The CRACK was ear splitting, more than enough to wake up the entire tower. The young mage cursed as he began to hear the sound of hoofbeats coming down the wooden steps; dozens of them. He had to work fast to mend the fragments of the lock back into one piece, desperately ushering out the cage's inhabitant as he refitted the massive iron device back onto the door. He had barely managed to restore the cage to proper working order when there came a sudden knock at the door.
"Ardent? Is that you in there?" Somehow Star Swirl had managed to get there first, even with his chambers being at the very top of the tower. "Ardent if that is you, I need you to answer me. Otherwise we are going to blow down the door. I'd prefer you not be behind it when that happens."
Fear racing through his mind as he opened the portal, he frantically searched for a believable story. His eyes came to rest on the sewer grate below the room's alchemy lab. The metal bars were rusted and bent, and the old wizard had been saying earlier that day how they are just waiting to give way. Pushing the little creature through the portal he had made, Ardent focused his mind on silently shattering the grate and slowly levitating himself and its pieces into the black waters below. "It's me! Just, just give me one second!"
"Well, get on with it, boy! Open the damn door. Half the castle's gathered upstairs wondering what exploded down here."
Calling up from the tunnel and its modestly-running waters, Ardent put his plan into action. "It was the sewer cover, sir. I'll be up in just a se-" A small explosion above him cut him off as a pair of guards filed in, accompanied by his master. Portal the young wizard had opened vanished the moment the door was blasted off its hinges, leaving no trace of itself nor anything that passed through it.
The old unicorn peered down through the hole in the floor, his eyes slowly adjusting to the darkness as he spotted his steward; soaked in what he could only hope was just water. "Quite the explosion for a rusted iron grate to make... What happened?" He did not seem to have any interest in helping his student back up up until he had a story he would be satisfied with.
"I was mixing something up and the grate just suddenly gave out underneath me. Some of the vials fell in with me and sort of... reacted when they will hit the water together." Part of it was true at least. He had indeed been concocting a mixture which he planned on using as an alibi, had he been caught. Many of the ingredients and vials were still scattered across the surface of the ebony mixing lab.
"Hmmm... Yes, a pain tonic by the look of it... For Meliora, I assume?"
"Yes sir. She had been complaining about headaches, fairly severe ones by the sound of it." Again, the truth of the matter made the lie that much easier to believe. The headaches had started almost a week before, and not a day had gone by that they hadn't troubled her.
"Mmmm, yes, of course. Enough if those ingredients mixing together in such a volatile base as sewer water could form a makeshift bomb, I suppose. Though certainly not one with enough force to do any significant structural damage. Still, just to be safe, I'll have to remember to send a few architects down there to examine the walls later... How exactly did you get out of the blast?"
"I didn't, sir. I threw up a shield around myself when I felt the bars give way. I wasn't entirely sure how far the fall would be and I didn't want to take any chances... Good thing too, I guess."
"Good thing, yes... Funny though, I'm not detecting any residual essence from a shield spell. If it all happened the way you claim there should still be a considerable amount of arcane energy in the air." His eyes had narrowed and grown far more stern as the questioning had continued. Ardent was certain that he had performed the duplication spell correctly, but being that he had not gotten a good look at the final result, doubt was beginning to seep in.
He knows... He knows and that's why he's keeping me in here. I must have left something out, gotten some detail wrong. Either that or he can simply sense that its a fake. The fear was eating away at him as he desperately reached out for some way to convince Star Swirl of his innocence, or at the very least keep his attention off the cage and the duplicated creature sleeping inside it. "I... I uh.... Master, I'm sorry... I panicked."
Star Swirl the Bearded continued to gaze down at him through a pair of less-than-forgiving eyes. He said nothing, however, which helped give Ardent the confidence he needed to carry on with the charade.
"The moment I felt the bars break I... well I... I used the first shield spell that came to my mind. And since we had just been discussing THAT book..."
