//------------------------------// // Healing Shade // Story: A New Friend // by Shadowflame //------------------------------// Twilight and Spike trudged through the thick undergrowth of the forest, only led by the light from Twilight's horn. Spike grumbled unhappily as he looked warily at the forest around them, "I still can't see why Rowan would just take off like that. I mean, he is powerful with magic, but the forest is dangerous, if not scary." Twilight couldn't help but feel the same way, "I know that Rowan shouldn't have flown off, but he was just testing out that cloud spell." She shook her head, "But it was still stupid. I mean, he even left the Liber Tenebrarum behind." Twilight held up the black tome with magic, "Good thing I brought it with us before we left the grove." She then quickly put the book into her magical storage. Suddenly they heard an explosion in the distance, making both of them jump in shock. Spike climbed up onto Twilight's back, trying to get a better view, "Holy Guacamole! What was that?" "I don't know. But whatever it was, it was big." The unicorn looked up at her assistant, "Can you see where it came from?" "Uh, no. Partly because it's night, and I can't see past all these trees." Twilight rolled her eyes and grabbed Spike with magic, raising him high over the trees. The small dragon yelped as he unexpectedly was lifted high into the air. Twilight looked up at him, "Can you see anything up there?" Spike, still unnerved by the fact that he was floating twelve feet in the air, looked around over the treetops to see a large column of fire rising up from where the explosion came from. He pointed a claw towards it, "Whoa, Twilight! There's a huge fire coming up from over there." Twilight used her magic to scan out in the direction that he pointed, and caught a thin trail of magic coming from the fire. She gasped, "That must be Rowan! C'mon Spike." she cut off her levitation spell, dropping the dragon out of the sky. Spike yelped as he found himself suddenly falling, landing hard onto Twilight's back. With Spike on board, Twilight started to gallop through the forest towards the fire. Spike held onto Twilight as tight as he could, "Uh, Twilight? What if that fire isn't Rowan? What if it's something else like a fire-breathing dragon?" The purple unicorn breathed hard as she ran through the deep vegetation of the forest, "Don't worry, Spike. When you showed me where the fire was, I was able to detect powerful magic emitting from it. It has to be Rowan." But as she ran, following a thin signal of magic, the trail suddenly cut off. The unicorn stopped and began to search around for the signal, panicking, "What? No!" "What is it?" "I lost the trail." Twilight lit up her horn brighter, making more of the forest visible. Spike stood up on Twilight's back and cupped his claws around his mouth, yelling, "Rowan!" Twilight quickly silenced Spike with her hoof in his mouth. "What are you doing?! You don't know what you might attract in this place." Spike's eyes went wide, "Oh, yeah. Right." He sat down, frowning, "So what do we do now?" Looking around the dark forest, Twilight shook her head, "I don't know." She scratched her head with a hoof, "Maybe if we head back to town, we'll see him later. If he uses that cloud spell again, then he'd be able to get out of here easily." Spike held a look of wide-eyed worry, "But what if he can't? What if he's hurt from that explosion?!" Twilight grimaced at the thought, but then a twig snapped behind her, making both the unicorn and the dragon jump in fright. Spike jumped behind Twilight for protection while, instinctively, the unicorn lowered her horn towards the source of the sound, making it shimmer in a purple aura as she prepared to use magic. But when she glanced in between the trees, she found... "Whoa! Hey, it's just me! No need to start blasting me." Rowan stuck a hoof up for protection, smiling sheepishly. Twilight gasped, "Rowan." She rushed over to meet him, "Oh, thank Celestia that you're all right." Spike stepped in next to Rowan, "Man, we were worried when that huge fire appeared. We thought that something must have happened to you." Rowan smiled and shook his head, exhaustion showing clearly on his face, "Don't worry. I told you that I can take care of myself. I am in my element here in the forest." Twilight perked up as she remembered, "Oh, Rowan. You left the Liber Tenebrarum behind when you took off." In a flash, the book appeared in front of her. Rowan quickly gave himself a facehoof, "Dang it. I can't believe that I left the book behind! That was stupid of me." He took the book back and placed it inside his storage spell, "Thanks, Twilight. I guess