that they were only barely rimmed with brown. In, and out.

He'd seen birds before. He'd seen dead birds before. He'd never seen a bird that he was about to kill, before.

Nightmare Moon's voice came again, and he focused on it gladly as he just... got used to the sight. "The first step is to finally allow you your first taste of what has always compelled you. Consider the bird and its contents formally yours; a present, from me to you."

He tilted his eyes up, to send a troubled look at Nightmare Moon, then back down to the bird. "Isn't that a bit... I don't know..." He swallowed, unsure of whether birds had the capacity to look as pleading as he imagined it was. "...bold?"

He was getting tired of looking at the bird with the incapably sad eyes, so he focused instead on Nightmare Moon: whose face had fallen into a dry well. "No, now take the creature," She droned, as said creature bobbed insistently in Her hold.

Well, no more stalling, then.

It was a strange soup of feelings that sat in his stomach as he stared the bird down. He felt nervous: he was about to murder this crow and steal its soul for his own. He also felt the lingering shreds of confidence that had been torn down as death loomed over him. Not his death, but still.

But he also felt so strangely excited. If he had to liken it to the most available feeling: it would be what he remembered of the slightly sinful anticipation that had rocked his adolescent mind as he sat wonderingly in front of a bunny carcass in a horseshoe box.

A bursting, tearing sensation in his stomach. A cutting, rending feeling.

Desire. Very, very strange and concerning desire. He felt... restless, almost. A kind of restless energy that he could almost sort of taste. All over his tongue like a slick, viscous fluid that wouldn't settle or stick or mix and it wouldn't go away no matter how much he swished or swallowed.

It made it hard to think. It made it a little hard to breathe.

He looked back up to Nightmare Moon once more, before licking his lips. That oily feeling in his mouth.

Now or never.

He let a familiarly unfamiliar energy rise up in him, and lit his-

The world spun, heat flared behind his eyes, and suddenly: he couldn't see.

It was between one blink and the next, and like somepony had turned off the switch to the moon itself: everything was dark.

He gasped, or, at least: he thought he did. The darkness, to his unseeing eyes, seemed... off. It wasn't just dark- shadows cast in un-light- it was black. He couldn't see a single thing, even as he tried to squint what felt like his eyes into the void.

But squinting brought with it an itch. A benign little itch on the very corner of his lid, nearly too small to notice at first: until it began to grow more insistent. It started as a little scratching that felt like it could've just been rubbing skin, but then certainty rippled through as it drew deeper: into a persistent ache.

The ache turned to pain, and the pain turned into fire.

He wanted to blink. He wanted to scream. He wanted to pound his hooves into his eyes until the deep flame that burned there like it was licking melted chunks out of his face was gone and stamped out.

But he couldn't move. He tried; but he couldn't feel. The ground still pressed insistently up against his hooves, the cool air still nipped and stung at his coat, he still even felt the awkward tension under his skin of just being near another pony; but it was like every mere ghost of a sensation was just prodding empty space.

But he wasn't empty; he still had heat. Not just in his eyes, anymore; it was all over. Lined across his body in long, agonizing ropes that curled and swept in odd places where there shouldn't have been any conduits but for his blood.

His heart. His lungs. His hooves. His spine. His throat. His eyes.

His mind caught fire, and it all swept away.

The world rushed like rapids into the empty space, and his eyes opened again.

A soul, right in front of him.

Listing light that glowed like an ember in the wake of a blaze, caught on the air as though some hook had marklessly punctured it through. But so still. So alive. Grey light pulsing so slow in time with his heartbeat like it was in perfect sync.

But it wasn't light. Not real light. Deeper, beyond what he could see: it was more. It was strands. Threads. Glowing strings overlaid so finely, so woven that he didn't even know how he knew to see them. He just...

It was almost as though he could count them. Could he? Was there time? Was it even worth it?

It would always be worth it. He wanted to know everything about that soul. About all souls.

He wanted it.

His magic was back, and he could feel it: a strong presence of warmth that seemed too obvious to ignore in hindsight. It was hardly a wonder that the night had been so cold; when he'd carried a much harsher chill inside.