Understanding finally began to show on the old unicorn's face as the story started to add up in his mind. "Ah yes... I suppose one of those spells wouldn't leave anything noticeable behind... You had me worried there for a moment, Ardent." Star Swirl's horn began to glow and Ardent suddenly felt himself being lifted upwards.
Relief washed over Ardent's mind as the cage came into view. The tiny monstrosity sleeping inside was a perfect copy. Everything about it seemed to be exactly as it should be, which in turn made it one of the most bizarre little creatures the young sorcerer had ever seen.
"Guards, you may return to your posts. It would seem this was nothing but a very loud little accident. Thank you both for your diligence on the matter." The guards bowed and exited the laboratory together. The charm Star Swirl had left upon the cage would have kept them abomination invisible to their eyes, but the old wizard did not seem to want to take any chances. So far as Ardent knew, the creature's existence was a secret only the two of them were privy to, and Star Swirl seemed adamant about keeping it that way.
Thankfully, with the duplicate in place and suspicious about his motives averted, Ardent was free from having to discuss such things with his master. Instead, their discussion turned to the matter of a certain book that had weighed heavily on both of their minds for the past few years. "You understand, of course, that I cannot simply allow this incident to pass by without reiterating how important it is that you refrain from using those spells. I know you did not mean to call upon that power, but the fact that you are capable of using such spells without meaning to is something that could prove quite dangerous for yourself and everyone around you. We don't yet fully understand this form of magic or where its power comes from."
"I know, master. I really am sorry and I AM trying to work on repressing that power. TI's is the first time I've used any sort of abyssal magic in months."
"I understand, but you need to realize, such things are not common knowledge to the general public. If word were to get out that such things were being taught here, or worse yet, that my own steward were practicing such spells... well I don't think I even have to begin explaining the kind of political backlash such a revelation might cause."
Ardent shifted uncomfortably as the old sorcerer moved to the other side of the room to check on his precious cage. Desperate to keep his attention off the creature held within, the young wizard dove at a question which he knew would divert his master's thoughts. "But... why? Why is it that these kind of spells are so mistrusted? Their powerful, their simple to learn, and they produce the same results as any normal spell of the same nature. What makes the the use of these ones such a taboo?"
Star Swirl continued watching the creature sleep for a moment longer. Then, with a sigh, he turned back to his student. "Ardent... You know as well as I do that there's no good reason for it. Truth is, the spells are disliked because of their color. Simple as that."
A tinge of annoyance crossed the Stewart's mind. He had hoped to drag his master into giving a long winded lecture on the nature of good and evil and the gray area between the two. He had not for a split second thought that the answer would be as brief or unsatisfactory as the one he just received. "Their..... Their color, sir?"
The old unicorn closed his eyes for, trying to find the best way he could to explain his meaning to his young apprentice. Finally, he opened them and walked over to the wall behind the cages. "Show me the spell you used to shield yourself. You have my permission to cast it this time."
Ardent hesitated for a moment, frantically thinking back to the spell he had claimed he used when the fictional explosion went off. Once he was certain he hadn't given any details the the couldn't duplicate he closed his eyes and focused on the darkness that flooded in. He spread his legs further apart and bent his neck so that his head was bowed, his horn pointing directly ahead of him. It soon began to glow with pale, blue energy, only to then have its color shift to a pitch black tone. Little motes of red and blue and silver danced within the shadowy aura as it spread out across his body, covering him in a spectral coat of black energy.
He shifted back into a comfortable standing position, his movements slow and drawn out in the improvised armor. "This is... umm... this is the one I used when I fell." His voice came out distorted and mechanical, as if it were echoing from a great distance away.
"Indeed. And now take a look at the color of the spell you've cast on yourself. Pitch black, aside from the tiny specks of red and blue swimming in it. Now, consider the colors you see in the castle, the town, even the ponies themselves.. They're all bright and vibrant. So full of life and hope, while the darkness speaks only of death and despair. All the colors of the rainbow are reflected in every aspect of our world. And here you stand, completely devoid of all those magnificent hues. Can you see how it might bring mistrust and superstition down upon any magic which rids the world of such brilliant colors? It makes them remember that life is not as perfect or as hopeful as they make it out to be. And there will always be those who wish to rid the world of anything which might bring that realization down upon them."