that I won't be doing that again." Spike noticed something moving on top of Rowan's back. looking at it, he let out a startled yelp as he saw a black wolf, covered in several wounds and splinters across the animal's fur coat. "Rowan? What's that?!" Rowan glanced back at the creature that he carried, "It's a shadow wolf." Twilight cocked her head slightly, "A what?" "A shadow wolf. That's what I call them, since they have the ability to meld with their shadows." Rowan explained, "When I was using the cloud spell, I came across a pack of these guys in a territory war against a pack of timberwolves. I saved this one when the rest of the shadow wolves ran off, but it's badly injured. We need to get it to Fluttershy's as soon as possible." Twilight tried to follow what he was saying, understanding only slightly, "Okay, let's get it to Fluttershy. I'm sure that she can heal it. But along the way, you're going to have to tell us what happened, more in depth this time." Rowan nodded and the three started to make their way through the forest, on their way to Fluttershy's cottage. _____________________________________________________________________________________ Fluttershy hummed to herself as she finished bidding her little animals goodnight. In her cottage, several little creatures were already falling asleep. Of course, she always saved tucking in Angel for last. The pegasus smiled as she hummed a small lullaby as she tucked the little white rabbit into his basket bed. Angel yawned widely, giving no resistment against being put to bed. Fluttershy smiled warmly and gave the little animal a small kiss on the head before she turned out the lights. "My, it's been a long day." Fluttershy whispered to herself, careful not to wake any of the sleeping animals in the house, "I'd better turn in for the night." But as she started upstairs, there was a loud knock on the door. "Oh, my." Fluttershy quickly ran to the door, "I wonder who that could be. And it's so late." She opened the door to see Twilight and Spike. The new unicorn, Rowan, was with them. "Oh, what are you all doing here?" Rowan stepped past Twilight and Spike, "Fluttershy, I need your help." Turning slightly, he showed her the black wolf that was on his back. Fluttershy gasped as she looked at the poor creature, "Oh, my. Yes, quickly come inside." All of them filed into the cottage and Fluttershy shut the door softly behind them. She pointed a hoof towards a table, "Put him on the table." Rowan and Twilight lifted up the wolf onto the table as Fluttershy ran to get her veterinarian kit. She returned quickly, and began to examine the wolf's wounds, "Oh, my. The poor thing's lost so much blood, not to mention that he's covered in splinters." She carefully touched the creature with her hoof in several places. Fluttershy sighed with relief, "It looks like he doesn't have anything broken or fractured. I just need to remove the splinters and bandage the wounds. After that, he'll just need a long rest, and then the poor little guy will be back to normal." She took out a pair of tweezers, sanitized them, and then proceeded to remove the splinters, "But, how could something this bad happen?" Rowan sighed, and then told the pegasus about the fight between the two packs of wolves, the shadow wolves against the timberwolves. But as he came to the end where they reached Fluttershy's cottage, the pegasus began to look warily at the wolf. Noticing it, Rowan asked, "What's the mattter?" Fluttershy stammered, "Well, if this wolf is from the Everfree forest, then it's most likely to be aggressive towards everypony, not to mention all of my animals. Once I bandage him, I can't keep him here to get better. He might hurt some of my creatures." The thought hadn't occurred to Rowan, "Oh, um...then..." He scratched the back of his head with a hoof, lost in thought. But then an idea came to him, "Oh, then what if I took him home with me. I could keep him at my house. He won't be able to hurt anybody there." Fluttershy pulled out the last of the slivers and placed it in a dish along with the others, "Oh, I don't know, Rowan. I mean, it could be dangerous to keep him in town. Even if you tie him down, he could get loose and hurt somepony." Rowan smiled, "Don't worry. I might be new in town, but I'm just as powerful as Twilight when it comes to magic. If he even tries to get out, then I'll just use magic to stop him." He gave Twilight a side-long look, which was met by a questionable glance. Twilight shrugged it off, "Right, Fluttershy. I'll help Rowan to keep this wolf tied up. Don't worry. We've got everything covered." Fluttershy smiled as she wrapped bandages around the wolf's midsection, "Oh, okay. I've