"C'mon, Fluttershy," Applejack said. "Let her get some rest on 'er own."
It wasn't that I wasn't hungry. Far from it. In fact, I was starving, but I wasn't going to let Twilight Sparkle have the satisfaction of helping out poor, helpless charity case Trixie any more than she already had. I watched them leave, then reached back into my saddlebags. They were lighter one notebook, which made checking for any stray bits easier.
First, scrap paper, which went straight into the fire. Twilight Sparkle didn't need my notes on her and I didn't want her to have them anyway, so I was glad that I'd already taken them out of my notebook. Bits of dried out flower petals and stems, remnants of forgotten snacks, also went straight into the fire. A rancid acorn, into the fire as well.
I sighed. I really wished that acorn had been fresh.
Finally, at the bottom of my bag, I triumphantly drew out a single bit. Not much, but it would get me an apple or some carrots, at least. I levitated my saddlebags back on, got up and headed out to find some food.
---
It didn't take long to find a store selling some nice-looking fruit. As expected, I ended up with a nice big apple. Food acquired, I then had to decide what to do with the rest of the day. My first thought was to go back to the castle and really take that nap that I had lied about earlier. My leg still hurt, although thanks to Fluttershy it was already feeling much better, and some more rest could only have helped. Instead, curiosity got the better of me. Maybe that idiot had wandered off by accident and my cart was back. It was a long shot, but it couldn't hurt to check, and it was a way to kill time, so I turned to once again walk out of Canterlot and toward the tent city.
The streets were busy this time of day. I thought I had seen some ponies looking as if they recognized me, but I didn't particularly want to encourage that, given my state, so I just kept walking. The apple was good and gone too quickly, but I was already in a better mood by the time I reached the square near the bridge out of Canterlot, where the matches were posted. This was the last day of the tournament, and so only one match was posted.
Naturally, I had been right about Twilight Sparkle's competitor. Amarok had been the odds-on favorite to win the entire tournament. As she was no doubt finding out, I hadn't managed to come up with a credible plan to beat the wolf-king. I wasn't about to admit it, of course, but I had been fairly certain that he was going to beat me in any event. Losing to Amarok wouldn't have been quite the embarrassment that losing to Twilight Sparkle had been. She may have been from a respectable Canterlot family, and she may have been bearer of the Element of Magic, and she may have been Princess Celestia's personal student, but in the end she was just a librarian. Amarok, at least, would have been an opponent worth losing to.
While I was thinking, I had already crossed the bridge out of the city. Suddenly, walking back to the empty space where my cart was didn't seem like such a great idea. It was just gone, and I didn't think I was going to be able to deal with subjecting myself to that very well. He may not have been the smartest pony, but I had genuinely liked Hopscotch. It really hurt that he had just been...
"You alright, miss? Are you crying?" someone asked. I ignored him and kept walking. I should have headed back to the castle, but instead I found myself wandering away from the road, toward the competition grounds where the finals were being held. I couldn't tell you why. I suppose I just wanted to take my mind of everything that had happened.
As I approached the dragon grounds, I saw a small knot of ponies standing around near the field. As soon as I got close enough to make them out distinctly, it was obvious that it was Twilight Sparkle and her friends. I stopped. I couldn't exactly see what was going on until Twilight cast some sort of spell over her friends, who all promptly collapsed. What in Equestria was she doing?
A moment later, Princess Luna appeared. She leaned down to Twilight, and then she and Twilight's friends disappeared. Once the other ponies were gone, I could tell Twilight was brimming with energy. She had Drained five ponies and a baby dragon? Was she trying to kill herself?
I just shook my head and teleported to the opposite side of the bleachers, where she and her friends wouldn't be able to see me. I climbed up on the bleachers and found an empty spot toward the rear.
As expected, Twilight Sparkle was on the field, opposite Amarok. The wolf was even bigger than I had expected. Even from as far back as I was, he was intimidating.
The pre-match was very strange. Twilight Sparkle was obviously inexperienced at using Drain spells. Naturally, I never used them, and seeing Twilight acting mildly schizophrenic made me think I had made the right choice all along. She was nearly glowing with power, however. I'd never seen anything like it from a unicorn. It was more than a little unsettling.
