//------------------------------//
// Chapter 13 
// Story: From Canterlot with Love 
// by Sagebrush 
//------------------------------//

Crack Shot stared over the lip of the staircase and into the dimness below, pondering its depth and resisting the urge to spit.  Curious about the distance, he began a rudimentary calculation of it on the slide rule of his mind.  He compared the apparent diameters near and far, performed a quick ratio comparison, and, finally, determined a result.  The result he got was ‘far.’  Double checking his arithmetic and realizing he’d forgotten to carry a one, he amended this answer to ‘deep.’

“Man, heck of a drop, isn’t it?” he said, announcing his findings. 

“Aye,” said Síofra, padding alongside him.  “The fact that there’s a staircase going down it says that its makers probably weren’t fliers, though the lack of guardrails makes me think that they didn’t fret much about being fallers, either.  I wonder how far down it goes.”

Crack Shot hummed and stared into the lightwell that was the chasm’s domed ceiling as he thought about this.  “Hey, I’ve got an idea,” he announced.  “You got another one of those gold coins on you?”

“Oh, those are never in short supply,” said Síofra, loftily.  She dipped her nose into the crook of her foreleg and brought out a piece of faerie gold held lightly between her canines.

“Right on,” said Crack Shot, nodding.  “So here’s how we’ll do this:  on the count of three, I’ll need you to drop the coin down the hole.  Got it?”

“Gosh, counting and dropping—I hope I don’t lose myself in all this multitasking,” said Síofra.  There was the definite impression that the uniform gold of her eyes was rolling like a wave.

“Yeah, yeah.  Anyways, ready?”

Síofra nodded.

“Alright, then—one… two… three!”

Síofra released the coin, and they watched it fall and spin and disappear from sight.  Eventually, a faint clink came echoing up and off the chamber walls.

“Hmm, roughly about twenty seconds, right?” said Crack shot.  “So now the idea is just to figure out how far the fall was by how long it took for the sound to reach us.”

“Aye?  And how will ya do that?”

“It’s not too hard,” said Crack Shot, before looking to the top of the crystalline stairs on the opposite side of the shaft and shouting, “Hey, Check!  How far down is it?!”

Check Mate tilted his head, weighing and working the numbers on the left side of his brain.  “Hmm… considering our altitude, the shape of the coin, the concomitant air resistance, the speed of sound… mm, just shy of seven hundred meters I would hazard, although that is rather back of the envelope, I’ll be the first to admit—”

None of the others present mentioned the physical absence of this supposed envelope, though Storm and Crack Shot both privately assumed that it’d have to be the width of the shaft for the necessary calculations to fit.

“—Also, that is assuming the density of gold for the coin, I should mention,” added Check.  “Um, would pyrite perhaps be more apropos for faerie gold?” he asked, giving Síofra an uncertain look.

Síofra met the worried stare with a wolfish smirk.  “Gold oughta serve just fine for comparison.”  She gave Crack Shot a sidelong glance, her smirk lengthening as she asked, “Ya know, the way ya presented it, I almost thought that ya’d be crunching the numbers yerself.”

“Work smarter, not harder.”  Crack Shot winked.  

“…What?”

“Anyways, guess we oughta grab our stuff and start makin’ our way down, huh?” he continued, as he and Síofra walked back towards where Storm and Check were waiting.

“Before that, I’d like to send off a letter first,” said Storm.  “You know, in case the smart stone doesn’t get signal down there.”

“To Nomde, I’ll bet.”  Crack Shot nudged Storm in the ribs as he came beside him.  “Gonna tell her about how you got all wet and wild with that mare?”  He turned to Síofra.  “What’d you say she was again?”

“A kelpie,” growled Síofra.

“Yeah, one of those.”  Crack Shot stopped at the tunnel mouth.  “Huh.  Kelpie.  Isn’t that a kind of dog?”

Síofra shrugged.  “Well, she was certainly a—” she paused, considering her current lupine form.  “…Probably’d be some irony in my continuing that line, wouldn’t there?”

“I don’t see why I wouldn’t tell Nomde,” said Storm, unfazed by Crack Shot’s goading and making absolutely sure that he saw this.  “A relationship is grounded in trust, and she’s not really the type to get jealous.”

“Nah, dude, but she seems like the type to get even.  Remember what she did to that one guy that trashed the doorway to her shop?  I wouldn’t be surprised if she skipped town just to give that kelpie a little heavy reading.”

The four of them followed the serpentine tunnel back to the cave where they had lodged.  The cave mouth opposite had filled with snow entirely, and a low, ominous wail of wind could be heard behind it.  If there had been any reservations among them about descending deeper into the mountains, then they’d be reservations for an extra few days and nights in the cave.  There’d be no getting back out the way they had entered.

Check retrieved the smart stone and its stylus from his bag before Storm needed to ask, though he hesitated in passing them over once he glanced at the former.  In the dimness of the cavern, the front of it lit his features.  Not just in green, but in blue.

“Now this is odd,” he muttered.  The others gathered around him, and he levitated it away from himself so that they could see.

The top panel was filled with the shape of Febre’s writing, which was a poor shape in general, though that itself was not so strange.  What was strange was the latticework of blue tracing the edges of the top and bottom panel, a dusting of it filling the spaces between the letters, glowing with a cool, soft light.  It looked almost like frost.

Storm noted it with curiosity.

Then, after a snort from Crack Shot, he noted that the letter was addressed to him.  Storm snatched the smart stone out of the air along with the stylus, pinning them beneath a wing as he stalked off towards another side of the cavern.

“Hey!  I was reading that!” shouted Crack Shot, in feigned annoyance.

“I noticed,” replied Storm, whose annoyance was entirely sincere.  He sat down against a wall, ducked his head beneath his wing, and brought out the stone and its stylus.  After setting the stylus to his side, he held the stone up in his hooves and began to read.  

Dear Storm,

Now that’s a rather rote way to start a letter, isn’t it?  And I suppose the expression, ‘Absence makes the heart grow fonder,’ is ubiquitous to the point of being bromidic.  But I can write both earnestly, so I see no reason not to include them.  I miss you.

A smile crept upon his face, and the cavern became just a little bit warmer for him.  Then an eyebrow raised as he continued into the next paragraph.

I’m also excited for you, of course.  There is a vicarious thrill that comes with knowing that you’re out there exploring the world.  Worlds even, if Villa is to be believed.  I should preface that by telling you that she went on another tryst with Featherstep.  She brought back stories, and, to my surprise, a few of them were about you and not just her evening.  Some of what I heard worried me, I will admit, even though I don’t doubt that you can handle yourself.  That doesn’t mean that I wouldn’t like to introduce the creature that tried to drown you to a hardbound copy of Pranst, though.

Still, although Villa has taken upon herself the uninvited role of liaison, I’d rather hear those stories from you, and any other stories as you live them.  Relish in your journey and stay as safe as it will allow.

With love,

Nomde

And here she did a rather fancy looping thing with her signature, though I’ll assume you’ll forgive me for not attempting to reproduce it.

Storm’s smile wasn’t diminished in the least by Febre’s postscript, although it did climb on one side.  He leaned over, took the stylus between his teeth, and dragged it across the smart stone’s bottom panel, marking a trail in the glowing blue rime that had frosted its surface.

No worries, and thanks for transcribing the rest.  You wouldn’t mind doing it again, would you?

When he breathed across the stone, it cleared away not only his writing, but the rime as well.  Slowly, however, the latter began to reform, as if a liquid film on the stone’s surface were freezing over.  As he watched the stone frost once more, it dawned on him that Febre might not have been present to receive his message, particularly since it was near dawn.  The kid seemed to work late hours, which only left recuperation for the early ones.  But before Storm could once more put the stylus to stone and leave a letter for Febre to find, he received a response.