"But... but that's stupid! These spells could do so much good for the world. Why outlaw them simply because of their color?!"
"Well, perhaps I over simplified that a bit. Of course there are other reasons, but few are as blatant and as ridiculous as that one." The old unicorn sat down upon one of the cushions which had been placed along side each table in the cramped laboratory. He shut his eyes as his horn lit with a ghostly purple aura. Then, with a great groan from the boards beneath him, his eyes flashed open to reveal blinding light where his pupils once were. The air around him rippled as the fabric of the reality began to wane. Finally, as the light faded form his eyes, a grim tome began to phase into existence in front of him.
The book was grey and brown, bound with metallic stitching which resembled some form of thick steel wire. The material which made up the cover was unlike anything Ardent had come into contact with anywhere else in the world, though in truth it was a substance that was closer to him than the cloak he now wore. Upon its cover, etched in a script that seemed to writhe and slither as one read it, were a series of symbols he had never been able to translate.
The book was thick, far too vast for anyone to hope to read in a reasonable amount of time. After having inherited the tome when he was still a foal, and reading anything he could from it every day since he had first learned how to translate it, the young mage was still less than a tenth of the way through its forbidding tale.
As the old sorcerer drew the book out of its hiding place between worlds, more and more of its sinister nature seemed to reveal itself. The light seemed to disappear from the air around it, the ancient tome drinking in any form of illumination that might lay near it. Ardent levitated a small table over to the space in front of them and as his master lowered the book onto it, the shadows it cast began to twist and squirm, working their way over the table and onto the floor in long, slithering tendrils.
Yet for all the over-dramatics that the volume displayed on the outside, the spells and stories contained within were by and large the same as the spells taught to all mages who trained at the castle. There was a section for healing, a portion dedicated to transformation, a wide assortment of concealment and illusion spells, and thousands which addressed basic needs that one might encounter on a daily basis. The only difference was that the spells themselves did not draw their power from the caster, but instead relied on something that Ardent had only been able to translate into meaning "The Empty."
Despite the versatile compilation of spells found within, the thing that had truly drawn the young wizard's attention was the occasional mention of what the book called "rituals." Most were spells of such absurd complexity and power that it required no less than five bodies casting the same spell at once to accomplish. The idea intrigued Ardent to no end. While rituals of a sort were no rare occurrence in the castle, they were always a means to an end that never truly came to fruition. Most had given up on the art because, due to the energy required to complete one, the end result was never as strong as it should have been and left the participants dangerously drained.
However, with these rituals drawing their power from the mysterious force of The Empty, that would not be an issue with one of these rituals. And the ones he had managed to translate seemed almost too good to pass up attempting. One promised to turn back time, allowing a single being to step back and alter past mistakes. Another acted as a beacon of healing energy which was so powerful that it would actually ward off Death within the spell's radius. The latest he had managed to decipher claimed that, if preformed correctly, it would unlock a path to limitless wisdom; though it also warned that failure would seal the caster away in an empty realm for all eternity. He was sorely tempted to bring that one to his master's attention, but common sense had gotten the better of him at the last moment. That had been when he had turned the book over to the old sorcerer, several months ago.
Now here it was again, still just as vast and full of forbidden knowledge as he remembered. "You explained to me when you gave me this that it spoke of something called 'Emptiness.' I've studied it extensively in the time since and I believe you may have made a slight error in that translation. While it appears at first to be speaking of a power source called 'The Empty,' I believe it is actually referring to an entirely different plane, which I translated as meaning 'The Void.' A simple alteration of the words, yet the meaning makes all the difference. These spells don't derive there power from some mystical source of energy floating above our heads."
