Twilight woke up, yawning, and glanced around, wondering why her bed was shaking. When she saw that she was sleeping in the train’s sleeping car, the unicorn remembered that she and her friends were going to Altomare for a little vacation.
“Hmm, I slept surprisingly well this night.” Twilight thought as she stretched in her bed. “Matt managed to make me relax so easily...”
The lavender mare glanced at the bed next to hers, where she saw that the paladin has already woken up, and was currently reading ‘Daring Do and the Quest for Sapphire Statue’. Twilight suppressed a giggle as she noticed that he finally gotten into the book.
She continued to look at him for few moments before she had realized that she was fantasizing about lying next to Matthias, snuggling to his chest. Twilight shook her head, chasing those thoughts away, but she knew it wouldn’t be long before they would return.
“I really need to talk to him.” the unicorn thought, gazing at Matthias. She was much calmer now, thanks to the stallion in question, so she was no longer freaking out as she analyzed the situation. “I would now, but the others might wake up soon. I suppose that I should be able to ask for a private talk without arousing suspicion from the rest, but... what then? He did say that we weren’t just friends, but even if that is true, would we be able to switch from being friends to being a couple? And what’s more, could our relationship survive? After all, we do argue quite often...”
Her further pondering was interrupted by a very loud yawn, followed by:
“Mornin’, ya’ll.”
“I would have thought that a farmpony would be first to wake up.” Matthias chuckled, glancing at Applejack, noticing by then that Twilight was also awake. “And yet both librarian and a jobless pony beat you to it.”
“'Jobless'?” Twilight asked, amused. “You do recall that you are the Grand Master of the Order of The Celestial Lights, right?”
“Well, until this order consists only me, and I’m living under somepony else’s roof, I figure I have no right to say that I am employed.” Matthias replied, winking at her. “Anyway, we passed Los Pegasus about twenty minutes ago, so we should arrive in Altomare within two hours. You can see the sea from the windows on this side, and the desert on the other.”
Twilight twisted her head to look on the latter, watching the San Palomino Desert for the first time. As she knew from her books, it was a sand desert, and as the name suggested, it was composed of huge sand dunes. Twilight could barely see the outline of the mountains in the distance, which served as the border between Equestria and Saddle Arabia, the horse’s country.
“How can you work on a farm if you sleep so long?” the unicorn heard Matt’s amused question, directed to Applejack.
“Har har, smart boy. Ah’m on vacation, remember?”
Having enough of admiring the empty desert, Twilight looked stood up and trotted over to the other window. Like the San Palomino Desert, she had also never seen the West Sea; however, it was pretty much alike to the East Sea, which was between Equestria and griffin’s land. The lavender recalled that in the depths of West Sea was Aquastria, the city of sea ponies, who sometimes visited Altomare and she briefly wondered if they would see one of them.
But, despite all her wondering, she couldn’t take one stallion out of her thoughts.
Matthias had to admit, the city of Altomare was beautiful.
He has been to a few port cities on Azeroth, but none of them could compare to how the Altomare used the water in architecture. The city itself was actually built on small islands, which are separated by canals, much bigger than the ones in Stormwind, and was linked together by bridges. To get from one part of the town to another, the most common way was to hire a small boat called gondola and travel by it, which was what they were doing now. Except for the small thing...
At the station, a pony from the resort has been waiting for them, to lead them to the house they reserved. Luckily, it was a rather strong stallion, so he helped Matthias and Spike carry the bags, which in majority, belonged to Rarity and Sweetie Belle.
“I really hope they are not going to buy some souvenirs.” Matthias prayed, despite knowing that even Light couldn’t do everything.
The boat carried them near the city’s limits, where they disembarked and traveled by taxi the rest of the way. For much of Matthias irritation, Altomare didn’t have any walls or other protection. While he could understood that in case of Ponyville and Canterlot, both of which were deep in the middle of the country, this city was right on the border, and was a very important strategically. Its location would make it the first target of anyone trying to invade, so that they had a safe port for ships to launch the attack on the rest of the West Coast. However, Matthias decided to keep such observation to himself, while making a mental note to mention this to Celestia later.
The houses of the resort were outside of Altomare, right next to the beach, so that the vacationists could enjoy the peace and quiet. The one Rarity reserved was quite a distance away from the others, so it took them a good ten minutes to get there. When the taxi finally stopped, Matthias saw that it was rather luxurious house.
“Damn, I knew that Rarity made quite a lot of bits from her dressmaking business, but this...”
The house was pure white storey house with terrace. Not only that, but it was spacious, too. It must had at least twenty rooms, aside from the living room, kitchen, and some bathrooms.
“What?” he heard Rarity asked, most likely due to her friends staring at the house she had rented. “I did say that I managed to find one big enough for eleven ponies, right?”