Can I assume that you’re not talking about transcribing the letter that you no doubt just read?  Or would you like me to draw little hearts over the ‘i’s and ‘j’s?

Storm blinked.  Even if Febre was up early, it was still a quick response.  Maybe he had sent Nomde’s letter just a moment ago?

I’m surprised you’re up, actually.  Don’t you ever sleep?

Of course.  But given that I’m a research assistant, I have to be liberal with how I arrange my sleep schedule, and conservative about the hours.

Really?  Well, I hope you can squeeze in a nap when you need one.

I have one tentatively scheduled for the end of this month.  Did you have a letter that you wished to send?  If so, go ahead.

That would be Febre urging him along, though Storm was touched by how subtle he was being about it.  He began his letter.

Heya, Nomde:

I just read your letter, and I’ve got to say that word travels fast.  Which, I guess, shouldn’t be so surprising, given that I’m writing on a slab of rock that somehow sends messages in the blink of an eye.  I figure you know what I mean.

It’s weird to think about all that’s happened in just a week.  One day you’re eating bark (which is a lot better than it sounds)  and watching a sunset, and the next you’re struggling to keep your hooves dry in a world where there’s no sun in the first place.

Which, reading back, makes that world sound bad, which it wasn’t.  You could probably spend a day there just watching the sky, watching how it measures out a day.  It’s constantly filled with stars, or something like them, and they dart around just like your fireflies.  Otherworldly is probably a redundant way to describe it, but I’m not sure what else to call it.  I’d bet you’d come up with something much better.  Who knows—if we do go on our little adventure together, maybe you’ll have the chance.

We’ve also picked up a travelling partner:  Síofra, as she’s decided to call herself (long story), who is a pooka (a longer story.  I promise I’ll tell you all about it when I’m back).  The four of us have spent the past few days in this huge mountain range, and it feels like the temperature hasn’t gone beyond single digits unless you’re counting the negatives.  I get the impression that ‘fall’ and ‘spring’ are nothing more than verbs here, and that the only meaning ‘summer’ has would be somepony that likes to add things up.  I hope the weather is still clear and calm for you back in Canterlot.  And that’s not just because it’d be good for business, and yours needs all the help it can get.

Love you, babe.

-Storm

After rereading his letter, Storm gave a nod, satisfied with its content.  This was good, because the smart stone didn’t have room for much more.  Just before sending it off, however, he thought of one more thing he could fit in, and he quickly scribbled across the rock.  As he breathed across the words, they drifted up towards the cave ceiling, disappearing into it.  A few minutes later, a response formed on the smart stone’s top panel.

Your letter has been transcribed, and it should be sent out sometime later than now.

Thanks, Febre.  I appreciate your efforts.

It’s cheering to know that somepony does.  One thing though, Storm?

Yeah?

The thing about dotting one’s letters with little hearts?  It wasn’t meant to be taken as a suggestion.

I know a good idea when I see one.

Storm stood up and rejoined the others, whereupon he returned the stylus and stone to Check.  With no more dragon fire to burn it away, the odd, luminous frost once more filled the smart stone’s panels.  Its blue glow colored the depths of Check’s saddlebags as the unicorn tucked it inside.

“It appears that whatever’s formed on the stone led to no hassle in your correspondence,” said Check, as he fastened his bag closed.  “Outside of whatever hassle might have been present in your tête-à-tête with Febre,” he added.

Storm lifted his peytral and slung it over his shoulders.  “Actually, he sounded like he was in a better mood than normal this morning.”

“It’s early,” said Crack Shot, putting on his armor as well, “give him time.”

“Perhaps his heart was touched in relaying your sweet nothings,” noted Check, with a warm, well-meaning sincerity that only he could attach to that sentence.

“Ha!  Sweet nothings?” said Storm, as he ducked his head into his champron.  “That makes them sound like fluff.  They were sweet somethings at the very least.”

“And speakin’ of fluffing, I’m glad they were just sweet and not spicy,” mused Crack Shot, graciously leaving ‘If you know what I mean’ from the end of the sentence.  “It would’ve been awkward if the rest of us had to leave the cave.”

Storm paused, then pressed a hoof to his face.  “Engh, for the love of—”

“The love of somethin’ would’ve been precisely the problem,” interrupted Crack Shot, grinning.

Síofra listened with fascination and a bemused expression that was underscored with a smile.  Then that smile flattened into an underscore when Crack Shot turned towards her and said, “Shame you can’t buzz Dorcha and do the same.”

“Er… what now?”

“Or Ciar or whatever—you know who I’m talkin’ about.”

“Aye, I do, and the ‘what?’ remains,” said Síofra, hotly.

“Oh.  Uh…” Crack Shot tried to scratch the back of his head, though his hoof was met by his helmet.  “I figured that you two were… you know.”

“…Were what?” asked Síofra.

Her eyes remained fixed on Crack Shot.  It was an impassive stare, which for her was still an impressive stare.  Those two lambent pools of gold must’ve felt as hot as the sun.  “Jeez, can you turn down the eighty-watt stare?” he pleaded.
 
“Eighty-what stare,” noted Storm.

Crack Shot and Check both flinched from contact embarrassment at that.

Síofra gave Storm a muddled look, before saying, “What I can tell ya is that me and him are friends.  Right close ones, of course, but there’s nothing more to it than that.  I’m curious as to why ya’d think otherwise.”

Crack Shot scratched the back of his helmet again.  “Ah, it’s just, uh, like… you know… that little moment between you two before we all left…?”

“Ahh,” said Síofra, in dawning realization.  “That’s what our kind calls ‘barróigín.’  It is an ancient act meant to demonstrate kinship.  Very steeped in tradition, it is.”  Síofra gazed upward and placed a paw beneath her chin.  “Hmm, let’s see… in yer tongue, I believe the word would translate to ‘hug,’ aye, though maybe the act has an obligatory romantic connotation for yer kind?”

“Aw, jeez…”  Crack Shot turned away, his face reddening.

Check patted him on the side.  “Do you see what happens, then, when one presumes?”

“…It’s supposed to be ‘assumes,’ dude,” huffed Crack Shot.  “You know, because it makes an—”

“Yes, I am well aware,’” said Check, primly.  He shifted his equipment.  “Anyways, now that Storm has had the chance to write his letter, shall we begin our descent?”

Crack Shot sighed and glanced at the wall of snow sealing the cavern exit.  “Might as well—it’s not like we’re goin’ anywhere else.”


---


After an unceremonious breakfast, Storm, Check, Crack Shot, and Síofra began their descent into the bowels of the earth.

Bowels of the earth, Storm thought.

Now there was an anatomical allusion he couldn’t reconcile himself with.  He felt that ‘spelunking’ was a term that sounded bad enough on its own.  Like somepony had dropped a rock in a pond and decided to name a sport after the sound it made.  Couple it with ‘bowels,’ and he was left with an onomatopoeic imagery that made him want to take a shower.  The purple flowers coloring the walls were a nice sight though, and they certainly had a pleasant scent.

Intestinal flora, sang a traitorous part of his imagination, which he promptly told to shut up.

“So what kind of flowers are these?” asked Crack Shot, as they passed another plant on the way down the stairs.  “This doesn’t seem like the kinda place you’d expect to find ‘em.  You know, underground.”

“Purple saxifrage, I believe,” said Check, just ahead of him.

“Huh.  Were they running out of names by the time they got to it?”

“As I understand, the name stems from how the plant is able to grow from rocky crevices.  Saxum meaning stone, frangere meaning to crush or break.  Thus, saxifrage.”

“Fitting,” said Crack Shot, as he stopped beside another plant growing out of the rock wall.  “So, they break rocks… what about teeth?”

“They are said to have a sweet taste,” noted Check, catching the hint.  It was all he needed to say for Crack Shot to lean forward and take a bite.  “But it should be mentioned that their pigment can stain.”

