— Tempered by Flame —
– Chapter II: Bright Lights –
“Cherish!”
The name echoed around the forest, repeating over and over again, mocking her cowardice. She had seen her sister get dragged into the low-laying brush, kicking and screaming and looking about with eyes wide with fear. She had caught but a glimpse of the monster that had been doing the dragging, a dark insect like being with a cruel smile shining just under a pair of blue, glistening eyes. The sound of her sister’s muffled screams and whimpers somehow drifted through the trees and grew louder until they were the only sound that she could hear.
“Cherish!? Cherish, I’m… I’m coming! Just hold on!” Her voice faltered a bit as she stepped forward with the intent of going into the forest, which seemed to writhe and change as she kept staring into its depths. Without warning a vine whipped out at her, leaving a gash in the dirt where her hoof had just been. I’m not going to let a forest stop me from saving my sister! After taking in a deep, yet shaky, breath, she charged forward into the wall of plant life. Pain seared at her sides as she stomped through the bramble, the many spiky vines clinging to her body. “Cherish!” The name simply fell flat in the air, dying almost as soon as it left her mouth. The only sound she could hear was that of the crunching plants around her.
How was she going to find her?
Her answer came in a blood-curdling scream that made her fold her ears back over her head. She was so close, so close to saving her Cherish. “Cherish!” Her horn pulsed with magic, and the forest around her was suddenly pushed away, trees being toppled and bushes being ripped from their roots in the soil altogether. “Cherish where are you?” All of the darkened colors blended together to form a wall of muddy green around the little circle of emptiness she had created.
Another scream pierced the air again, this time followed by labored words that grew steadily louder as she started to charge towards them. “Bright! Bright, help me!” Each syllable was heavy with agony, driving her to pound her hooves into the packed soil even harder. She had to get there. She had to save her sister! “Bright, please! It hurts!” That last sentence ended with a third scream; the kind of scream that sent chills down your spine and made your very bones freeze. “Bright!” There, right up ahead! A sickening green light pulsed from between the cracks in the foliage, sending long, reaching shadows to grab at her hooves as she closed her eyes and practically threw herself into the bushes, stumbling out into the clearing.
Crack.
That’s all it took for her to stop dead in her tracks. That one sound echoed all around the woods, coming back louder and louder until it was nearly deafening. “Ch-Cherish?” She looked up slowly, opening her eyes despite her entire mind screaming at her to not look. She had to know. The first thing she saw was a set of light-blue hooves laying flat on the ground, a small stripe of red staining the normally beautiful coat. Her eyes couldn’t stop following the line of red. Next was the frail body, its chest still and cold. There was the creature, standing right beside her with his smile dripping with blood and some clear fluid, but she ignored it as she fell to her knees beside the limp pony. “Cherish?” The figure before her wavered slightly as tears began to fill her eyes. “Cherish… no…”
“B-Bright?” The voice was weak, pitiful almost. “Bright… it hurts so much.”
“I know, Cherish. I know, just… just hold o—“ She felt another chill wash over her as she realized something; that the voice wasn’t coming from in front of her, but rather off to the side that the bug creature was standing. “No…” Her gaze slowly, impossibly slowly, began to drift upwards, tracing along the jagged hooves of the… thing until she had reached its neck, terrified to go further. “No… please…”
She made that final movement upward and saw her sister’s face, contorted in its last moments of agony. “Help me, Bright…” There was a cruel laughter coming from the forest, surrounding her as her sister’s face began to contort even more. “Help me! Why won’t you help me!?” Louder and louder the laughter became, pressing into her ears and causing pain. “Bright, please help me! Why aren’t you helping me, Bright!?”