seen your magic, Twilight. I'm sure you can keep this little guy from hurting anypony. I'll be finished with bandaging him, and then you can take him. It doesn't seem that he'll wake up until morning." Rowan beamed, "Great. At least I'll be able to sleep without worrying about him." Spike suddenly yawned loudly. Everypony turned to look at him to see the little dragon had curled up and had fallen asleep on Fluttershy's couch. Twilight smiled, "Speaking of which, Spike's been up all night. We need to get going." Fluttershy nodded as she set the last bandage on the wolf, "Okay, it's done." She turned towards Rowan, "He's all yours." Rowan smiled, "Thank you." He levitated the wolf onto his back, carefully draping the animal across his sides. Fluttershy glanced down at the wolf, "What are you going to call him? I mean, you can't go around just calling him 'the wolf'. That would just get annoying." Rowan looked down at the sleeping animal, "Oh, I guess that's true. Hm..." He scanned the wolf up and down, thinking for a suitable name, "How about 'Shade'?" Twilight smiled as she trotted over towards the sleeping Spike, "That sounds pretty good, Rowan. It seems to fit well with his nature." She levitated Spike off of the couch and placed him softly on her back, curled in a scaly ball. Rowan grinned as the name seemed to appeal to him, "Then that's what I'm going to call him: Shade." He carefully placed a hoof on the sleeping wolf, and began to pet his head like a dog's. Twilight began to walk towards the door, "Come on, Rowan. We should get going." Rowan nodded, "Right." Turning back to Fluttershy, "Thank you." "Your welcome." Both of the unicorns then said their goodbyes to Fluttershy and stepped out into midnight. Fluttershy waved them goodbye and closed the door. Yawning to herself, she headed upstairs for her nice, comfortable bed, ready for a rest from the day. _____________________________________________________________________________________ Twilight and Rowan made their way into town and stopped at Twilight's library. They stopped just outside the door, and Rowan smiled towards Twilight, "Thanks for helping me today." Twilight replied with a grin, "Hey, what are friends for?" But then the door to the library suddenly swung open, behind it stood Shining Armor. He looked down at both of the unicorns, "Oh, thank Celestia that you both are all right. It's been hours since you left. I was getting worried." Twilight smiled, "Oh, come on, Shiny. You've seen us both before when it comes to magic. We can take care of ourselves just fine." The Canterlot guard smiled and gave his little sister a hug, "I knew that. But now that you're back, I want to hear what happened." Rowan let out a yawn, "You guys can go ahead. I need to get home and tie up Shade, just in case if he wakes up." Shining Armor gave Twilight a questioning look, which she returned with a small laugh, "I'll explain later." Rowan waved both of them goodbye as he turned around and began to walk home. As Rowan walked through the quiet town in the dead of night, he felt a certain calmness exceed from the gloom. After he walked down the dark road for a while, Rowan reached his house. The colt sighed in relief as he walked in. Shutting the door behind him, he flicked the lights on. He looked at Shade, who lay slumped across Rowan's back, and then back at the room. He frowned to himself, "Hm... Now where to tie you up, Shade." He continued to scan the room for a suitable spot. Hm... He thought to himself, It can't be anywhere visible for anybody to see, otherwise they'd just get spooked. And it can't be near any furniture, otherwise Shade will just tear through it. He sighed, I guess upstairs is the best option. He walked to the stairs and climbed up the steps, carrying Shade on his back. Once he got upstairs, he looked at the three rooms that he could use. Okay, I can't use the bathroom for obvious reasons. There's my room, but if Shade got loose, then he'd tear up everything I have. Rowan sighed. That left the study as the only possibility. Rowan opened up the study and walked in, turning on the light inside. The only objects in the room were an empty book case and a desk, both standing in the far corner of the small room. Not wanting anything to be accidentally destroyed, Rowan levitated Shade off of his back and placed him in the opposite corner. Before he had gone into the forest, Rowan had been studying other spells along with the list that Twilight gave him, just in case he needed them. It seemed that she had been right. One of the spells was a shadow bind, which restricted the victim's movement with their own shadow. He drew out his magic and put a shadow