It was a flow: guided along his body like a soothing stream of a spring, bathing every inch of him in the sheer effervescence of its presence. It pooled like lakes in the beds of his body, wherever banks had been worn by the natural process of motion.

Around his heart: boiled by its steady beat. Along his lungs: cooled by the take of his breath.

Down his hooves: weighed by his connection to the earth. Up his spine: aerated by the lift of his body.

Heavy in the sockets of his eyes, bringing as much stinging itch as it brought clear clarity.

Across the threshold of his skull, through the nexus of his brain: to process as to compress before riding one, final line to the absolute foci of his body.

And out it came through his horn. Trickling in drops and cinders off the tip to sweep away into a held maelstrom of activity. His magic, taken intricate turns through the maze of his body just to manifest itself in less than a physical form.

To make it physical: to bring solidity to what wasn't. From the core of his body, down through his hooves, then up once against the spine: and to finish at his horn.

Holding something with levitation wasn't such a tactile touch as it was a brush of sensation. There wasn't as much real feeling to touching something with just a grasp of magic, as there was an almost empty go-between in the brain. It was feeling something with as little actual sense as possible while faux imagining what it felt like.

He felt something slick, smooth, and almost soft: but still rough. Feathers; rimmed by a familiar, featureless coating of blue that retracted at his touch, and suddenly: there was weight.

Beautifully possessive weight.

It hefted in his grip, and what feeling there was to be had rushed in. Pushing, pounding, pressure probing from the inside in irregular intervals: like a bag filled with air left to settle and bounce.

But he didn't care about the bag, the bag only held the prize.

The soul was so close now: so torturously close, but out of reach. He could see it, so large like it was just there. He held it. He held its bag. But he didn't feel it.

He wanted to feel it. Even just with his magic, he wanted to touch it.

He let the net of his magic spread, to search blindly for any possible way down. Down to the center of the bag. Down to the soul. There had to be a drawstring, an opening, a tear, a hole, a way through.

There was none. It was all solid: all unbroken.

He'd have to go through.

Pushing magic through something was difficult. It was something he'd never done. It was invading a space that already held something. Pushing a stone through wood. Throwing a brick through glass. Shooting an arrow through a wall. Easing a needle through skin.

Magic couldn't do that. Magic wasn't solid, even in levitation.

But it wasn't solid.

It was air through a crack. It was water in a sponge. It was fluid, it was malleable: it occupied space beside space.

He didn't have to break the bag: he could just drip magic in, then suck it back out.

His power gathered, pooled on the surface in one spot without breaking the film. The action was difficult, almost too much for him: made even more so as the bag seemed to struggle against his efforts. He was moving; the ghost feeling of tightness squeezing him the only indication that anything was happening.

His head hurt, pounded like the slowly growing sound of drums as his magic made the unseen motion of creeping through the fill: towards the soul at its depths.

A fly was buzzing around his ears, making so much noise. Made it hard to concentrate as he knew he needed to, as the unestimated distance closed.

He didn't know when he'd reach it. He didn't know if his magic was even working like he thought it was. It was all just theory.

But he would trawl the depths until he felt something. Until he felt it.

He felt something. He felt it.

The motion of the bag against his magic flew into a frenzy as the weight-in-weight feeling of holding tugged at him. He tugged back: the world blurring for a hazy moment of where am I what's happening as the soul began to move, and his hold stayed still.

Closer, then closer. The bag was calming; fluttering light touches in the wake of a last-ditch struggle as the soul rose from its grave, towards the edge, towards him.

It was almost out. Hovering so close on the edge of one last wall that tugged like an entitled child keeping hold of their favorite toy. He was losing strength, losing momentum. For one, terrifying second: he almost thought he'd lose.

But then, the wall gave way: and the soul came out.

Warmth sprung like a spring from the source he held in a wonderful, enlightening instant: running like a flush across the field of his body. It brought a wordless, nameless, wonderful sense of fulfillment that, for a moment, he closed his eyes to immorally indulge himself in.

The bag had stopped moving, and it was as worthless as everything else was. He let his hold retract, and it fell wherever it happened to fall. He didn't care to check: he had what he needed.

