Brick poked his head into yet another dark room and looked around, listening for anything that would give Scootaloo away. He felt drool drip down the knife as he stalked forward, the blade held firmly between his teeth. The tips of his wings bristled, ready for a moment’s action in case he got caught. Where is this kitchen that she spoke of? Did she lie to me? he thought, pushing down yet another snarl. This wasn’t the first time he’d wondered such a thing, for it felt like he’d spent too long down here as he pushed open yet another door, never revealing his quarry.
He spit the knife into his left hoof as he snuck inside the last door in the hallway, pushing the door shut with his right wing. He sat down with a grunt and looked around him, finding himself in a windowless closet. Shelves of various jars lined the walls of the small room, barely big enough for a few ponies to stand in. The sounds of many, many hoofsteps all trotting to a silent beat echoed from above him, making him worry. “Getting too hot down here…” he muttered to himself.
He poked his head out of the door, looked both ways, then slunk back out into the cold the way he came in. He took to the skies once more, trying to gain as much altitude as he could. Brick finally found another cloud big enough for him to hide in, and as he dug into the cloud, he kept his eyes locked on the windows of the castle. A minute passed, then two as more and more lights sprung to life inside the castle. “Heh, guess that wench told someone I made it inside.”
Movement near the top of the castle caught his gaze. He was barely able to recognize Twilight’s purple coat color through the snow and the foggy windows, and as he watched on, he could have sworn he saw others with her. “Figured she’d lie to me. She probably went right for that starving rat of a pony and told me to go to the other end of the castle.” He pushed himself up, preparing to do what he promised his wife when a lightning bolt flashed mere inches in front of him, the following thunder making him tremble like a little girl. He nearly dropped the knife out of sheer fright, for if he had taken flight one moment earlier, he would have been struck down and turned into a burnt chicken.
He lay back down to gather his wits amongst him once more. As his heart started to slow down, he spat the knife onto his forelegs and licked his dry lips. “Do I really want to do this? Does she really need to die?” he asked himself. “Can’t I just tell the love of my life I did it and help her escape? We’d leave this horrid place far behind and live the rest of our lives without a worry!” He rolled his eyes as he sighed. “I could never lie to her, though… she’d find out that Scootaloo is still alive in an instant. Then we’d be right back here doing this all over again… And I have her right in my sights. I could finish this right here, right now, and fly back to Canterlot to break my wife free.”
With a deep sigh, his resolve grew strong as he took flight, gliding towards the balcony of the room where Twilight stood.
Spike’s words echoed in Twilight’s head as she struggled to think of what to do. What do we do? I don’t know! she thought. With no guards around to ask for help, it was up to her to ensure everyone’s safety, and without her magic, she felt much too vulnerable. “We’re too exposed here,” she finally said. “We need to… we need to…”
“What? We need to what?” Scootaloo asked, puzzled. “Are you okay?”
Twilight’s head wouldn’t stop throbbing. She figured it was from her frantic run in her already weakened condition. “Yes,” she lied, fighting through her headache. The pain radiated from the base of her horn, making it hard to think straight. She tried to hide her wince from the little ones, but Spike saw through her obvious lie and lightly swatted her side with the scroll to try to bring her back to reality.
“Snap out of it, Twilight,” he said. “We need you!”
“I, I just… I’m not sure what to do!”
“We should split up!” Scootaloo suggested. “That way we could find someone to ask for help twice as fast and tell them that my father is here!”
Twilight shook her head, trying to remain focused and in the present. “No, we aren’t splitting up. You two are safe with me and I’m not letting you out of my sight until he’s locked away for good.”
“But if we split up and agree to meet somewhere, we can double or even triple our chances of–”
“I said no!” Twilight snapped. The sound of somepony flying outside made her freeze, fearing that it was Scootaloo’s father returning to find them. She opened her wings as she crouched down, pulling them up against her side, staying as quiet as she could until the sound of beating wings disappeared. “We need to go,” she murmured as she stood back up.
“Go where? Cadence’s bedroom?” Scootaloo asked. “Shouldn’t that be the safest most guarded place in the whole castle?”
I suppose that could work… Twilight thought. “I left a note in my bedroom saying that I was coming to get you guys here, though. What if they send more ponies down here to help us and we’re not here?”
“But won’t there be guards at Cadence’s bedroom? They can protect us!” Spike said. He scurried to the door and peered out into the hallway. “Looks good for now.” He waved at them to follow as he left the room. “I’ll scout ahead and make sure the coast is clear,” he said as he ran down the hallway, the sounds of his feet hitting the ground fading away.
“Spike, wait! You went the wrong way!” Twilight called after him. Only silence met her calls. “You ready to go?” she asked Scootaloo as she knelt down to let her climb on her back. “We need to catch up with him.”
“Guys, come on!” came Spike’s voice from further down the hall.
“Keep your voice down!” Twilight hissed back as she caught up to him at the corner. “The grand staircase is that way!” she hurriedly whispered, nodding back towards the way they came from.
“Yeah, but this way is better. Scootaloo’s dad would expect us to take the grand staircase; it’s totally exposed.”
Twilight’s eyes narrowed momentarily. “Okay… but it’s also the quickest.” She looked over him and noticed a much smaller staircase further down the carpeted hallway.
“But I–”
“Shhh…”
“B-But–”
“Shh!” Twilight glared at him, trying to impose upon him the seriousness of the situation. “We don’t know where Brick is! He could be around the corner waiting for us!” she said, her tone fraught with worry.
“Fine, fine! I get it.” Spike looked both ways down the hallway, then gestured behind him. “Shall we?” he asked. “You think they still have snacks up there?”
Scootaloo groaned. “How can you think of snacks at a time like this?”