bind on Shade, making it loose so the wolf could move in place, but still tight enough to keep him from getting at anything in the room. Once the bind was set, Rowan looked at his work, checking it for any loopholes in the spell. Satisfied that he couldn't see any holes too big, he walked out of the room and shut the door behind him, locking it with magic. Rowan yawned as he walked into his room, and slumped down onto his bed. Exhausted from the days events, Rowan drifted into sleep almost immediately, as the moon shone high in the sky. _____________________________________________________________________________________ Rowan was suddenly woken by a large bang from the wall. Startled, he fell out of bed and onto the floor. Groaning, Rowan sighed, "Just for one day, can I wake up without ending up on the floor?" He got himself up off of the floor, but then the same bang resounded from the wall. Rowan noticed that it was coming from the study. He sighed, "I guess Shade's finally awake." Groggily, Rowan walked out of his room and to the door of the study. Without any real thought, Rowan undid the spell on the lock, opening the door. He walked inside and looked over to where he put Shade the night before. Rowan was surprised to see that the wolf was wide awake, and it was desperately looking around for what was holding him in this unfamiliar place. But then Shade stopped as he noticed the unicorn at the door. The wolf reared back as far from the door as its bonds would allow, and growled at the unknown pony. Rowan smirked, "Good morning to you, too, Shade." He looked at the bandage covered wolf and a thought occurred to him, I wonder if he's hungry. Rowan shrugged, I was planning on buying some more food for myself, so maybe I can find something for him. But first, I should change the binding spell a little, so that he doesn't put a hole in my wall. Focusing on the wolf's bond, Rowan retracted the bond limit away from the wall and lengthened it out more towards the center of the room. Shade, cautious of the strange light coming from Rowan's horn, crept towards the unicorn. And then he sprung out in a deathly leap, aiming for the unicorn's throat. But then, something tugged against him, snapping him away from his target. As he landed, Shade let out a low whine as he landed on top of his hurt back. He smiled sincerely at the wolf's efforts, "Well, Shade. I'll see you later with some food." He stepped back through the doorway, "Try not to hurt yourself too much." He shut the door as Shade gave Rowan one last growl. Once again, Rowan locked the door and went into his room. In his room, Rowan went to his saddle-bags, which sat against the wall, and began to look through them for the money bag that Princess Luna had given him. Once he had taken it out of his bag, he stuck it in his storage spell, emptied his saddle bags, placing them on his back, and headed downstairs to eat something for breakfast. Downstairs in the kitchen, Rowan looked in the fridge to find the leftovers from yesterday's breakfast. Rowan sighed. He had only eaten apples for his meals all of the yesterday, and the taste was getting old. When he went into town, he was going to have to get other things to eat. Rowan shrugged, as it was the only thing to eat at the moment, and took a hoof full of the apple treats. Rowan quickly ate his light breakfast, and headed out the door and onto the road outside. The town bustled in the usual morning way, with everypony out doing their daily business. Rowan turned and headed for the town market. The walk was short from his house to the market, which was good for Rowan, because he wanted to get the food he needed quickly, as well as something for Shade. Even in the morning, vendors were out at their stands calling out advertisements to everypony there. Rowan walked along each stand that sold food, buying a bit of everything. Seeing as his taste buds were different now, he thought that he'd try everything, just to find out what was good. At each stand, he bought whatever food looked good, including fruit like strawberries and bananas, or just plain food like bread and cheese. All of the vendors gave him a friendly thank-you as he bought their products, paying with what bits he had. Although, every time that he got out his money bag, he realized that at the rate that he was spending, he would run out of bits by the end of the week. If I'm even still in this world by then, I'm going to have to find a way to make some money. He pushed the matter out of his mind. Suddenly, a voice called out from across the road, "Rowan!" He looked to see Twilight and Shining Armor walking towards him. "Oh, hey guys. What's up?" Twilight smiled, "Spike