Najstariot made her announcements. I was more interested in what Amarok and Twilight Sparkle were saying to each other. It looked like Amarok was doing the expected posturing. I couldn't quite make out what Twilight was doing but it was certainly theatrical, teleporting practically into the wolf's mouth and then snapping her wings together sharply. She even made Amarok fall back on his haunches. I had to admit, I was impressed. It was much more showmareship than I'd ever seen out of her.
The match began, and I really don't know what to say about it. They were trading blow-for-blow with telekinetic strikes. Twilight Sparkle was using some form of shield spell I had never seen before and flying around attacking at the same time. She kept up the theatrics, too, doing little aerobatic stunts in the air. Where did all of this come from? Maybe Drain spells did have their advantages if they could help stuffy little Twilight Sparkle put on a show like this.
The bigger spells started coming out, then, with Amarok being tossed around by a Gravity spell while Twilight had her wings transformed into big metal slabs with some extremely nasty shapeshifting spell. Even as she was dragged to the ground, Amarok turned Twilight's side of the field into mud. Well, I thought, this is where Twilight loses.
Except, strangely, it wasn't. She somehow found the strength to use those big metal sheets attached to her back like a pair of giant knives, cutting through the muck. I really couldn't keep track of what was happening anymore, it was all moving too fast. In the next moments, somehow the entire field was covered with tangled vines and then frozen. Twilight's wings turned back to normal and she flew back into the air, and I felt extremely jealous. How had she managed to create such durable temporary wings? On the fly and after a long and tiring qualifying round, too!
Next, a huge stand of illusory trees appeared. I grumbled, and I wasn't the only one. Field-wide illusions like this were very effective at blocking one's opponent's view, but they also blocked the view for the crowd. We could see occasional flashes of light from inside the 'forest' and hear shouts, but that was it. After a while, a web of white energy appeared and the illusory forest seemed to disappear in pieces. I'd never seen a Dispel like that before, but it was certainly effective.
The two went back to lobbing energy bolts back and forth. Twilight was still throbbing with energy and it was even bleeding through her hooves, creating a strange purple aura on the frozen ground around her. The two traded a last pair of blows, and then all of a sudden there was a blast of light from Twilight's horn that seemed to wash over her side of the field.
I don't quite know how to describe what was left when the light faded. There were seven ponies standing there. Twilight had somehow cloned herself, or created replicas of her friends, or... something. As fast as things had been moving before, it turned into havoc then. Amarok was being batted around like a rag doll. His side of the field changed several times. He was beaten around with telekinetic strikes, gravity effects and who knows what else.
I can't explain what happened after that. The match didn't last much longer. The clones disappeared, and at the same time Amarok's side of the field went black. Completely, utterly black. A few moments later, there was yet a third explosion, and the blackness disappeared.
They both collapsed. It was incredible. Twilight Sparkle had somehow fought Amarok - Amarok with nine Cup victories, no losses and no draws, Amarok the ruler of the north, Amarok who saw himself as a peer of Princess Celestia - to a standstill. I couldn't believe it. I was still trying to comprehend what I had seen during the match, what Twilight had done. How did she have that much power? Even having Drained her friends, it was impossible. And yet, here I was, seeing exactly that. She hadn't lost.
And then she won. After all that, she still had enough strength to throw dirt in Amarok's eye with her telekinesis. She won. Twilight Sparkle won. I had seen it all happen. No tricks. No lies. I didn't know where she had learned those spells or gained that kind of ability, but she had beaten possibly the most powerful magician in the world, other than the princesses themselves. It all made the Ursa Minor seem kind of petty.
There was cheering and applause and ponies flooding on to the field. I just sat there. I wasn't sure I could move. Everything just felt numb.
"Excuse me, miss, are you alright?" a voice asked.
"Fine," I said, staring down at the bleachers. A golden horseshoe at the end of a long white leg came into view, and I looked up at Princess Celestia.
She smiled at me. I think I just stared back. "You must be Trixie. It's good to finally meet you. Your matches earlier were very impressive."
"Thank you," I managed to say.
"Would you like to walk with me?" she asked. Her smile could have lit up the sky. "I've heard you've had a run of bad luck and I was wondering if there wasn't some way to help."
Somehow, I stumbled to standing and followed the princess down to the ground and away from what I had just witnessed.