Bright Lights’ eyes snapped open as she was roughly dragged literally kicking and screaming into the world of reality. The ceiling was in view for but a brief moment before she jerked upright, her screams subsiding almost immediately as she sat there panting wildly. Her blanket, dark blue just like her mane, lay in a heap on the floor where her flailing hooves had tossed it as she had unconsciously tried to free herself of the stifling layer of cloth. She kept staring at that pile of bedding for what seemed like ages, trying to calm herself and forget the images that were in her dream, but she only saw her sister’s bloodstained coat, the teeth marks shining freshly red on her neck, and the creature who had put on her sister’s face. All of these horrific recollections of her dream superimposed themselves over what she saw already as her eyes roved around the room. Sunlight streamed in through the window, creating little shafts of light that got bigger and smaller as the curtains gently blew in an intangible breeze. The decidedly bland interior of the room held no distraction for her as she sat there with her shoulders heaving, trying to recover from the horrendous dream.
After what seemed like forever, she slowly slid her hooves over to the side of the bed and dangled them over the edge, gently lowering herself onto the floor. Though her shaking hooves were barely enough to keep her upright, Bright eagerly welcomed the feeling of something solid beneath her hooves, something she knew was real holding her up. Once she had taken a few steps towards the staircase to go downstairs, Bright couldn’t help but spare a glance for the bed behind her, though she quickly turned away just a quickly. I’ll just fix up the bed later… once I get done with patrol and have that dream out of my head. Her thoughts trembled just as much as her body did as she stepped over to the staircase, staring down at the slightly dim staircase with apprehension. Apprehension that wasn’t misplaced as she stumbled on the last step and nearly face-planted onto the floor despite the extra care that she took going down the treacherous steps. Once she had steadied herself and taken a deep breath, Bright trotted off towards the kitchen in pursuit of some breakfast.
She managed to make it to the kitchen and throw together a daisy sandwich without much incident, aside from her berating herself for not buying more bread as she had just used the last of it for her meal. Taking a rather large, hungry bite of the food, Bright slowly made her way to the living room to get ready for patrol. When the Mayor had suggested starting up a search party to try and find Cherish, she had been the very first, not to mention the only mare, to volunteer for it. Each day she donned the heavy, makeshift armor and strapped the rusty farmer’s sickle that she had been given as a weapon before trotting out of the small village she called home with the rest of the equally equipped volunteers, only to return at the tail end of the afternoon tired and dirty.
However, before she made it to the rack where her “armor” hung a glint caught her eye from the corner of her vision. Her body followed her drifting gaze into the bathroom, where the edge of the mirror was shimmering from the sunlight that drifted in through the window just above the bathtub. Hooves clicking on the shiny bathroom tiles, Bright stared at herself in the silver-backed glass with slightly widened eyes.
“Celestia, I look like Tartarus…”
Her coat, which was normally a bright and cheerful butter-yellow, was dull and unkept, smattered here and there with dried bits of dirt and mud clinging to the fur along with a small helping of red streaks from where she had snagged herself on cruel brambles that cut at her sides. Her mane and tail were in the same condition, though thankfully lacking the blood. She brought a hoof up to her eye and winced as she poked at the purple bruise beneath it, the product of her running headlong into a tree a few nights ago. The more she looked at her reflection, the more she began to hate it. It wasn’t just the rough things she did during the day, but also the lack of sleep that was wearing on her mind and body. The resonant sound of the clock on the wall ringing reminded her that she had somewhere to be, though Bright couldn’t help but cast a longing glance back at the bathtub, something that she so longed to use for once.
Once she tore her eyes away from the bathroom, Bright trotted over towards the rack on the wall where the armor hung, waiting for her to don it once again and take it out with her on yet another patrol. Her horn glowed as she magically lifted the heavy mess of leather straps and metal scraps over her head and lowered it onto her back, letting out a tired, weary grunt as the weight settled into its usual place. Deep down inside she hated how familiar the feeling of the armor pressing down on her back had become, but it could hardly compare to the worry for her sister that hung heavily on her heart.