What he wanted. What he'd always wanted.

The lingering, pounding pain of restraint in his head seemed so... far off as he grew impatient, and opened his blurry eyes to stare in wonder down at the glimmering orb. Even without the bag that held it, it spun, and shone, and pulsed so softly he could feel it like a living heart.

He brought it closer, and it filled his senses. His eyes fluttered drunkenly as he drank the sight, the sound, the lack of scent of it in so greedily he thought for a fearful moment that he might accidentally inhale it. It was so small, there: in the undulating, shapeless mass of his magic; he could probably swallow the poor thing like a pill.

Not now. Not yet? Not now.

His chest squeezed mournfully as he leaned away, and let it drift down, away from the cliff of his face. He was nervous. What if, when he let go, it just flew away? Who could say whether he was the only thing keeping it tethered?

But he needed to let go. He needed to feel it.

Slowly, regretfully, shamefully: the wisps of his magic blew out. Little by little, the film receded: his heart dying with it. He was ready- even as he leaned back, brought his hooves up- for the light to disappear. To fade like the last remnant of a fire hardly felt, to leave him cold and alone without it.

He didn't want to let go. He wanted, more than anything, to let go.

He let go.

He sucked his lip into the vice of his teeth, to gnaw in anticipation of penance as the soul hung for a moment. Without the supplanting strength of his magic holding it aloft, it seemed almost confused. It bobbed: once, twice, then began to fall.

His hooves raised up reverently below it as it floated on a solitary draft that simply didn't exist. He might almost call it shy: the way that it staved the inevitable fall. Every other second, it would raise half of what it had fallen: like it was trying to climb back up. To claw itself away from him.

But it was only so evitable. It was meant for him.

Eventually, inevitably: it fell; and he caught it.

The first touch on the bare flesh of his frog was subtle enough that he wasn't sure it had really happened. A light kiss to meet before parting on a small, wry waft. Come back: he wanted to say, to scream. He might've mouthed the words, actually; it was hard to tell with every nerve in his body rotting for the wait.

But then, back down it came: and it finally rested.

The settlement was electric. It was like every ounce of his blood lit like flammable gas for one, intensely painful moment; and he wasn't entirely sure he didn't black out. But, no, he didn't; because he was still there, still staring, still feeling the soul laid like any ordinary ball in the cleft of his hoof.

But it was warm. It was so warm: and it was moving. Gently, so gently that if he hadn't been actively blocking himself from the entire world: he wasn't sure he would have noticed. And it wasn't one, natural stream: it was every direction at once. Where one little bit of flesh felt motion in one way, another too close to distinguish felt the opposite. And it went on, and on for what felt like every millimeter of his frog.

It was the motion of a soul: of the living code for life. Every stream was an isolated instance that dictated behavior like words on a page; too many to count: all together as a conglomerate mass.

It was like its own living being; kept like a grave secret even to those who carried them.

Living being.

His brain ticked, and his eyes widened.

If a trance could be called an ocean of thought- especially as his went- then his first gasp as actual sense clocked him over was his breach.

The cold air. The castle walls around him. The ground under his hooves. The breath in his lungs: more frantic by the second.

The soul held aloft in his hooves.

The crow lying in a motionless heap half-between steps.

The mare, standing where She'd never left, looking down at him with such a mixed, mashed, bevy of emotion on Her softly smiling face that his overstimulated mind raced to put a name to every one of them before he told it to stop.

Every breath was a throaty gasp, and every second counting the aches in his too-still body was one in a world of feelings and realizations that he'd completely blotted out.

What had happened? He needed... He needed to go step by step. Conceptualize. Consolidate. Consider.

He'd used his magic, but his magic hadn't been there. It had to come back; it had to turn on. This had been the first time using it since he'd lost it, so something must have broken when... when he did.

He'd been blinded: every sense lost to him in less than a second as his system restarted, and he'd become lost in the feedback.

A dark void of feeling every single one of his magical pathways filling with mana: and it had hurt.

His vision had returned, eventually; and with it came his vision. A vision that he hadn't even realized he'd lost until just then; and it had overwhelmed him.