“Oh yeah?” asked Crack Shot.  As he turned around, the others had to bite their tongues at the sight of the lips the words had come out of.

“…Ohh, yeah,” echoed Síofra.

Storm canted his head.  “Sort of looks like you’re wearing lipstick.”

“Really?”  Crack Shot puckered his lips, which had turned as purple as a bruise.  “Heh, sexy.  If there is anybody down here, I guess they shouldn’t have any trouble tellin’ us apart right now, eh?”

“I think ye two distinguish yerselves pretty readily.”  Síofra walked beside Crack Shot and pulled back the fur on his foreleg with a paw, revealing an underbrush of yellow.  “Besides—ye do know that yer roots are showing, right?”

Storm lifted a foreleg and took a closer look.  Sure enough, like earth buried beneath the snow, there were hints of brown.  “Hm.  It has been a while since we touched up, hasn’t it?”

“I wouldn’t worry about it, dude,” said Crack Shot, licking his lips relatively clean.  “The Staff Sergeant’ll get on our case about that when we get back home.”

As the staircase circled around and beneath itself, winding like a corkscrew boring into the earth, Storm noticed another peculiar property about the crystal that formed it.  Every square inch of it beneath him glinted with faint redness wherever the sunlight touched it.  Yet, when he looked up and through the upper levels, all he saw was blue.  Like staring skyward from underneath the ocean.  He alternated his gaze, above and below, curious about the phenomenon.  And as he watched the long, wide, translucent steps disappear and reappear, a level gone below and a level added above with each circuit, he discovered something even stranger.

The staircase had been created entirely in one piece.

No matter how much he scrutinized, he could find no gaps, no seams, no mark to prove that it hadn’t been cut from a single stone.  Not for the hundreds of meters it descended, for the thousands of meters it spiraled.  Did its creators happen across a giant crystal and decide to see how far down it’d go?  Did they excavate the shaft, seed a crystal, and take a coffee break for a few dozen generations?  He couldn’t imagine the stress of being whoever had worked the chisel.

The four of them at last reached the bottom of the shaft, a floor of flat, smooth crystal just barely blushing from the kiss of light that managed to make it that far down.  Although there was no crevice or cranny for Síofra’s gold coin to have wedged itself into, it was nowhere in sight.  But then, none of them expected it to be.  What they did find was another tunnel mouth, a damp, cool air wafting out of it.  Its existence was an invitation to enter, and so they did.

Less inviting were those they found waiting just around the first corner.

Crystal barding segmented into plates, with specks of cloudiness marching across them.  Winged circlets of similar make, detail and care given to every feather and filigree.  Thick, white coats, saddled with mottled patches of brown fur, streaked with whirls and whorls of purple.

Storm would’ve paid more attention to these, if not for the antlers lowered towards him.  This would be for the same reason that one probably wouldn’t take the moment to study the etchings, the tassels, or the jeweled insets of a spear aimed at their face.  It would have been missing the point.

“Oh dear,” whispered Check.

“Yeah, I’d say that’s what they look like,” added Crack Shot, quietly.

Before the group stood three armored cervine figures, their heads low and their eyes narrowed.  Some kind of caribou, Storm guessed, though his mental picture of them usually included a sleigh.  They’d serried themselves in a line blocking access into the rest of the tunnel.  The one in the middle, the largest of the three and ostensibly the leader, spoke first, his voice low and threatening like a roll of thunder.

“Þið skuluð segja okkur hver þið eruð og hvers vegna þið komið hérna í óleyfi.”

This left a bit of guesswork as to what the threat actually was.

“Uh… pardon?” hazarded Storm.

For a moment the stag look puzzled, his mouth creasing with the act of cogitation.

He repeated, slower and louder, “Ég sagði að þið skuluð segja okkur hver þið eruð og hvers vegna þið eruð hérna í óleyfi!”

Crack Shot nudged Check in the side.  “Psst,” he hissed, rather unnecessarily.  “Dude!”

Check didn’t avert his eyes from the three barring their path.  “Yes, what is it?” he whispered back.

“Use a translation spell!”

Check still didn’t avert his eyes, though his brows did furrow above them.  “…Beg pardon?”

“You know—so we can understand ‘em!”

“What gives you the notion that such a spell even exists?”

Crack Shot gazed upwards, thoughtfully.  “I dunno.  I just kinda figured there’d be a spell to do just about anything if a situation called for it.”  He looked down to Síofra and whispered, “What about you—any idea what they’re saying?”

Síofra looked up towards Crack Shot, looked back at the stags, and said, “Bark.”  After a moment’s consideration, she added, “Woof,” for purpose of clarification.

A couple of yards away, the stags had fallen into a hurried conference.

“Hefurðu hugmynd um hvað þeir eru að segja?”

This was asked by the one on the left, a slimmer, younger-looking stag, as he watched the guardsponies from the corner of his eye.

The leader frowned and shook his head.  “Hljómar eins og bull fyrir mér, en mér líkar ekki hvernig þeir eru að hvísla.”

He stared at the guardsponies and his frown deepened.  “þeir gætu verið að hugsa um að reyna eitthvað.”

The one on the right remained silent, apparently deep in thought.  He looked as young as the stag on the left, though the antlers on the right side of his head looked to have been snapped off in the middle of the stem.  Eventually he spoke.

“…Ég held reyndar að ég hafi einu sinni heyrt þetta tungumál notað af einum þeirra sem er með óhreinindi í feldinum.”  He pointed at Storm, who quirked an eyebrow.  “Frá einu af skáldunum, þegar við vorum yngri.”

The slimmer stag gave a laugh.  “Síðan hvenær tókstu eftir í tíma?”

Storm reddened, and wished more than ever that he could tell what they were saying.  Did he have something on his face?  He knew Crack Shot did—why weren’t they pointing at him?

“Haltu kjafti,” growled the stag with the cracked antler.  “Ég ætla allaveganna að reyna að tala við þá.”  He cleared his throat and called out, “You three—”

The guardsponies focused on him.

“—Where are you up towards and who are you why?!” he demanded.

Silence.

“Erm,” began Storm, “we’re members of Equestria’s Royal Guard, on an exploratory assignment on behalf of Her Highness, Princess Luna.  If that answers, uh, whatever that question was supposed to be.”

The stag with the cracked antler nodded.

The apparent leader gave his companion an approving clap on the withers.  “Hvað sagði hann?”

The stag with the cracked antler shrugged.

The other two groaned, and Storm suspected that his answer had just been turned away at the language barrier.

“Förum þá með þá til einhverns sem hefur,” said the leader, and it carried a note of finality.

The three began to advance towards the guardsponies and Síofra, eyeing them warily.

Crack Shot glanced at the others.  “So, uh… do we fight, book it, or what?”

Check shook his head.  “If they wanted a fight, they would likely be charging us right now, instead of approaching so charily.  Perhaps they wish to bring us to one that can interpret us.”

“And if not?” asked Storm.

“Well… we can figure it out from there.”

The lead stag waited at the front of the group, while the other two moved to position themselves in the back.  As the slimmer of the three walked past, he pulled Crack Shot’s spear free of his bags’ straps.

Crack Shot gave half of a frown.  “I don’t suppose you have a word for ‘please,’” he muttered.

The slim stag stared at him for a moment, grinned around the spear, and said, “Fyrirgefðu mér,” before joining his companion at the rear of the group.

The stag in front then gave a curt nod for the guardsponies to follow.

As they began their march, as prisoners if not guests, Crack Shot smirked.  “Heh, you know, ever since leaving Fiddler’s Plain, we’ve been kinda SOL for warm welcomes, huh?” he said, watching Síofra from the corner of his eye as they proceeded into the tunnel.