is still asleep at the library, so Shining offered to help me run errands this morning. But anyways, how's Shade?" Rowan smirked, "Well, I can say that he's a little tightly wound from waking up in an unfamiliar place, and that he tried to take a bite out of me. But other than that, he's fine." Twilight shook her head, "Well, I guess that's not all bad. I mean, he's separated from everything that he knew before and stuck in a totally different place. It's only natural that he'd be a bit freaked out." As she said this, Rowan tensed up and glanced at Shining Armor. The captain slightly shook his head, as if to say, 'No, she doesn't know.' Rowan let out a small sigh of relief. He looked back at Twilight, "Well, I want to make Shade comfortable while he heals, but I can't help if he keeps trying to break out. What do you think I should do?" "Well, in the library, I read a book about animal behaviors a while back." Twilight replied, "It said if any animal is angry, aggressive, or uncomfortable, then you should try to spend as much time as you can with it, while still keeping some distance. The idea is to let the animal grow accustomed to you." Rowan thought about the idea, "Hm... It seems like a good idea." He nodded as he decided, "Okay, I'll try it. Thanks." Shining Armor's eyes caught the colt's saddle-bags. Pointing a hoof at the bags, he asked, "So, Rowan. What are you doing right now?" "Oh, I was kind of getting sick of eating apples, so I'm getting some more food while I stay here." But then Rowan suddenly remembered, "Oh, yeah. I almost forgot. I don't know how long it's been since Shade ate something, so I was going to try and find him something for him to eat. Do either of you guys know where I can find something that a wolf can eat?" Shining Armor shrugged helplessly while Twilight thought hard. But then her head perked up, "Oh, there's a vendor stand around here that sells imitation sausages. I bet if you ask him, he can sell you some to feed Shade until he gets better." Rowan smiled, "Great! Show me the way." Twilight pointed a hoof down the line of vendors, "It should be past all of these stands, almost at the end of the market.: Rowan waved a hoof at them, "All right. Thanks, you guys. I'll see you later." He turned and headed through the market, on his way to the stand. _____________________________________________________________________________________ Rowan groaned as he walked back into his house, slamming the door angrily behind him. He walked into the kitchen and lifted his saddle-bags off of his back and slumped them down on the kitchen floor. Using the levitation spell to save time, Rowan started to take the food out of his bags and put them away in the cupboards and fridge. While the unicorn occupied himself with the job, he muttered to himself, "Geez, can a vendor be any more irritating?" His trip to the stand to get sausages for Shade hadn't been very good. When he got there, asking for about a pound of sausage, the merchant didn't pay him any attention while he read a magazine behind the counter. But when Rowan managed to get the his attention, the merchant told him that it would cost fifty bits just to get half a pound, way more than twice the original price. Rowan grumbled to himself as he put the last of the food away, remembering that cheat of a salesman. Making that large of a price, just because he was new in town, put Rowan's teeth on edge. After arguing for a good twenty minutes over a price, they both had settled on a smaller price of twenty bits for a pound of sausages. Rowan sighed to himself as he grabbed a few pieces of meat for Shade, "I hope I don't have to buy from him again. Otherwise, if he tries to stiff me again, he's going to get a flaming crescent to the face." But even in his grumbling, Rowan managed to calm himself down as he walked upstairs with Shade's sausages. He reached the door to the study and unlocked it, opening the door wide open. Rowan flicked on the light to see Shade lying on the ground, too tired from all of its escape attempts. The wolf's head rose off of the floor as the unicorn walked in again. He began to growl at the pony, until his nose smelled a delicious scent. Shade stopped his growling and looked at the pieces of meat that Rowan held up in the air. A smile crept onto Rowan's face, "Hey, Shade. I got you breakfast." He lightly tossed the sausages in front of the wolf, between his outstretched paws. Rowan watched as Shade eyed the meat curiously, but then received a sense of satisfaction as the wolf began to greedily chew on them. Rowan beamed, "Glad you like it. You don't know what I had to go through to get that. True, it's not meat, but it still