His horn let up and the book began to open, its pages flipping by in a torrent of dimly-lit text. "They draw it from an entirely different dimension, one comprised of absolutely limitless magical resources. The spells are literally spun from nothing. It's magic in its purest form, pulling power out of thin air... And THAT is what makes these spells so terrifying to the uninitiated."
He stopped on a page that Ardent was all too familiar with. "I see you recognize this one. So lets use it as our example." His horn lit up with its usual pale energy. A split second later Ardent became painfully aware of something trickling down his neck. Agony shot through him as the cut became deeper, the blood rushing faster. He opened his mouth to speak only to find that he could barely do anything more than gasp for breath as his throat began to open from ear to ear. Blood filled his mouth as his front legs buckled and he fell to his knees.
The old sorcerer looked at him unapologetically. Finally his lips moved to form the word Ardent had been waiting to hear. "...Verrimorae..." The energy emanating from Star Swirl's horn twisted and writhed as the color drained out of it and the aura shifted to shadow.
It was over in the blink of an eye. A tenebrous arm stretched out from the ground and gripped the young mage by his eviscerated neck, squeezing him until he was certain he was about to pass out. Then, as quickly as it came, it was gone; the shadows disappearing from around Star Swirls horn. Ardent was panting heavily as he tried to catch every last bit of breath he could, his throat perfectly mended as if nothing had happened.
"A magnificent spell, one which could work wonders if our medical teams were taught to properly use it. Yet as you can see, it is a ghastly sight to behold." He got to his hooves and walked over to his apprentice. "Can you imagine the fright that would spread if a whole contingent of medical mages began summoning ghostly claws from thin air to wring injuries out of other ponies? Somehow I doubt it would catch on, regardless of its effectiveness..."
Ardent's eyes were still wide and strained from the experience of having his throat opened. He was not so naive that he would believe that had merely been a demonstration of a spell he had used countless times before. He knew how to recognize a warning when it was given to him, particularly one as thinly veiled as that. "I..." He coughed as more air rushed in to his desperate lungs. "I understand... master..."
"You've used this spell quite a bit in the past, haven't you?"
He nodded, still having difficulty breathing properly as he attempted to calm himself.
"Why? And on whom? Does anyone else know about the existence of it or were they all your own injuries that you healed with it?"
It took a moment and all of his willpower, but the unicorn finally managed to find his words again. They came out thin and shaky, but they came nonetheless. "They... they were mostly mine. I've used it once on a guard who fell down a flight of stairs and once on an Evoker who had suffered an aneurism while examining a prisoner's memories. Both we unconscious and nopony else was around when I did it."
The old unicorn's eyes narrowed. "What have I told you in the past? Don't say that, its a degenerate term and its far beneath us. It makes you sound uneducated. It's 'no one' not 'nopony.'" He looked directly into the Stewart's eyes. "I've not heard you say it in quite some time... Not since the last time you tried lying to me. So lets try this one more time. Does anyone know of the spell's existence or that you know how to cast it?"
Star Swirl's stare left him powerless, no lie was likely to let the truth slip past now that he was looking for it. I'm sorry. Forgive me, sis. It looks like your big brother wasn't able to protect you after all. I'm sorry. I'm sorry...
"Just... one other. When we were younger. Back in the orphanage. Meli wanted more than anything to be a pegasus, to be able to fly over the walls and see outside of the city. I... I had just found the book by then, had just started translating it. I found a transformation spell that could give us wings.... temporarily..."
The memory was more than he could handle. He couldn't go on. The images began to flood back into his mind before he could throw up the usual barriers. The city disappearing behind them. The clouds dancing around them as they soared over the walls. The smile on his sister's face, lighting it up with a joy of an intensity he had never thought possible. Sun rising before them as they reached the mountain peaks just beyond the city. The smell of pine needles as they dove closer to the forest.
And then there came the scream. A sound so bloodcurdling that it could only have come from some demon out of a nightmare. The air had been cool, the mountain winds blowing against their backs as they soared, alerting the hunters downwind of them of their presence long before the first one even came within sight. By then it had been too late. By the time the little colt had realized what was happening three of the beasts had already descended upon them. The scream came again, echoing across the valley as a victory song of a successful hunt.