“Hey, we might be up there for a while. We don’t know how long it’ll take to catch this guy.” A quick look from Twilight made him mouth the word, “Sorry,” at her before she nodded at the stairs. He took the lead and led them back upstairs. As they neared the last corner to Cadence’s room, he started to feel a sense of relief, knowing that their perilous journey was going to be over.
“Guards!” he called out in a strong voice without looking up. “We, uh…” He looked up to find Cadence’s bedroom doors wide open without any guards in sight. “Uh-oh… this can’t be good!” he said under his breath.
“Yeah, no kidding.” Twilight trotted past him, her ears perked up as she listened for anything out of the ordinary. She trotted into the empty room and looked around, her gaze finally coming to rest on the shattered glass near the balcony. “Odd…” she muttered. A shiver ran down her back, coaxing Scootaloo to slide off of her.
Spike pushed the bedroom doors shut and locked them, barely able to reach the key. “Why is it so darn cold in he– oh, that’s why. Do you think Scootaloo’s dad broke in?”
“I sure hope not.” Twilight walked up to it and saw that there was still glass on the floor, indicating that someone had broken it from the outside. “It was probably Rainbow,” she said with a chuckle. Oh, I hope you’re okay… she thought. “I’m surprised she didn’t take out the whole window like she did back in our room.”
“She what?” Spike asked in disbelief. “She took out a whole window? What happened?”
The bedroom doors suddenly lurched forward, held only by the lock. Her heart skipped a beat as she opened her wings wide. “Get behind me,” she ordered. Figuring that she probably had mere seconds before the door broke down, she prepared herself for a fight. If I have to use magic to save them, I will…
“If they’re not here, where could they be?” Rainbow asked Cadence. She walked around the room and felt both beds. “They couldn’t have gotten that far; we probably just missed them. Their beds are still warm. She walked in circles as she thought. “If I was Twilight, where would I take them? Where’s the safest place in the whole castle?”
“The throne room?” Cadence offered.
“Maybe, maybe… is it guarded all the time?”
“Shining likes to post guards there at night, but…” She giggled for a brief moment. “I think it’s silly guarding an empty room all night so I usually let them off.”
“Speaking of Shining, do you think he’ll be back soon?”
“Oh, I’m certain of it. “He’ll have this whole place searched from top to bottom in short order.”
“Good, good.” Rainbow stopped pacing, her eyes going wide. “Hey, what about your bedroom? Do you think she’d go back there with the little ones?”
“That seems like the most logical choice. C’mere, I’ll get us close.”
Cadence trotted up to her with her horn lit, and with a quick flash of light, they reappeared just outside the royal bedroom. “Gotta warn me when you do that, Cadence,” Rainbow said as she groaned. “Say…” She pushed against the bedroom doors and found that they didn’t budge. “Weren’t these open a few minutes ago?” She pushed against them as hard as she could but paused as she heard hushed voices come from inside.
Rainbow’s ears perked up. “Twilight?” She banged against the door with her hoof as hard as she could. Ignoring her now-throbbing hoof, she pressed her ear up against the door, listening as someone’s hoofsteps grew closer from the other side. She took a step back as she heard the key turn, breathlessly waiting as the door opened just enough to reveal a familiar purple face. She shouldered the door open the rest of the way and pulled her lover into a ferocious hug. “I’m glad you’re okay,” she whispered. “I was so scared leaving you behind like that, and– and–”
“It’s okay, we’re okay,” Twilight whispered back as she wrapped her right foreleg around Rainbow’s neck. “Everyone’s safe, Rainbow.”
“Good, good.” She nuzzled the side of Twilight’s neck, her eyes shut tight as relief soared through her. She relaxed as she sat back, letting go of her as she looked around for Spike and Scootaloo. “You two okay?” she asked as she held her forelegs open wide, silently asking them to come in for a hug. Scootaloo darted forward into her embrace, nearly knocking her over.
“We sure are!” Scootaloo looked up at Rainbow, her eyes full of fear and uncertainty. “What are we going to do?”
“I–” The sound of the balcony door slamming against the wall shocked Rainbow into silence. There stood Brick, panting, his back covered in snow. Rainbow noticed the glint of his blade held in his right hoof, her eyes going wide. Before she could speak, Brick’s cold gaze turned to one of sinister joy as the knife left his grasp.
As the knife twirled through the air towards them, Rainbow pushed Twilight out of the way and grabbed Scootaloo between her forelegs then turned, using her right wing to shield them. She closed her eyes and braced herself, praying that she’d get lucky and get hit by the blade’s hilt. She heard Twilight scream, “No!” at the top of her lungs before she felt someone’s magic crawl all over her fur. Her eyes whipped open just in time to see Twilight’s horn bursting with light before all went dark a split-second later.
The air turned as cold as ice in stark contrast to the warmth of Cadence’s bedroom as Rainbow felt herself falling. She whipped her wings open wide to try and stop her fall only for it to crumple underneath her as she impacted the ground. The impact knocked all the air out of her lungs. She wheezed as she struggled to breathe, but she still pushed herself up anyways on unsteady hooves as pain radiated from her wing. Unable to see a thing in the darkness, Rainbow felt a pit of dread form in her stomach as she immediately recognized the pain: she’d broken a bone.
Where am I? she thought. She gingerly folded her wing against her side as best she could, trying to ignore the pain. The freezing cold air helped a little. “Scootaloo? Twilight?” Rainbow called out into the darkness. She blinked a few times as she tried to see a flicker of anything that would provide her a modicum of hope, only now realizing how cold it was. She turned around in a circle slowly, letting her eyes adjust so she could hopefully see something. “Anyone?”