She shrugged, gave a dismissive, “Arf,” and made no further argument.


---


Storm followed the clack of hoofsteps as the larger stag lead the way into the tunnel, relying on sound since sight now failed him.  After leaving the light of the vertical shaft, he found that little replaced it.  The scant amount there was came from the thin, green foxfire of a mold smeared virulently across the lower, damper parts of the cave walls like some kind of illness.  The sickly light only made the darkness heavier, and it came with a stench that far outreached it.  But although he couldn’t see the cave ceiling, Storm could feel it.  Low, oppressive, and bearing the weight of a mountain.  How much lower would it sink if the earth chose that moment to move?

Storm tried to shake the thought from his head.  It didn’t do any good to be thinking about tremors and about cave-ins.  About subsidence, about being buried alive, about—

—Bowel movements, sang that part of his imagination again, though he was grateful then for the absurdity of it.

As they walked, their hoofsteps echoing off the walls like the march of a phantom army, the tunnel became tunnels, branching off—divarication, echoed Check’s voice in Storm’s memory—into a taphephobe’s worst nightmare.  However, their escorts (or captors, if he were to be honest with himself) had no trouble navigating the midnight spaces, quite possibly by sonar.  The lead stag kept a steady clip, even as the path bent and broke and seemingly backtracked.

Even without the other two acting as rearguard, Storm would have followed right behind.  In this labyrinth, he certainly wouldn’t want to be left behind.

Then, a low, deep roar began to build, white noise at first, but soon filling the narrow tunnel with its din.  For one chilly moment, Storm’s thoughts were drowned out by the fear that the mountain really could be coming down, that the earth was preparing to swallow them and that it wouldn’t bother to chew.  The path weaved, and light began to color it, and Storm’s heart slowed its beat, but not by much.  He couldn’t fathom how anypony could live in such claustrophobic conditions, so many fathoms underground.  It was a choice he’d never make.  Then, the leader of the stags rounded a corner, and Storm saw that they hadn’t either.

Crack Shot whistled, Síofra whined, and Check gasped.  Storm simply stared, open mouthed, at the city beneath the world.

The rough and rutted stone of the tunnel ended at its mouth, left behind like a bad dream.  In its place was smooth, rose-tinted crystal, running in an avenue beneath a series of arches hung with unlit lanterns.  Farther ahead, it turned into a staircase and climbed towards a plateau.  Plumes of smoke hinted at what lay beyond its edge.

Turning his head, Storm saw the source of the roar that had filled the tunnels, and felt its spray kiss his face.  Waterfalls, cataracts of snowmelt, cascaded down stony walls in a symphony of gurgles and crashes, creating a haze that made the elevated architecture appear to be nestled in a cloud.

From a cave ceiling that was high enough to be the sky, shafts of light cut through steam and mist, casting oranges and yellows, blues and greens along their path.  To Storm, it looked like a bridge had been laid in front of them, built from rainbow itself.

He wanted nothing more at that instant than to soar into the air and take it all in.

But, as the stag in front of him was proof of, he and his friends were captives.  Or, at least, the stags probably viewed them as captives.  It wouldn’t do to go divorcing them of that belief just yet.

The lead stag turned towards him and the others and grinned at their wonderment, before barking a command which Storm took to be some variant of ‘follow.’  The stag began to march up the avenue, so Storm and his friends did just that.

“Jeez, the size of this place,” said Crack Shot, craning his head upwards as they passed beneath an arch.  “It must’ve taken forever to make a cave this huge.”

“Mm, if that were the case, then it wouldn’t exist, would it?” asked Check, half of a smile crossing the side of his face that Crack Shot couldn’t see.

“Dude, there is literally nothing worse than bein’ that literal,” said Crack Shot, sticking out his tongue.  “But seriously, when I was a colt I spent like an entire day digging a hole, and I only got as far my fetlocks.”

“Why were you digging a hole?” asked Storm.

“My brother said I could get to Neighpon if I dug straight down.”  Crack Shot gave a shrug.  “It wasn’t until my legs were covered in dirt that I figured out he might’ve been pullin’ one of ‘em.”

“Particularly since Manehattan and Neighpon aren’t even antipodal,” mused Check.  “How is your brother?”

“He’s aight.  I might write him if we get reception down here.  And if we’re not headin’ off to the executioner’s block, so to speak.”

“Growl,” said Síofra.

“Relax, it was a joke.”

“Hmm, on the subject of the stone, I would be interested in studying it, if we’ve the opportunity,” said Check.  “Rather, the aberrancy on its surface, for lack of a better word—”

“—Since when do you lack a better word?” interrupted Crack Shot.

Check gave this the eye roll it was due, before continuing.  “It wasn’t present, or at least wasn’t noticeable, at either the base of the mountain or the cave where we first retired.”  He looked past Crack Shot towards Síofra.  “I wonder if it’s not related to whatever is worsening the weather in this region.”

“Þeir tala mikið,” said the slimmer stag, to his companion with the cracked antler.

Storm glanced back.  “I wonder what they’re discussing.”  He noticed that the slimmer stag had clipped Crack Shot’s spear to the side of his barding.

“Probably wherever they’re takin’ us,” suggested Crack Shot.

They reached the staircase, and upon ascending it Storm saw others off in the distance that provided access to another plateau.  It appeared the city rose in tiers.  He wasn’t surprised to see that the nearby houses—if that’s what the long, rounded buildings were—were also crystalline, though their owners had had the modesty to frost their sides.  Their roofs were topped with sod.  Looking at them, he found himself thinking of the grass roof of the schoolhouse in Fiddler’s Plain.

They looked like capsized boats to him, covered in algae and moss.  Like the remnants of an ancient fleet, the revenants of a ships’ graveyard.  Surrounding each one was a garden of purple saxifrage, and each garden looked well attended and well sampled.  He suspected that the stags had used the flower to give themselves their purple markings.

Smoke—or was it steam?—drifted in steady plumes from every building, and he wondered if each had somebody to attend them.

Past the residences, the lead stag turned onto a cobblestone path.  It was a strange thing to see, out of place amongst the rest of the crystal architecture, and so was the building they lead to.  A thing of ironwood, stone, and mortar, it stood out like a rotten tooth.  This was fitting, if the giant wooden door bar and window slats were proof of its purpose.  It was a jail.

The lead stag placed a hoof beneath the door bar and lifted it as easily as cork.  He pulled it open and gave the guardsponies a meaningful look, which needed no translation.  The guardsponies stepped inside, with Síofra right behind them.

Outside of the jail door, the stag with the broken antler barked, “Take it to the heart, the waiting is the hardest part!  Try not anything humorous, understanding?!”

Once more, silence.

“O…kay?” ventured Storm.

The stag stared at him.

“…Yes?”

The stag nodded and the door slammed shut.  There was a heavy thud as the door bar fell into a place, and, unexpectedly, the sound of tumblers clicking.  Not that Storm had gotten a good look, but he was certain that none of the stags had been carrying a key.

“Hvað var það fyrsta sem hann sagði?” asked the voice of the slimmer stag, muffled by the thick wooden door.

“Tveir bókstafir stafrófsins hans,” answered that of the stag with the broken antler.

It was followed by the sound of hooves on stone, growing quieter with each step.

“Now ye can’t tell me that me and mine weren’t a wee bit more hospitable than this,” said Síofra, her voice just above a whisper.

“Oh hey—she speaks,” said Crack Shot.  He rolled his bags off of his withers and lay down on a wide wooden bench set against a wall of hewn stone.  He splayed his limbs out, stretching out as far as he could then trying for a little bit farther.

Síofra shrugged.  “No point in giving them any idea of what I am or, more importantly, what I ain’t, I figure.  It’s better to be underestimated than overestimated.”

Storm surveyed the cell.  Whatever light managed to touch the windows was slashed into thin bands by the wooden slats barring it.