That scream had mingled with a second. "We... we strayed into gryphon territory. Needless to say two little ponies like us would never have been a match for one of them, much less three." Before he could go on the memories rushed in once more.
A flurry of wings, a storm of feathers, the scream of the hunters and that of a tiny filly falling through open air to the forest below. Talons as sharp as any blade tore through the conjured wings he had granted her, ripping them to shreds in a matter of seconds. His own had held up no better. A slash to the back, a cut to the face, the ground rushing up to meet him. All of it had happened in the blink of an eye. He remembered clutching the book, screaming for his sister, and shouting some incantation he had practiced only once before. Then the darkness had rushed in, embracing him in its loving caress, wrapping him in a coat of black energy just as he reached the treeline.
The shadows had taken care of the rest.
The imprint he had left would be covered by snow a few days later, the shouldering remnants of the two gryphons who had followed his descent would meet the same fate. No evidence would remain of him ever having been there. He walked between the pine treed, needles grinding beneath his hooves as the Void's whispers directed him. She was close, he had known that much, but it was only the shadows that knew exactly where.
Tears began to run down his face as he spoke, involuntary testaments to the trauma of that bright, sunny autumn morning. "When I finally found her she was... she... She was...."
The gryphon hadn't belonged to any major clan. She and her two brethren had been outcasts, starving and desperate to get something in their bellies before the first snows began to fall. The little filly must have seemed like a godsend when she descended upon her, nature's way of ensuring her that she would make it through the winter after all. So she had wasted no time helping herself to the meal. Besides, warm flowing blood would always taste better than the cold fetid juices of a dead pony. No point in finishing the job. The filly was sure to pass on eventually; nothing survived long once its best parts were all eaten.
She had just started digging into the tiny Marie's stomach when something warm began to work its way up her left wing. It was a strange, tingling feeling; not quite an ache, but more of a dull stinging sensation which seemed to be coming from the tips of her feathers. She lifted her head from her adorable little meal long enough to get a quick look what seemed to be tiny black stars dancing across the edges of her wings. Then they spread to the rest of her feathers, strange ticklish little sparks of darkness playfully lining her wings, then her back, then her legs and tail and head.
Then she heard it, something approaching from out of the forest. She turned her head and came face to face with what could only have been some sort of demon, straight out of a nightmare. A pitch black coat with a ghostly mane and tail, seemingly made of shadows, billowing in the wind. It's horn appeared to be on fire, though the color of the flames as all wrong. She opened her mouth to deter the beast, perhaps to intimidate it with some half-thought-out remark about its stupid swirly eyes. What came out, however, was a cry far more terrible than any she thought herself capable of making.
The sparks had ignited into a full-blown inferno of jet black fire, engulfing her with its fiery hunger. It burned her to the bone as it worked its way through feathers, skin, and muscle. She attempted to fly away, only to have her wings snap off as the thing bones that supported them were reduced to cinder. Her cry only intensified as she realized, with no small amount of horror, that the flames were killing her, yet at the same time not allowing her to die. By the time her flesh had all burned away she had become fairly certain that attempting to make a meal of the little filly had been a mistake.
She ran from the edge of the forest in agony, a horrible burning figure that only vaguely resembled the skeleton of a gryphon. Her scream died out as her lungs and vocal chords melted away. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity of burning, she reached the due of the nearest cliff and hurled herself into the valley below. She wouldn't have to worry about starving to death that winter after all.
"And... And by the time I got to her, her stomach was... it... she was... Oh please don't make me say it! Se was still alive! The fall, the rocks, the gryphon. None of it had killed her, it... it wasn't right. It wasn't fair! She shouldn't have had to live with all of that. Knowing it all happened. I should have just let her pass on. I should have eased her suffering." He looked to his master for any hint of understanding, but found nothing in his eyes that would comfort his mind. If Star Swirl had an opinion on the matter, he was keeping it to himself. He motioned for his apprentice to continue.
