//------------------------------// // Awake // Story: Trinity // by Freescript the Bard //------------------------------// It was rare that Twilight was without a study topic, such was her curious nature. But that night, she had not thought of any sort of spell to attempt, nor any topic that had perked her interest throughout the day. So, in this rare segment of time, Twilight simply cast a randomization spell, causing a random tome to topple unceremoniously from its place among other such books. In this specific case, a book from the Starswirl the Bearded shelf slid out and tumbled to the floor. Twilight levitated the book to her reading stand, giving Owloysius a thankful nod as he flew over with a fresh quill and parchment for note-taking. Spike had gone to bed after reorganizing the books in the Magic Theory shelf. With the candles on the desk lit, Twilight looked at the moderately aged tome the randomization spell had selected. "'A Compilation and Brief Overview of Archaic Spells and Charms by Starswirl the Bearded'," she read. The title was seemingly crammed onto the leather cover, as if printed in an over-large font size. Twilight wondered at the title. If these spells were ancient in Starswirl's era, then most of them will likely be lost to the ages, she thought as she opened to the inside cover, seeing that the book was a donation to the library by an anonymous benefactor before Twilight became the librarian in Ponyville. Turning to the table of contents, Twilight looked over the alphabetical list. 'Alchemical Enchantments,' 'Botanical Charms,' ' Battle and Combative Spells'... Twilight skimmed the list searching for a chapter to perk her interest. After a moment, she came across a peculiar chapter title, 'Spells of Unknown Intent or Use'. The lavender unicorn slowly flipped to the respective page in the book, getting an idea of it's layout. As it would seem, the book was set in alphabetical order, giving the name of the spell, a brief sentence or two on the effects and an overview of how to cast it. However, in the chapter that Twilight chose, the descriptions were replaced with an account of where Starswirl the Bearded had discovered the spell. Twilight looked on in disappointment as the chapter was only two pages long, and most of the 'spells of unknown intent or use' were spells that had been discovered later after the great wizard's death. Frustrated, Twilight was about to turn to the next page when she spotted something else next to one of the unknown spells. As far as she saw, it was the only illustration in the book. The drawing was that of three blades, crossing each other with the hilts equidistant from the next. Starting with the top going clockwise, the pommels were inlaid with a sky-blue sapphire, an orange-red ruby, and a forest-green emerald. Twilight glanced at the illustration once more before turning to the spell the drawing was adjacent to. "'The Trinity: Discovered in empty tomb, approximately 150 paces North from the castle of the Two Royal Pony Sisters in the Everfree Forest'." Twilight read aloud, thinking back to the same castle in which the Elements of Harmony freed Princess Luna from Nightmare Moon. Her curiosity got the better of her, and she read and re-read the casting instructions. Twilight grimaced, realizing the spell would tax her energy levels in casting it. She looked at the clock on the wall. The librarian decided that, after casting the Trinity and making her observations, she would turn in early that night, as a result of the soon-to-come exhaustion from the spell. Twilight closed the book and concentrated. Her horn began to glow a bright lavender as she let the flow of magic become entangled with her form. The ground below her became inscribed with the same image that correlated with the spell as she focused all her magic on the mental image of the symbol, impregnating it with power. A few brief moments later it was finished, and the magically exhausted unicorn collapsed, the spell having drained her body's energy. Twilight stood shakily and glanced around the library. It was exactly as she left it a minute ago, with nothing all too extraordinary having appeared or occurred. She took a glance at the mirror, and was disappointed to see that the spell hadn't transfigured her in any way. Dejectedly, Twilight wrote out her rather short observation report and walked slowly up the stairs to her bed. ••• If Twilight had even thought about the tomb in the Everfree Forest, she would have trekked there and seen the results of her self-imposed lethargy. It would not, however, be what anypony, especially Twilight, would expect. Within that tomb was a single, round room. The walls were etched with the language of Archaic Equestria, a time before Princess Celestia and Princess Luna first defeated Discord. On the floor of the room, a larger circle surrounded by three other cirles had been magically sculpted out of the black marble floor. Within the larger circle was the image of the Trinity, each hilt of the swords pointing toward one of the smaller circles. In clock wise order, the images in the smaller circles were a cog of cloudstuff, a ball of fire, and a tree with its roots wrapping around a boulder. As Twilight finalized the spell miles away, the three images glowed fiercely. The painted jewels in the pommels of the three swords were transformed into the gems they represented, each glowing as brightly as their respective circles. Slowly, the glowing gemstones rose and floated out to their circles. As the gems entered the space within the three insignias, the glow of each increased to small