Seeing a soul so close, for the first time in over a week: it had turned him ravenous. Ravenous and mad and focused in ways that left somepony else's memories uncomfortably crawling on his skin like worms.

That had been him, going after a soul. Every time he'd come close, every time he'd abstained: that was what he'd just barely staved off.

Though, he'd always imagined that involving a lot more blood.

His eyes were still spinning and still blinking away too-big flashes of soul-light, but he still managed to look down, beyond the soul that still called to him: to his hooves.

Completely clean- well, for a certain definition of clean. Blood-free, at least. No red spatter at all.

His eyes dropped further: to the crow. It was dead, obviously; body half-folded at its waist as he'd apparently discarded the now sack-of-bones like trash, and it had simply crumpled as any old bag would.

It was still a crow, though. Cold, black feathers spread like ashes across the stone that were quickly gaining another sense of cold; with closed eyes and skin and organs and everything else that every living body contained.

But it was dead.

He'd feel sad about that, soon.

He returned his attention to himself, but not too much! Only enough to take quick catalogues of the self that he'd momentarily thrown off for greater focus.

His chest ached a little, though he could tell that was because he'd forcibly sped his breathing to return his attention outward. The real star of the show was his head.

He winced, and the hoof not holding the soul that called to him came up to rub against the pounding, there. He'd overtaxed his magic, and it was obvious in places other than the headache. Mana was a finite, if replenishing, resource: and his mana was running dangerously low. Burned away like cheap fuel on a weak wick.

Not low enough to leave him comatose or too weak to stand, but weak enough that he was sure the only thing he could manage to hold then was the soul that called to him.

The itch in the back of his brain nagged again, and he broke a short breath of shuddering need. He would get there, okay? He... He had to keep himself unfocused.

He'd really gone into it, though. Now that he had perspective, he could remember the struggles of the 'bag' as the frenzied escape attempt of the crow as he tore its soul out. The buzzing in his ears, too, had been the peaking shrieks of its last, terrible birdsong as it died.

He'd feel bad about that, soon.

Anyway, he was mutedly surprised that he'd even been able to keep the bird contained. Not that the bird was particularly strong or that he was particularly inept: but he'd been splitting his magic pretty unevenly.

It had taken a lot to reach into the crow's chest without breaking the skin to pull its soul out, all the while maintaining enough of a levitation field to keep it relatively still and aloft. Levitation at that level may have been normal for an adult unicorn, but not for him. Not for never having done it before.

He hadn't known he could do any of that. Not maintaining such extended strength, nor pulling a soul out. Especially not pulling a soul out- was that normal?

Was that what Nightmare Moon had been talking about? What he could do?

Nightmare Moon. She was still standing there, watching him relatively menacingly; or maybe that was what his imagination filled in. She did have a smile on Her face; and at least some of the emotion in Her hooded eyes was pride.

Pride, interest- was that a bit of fading surprise? Seemed She hadn't expected him to do that, either.

He realized too late: he'd spent too long with his eyes on Her. Her eye caught his, and affirmed the attention he wished he could take back. Her smile dipped just enough to classify as coy, and the sound of ruffling wings reached his ears before She began to move.

He was still a little too panicked-out to feel any real fear as She stood, but he did have the wherewithal to scoot futilely backward on his butt as She took one step down the stairs. One step, then another just past the dead crow: and by then he'd made enough space that She only had to keep one hoof on the stairs behind Her as She stood fully in front of him.

Her eyes were a bit too piercing for his tastes, especially as he was holding a soul that called to him. Paranoia tugged his ear, and he indulged it fully as he tilted his body away: taking his soul with it in a possessive hold close to his body.

But he kept his eyes on Her. It was his soul. She wasn't going to take it from him.

He couldn't help it if his face made a pout, but he could paint it red with anger as Her eyes lit in amusement at his action. She even chuckled quietly: a soft, creeping noise that didn't help his fears.

She shook Her head, and leaned down in the raising of a hoof towards him. If he'd been in any position to shy overtly away without putting his soul in danger, he would've; but as it was; he just had to bare his teeth threateningly and squint his eyes dangerously as that metal-clad hoof came to rest gently on his cheek.