"...But I... I couldn't. I couldn't just let her die there. I... It was selfish of me. But I just couldn't bare to lose her.... So I used it on her. She was still conscious through the whole experience. If you ask her today she can probably still recount every second of what happened... And that spell is in there with the rest of those memories."
He could not stop the tears this time, nor the sobs which accompanied them. Crying was something he thought he had left behind when he first became a sorcerer, yet here it was sneaking up on him again so many years later. Shame washed over him like a tidal wave. He could not stop no matter how hard he tried.
It was not until he felt the pressure settle onto his right shoulder that his breathing finally began to calm. When Star Swirl's had placed his hoof on the young mage's shoulder it seemed to draw away some of the trauma that the memories carried. It was not until he looked into the old stallion's eyes again and saw the full extent of the compassion within them that he was finally able to take control of his breathing. "I'm... I'm sorry, master. I didn't mean to... to... That is, I thought I had better control over my emotions than this."
The old wizard just sat there for a moment. Ardent knew he had said more than he had needed to, but it had all come out before he could stop it. "...There's no need to be sorry. And don't worry, I'm not about to check that story with your sister. No no, don't deny it. I can see how worried you are. Trust me, I have no intention of following up on it. So long as Meliora is the only other one who knows of the spell, I think we can just let it slide... You really care for her, don't you?"
Rage burned away every last bit of pain and regret he had been feeling. What sort of question is that?! Of course I care for her! "Of course I care for her!"
"Of course you do. So I don't want you to ever, EVER doubt what you did on that mountain again. You saved her bloody life, be thankful you see able to do that much in time. If need be, memories can be removed or altered, but only if someone survives to have them in the first place. If she ever wishes it, we can make it so that, for her at least, such a grisly event never occurred."
Ardent was not certain how to respond to that. He was thankful, to some extent, but the mere thought of asking Meli if she WANTED such a memory to begin with sickened him. "I... Of course. Thank you, sir." But that wasn't it. Something else bothered him about the entire reaction. "But... If I may ask, why? Why would you even offer such a thing when you can simply remove the memory at any time you wished? Why give us the choice in the matter?"
"Because such memories might be jut the sort of thing that pushed her to become one of our city's top healing students. What would her life be like if such a vital memory was suddenly missing. No, I'm not about to remove it unless she asks to have it taken away... As for the other 'why'..." He moved back to his spot across little the table from Ardent. "You know why I took you on as my apprentice, don't you Ardent?"
The young mage merely looked at him, he had no intention of answering that question.
"It's because you remind me quite a bit of myself when I was your age. Or at least, what I could have been had i made better choices earlier on... Did you know I had a younger sister as well?"
That actually was news to him. He had had no idea that Star Swirl had had any sort of family. The bearded unicorn had always seemed more like the sort of enigma that simply had always been the wise old wizard he was today. "I... I did not, sir. Is she..."
"The word is 'dead,' boy. Get used to saying it, its a fact of life that isn't like to go away any time soon. But, yes... She's dead. We all have a chance to do something heroic during our lives, Ardent. I'm afraid I wasn't as prepared to play that role when I was called to the stage as you were. My weakness cost Soliria her life, and I've never forgiven myself for it. As such, do not for a single second allow your moment of strength be something that haunts you. I'll say it one last time and then I never want to have this discussion with you again. You did the right thing. Abandon any doubt you may have about that here and now. Otherwise, you can consider your days as my apprentice and steward over."
"I... Of course. Don't worry, master. I'll never look at it that way again... And thank you. Again." The old stallion nodded to him and, after banishing the ancient book back into its hiding place, got up and left the laboratory.
A sense of deep relief filled Ardent the moment the sorcerer was out of the room. Not exactly what I had in mind, but it certainly got his attention off you... Ardent sniffed away the last of his tears as he examined the disturbing little monster he had left in the cage. Now to figure out what to do with the real you...