There were two long benches bolted to the walls opposite each other, one of which Crack Shot was currently spreading himself across like some kind of liquid.  From the wall farthest from the door, a weak but steady stream of water spilled into a small, earthen drain.  It might’ve been meant to keep any potential tenants—yes, that was a good word for him and his friends—from dehydrating, but it was also the only source of plumbing in the cell.  That fact alone made it seem a bit too… multipurpose for Storm to consider taking a drink.

Thankfully, they still had the canteen, and everything else for that matter, save for Crack Shot’s spear.  Check had apparently thought the same, and was already freeing the smart stone from his bags.

“Callin’ for backup, dude?” asked Crack Shot, as he let his head seep over the side of the bench to stare upside-down at his friend.  “Let ‘em know where we are now, and they might just make it down here in time to be a Hearth’s Warming miracle.”

“While it’d be prudent to keep our cohort apprised of our situation, recall our earlier conversation about its appearance.  Hm, now this is curious.”  Check pursed his lips upon revealing the stone, though it quickly became obvious why.  It was written all over his face.

Crack Shot rolled upright.  “Whoa, look at that thing glow!”

Storm set his things down and moved to take a closer look, which proved entirely unnecessary.  The twin panels of the smart stone had lit with a singular brightness that made his eyes water.

“What on earth—what under it could be causing that?” he breathed.

Síofra’s eyes went wide.  “Ya mentioned the weather before.  The way it went wojus right on top of us, how that thing started lighting up like a will-o’-the-wisp at around the same time…”

“Well, that is merely a hypothesis at this stage,” said Check.  “To strengthen it, we’d need to first increase our sample size of locations, our—”

“But ya might just be right!  We might be getting a lot closer to the source of the weather!”

Crack Shot sat up and tilted his head at Síofra.  “Huh.  This really is a big deal to you, isn’t it?”

Síofra tilted her head right back.  “Aye, why wouldn’t it be?”

Crack Shot hummed.  “Well, when we were kickin’ it in your world, the weather didn’t seem all that bad.  I mean, it looked trippy and all, but it didn’t seem like anything was crossin’ over, least as far as I could tell.  If it doesn’t have any effect on your side of things, why does it matter so much?”

Síofra let out a sigh.  “Because some of us aren’t keen on just staying on our side of things.  Sure, there are plenty back home that are happy with self-exile and would just as soon never see a field of stars that can keep still for a bloody minute, but not me.”

Her ears folded back as she continued.

“And even if a mushroom’s… mycelium runs deep, a mushroom can still drown.  If the flooding in our valley gets any worse, as it really seems to be doing, then we’ll be looking at a long holiday.”

Crack Shot nodded.  “Ah, gotcha.”

Síofra stared at him.  “Ya know, of all the responses I assumed that might’ve garnered, I’ve got to say that ‘gotcha’ didn’t quite make the cut.”

“Er, like, what I mean is that I get it, I think.  There’s no way I’d want to be stuck in Manehattan all my life…”  Crack Shot shook his head.  “Anyways, my point is that we’ll lend a hoof if we can.”

Síofra cracked a smile at that.  “Well I—”

There was the creak of the door bar being lifted, and the click of a key sliding into a lock.  Check managed to shove the smart stone back into his bag just as the door swung open.  The slimmer of the three stags stood in the doorway, a large bowl balanced on his barding.  Crack Shot’s spear was no longer with him, and Storm could find no location on the crystal barding where it would have slotted.  The stag looked around the cell for a moment, his brows knit in confusion, before focusing on Síofra.

They looked at each other.

“Howl,” said Síofra.

The stag canted his head and quirked an eyebrow, staring at her.

Then, finally, he shook his head.  He reached back to take the bowl, and set it on the bench beside Crack Shot.  It was loaded with spinach, chard, and what looked like chop radishes.  The stag pointed at the bowl, and then began chomping the air and pointing at himself, in case there was any question about what the vegetables were for.

“Oh!” said Check, upon seeing the bowl’s contents.  He gave a polite smile.  “Thank you, that’s very kind of you.”
        
It took the stag a second, but afterwards he smirked and gave a nod.  “Það var ekkert,” he muttered, as he turned to leave.

He paused before stepping out, however.  Instead, he turned to study Síofra once more.  The cell at-large held its breath.  He lifted a hoof towards her and raised an eyebrow.  Then, for clarification, he pointed towards the bowl.

Síofra gave an ‘Ah!’ which she hastily appended an ‘-rf!’ to the end of, then bounded towards the bowl and dipped her head inside.  She came out with several leaves speared on her canines.  “Yip,” she noted.

For a few very tense seconds, the stag just watched her.  Eventually he shrugged, stepped outside, and closed the door behind him.  The door bar thudded into place, the tumblers clicked, and the four of them let out their breath.  The sound of hoofsteps outside faded until only the hollow sound of water trickling into the wooden drain remained.

Check once more retrieved the stone from his bag, along with its stylus.  The others gathered around as he tried tracing a few experimental lines across the surface.  Markings appeared but didn’t last, evaporating seconds after they were drawn.  A thin line of green trailed after the emerald tip of the stylus like the tail of a comet, before shortening into nothing when Check ceased writing.

“It appears that we won’t be notifying Canterlot about our situation,” he sighed.  “But I suppose if there is any validity regarding the correlation between the stone’s luminance and the abnormal weather, it may be of some consolation to have it as a metric.”

“Not if we’re sitting around in a jail cell,” said Storm, as he took a seat on the bench opposite Crack Shot.  “I wonder how long we’re supposed to be in here.”  He noticed that there were hash marks scored into the wall beside him, somebody’s crude measure of time.  Did they count down days?  Weeks?  Months?

“Might be our call, dude,” said Crack Shot.  “Think we oughta bust out of here or what?”

“Hmm.”  Check tapped his hoof on the floor.  “Perhaps we should allow them to hold us for at least a couple of days before deciding on that course of action.”

“You want to see what they have to say, and if we’ll be able to understand it?” asked Storm.

“Mm, yes, there is that, of course,” said Check, staring at the bowl of vegetation.

“…Aye?” asked Síofra.  “Ya make it sound like there’s more to it than that.”

“Well, it’s just that they’ve seemed hospitable enough so far in the completion of their duties.  To escape so soon after they’ve just gone through the hassle of capturing us…”  He turned towards the others, a small, worried frown on his face.  “…It just seems rather rude, doesn’t it?”


---


They didn’t even have to wait a day, only the better part of one, to receive another visitation.  The light scored across the floor and walls hadn’t moved, but it had dimmed with the oncoming evening.  A shadow blocked a small part of it as a squirrel crept through the barred windows and into the cell.  Once inside, she shifted and grew into the form of a wolf once more.

“Looks like those feens are on their way back,” said Síofra, as she shook out her fur.  “And they’ve got another with them.  No armor, but he’s a big-looking fellow.”

“Someone else?”  Storm stood from his bench, stretching his neck and wings.  “I wonder he’s an interpreter.”

“Be kinda annoyin’ if he wasn’t, since they took so freakin’ long to get him,” said Crack Shot, as he rolled onto his hooves.  “Unless he’s really good at charades.”

Check didn’t chime in immediately, apparently lost in some thought.  Eventually he said, “Hopefully he is, Storm… but, it may have been quite some time since they’ve had contact with ponies, or others that speak our tongue.”

“What gave it away?” deadpanned Crack Shot.  Check only hummed in response.

A minute later, there came the percussion ensemble of the door being unlocked, and the four of them turned to face it.  The door was pulled open, and an older stag stepped inside.  Age had streaked his coat with hoarfrost, but his gait was proud and supported by powerful legs.  His frame filled the doorway, and his antlers curved forward in several points like an instrument of war.  His eyes were keen, like two polished pieces of volcanic glass, even if the skin beneath them had softened and sagged.  He scrutinized Síofra and the guardsponies, lingering on Storm and Crack Shot in particular.