"You fascinate me." The softly spoken words were such a far cry from 'give me that' that he wasn't sure if he'd heard right. His squint ended off into a confused blink, but running through the last five seconds in his head confirmed what She'd said.

He narrowed his eyes as a slow-starting feeling of strange shame washed over him, and he jerked his head as far as it could flee from the hoof on his cheek. "I don't know what you mean," he murmured, as he returned his eyes to the much more comforting sight of his soul.

So pretty. So alive. So tangible. It was still a little surreal that he was really holding one: the bulk of emotion that he could feel lying in wait still hadn't hit him. Who knew what would happen then, though. He'd probably burst into tears while hugging the thing, before passing out in a puddle of tears and inevitable vomit.

That sounded nice, he was looking forward to it.

He was literally brought back to attention as a cold hoof placed itself on his other cheek: nudging him and leaving him staring slightly smushed at Nightmare Moon: whose face seemed almost... in awe?

"You really don't, do you?" Her words came out quiet, barely eked through the small opening of Her mouth. She shook Her head, as he stared back with purposeful petulance. "You have no idea what you've just done."

That was a little insulting. He jerked his head away from the hoof again, though kept staring at Nightmare Moon as She seemingly took no offense at his action. "I do, actually," he retorted, as he pressed his soul to his side, the contact unintentionally making him shiver a little. "I took a soul. I took the soul that you offered me."

That made Her chuckle again, to his frustration. She leaned back, finally; regarding him with quiet scrutiny that put him on edge. "That is exactly it, Light. You took a soul."

The distrust he was attempting to put on full display melted into confusion, and he leaned forward on the back of his open frown as he softly shook his head. He didn't need an echo, thanks very much.

Nightmare Moon must not have understood how unhelpful She was being, as Her eyes rolled sufferingly. She returned to him with a frown sans sarcasm. "Without my direction. You did not need teaching, or telling: you simply acted on instinct."

She scoffed out of the corner of Her mouth, as if She couldn't believe She was explaining this to his slowly widening eyes. "It is simply fascinating, because I have never seen such proficiency from one like you."

A cold shock was beginning to wear on his extremities as Nightmare Moon continued, Her tone paradoxically harsh inside the praise She was brazenly throwing. "Among the gifted few I have known who have had marks like yours: you are gifted. A gifted mark among the many chosen prodigies, among the diamonds of your craft; they have all bumbled where you have just excelled."

The shock had all but numbed him now, but something else was beginning to wane in. Something unfamiliar. Something warm.

Pride? Was he feeling pride?

He was. He was proud of what he'd done.

A smile was working onto his face, he couldn't help it. Maybe it was vain, maybe he was full of it: but he was buying into what She was saying. The self-hating part of his mind was screaming that he was worthless and talentless and Nightmare Moon was spewing crap: but that part was being systematically crushed by the rapidly growing part of himself that liked himself.

He had done something special. He was special. His special talent was special.

"Light, look at me." The call to his ears came as a surprise, because he hadn't realized his eyes had drifted in a happy haze. He wanted to beat the smile away as he look back to Nightmare Moon, but it was especially hard as he saw a soft smile on Her own face.

And Her magic, glowing around Her horn. That made his smile dip a little, because he was still afraid of Her and the potential that She would take his soul away. But thankfully- because he wasn't sure he could escape on his weak hooves- the blue build-up of magic was only coalescing around Her shut eyes.

Only shut for a moment, though: as they soon opened with a small corona of blue light glimmering around them. Were Her eyes a little more red behind the cyan than usual? "Do you see what I am doing, Light?"

Her eyes focused on his face for a moment, then strangely flicked down to his chest, then to his side. His spirit dampened a little as She coincidentally stopped in a glance where his held soul was, and he turned just a little more to hide it.

Her eyes followed the movement perfectly.

"You're looking at my soul," he muttered, perhaps a little more hostilely than he'd meant. Or maybe he'd meant to be more hostile; either way, he didn't like Her eyeing his prize.