The sound of hide scraping against metal filled the air as Bright’s magic tightened the ragged leather straps into place. A shiver ran down her spine as the metal pressed into her body, cold from hanging there overnight. She cast a small warming spell to heat the metal to match her body temperature and shook the rest of the tingles out hurriedly, opening her door and stepping outside into the late-morning sun. After locking her door with magic, using the secret bolt that was hidden in the frame of the door to ensure that nopony else would be able to get in save for breaking in forcefully, she began her walk across town to meet up with the rest of the search party.
As soon as she had taken ten steps, she was greeted with more than a few looks and glares here and there, not to mention hissing whispers that accompanied them.
”There she goes again…”
“Always going out to the forest… trying to find her sister of hers.”
“I’d have written her off as dead by now.”
Bright had to force herself to keep trotting forward, to resist turning around and lashing out at the not-quite-whispering mares, though to be fair she did turn back briefly to throw a few daggers with her eyes. Her sister was alive, she knew it, and it would take a lot more than four days to convince her otherwise. It was much like that through the rest of the little village, the stares and the whispers and the glares too. After all, she was the main reason that the search was still ongoing, insisting that Cherish was still out there and could still be saved. As she got closer to the meeting place, she was met with more and more glares by ponies walking the other way, presumably after saying goodbye to their boyfriends or husbands for the day. Despite all of this, her mood wasn’t remotely shaken by the sheer hostility. She’d have gladly faced down a whole battalion of Royal Guards on her own if it meant saving her sister.
It was only when she was a couple dozen feet away did things change, the sight of a group of shoddily armored stallions suddenly blocked by a rather large and rather angry mare. However, it wasn’t the fact that somepony had stepped in front of her that made Bright’s eyes widen in shock, it was the hoof shoving into her chest and making her stumble backwards that caught her off guard. “Look at you! All saddled up like a big, strong stallion, aren’t you?” The mare took another step forward, shoving her again and nearly making Bright fall backwards onto her rump. “Just what exactly are you off to do with the rest of the town’s stallions? The ones you go alone with everyday into the woods!?” She felt eyes staring into the back of her neck as nearly all of the passing ponies nearby turned to watch out of curiosity. “I bet that’s not the only place you take them into, is it!?” Yet another step and shove, this time sending Bright onto her flanks and sending up a bit of dust as the pony towers over her. “I bet you let them have their way with you! You let them take you on that rough like a little whorse, ain’t that right!?”
By this point it felt like the entire town was watching her as she calmly stood up and brushed the dirt from her body as best she could, though Bright doubted it if really mattered aside from seeming unfazed by the mare’s aggression. Her eyes flashed as she angrily glared at the other pony, speaking loudly and clearly while also stepping forward. “We are going to find my sister, as your husband has undoubtedly told you. Maybe if you decide to actually listen to him instead of forming your own, misguided conclusions you would know that.” She made to trot around the angry pony but found herself on the ground again staring up at the practically shrieking mare with a dull pain throbbing on her rump as well.
“Ha! Surely you’ve marked her off as dead by now!” A bit of red rose up into Bright’s face as a flare of anger started to heat up her blood. “Ah, so that’s it! You just go with those stallions and let them rut you so maybe you can just make yourself another sist—“
Slap!
The sound echoed against the buildings for a moment before the imminent chorus of gasps rose up around her. Bright didn’t even acknowledge the sounds, however, as she was infinitely more focused on not throwing the pony before her to the ground and stomping on her face with a hoof, or two. “She is not dead.” Tremors ran up and down her legs as she took a small, dangerous step forward. “Don’t you ever say that she’s replicable. Nopony could replace Cherish, do you understand?” Bright simply brushed past the stunned mare now, leaving the crowd behind her to whisper furiously about what just happened, though she hardly cared about their hushed words. Let them whisper.
“Sorry I’m late, let’s get moving.”
Twenty or so hooves began pounding at the ground as their owners began to briskly trot along the usual path that they took to reach the forest. For some reason, Bright had been “elected” to be the leader of the group, though there wasn’t ever a formal vote. She just was. There weren’t any questions or comments raised to her about what had happened before, save for the mare’s husband, though all he did was throw her a worried glance. Like most stallions with any experience with marriage, he knew not to get involved with any sort of argument between mares.