Storm fought the urge to shrink back as this towering stranger sized him up, as he stared him down.  He was a soldier—a sergeant no less!—of Equestria’s Royal Guard.  He was a surrogate for all of his brothers and sisters in arms, and the thought of that steeled him.  He kept his shoulders squared and his face set like stone as the stag looked him over.

At last, the stag’s gaze left him to pore over Crack Shot, who, against such scrutiny, chose to waggle his eyebrows.

The stag scoffed, before finally speaking, his voice deep, sonorous, and with a faint lyrical quality.  “My name is Fannar.  Already you have met Björn, Leif, and Víðar, by their claim.”  He made no point of saying who was whom, and they gave no indication.  “Now, it doth strike us as queer to discover your kind so deep in our territory.  Explain anon, and I’ll no prevarication.”

“Oh jeez.”  Crack Shot put a hoof over his face.  “Did we stumble into the lost world for languages?”

Check recognized his cue and leapt into his role.  “Mine allies and I mean to commit no offense.  Our reason for being here is twofold.”

Fannar and his cohort turned their attention towards him, which also meant turning their antlers towards him.  He swallowed.

“…Firstly, we come at the request of Her Royal Highness, Princess Luna, who inquireth on the state of the world beyond Equestria’s borders—”

“Doth she now?” interrupted Fannar.  “From her moonlit bower on high?”

“Nay, the moon and firmament no longer keep her, nor doth the darkness which necessitated such.”

Crack Shot groaned.  “This is like a bad play.”

Storm hushed him.

“So she hath abandoned all aims of shrouding the world in shadow, thou wouldst claim?” asked Fannar.  There was an acerbic lilt to his tone.

“Yea, dawn’s light giveth testament to this.”

“It is the east, and Celestia is the sun!” whispered Crack Shot.  Storm elbowed him in the side.

“…Doth it now?” asked Fannar, ignoring this.  His eyes were like two wells of pitch, and they gave away nothing.  “And who are you that would represent her?”

“My name is Check Mate.  My friends beside me are Storm Stunner and Crack Shot.”

Each nodded as they were named.

“Very well, Check Mate.  Thou said your reasons were twofold.  For what other purpose have you come here?”

“The weather,” answered Check.  “Hast thou taken notice of its vicissitudes?”

“Hark!” said Fannar, which nearly proved too much for Crack Shot, who’d never thought he’d hear the word in spoken conversation without an ‘s’ on the front of it.  “An interest in our climes you claim…?  So Equestria’s borders yet migrate so far that she desireth an active role in them?”

“She doth not,” answered Check.  “Our interest is our own.”

Fannar stared at him, saying nothing, reading him for any sign of artifice.  “…Knowledge of your ilk is uncommon amongst mine, but there are songs sung by the skáldunum—poets, in your tongue—that speak of you.  And of your abilities.”

He turned his attention towards Storm and Crack Shot once more.

“To climb into the heavens and summon swith a tempest, or to rend such storms indiscriminately.  …And all on such unlikely wings.”

“I don’t see what’s wrong with our wings,” muttered Storm, to which Crack Shot elbowed him in the side.  Not because he disagreed with the sentiment, but because turnabout is fair play.

Fannar returned his attention to Check, and his face split with a grin.  But as far as grins go, it contained no warmth, no mirth.  It was a means of baring one’s teeth, a threat.

“It doth seem unlikely that you would be harried from your home by the weather.  Yet, one matter confoundeth me…”

“That being?”

“There are songs about thy kind as well, those possessed of a single horn.  From what I know of them, the simple securities of this cell should not have been enough to hold thee.  Why did thou and thy companions not away?”

“Because of the reasons that I gave thee, and because we wished, rather, to talk.”

Fannar laughed—a deep rumble of a laugh—and it thundered off of the stone walls of the cell.  “You’ve mettle,” he said after settling.  “I wonder if it is deserved.  Very well, there shall be talk.  But it shall wait for another time and another place.”

He stepped back through the door, out of the cell, and the other three stags fell in beside him.  However, he didn’t close the door behind him.  Instead he said, without turning to face the guardsponies, “Will you follow?”

The guardsponies and Síofra looked between each other.

“Does—doth this mean we are no longer captives?” asked Check.

“It meaneth that I will see to it that you are shown proper hospitality.”

He began to march, not bothering to see if the guardsponies were keeping step behind him.  They quickly equipped their belongings, with Check shoving as much of the crystal bowl as would fit into one of the main pouches of his saddlebags.

“I will not say that I discount thy words,” continued Fannar.  “However, that doth not mean that I trust you.”

“I wonder if that’s how it’s going be for the rest of the trip,” said Storm, glancing sidelong at the other three stags on either side of them.

The largest of the three was all business.  He kept his eyes directed straight forward in a way that Storm just knew meant that he was watching them out of the corner of one.  The ears of the one with the broken antler were perked, and Storm assumed that he was trying to work out what he’d just said.  As for the slimmest of the three, there was no need for guessing.  He was looking at Crack Shot and him with either disbelief, or simple uncertainty, and he made no point of hiding it.  His eyes kept flitting to their wings.

“It’ll work out, dude,” said Crack Shot.  That was the extent of his argument, but he said it with such conviction that Storm couldn’t help but believe it somewhat.  “I think I’m gonna have a time of it figurin’ out what they’re sayin’ regardless of the language, though.”

“We do not have the opportunity to practice your tongue with any but ourselves,” rumbled the elder stag.  “Was mine enunciation and word choice incorrect?”

“Nah, that was all probably fine… uh, probably fineth,” said Crack Shot.  “It’s just that it might be about a thousand years past its expiration date.  Still, you’re speakin’ our language and we can’t speak yours, so I think you’ve got a leg up on us.”

Fannar surreptitiously checked the location of each of his hooves.  “Mayhaps it is that mine antlers make me seem taller.”

Crack Shot blinked.  “Huh?  Wait, what—”

“Might be a good idea to ease up on the idioms,” whispered Storm.

“Dude, I’m not sure that I can.”

As the arched avenue came into view, Storm saw that it had grown busy.  Caribou, as individuals or couples or groups, fed into it from the various staircases leading to the next plateau, and filled it with the sounds of movement and conversation.  Every one of them that he could see wore ornamentation of some kind—pastern bangles or rings around the tines of their antlers—made of the ubiquitous rose crystal, and each had a unique pattern marking the fur of their legs and body in purple.  When the guardsponies and their escort drew near, several of them paused to look, falling into whispers.  Storm wouldn’t have expected any different.

He ignored the stares and focused on the arches instead.  He saw that the hanging lamps were now lit.  Not by flame or by firefly though, he noticed upon coming closer.  Instead, each contained a single blue stone that radiated a soft, blue light.  He decided to ask about them.

“They gather light during the day, and return it upon the eve,” answered Fannar, as they passed beneath an arch, following the tide of caribou towards the residences.

“Ah, phosphorescence?” asked Check.

“Is that the word your kind giveth it, then?  Those stones are among our greater discoveries.”

“Are there a bunch buried around here or something?” asked Crack Shot.

“Nay, we created them.  About two years or so agone, after much research and development.”  There was a hint of pride in his voice.

“Wow, no kiddin’.”

Fannar snorted.  “Nay, I am not.  Surely thou dost not think that the world stagnateth without a pony’s hoof to coax it?”

“Relax, dude.  I just meant that it’s neat.”

“Yea, ‘twould not do if ‘twere dirty.” 

Crack Shot gave an exasperated groan.  “No, like, I mean that it’s, you know, nice.”