suns... ••• Cloudlight... He opened his eyes groggily to the darkness at the name that ran through his head. It puzzled him at first. Why would a name be the only thing in his head? Yet as he pondered this, the name’s purpose simply revealed itself. It was his name. Something to identify himself with. This revelation gave him an inexplicable vigor, but increased the slight throbbing in his head. My name is Cloudlight... With his newfound strength, Cloudlight pushed himself to his hooves, dragging his body to a sitting position, and stretching his wings. Wait... wings? He turned his head around to find the outline of two white wings in the low light of... wherever he was. I’m a pegasus. Cloudlight didn’t know how he knew the name of his race. It just seemed to come to him, much like his name. A groaning sound from within the room caused his ears to swivel toward the noise. Turning his head, he found two other ponies in the darkness of the small, circular room. A unicorn and an earth pony. The unicorn was struggling to sit up as Cloudlight observed him. He was significantly smaller than the average stallion, about a hoof-length and a half shorter than the pegasus. A fiery orange and red mane topped his ashen head. Ruby eyes opened slowly, eventually turning their crimson gaze on Cloudlight. Upon the unicorn’s flanks was the symbol of three swords superimposed upon a ball of fire. Blaze... Cloudlight blinked as another name entered his head. Again, he looked at the unicorn, and saw him with a new perception. It was as if this unicorn, who he assumed the name belonged to, was somehow connected to himself. Within the pegasus’ mind, he felt the unicorn’s presence, his consciousness, and his emotions. Blaze regarded Cloudlight with an analytic stare, making the pegasus curious of the specifics of his own appearance. Again, he turned his darkness-adjusted eyes over his shoulder. He was surprised to find that his wings were superfluously more massive than any definition of normal, spanning half again the length of himself from nose to tail-tip if they were at full-spread. Lifting one of the wings slightly, he found the same triple-sword image on his flanks, crossing over a cloudstuff cog. “If you’re done looking at yourself, could we please focus for a minute?” Blaze’s voice- or what Cloudlight recognized as Blaze’s voice -nearly made the pegasus cry out. Cloudlight flicked his ears, but the voice was not a physical sound. Instead, he found that Blaze had directly sent the phrase via the connection between their minds. Curious, Cloudlight focused experimentally on the link. He found the consciousness of the unicorn, but also discovered another, weaker link from the earth pony, who lay momentarily forgotten on the stone floor. Cloudlight glanced at Blaze, and the pair made their way over to the slumbering pony. ‘Pony’ is an understatement, Cloudlight thought to himself as he looked upon the remaining stallion. He could be mistaken for a small hill! The earth pony had a forest-green coat and a cropped grassy mane and tail. On his flanks, the three swords crossed over a rowan tree, it’s roots strangling a large boulder. But what impressed Cloudlight the most was his sheer size. The stallion’s huge physique could have matched Cloudlight’s wings proportionally. Had he been standing, the green pony would tower over either of the other two stallions, and had a bulky, muscular frame to boot. Yet, as the earth pony stirred and emerald irises were briefly shown, Cloudlight was certain that this stallion was no giant of brute force and rampage. Rowan... Blaze and Cloudlight looked at each other as the name floated through their minds. Their link with the earth pony, Rowan, heightened to the same level they had with each other. On sequence with the stronger link, Rowan slowly woke, rising shakily to his full intimidating height. His mind, the other stallions noticed, was a state of wise calm. They both felt they knew him as well as anypony could Rowan turned his gaze down on the two with soft-spoken eyes. “I would introduce myself, but that’s hardly an issue, I think,” the green pony’s deep voice spoke within their minds. “This is so... weird,” Cloudlight concluded, probing the mental link. “We didn’t even know what we look like, so why do we remember our names and a general command of language?” No matter how the pegasus tried to look at it, this whole situation could not be explained. It annoyed the white stallion to no end that there was no answer to this strange riddle of their existence. “Settle down, Cloudlight,” Blaze reprimanded coldly, reading the emotions of the pegasus. “We’re all curious, and getting anxious about it is not going to solve anything.” Cloudlight exhaled slowly, his irritation waning, but still present. The small unicorn nodded and looked between the other two. “Whatever the case, we can’t just sit here in the dark. We need a plan; something to focus our efforts on rather than standing around pondering our spontaneous existence.” “Agreed,” Rowan replied. For whatever reason, Cloudlight found the earth pony’s mental connection more fluid and clear than Blaze’s. “However, we cannot truly analyze the situation until we know our bearings. My suggestion? Leave this room post-haste.” He pointed his hoof toward a doorless threshold, a shallow stairway ascending up and out of the room. “I second the motion,” Cloudlight nickered. Blaze began trotting for the door. “Come on, then. There’s no point in loitering here any more than we have to.” Cheery little thing, isn’t he? Cloudlight thought to himself, taking care not to relay it across the link.