Nightmare Moon nodded at his words: outing Herself as the covetous witch She was. "I am using a spell to allow me the gift of soul sight. That is the spell name, as it happens: Soul Sight. It is the only Necromantic spell that I know, and I only learned it as a curiosity." Her head tilted in a question. "Do you see what I am saying?"

His brow furrowed as he relished in the warmth of the soul on his body, and his tongue licked along the backs of his teeth as he gave precious thought to the question.

"You're saying..." He started before he'd really finished thinking, and he stalled in a pause for a moment before he made up his mind. "...that you need a spell to do what I do?"

He hated the silence just after he'd made a guess, and he was beginning to think Nightmare Moon let it stretch just to see him squirm. But soon enough, the silence ended with Her smile, and a nod. "You are correct: though it is something you should have already guessed. Your cutie mark allows you the ability to natively interact with souls in ways normal ponies cannot."

He had sort of been thinking that: if only because of the hints towards it and the fact that he'd been the only one seeing souls all his life. A little sobering to hear it explicitly stated, though.

Some of his very mild bewilderment must have shown on his face, because Nightmare Moon squinted thoughtfully at him. She nodded, eventually: and put one hoof out towards him. "Let me see your soul, if you would."

Outrage flared in his chest like an unattended bonfire, and the immediate scoot backwards he made was his attempt to save his own life. "Get your own!" he spat venomously, and hugged his soul closer as he glared as many daggers he could throw Her way for even asking such an awful question.

Something he did finally put Her off enough to not be amusing, and Her eyes fell into a soft mimic of his own anger. "Do not be a child, Light Flow; I need only to demonstrate something." She wasn't quite snarling, but She wasn't asking as nicely as She might've. Her hoof bobbed: gesturing again for what was his.

But the answer was still no. It was his, and the gods help his burgeoning sense of pride if he let any old Goddess touch it.

Nopony else would ever touch it. It was his, and that was how it should be. He'd waited all his life for this moment, and he would sooner have his life end here than concede.

His lack of a response but for glowering was its own response, as Nightmare Moon did begin to actually snarl. Her red-tinted eyes were stormy and hostile as She leaned in, and he leaned out. "You are testing even my best side's patience. I will not ask a third time for something so juvenile as putting your mind at ease, now let me see it."

She sure did know how to sound so loud when speaking at a normal volume, but he was practically fearless at this point. Maybe he would kick himself for the blind sins of hubris and greed he was brazenly indulging, but maybe he would win out and keep the soul forever: and those odds seemed even enough to him.

His continued refusal lit some kind of fire under Nightmare Moon, as She leaned back, and Her snarl seemed to shrink in on itself. "Very well," She intoned, with so little emotion that She might as well have slapped him with the monotone trudge of Her frown.

But then, the haze around Her horn glowed brighter, and a force wrenched his hooves forward.

He cried out in a mixture of surprise and anger as an angry cloud of blue magic forcibly straightened his hooves out; the sensation nearly painful as the miasma prickled rudely at his skin.

He jerked his hooves in any direction he felt he could put force behind, as his prized soul was put on full display. Nightmare Moon loftily regarded his struggles through cold eyes that he did his best to heatedly return through frenzied bouts of struggling.

And then, like his world was just crashing down around him: She began to reach down towards his soul.

He wanted to scream. He did: as angrily as possible. He wanted to smack Her hoof away. He tried: to absolutely no effect.

He wanted to tear Her apart, to cry, to scream for help, to rip himself to shreds with the maddening thought that somepony else was going to touch His Soul!

Her hoof went through it.

"Do you see? Foolish child, I told you I possess no other Necromantic spells!" Came the yell that battered his ears as he watched with wide eyes: the spectacle of Nightmare Moon's hoof repeatedly phasing though the soul he held. "You and those like you are the only ones who may touch a soul without the aid of a spell! If you had not resorted to the most infantile crying of thievery I have ever witnessed, you would have recalled my saying so!"

It was hard to put a definite pin on his emotions, just then. He didn't quite feel shame: he was still too hopped up on himself to feel bad for doing much of anything. It wasn't regret: again, very little self-awareness. He wasn't afraid, sad, or even really all that mad.