The other stags stiffened as their elder spun towards Crack Shot, new wrinkles creasing beneath his narrowed eyes.  “Fie!  Nice?!  Thou wouldst diminish—”

“The word ‘nice’ hath new meaning in recent times,” sighed Check.  “Now it refereth to that which is goodly.”

Fannar’s frown softened somewhat.  “Ah, doth it now?”

“Wait, did it have another meaning before?” asked Crack Shot, who was uncertain about this latest offense and liked to keep a clear record of them.

“A number of them, actually,” answered Check.  “Exact and precise, or trivial and unimportant.  Even foolish.”

“Huh,” said Crack Shot.  “Well those don’t sound nice at all.”

Fannar’s answer had come easily enough, Storm felt, even if Crack Shot ended up making it difficult.  He decided to try for another.

“What about all of the crystal here and across the mountains?” he asked, arcing a hoof expansively towards the road, the arches, the staircases.  “There’s no way that it was mined, unless you’ve all been hollowing out one giant piece.”

“Yea, thou art correct.  The crystal you see is of our make as well.  A sore nice—simpler task for our ilk.”

“Really?  How so?”

Fannar asked something of one of his cohort, the slimmer caribou of the trio, who nodded in response.

Fannar then pointed a hoof towards the younger stag, beckoning the others to watch him.  “Leif shall show you.”

The slimmer stag, Leif, approached Check, pointed to the crystal bowl sticking out of his bag, and then to himself.  Check nodded, before levitating it free of its pouch and towards him.  However, rather than reach out a hoof to take it, Leif instead took the bowl with magic of his own, white beads of light appearing about his antlers like mistletoe berries about the limbs of a birch.

As the beads of light drifted into an orbit around the bowl, what little of the crystal’s tint that was visible in the low light vanished, leaving it as clear as glass.  Then, in the blink of an eye, the bowl dissolved into a thin liquid, splashing and coalescing into a clear, rippling orb in the air before him.  The air misted around it.

Leif pursed his lips, canted his head, narrowed his eyes as he focused on his efforts, as the liquid began to take new and complex shapes.  It first stretched into an oblong form, rounded on one end and tapered on the other.  Then, a thin tendril erupted from its side, snaking and growing outwards.  Soft, billowing leaves began to break off from its stalk as it lengthened, and soon a small bulb formed at its tip.  Finally, as the last of the fluid of the faux seed drained into the stem, the bulb opened outward into a five-pointed star.  The surrounding mist melted away as the liquid hardened back into crystal, as the color returned to it.

The glow of the arches’ phosphorescent stones added just a hint of blue to its natural rose tint, leaving no argument as to what it was meant to be.  A flower of saxifrage, as like to life as crystal could be.

Leif grinned at the guardsponies as if he had just performed some amazing trick, and Storm had to give it to him, because he had.

Crack Shot leaned towards Check and said, “Psst.  Can you do that?”

Check shook his head.  “And you needn’t say ‘psst.’”

“Pfft.”

“…And can you do that with anything?” asked Storm, uncertain of how to respond if the answer was yes.

Fannar smiled.  “Certes, we cannot but with this substance.  But it is to our fortune that it doth exist in mickle supply.”

“Erm…”

“It means there is a lot of it,” said Check.

“Ah, right, thanks.”  Storm nodded.  “But… what is it then?  I don’t think I’ve ever seen it before coming into these mountains.”

Fannar hummed.  “That doth surprise me, for it existeth nigh everywhere.  Even in the air thou art breathing now.”

Storm puzzled over this for a moment.  Then it clicked.  Or, perhaps, it splashed.

“…It’s water.”

“Yea, though presently it is ice.”

“Wait,” said Crack Shot.  “You mean that all of this—the road, those buildings, that armor—is just ice?”

Fannar spat as he spun towards him.  “’Just ice,’ thou sayest, which I think doth not do it justice.  Hast thou ever before spied ice that doth not melt?  Surely thou dost not think it such a trivial thing.”

“But, I mean… it’s not cold or anything!”

“Which is why it wouldn’t melt,” said Check.  “It must not absorb any heat.  Is that why it hath such an unlikely color?” he asked.

Fannar nodded.  “Whatever light the water keepeth, warmeth, but this ice will only repel it or let it pass, holding none at all.”

Check placed a hoof to his chin.  “Incredible.  I cannot fathom the amount of work that must have gone into the creation of such a spell.”

“Verily?  Scant,” said Fannar.  “Even a yearling might perform the like.  And there hath been much for them to practice with in recent days.”

Síofra gave a soft growl.  A fawn that was following at what she thought was probably a safe distance squeaked and leapt a step back.

“Doth something trouble your wolf?” asked Fannar.

“Oh, uh, she’s probably just hungry,” said Storm.  Then, realizing he was talking about a wolf, he quickly added, “For leaves.  Er, not Leifs.  Green things.  Plants.  That’s what she eats.”

“Yea, I had heard as much from Leif.  A queer thing, that…”  He stared into her eyes, the faint golden glint of them disappearing into the darkness of his.  “…Doth she have a name?”

“Greasy,” blurted out Crack Shot, before anypony else could answer.

This took all of his friends aback, though none so much as ‘Greasy’ herself.

“Wha—woof?” she said.

“Aw, don’t worry, girl,” said Crack Shot, patting her hackles back, which made them bristle with fury.  “Just tellin’ this dude what your name is!”

Síofra gave him a glare which said that there’d be words later, when she had an opportunity to actually use some.  However, the answer was apparently enough to satisfy Fannar, and with a nod he continued forward.

They came into the shipyard of the residences, where plumes still drifted from their sod roofs, tallying their number in the doldrums of the cavern’s faux sky.  Fannar turned down a side road, where the boat-like dwellings began to increase in size, towards what could have been the flagship for this motionless fleet.

It had to be at least fifty meters long easily, Storm guessed, with another building half that length docked at one end like a lifeboat.  There was a porch beneath a gable on the opposite end, with a wide door that had obviously been constructed with a pair of antlers in mind, namely the foot or two they’d stick out from said mind.  The flickering yellow of filtered firelight shone through porthole-like windows in its hull.  This gave Storm pause.

If the caribou's ice behaved like Fannar had described, wouldn’t it be sweltering inside?

Fannar stepped onto the porch and pushed open the door, which Storm saw was embellished with the figure a large, leafy tree, beneath an arc of the bubbles and streaks that Check had guessed to be writing.  To Storm’s surprise, the door released a rush of cold air.

“Our kind prefereth a cooler temperature,” explained Fannar.  “But should you wish, you may adjust the heat.”

“You guys have central heating and air conditioning?!” gasped Crack Shot.

Fannar spun towards him, which the others were starting to get used to by now.  “Surely thou dost not think—”

“No, I dost not!” shouted Crack Shot, pressing a hoof against the brow of his champron.  “I meant that it’s cool!”  Fannar opened his mouth to reply.  “I mean goodly!  Jeez!”

Fannar nodded and motioned for the others to enter, which Crack Shot did with a huff.  The three younger stags held back outside, but after a word from Fannar that was no doubt an invitation, they grinned and stepped inside as well.

The entrance room was a crowded thing, and a fire of burning peat took up most of what little floor space there was.  A bell-shaped encasement of ice enclosed it, allowing its light if not its heat to fill the room.  The encasement had a sort of vine motif, with leafy, translucent ivy climbing the neck of it, wreathed around the smoke.  It complemented another interesting addition that Storm found below the ceiling.

A large fan, its blades modeled like leaves right down to their veins, was spinning slowly.  A pipe appeared to have been fed through its base, allowing a flow of water to push its turbine.  Additional pipes below it, long openings cut along the tops of them, must’ve cooled the air that was being fanned down.

All of it was made of ice, as nearly everything besides the jail cell seemed to be.  Storm wondered if it ever got boring to look at, though he conceded a potential bias born of coming from a kingdom where interior decoration could be accomplished with a paint-by-numbers kit.