tastes like the real thing." The colt stepped farther into the room and shut the door behind him, leaving Rowan and Shade in the study together. Rowan sat down in front of the shut door, "Guess that I'll keep you company for now." Shade eyed Rowan cautiously while it chewed on its breakfast, watching for any signs of movement from the pony across the room from him. Rowan just smiled as he pulled the Liber Tenebrarum and out of his storage spell. He flipped open the book and began to read it, resuming his task of finding a spell to get home. _____________________________________________________________________________________ The changeling spy lighted down in front of the mouth of the cave as the sun rose high in the sky, resting his transparent wings from his long journey. He was far out of the border of Equestria, so he didn't worry about being in his native form in broad daylight where anyone could see him. The entire land around him was nothing like Equestria, which was rich with life and flourished with vegetation. Instead, outside the border of Equestria, there was nothing except barren, open desert, with only a couple of dead weeds dotting the region. The cave in front of him was the only entrance into the changeling hive, where no one would find it, and also where the queen was waiting for him. He entered into the dark, narrow tunnel, which spiraled down into the earth and into the center of the changeling hive. In the dark, gloomy light, there were several members of his race, who were called drones, on account that none of them could think for themselves without the command from the queen. None of the other changelings paid the Ponyville spy any attention, as he made his way into the heart of the hive, the queen's private chambers. He entered into the large open space under the earth, where the changeling queen, Chrysalis, stood on her stone throne. She noticed the spy, regarding him with a look of interest, "Who goes there?" He bowed before her, "My queen. I have come to report my findings while I hid under cover in Ponyville." She nodded, "Yes, of course. Tell me, has anything happened that is of any importance to me in that miserable, little town?" "Nothing very large has happened, except for one peculiar thing." "Oh, and what would that be?" The spy proceeded to tell of the colt unicorn, known as Rowan, who arrived in town as an order from princess Luna. He also described in depth the magic which the unicorn possessed, which had extraordinary power. And then he concluded by telling the queen about the black book, the Liber Tenebrarum, which was in Rowan's possession. After the spy had concluded his report, the queen found that an evil smile had grown on her face, "Yes, that will do." She pointed her foreleg towards the small changeling, "Gather all of the drones. Tell them that at sundown, we depart for Ponyville. The time has come for revenge." The changeling bowed and raced out of the chamber, on his way to fulfill the queen's assignment. Once he was out of earshot, Chrysalis chuckled to herself, "So, that's where the book has been hidden, after all this time. I should have known it was you, Luna, who stole my mother's book. You sealed it away after you saw it's power. For a thousand years it's been missing, and no one ever suspected anybody like you to have it. That is, no one had seen your land of Equestria before at the time, until I came here." She laughed maniacally, "But, now you've given it to one of your weak little ponies. You are a fool, Princess Luna. Once my changelings reach Ponyville, I'll easily dispose of this Rowan, and the power of the Liber Tenebrarum will be mine, as it was meant to be. And then no one will be able to stop me from taking over all of Equestria." Her evil laughter carried through the expanse of the hive, where the changelings were grinning wickedly to themselves as they prepared to raid the small, vulnerable town. All of them chuckled to themselves at the thought of terrorizing those helpless ponies. That is, all of them except for one, young, changeling filly, who had heard every word that the queen had spoken. Her eyes widened as realization dawned on her, "Oh, no. I have to get that book first." But then a thought stopped her, "But I can't leave now, or else I'll be caught for sure." She frowned as she tried to find a solution to the problem, "I need to at least keep the book away from the queen. So if I want to do that," A look of determination glittered in her pupil-less eyes, "Then I need to get to the book first, during the raid, before any other changeling does." With that, she raced down the tunnels within the hive, going to prepare for the long flight to Ponyville.