As the others have trotted to the house, Rarity stayed behind to talk with the resort’s pony.
“Thank you very much for your help.” she told the earth pony, who blushed slightly.
“It wasn’t a problem, Miss Rarity.” he replied. “Princess Cadance had sent us a letter requesting rebuilding this house to accommodate all of you and paid us handsomely for that. And while I don’t understand why she later asked us to pretend that it was you who made the reservation, we take pride in our discretion. Anyway, Miss, here are the keys.”
Rarity took the few sets of keys the pony gave him, thanked him once again, and trotted into the house, wondering how to arrange the next part of Princess’ plan. Luckily, she received help from the most unexpected source.
“Hey, can we go to the beach now?” Sweetie Belle asked, looking at Rarity pleadingly with poppy-eyes. “Pleeeeeasee?”
Matthias jumped to the air, twisting his foreleg for a better strike...
… and bounced the ball back to the other side of the self-made court.
“Aand Matt serves the ball to the opposite side, will their opponents- Rainbow Dash saves her team!” Spike exclaimed, while holding up a stick to his mouth. “Oh, it looks like...
Almost as soon as they set hooves in the beach house over an hour ago, which looked as presentable inside as outside, but still comfortable, the fillies practically dragged them to the beach. Why they couldn’t trot those five hoofsteps by themselves was a mystery, but Matthias and the mares quickly gave in. Only Rarity excused herself for a moment to put on some bathing suit, much to the paladin amusement, until the white unicorn explained that if she went swimming in the sea (which everypony doubted) she didn’t want to get the soil directly on her coat if she could help it, and that the suit also served protect coat from the sunburns.
“How is it exactly possible to get sunburns on coat?!?”
As soon as they started placing folding beds and chairs, as well as umbrellas, the little ones tried to go into water; only to be coughed by Twilight spell, and they had to wait for her to finish her lecture about safety. Luckily for them, it wasn’t really long, so they were soon ready to join Rainbow, Pinkie and Applejack in the sea.
“You’re not going?” Rarity asked him in a surprised tone, as they, Twilight and Fluttershy opted to stay on the shore, laying on the beds.
“I’m not in the mood for swimming right now.” he explained back them and, reaching to his saddlebag, he added: “Besides, I’ve just gotten to a really good part.”
Reading the ‘Daring Do’ book, instead of just listening about it from Rainbow, was quite entertaining. Matthias always figured that to somepony like him, who used to face death (and undeath) on daily basis, the book about just treasure hunting would seem boring, but he was wrong. Daring Do was fun to read, as well as entertaining, and imparted some knowledge onto the reader (like not going to the ancient temples, which was something a lot of people back on Azeroth should learn). Matthias even began to understand why Brann was so interested in exploring and discovering the past.
However, he didn’t managed to read the book for long for the others soon asked him to join their volleyball match, to even the odds between three adult mares and three fillies. Spike, instead of playing, chose to be a commentator. And so, Matthias was in the team with Pinkie Pie and Sweetie Belle, and played against Applejack, Apple Bloom, Rainbow Dash and Scootaloo. They had to occasionally remind Rainbow that this was a friendly game, so she wouldn’t hit the ball too hard for any of the Crusaders to bounce back.
Matthias found the entire game to be really fun. While he did played few games with Jarim, and later with Varian, he never had an occasion to play this volleyball. It took great deal of self control from him to not take an example from Rainbow Dash and lose himself in the game.
He received the ball from Sweetie Belle and passes it to Pinkie Pie, who shoots it at the other part of the field, making both Apple Bloom and Scootaloo jump for it to intercept it, which resulted in them running into each other, and the lost of the ball.
“Are you two alright?” Matthias asked them, breathing a bit deeper. They were playing for some time now, and it showed the most on the fillies. Once the two in question nodded, panting, he added: “I think we should make a break for now.”
Everypony agreed to his suggestion, barring Rainbow, who was slightly angry at the loss of the ball in the last moment, but they all lay down on the folded beds. They stayed like this, chatting and resting and eating, for about an hour, before Rarity rose up.
“Well, it looks like its past noon.” she said. “What would you say that we would go for some sight-seeing in Altomare? The city looks simply divine!”
“I think it’s a wonderful idea!” Twilight exclaimed, also rising.
“But we want to play some more!” said Scootaloo, with the other Crusaders supporting her by viciously nodding.
It seemed, however, that everypony else, including Spike, wanted to go. Not wanting to see the moment ruined, Matthias quickly acted.
“You can go, I’ll stay and keep an eye on them.” he assured them, not moving from his bed.
“Are you sure about this?” Rarity asked.
“Don’t worry, they won’t be much of a problem.” Matthias said, and smirking, he added: “I’m afraid you will have to find somepony else to carry all your shoppings.”