To put that definite word to it: he might've said sheepish. Mostly just indifferent, though.

His expression was a painful mix of awkward discomfort and apathy as the magic holding his hooves cut out with a crackle of static feedback, none too gently. He let his hooves fall to his chest as his freedom was regained: to continue his close hold of his soul that felt so unguarded out in the open.

The pressing, whirring motion against his bare body: it was intoxicating. He covertly snuck his eyes down at it, to catch comforting glimpses of moving grey even as yet more harsh rhetoric battered his ears.

"You stupid foal; you think me such a monster that I would give a genuine gift, then steal it away as petty as the day?" The acidic lash of Her words made him consider flinching a little, at least to show some kind of penance; but then he thought again, and he didn't feel as obliged.

It was hard to remember any kind of obligation to Her when he stared down at his lovely, beautiful soul.

His ear perked: to catch a barely suppressed sigh of aggravation, and the slow murmur of words kept quiet. "Of any time to grow your spine, you would choose now? When it is least convenient to me?"

He let his brow fall in time with his frown, as he looked back up to see Nightmare Moon with a hoof to Her shaking head. "I heard that!" The dry accusation was meant to poke some weak hole of embarrassment in Her wall of antagonistic toleration, but it seemed to do the opposite.

Nightmare Moon instead looked up from the headache he half hoped he was giving Her: to regard him with dull eyes shining vaguely with resentment. "If I had not meant for you to hear, I would not have spoken," She muttered through a half-expressed grimace.

He glared back anyway, even though the wearing feeling of danger was tugging at his scruff. "Insulting me is hardly going to help!" he shot back, plenty loud enough for anypony to hear because he wasn't going to be sly with his anger. If he was mad, he was going to wear it on his cuff!

Nightmare Moon's eyes flashed with something dangerous, but he kept his defiant stare steady: even as She loomed toweringly over him for one terrifying, nerve pinching second.

But then, the sheer force of potential violence in Her eyes began to abate, and the precarious lean She was forcing over him slowly edged off. With clear tension bunching in Her shoulders: Nightmare Moon seemed almost to pout at him for a moment. A heady glare of exasperated emotion that worked the tired lines of Her frown: eventually dripping away into a cold stare of consideration.

He didn't like that. She looked... plotting.

Her head turned in a moment as She audibly huffed; a clearly haughty dismissal of his antics. "Very well. Act yet younger than you ever were, for all the rapport we shall build." His eyes flicked up from his soul to catch a nasty side-eye: a thorough snub finished by taking even that away. "A shame, though. What I was going to teach you was something I estimate even you will need extensive time to figure for yourself."

The aching detachment he felt as he fawned over his destiny incarnate halted; tension forcing his ears to an attentive perk that he fought down. No need to look more interested than he was.

Except he was very interested because that sounded so interesting.

His eyebrow wanted so badly to twitch a question into his voice as he slowly raised his head, to set himself into a guarded, suspicious stare. "What... do you mean?" He softly rubbed his hooves against the slightly filmy surface of his soul as he spoke: the beginnings of a habit he hoped he would be perpetuating.

Nightmare Moon's peeked one eye at him for a second out of Her side profile, and She sniffed absently. "Oh, you need not concern yourself." She smirked, as She hummed a humorless laugh. "I'm afraid something far more immediate has come up, and I simply do not have the time set aside to work with children."

The socialite canter of Her tone was perhaps only insulting because of how much it made him think of Rarity and the off-tone shriek she so often assaulted him with; ended with a slow turn to him over heavy accentation to Her last, especially wounding insult.

He didn't need this third degree, this unfair badgering; he had a soul, damnit!

But he could have more; and that was what brought him to a tired sigh. Reluctant would be the easiest and least painful word to describe how he felt as he stared at the dark ceiling for a moment of reflection, before turning down to the Goddess he'd offended.

"Sorry, okay?" he conceded, though he couldn't get his face to relax for it. Nightmare Moon finally turned just back to him, to stare with hooded, unconcerned eyes that he rolled his own at. "Fine, I was out of line. I was being... childish." The confession of what was well enough evident still burnt for whatever reason.