It didn’t take long for the ragged party to reach the edge of the trees, given that the forest was practically bordering the village at some points. The sound of silence reigned supreme as they all came to a stop as one, looking over to Bright for direction; something she readily, and firmly, gave. “We’re going to be going into the southern half of the forest today!” Her commanding shout echoed amongst the treetops, coming back louder than before. “We’ll take a break in an hour’s time, so no complaining!” While an hour seemed short, there was a good reason for such a brief search time before breaking; the last time she had taken them into the southern forest, the entire terrain seemed to battle against them. Bright, of course, battled back despite the many complaints that were presented to her from several different stallions, stopping only when a snake had chomped on an unfortunate stallion’s hoof because he had been too tired to pay attention to where he was stepping.
The hour was up almost as soon as it had begun, and Bright found herself looking back at the rest of the heavily panting volunteers. “Alright, time for a rest. We’ll keep going on in ten minutes.” It was nearly impossible to tell time given the fact that they couldn’t see the sun above their heads, but Bright knew that they had been going for long enough to warrant a break, especially in such a perfect location. There were even flowers going around the small pools of water that were on the edge of a slowly flowing stream that cut right through the middle of the clearing. The leaves beneath her made loud, crunching noises as she let her flanks plop down onto the ground. All around her similar sounds rose up to fill the air, followed almost immediately by a dull hum of conversation.
Despite this, she couldn’t help but frown as she glanced over at her “troops” and saw more than a few faces showing signs of exhaustion. The rough terrain was taking its toll on the whole group, especially when coupled with the fact that a good portion of them were thinking on what the mare in the street had said. The bleak thought had even started to plague Bright’s mind as well, whether she believed it or not, it was there stewing. She didn’t rightly know herself what she believed in, but nearly being attacked by somepony in the view of the rest of the town opened her eyes to one glaring fact that she had been ignoring: she couldn’t keep these ponies from their homes anymore. They weren’t professional soldiers and she wasn’t qualified to lead them like she did. They all certainly had jobs of their own that they had put aside to answer the call for help, but enough time had passed that quite a few of them, she knew, were already thinking that the call had faded beyond hearing. There came a time when even burning hope had to give way to reason.
The ten minutes rolled past all too quickly, but Bright stood up all the same. She had to do this. What she had to say wasn’t easy to say, not in the slightest, but it needed to be done. “Alright, get up everypony, I have something to tell you.” She slowly got up onto a rock, twenty pairs of eyes following her movements as she clambered up onto the stone. Thuds filled her ears, shutting out everything as her heart began to lurch and sputter frantically. Was she really about to do this?
“I… I’m calling off the search.” Her eyes slid closed to block out the shocked faces, and her ears were filled with a low buzz that blocked out the sudden rise of whispers. “Go home to your families. Go love them.” Her hooves clicked unnaturally loudly as she turned away from the volunteers whose duties were now fulfilled. “Go back to your families…” She closed her eyes and rubbed a hoof against her cheek where the first few tears were beginning to fall. “And leave me to mourn mine in peace.” Without warning, Bright leapt forward and practically threw herself into the wall of trees, pushing herself to go as fast as she could so nopony would find her. She had to get away. She needed to be alone. After what seemed like an hour of mad galloping, the sounds around her faded to just her own hooves and the noises of the forest. Only then did she let herself slow down to a plodding walk, her head held low as tears began trickling down her cheeks.
The colors all blurred together as she walked, becoming a wall of gloomy blues and purples that swirled as she passed them. Eventually she found herself staring down into a clear pool of water, looking into her reflection without seeing it. She was so lost in her emotions that she didn’t even notice as one of the brighter-colored flowers rose up and gently nudged her cheek, wiping away the tears there, nor did she notice the light-pink spores shimmering in the air around her.
She didn’t even have time to blink before unconsciousness grabbed her in its black grip, dragging her down into the darkness.