“Well, since ya’r sure, we’ll leave them in yar care.” Applejack chuckled, amused like everypony else by the earlier comment. Turning to her sister and the others, she said: “Don’t cha get yarself and Matt in any problems, ya hear?”
After the Crusaders assured them, the six mares and one dragon said their farewells, and left for the city. The fillies tried to get into the water as soon as they were out of sight, but Matthias stopped them, reminding them that they’ve just eaten, and had to wait an hour.
“Cant’ya speed it up with the Light?” Apple Bloom asked him hopefully.
“I’m afraid I can’t.” the paladin replied, amused, but seeing the disappointment on their faces, he quickly added: “How about this? You could go around the shoreline collecting shells, until the hour passes.”
The three of them quickly beamed up at that, and trotted over to the line on the beach where small waves constantly hit. Luckily, it was full of shells (Matthias wondered if they were placed there by the resort’s workers) so they didn’t have to wander off anyway far from paladin sight.
Matthias stretched happily on his folded bed, enjoying the warmth of the sun, the company of fillies, who run up to him every now and then showing him a shell they found which they deemed really beautiful, and simply enjoying life.
“I will have to watch out to not doze off.” he chuckled to himself. “Why they say those girls are nothing but a problem is beyond me, I cannot think of anything that could cause me any trouble.”
Twilight watched in awe as the gondolier showed them the most interesting parts of the city. Altomare was simply beautiful. The canals, the bridges, the buildings... everything about it was beautiful.
At one moment, they stopped and disembarked, so that they could see the town hall, the gift shops (Twilight pitied Spike for carrying all those things Rarity bought) and the square, with its magnificent fountain.
It was an image of the city’s founders, Prince Alto and the sea pony mare he fallen in love with, Misty. The prince, who happened to be one of the thousands unfortunate passengers of the luxurious ship S.S Alicorn, which was supposed to sail around the world from Manehatten to Vanhoover, but when it was just few days away from its destination, a tragedy happened. The ship hit a drifting iceberg, which caused it to sink, taking away the lives of so many ponies. There were only a handful of survivors who managed to get into the lifeboats the gigantic ship had, and the few pegasi who were on the ship flew for the land, searching for help.
The prince himself, however, was not on any lifeboat. He chose to give his place to some mare with a little filly, saving their lives and sacrificing his.
Or so he thought.
As the ship sank, and the Prince Alto with him, he lost consciousness, so he couldn't remember exactly what happened, but he recalled drifting on the sea for some time, holding onto some piece of wood, until, one day, when he opened his eyes and found himself not in water, but cave instead.
Not knowing what happened, he rose and staggered into the light. The cave opened up towards the beach, but it wasn’t the sea that got his attention, rather, it was the strange tracks on the sand, leading first to the cave, and then towards the hills. Alto, while knowing it wasn’t the best thing to do in his condition, followed the trail, curious who saved him. He climbed the side of the cliff... and saw Misty.
The sea ponies, contrary to what someponies believe, can move actually pretty well on the land. They long, ended with a fin tails allowed them slither like snakes on land, keeping their chest and head straight up with ease. That was how Misty managed to drag Prince Alto into the cave, after finding him drifting on the surface of the sea, and how she went into the land to find something to eat for him.
Twilight recalled all that as she admired the fountain, thinking how beautiful this story was, about to ponies that were joined by a tragedy as they fallen in love despite the obvious differences. How the Prince (with Celestia’s blessing and his fortune) founded this city, which instead of streets had canals, so that he and Misty could live in it.
“If I remember correctly, there was also a shrine built in the place where Prince Alto first saw Misty.” Twilight mused, still gazing at the memorial. “Where was it? West of the city... about...”
The lavender unicorn’s jaw dropped, which, fortunately, none of her friends saw.
The shrine was located on the hill outside of their beach house!
Many hours later Rarity could barely keep herself from bouncing like Pinkie Pie as they made their way back, being happy despite the very late hour, which had nothing to do with the few things she bought today.
She saw how Twilight looked at the fountain, and she knew that Princess Cadance was right again. As soon as their lavender friend saw it, she realized that the shrine memorizing the spot where Prince Alto and the sea pony, Misty, fell in love was practically around the corner.
“Now, they are bound to go talk by that shrine!” Rarity fought triumphantly. “And then, they will finally realize what they fill for each other is love, and will confess, and then they will start their courtship, and soon they will get married. I will make us all dresses, and it will be the greatest day ever!”
She returned to reality as they finally neared the beach house, so that she could later remember those moments clearly. After a few second however, the door to it opened and they all saw Matt, running up to them, with... anger on his face?
“Where the hell have you all been so long?!?” he hissed as he stopped in front of them. “Do you have any idea what have happened?!?”