Her head turned toward him fully now: face thoroughly unimpressed. He groaned as his shoulders sagged, and he pressed his soul tightly to his chest for the strength needed to completely humble himself. What a pain. What a drag. He didn't want to apologize to Her, and he didn't want to admit whatever fault She saw in him.

At least the soul was warm on his chest. Warm, warm, so warm. Like the flickering little flame of a match, except without the burning. Just the wavering line of heat right on the edge of the actual flame, except it was bigger and it had depth, and oh it even moved like fire!

He wanted to sigh. The soul wasn't soft, but it was just slightly malleable. Like cotton. Like foam. He would press his frog against it, covering the entire two inch length of it, and it would just meld. It would squish, but not deform or lose its mold. It was supremely satisfying.

Oh, the warmth. Warmer than anything he had ever felt, it seemed. One little spot of all-consuming, sleepy, calming heat. So small, though. So, so small. Just a pinprick. A hole. A wound.

He wanted to feel it all over his body. If he was that warm everywhere: he wouldn't need anything ever again.

If he could just... press it in. Both hooves over his heart: and just knead that warmth into his being. He could feel the thrum of his blood under it, maybe even through it. Would it be so hard? To just... let it suffuse him?

The beat of the soul, and the thrum of his heart: why couldn't they just.. synergize? Connect. Tether. Intertwine.

Become one.

He wanted the warmth. He wanted the soul.

But, he couldn't have it. Not that way, anyway.

He did sigh, as he let his hooves drift away from his chest. He felt a bit dazed, as his eyes fluttered open. Held in such a trance, he could almost swear he had started to feel that warmth he'd been crooning about.

How heavenly it would've been. The aches of his muscles, the empty tank of his mana, even the terse tear of emotion he'd been feeling: under that warmth, he couldn't even feel any of it.

Just an illusion, though. His imagination could only account for so much, and all the worldly things that bothered him would shackle themselves back on soon enough. It'd be so nice to really feel like that, though.

He turned his dreamy eyes back to Nightmare Moon, though he'd sort of forgotten what they'd been talking about. Didn't She have something to show him?

Why were Her eyes so wide? Face quiet and mouth stoic: with that kind of expression, he could almost say She looked kind of shocked.

What could shock Her, though? She was pretty obviously staring at him, and the most he could do to shock Her would be to stop breathing and drop dead.

Oh, thought for later?

Where was She looking, though? At him, but not his eyes. Slightly down?

It was an idle trace of Her eyeline; followed as a curious whim because he had nothing better to do. He meandered down, smiling slightly to himself for as long as the memory of fake warmth held him like a blanket.

He frowned.

Where had his soul gone?

His hooves, held uselessly against his side with nothing in them, pressed in: to touch his side. He pulled them away, and the soul still wasn't there. He did it again, just to make sure.

Not there.

He raised his hooves up to his face, and turned them around in front of his scrutinizing gaze. The sides, the backs with their little squiggly unshorn locks, his frog, the first running fores of his limbs. He even peered deeply into the black sole of his hoof.

He really should wear horseshoes, but he didn't like how cold they made him feel all the time; and he'd not stepped on anything damaging enough to break the bone in his life thus far, so the stakes weren't particularly high. All besides the point though: where was his soul?

He turned his head around to look behind him. Nothing but a long stretch of stone and toppled pillars: no luck. He twisted, turned the other way: and there was nothing there either.

He peered around at the ground around him, letting an instinctive urge guide his hooves as they patted and explored the stretch of his body.

Had he sat on it? Accidentally thrown it out the window? It... It hadn't passed on, Had it?!

One hoof passed his heart, and he stopped.

He felt the blurring dilation of his eyes as what seemed like his entire body pulsed for that first beat. Both hooves came up, pressing hard edges painfully in as he desperately let his dual frogs feel as deeply as he could let them.

Bump. Bump. Bump. Bump. The steady thrum of life.

He was still warm. The warmth wasn't going away. He felt chill pressing on his coat, but he stayed warm.

All through his body, like he was the flickering flame of a match.

The soul was in his body.