It seemed to be having some kind of an effect on Síofra.  She kept staring around the room, at the frozen furnace and the spinning fan, giving a small whine.

A small closet was shoved into one corner of the room, and the younger stags began helping themselves to it, storing their barding and circlets on top of each other.

Fannar stepped through another frosted door, leaving the stags, the guardsponies, and Síofra alone with each other.  Storm wondered if there were sanctions against leaving two unfamiliar groups of houseguests together in a small room like this, and if there weren’t, why not.

The larger stag, Víðar or Björn, had squared his shoulders towards the guardsponies and looked like he’d cube them if he could.  He held his head up defiantly and kept as still as a statue.  He did blink once, and didn’t seem at all happy about the fact.

The stag with the broken antler, Björn or Víðar, looked like he was ruminating for both meanings of the word.  He kept opening and closing his mouth, possibly thinking of something to say and making a dry run of it so he wouldn’t stutter when he did.

Leif just continued to give Storm and Crack Shot a curious stare.  Then he walked towards the two of them and poked Storm in the wing.

“Uh, yes?  Er, yea?” asked Storm.

Leif poked him in the wing again, then reared up and starting flapping his hooves in the air.  He ended this pantomime by point a hoof towards the ceiling and raising an eyebrow.

“He wanteth you are floating,” explained Björn/Víðar.

“Y-yeah, I think I got it,” said Storm, rubbing the back of his helmet.  “Not a lot of space in here for it, but…”

He shifted the camping gear along with his saddlebags off his withers, then stretched out his wings.  In response to this, Víðar/Björn moved to position himself in front of the door leading outside.  Storm wasn’t surprised in the least to learn that they’d just traded one cage for another, though he did hope this one would have better furniture.  Setting that thought aside, he gave his wings a couple of experimental flaps, then lifted himself into a hover, a few feet from the floor.

Leif gave a delighted laugh, a universal expression of amusement, and Björn/Víðar’s mouth fell open.  Even Víðar/Björn’s cold stare had thawed enough for him to raise an eyebrow.

Storm preened internally at the effect he was having.  And then the sudden earthen rumble of Fannar’s voice from behind sent him sprawling towards the floor, whereupon he banged his chin on the fire enclosure.

He groaned as he pulled himself up.  “Wh-what was that?” he asked.

“I said dinner hath been served,” said Fannar, before stepping back out of the entrance hall.

“I think you really impressed ‘em, dude,” said Crack Shot, nodding towards the three stags.

Each of them had turned away, their faces wracked by the strain of not bursting with laughter.

“Ugh, whatever,” said Storm, as he gathered his gear to follow Fannar.  “At least there’s plenty of ice around if I need to put some on my jaw.”


---


The dining hall occupied one long half of the main building, and it was cold enough for Storm to see his breath turn orange in the firelight.  In the long space between two hearths stood a table that could’ve seated a small army, and probably did on occasion.  This would be auspicious, because it’d mean that the servants would’ve had practice for what they were now up against.

Stags and does shuffled in and out of a small room at the far end of the hall, carrying plates and saucers and pitchers, carrying on somehow as they tried to keep pace with Björn, Víðar, Leif, and Crack Shot.  The four had wordlessly entered into a kind of four-way gastronomic battle royale, piling their empty dishes like war trophies.

Several of the servants seemed uncertain about what to make of the large wolf seated at the table next to the ponies, and even more so about how politely she cleared and set aside her dishes.  It wasn’t hard to tell that she made them nervous though, especially with the way she stared whenever one of them brought out a particularly embellished piece of crystalware.

Check and Storm were seated across from Fannar and his wife, a matriarchal doe named Brynja.  She was nearly the size of her husband, and wore her purple markings in harsh slashes like war paint.  The wrinkles on her face, however, looked like they’d come from a lifetime of smiles.  Or so Storm guessed, judging by the one she was giving him at the moment.

“How did thy friends and thou come to find this place?” she asked.  “Björn sayeth that they found you skulking about one of our egresses.”  She nodded towards the largest of the younger stags, who had buried his head in a bowl of salad.  His antlers clattered against the remaining branch of the one who, by process of elimination, would’ve been Víðar.

Storm gave a small laugh.  “Well, I, uh, wouldn’tst—”

“’Wouldn’t,’” corrected Brynja.

“Er, right.  I wouldn’t say that we were skulking.  It was more that we were exploring.”

“Ahh.”  Brynja nodded.  “The difference being?”

“Um, intent, I guess.  One of our princesses wants—”

“Wanteth,” corrected Brynja.

“…My mistake.  One of our princesses, Luna, wanteth to know how the world is doing, but she is unable…”

He paused, waiting for a correction.

“…to abandon her duties.  So we’ve come in her stead.”

Brynja nodded.  “Luna.  Her name liveth in our songs.  The midnight queen that would bring Eilíft Kvöld, the endless night.”

She gave a hearty laugh, which caught Storm off guard.

“Though in other places where our kind hath dwelled, that was common for the winter.  As thou seest, we do not fear the cold!”

And Storm did see… st.  Even with a laugh like that, the frigid air had remained clear and unclouded in front of her, while his steamed like the exhaust of an engine.

“…Not entirely, at least,” she finished.

Beside Storm, Check had entered into conversation with Fannar, which was going much smoother syntactically.

“It would seem that thou art possessed of much influence among thy people,” said Check.  “If such affluence speaketh as such.”

“Yea, verily,” said Fannar, which was another one of those lines that Crack Shot never expected to hear without a collection of bad costumes and poor stage lighting to accompany it.  “I was goði, though our son hath since taken the honor of that title.”

“Doth he wear black eyeliner?” asked Crack Shot, nailing the verb conjugation only because of the food in his mouth.  He added another level to his tower of dishes, putting it two bowls above lead-challenger, Björn’s.

“I do not believe he refers to that sort of goth,” answered Check.  “Though I cannot say that I am familiar with the term ‘goði.’”

“For us, a goði serveth many roles, but one of the most important is that of a defender,” said Fannar, gravely.  “In his people’s time of need, he must protect and lead them.”

He hummed deeply and gazed upwards, staring off into some distance far beyond the sod ceiling.

“…Yea, there were many times that I was called upon to wield the strength of görð in protection of others’ land and holdings.”

“Görð?” asked Check, rapt.  He leaned forward and rested his chin on a fetlock.

“Ith that thome kinda weapon?” asked Crack Shot.

“Yea, ‘tis!” answered Fannar, his obsidian eyes brightening.

Crack Shot swallowed.  “So… is it, like, a spell or something?  Usually stuff gets blasted with like rainbows or hearts back home.”

Fannar shook his head.  “Nay.  ‘Tis arbitration, as your kind would call it.”

“Arbitration?” asked Check and Crack Shot both.

“Yea!  The sagas brim with the tales of past goði, their voices booming above the crack of thunder and the blizzard’s roar, carving legal precedence and court procedure into history!  The fire burning in their words branding it with legislation!”

Crack Shot thought to comment, thought better of it, and shoved his face into another dish.

“Fascinating,” said Check.  “Law is held in great regard for you, then?”

“Yea,” said Fannar.  “More so than goring each other with our antlers, at least.”

“Um, quite,” said Check, his face screwing up at the thought.  “…Changing the subject, I had hoped to discuss further mine and my friends’ errands here.”

Fannar nodded.  “And I promised a time and a place.  Tomorrow you shall meet with my son, who hath gone to inform several of the other goðar of your arrival.  They will hear you then.”

Check nodded.  “Very well.  Though, I am surprised.  Thou hast been a gracious host to those thou dost not trust.”

“It is a matter of honor among my kind to treat all guests with hospitality,” said Fannar.  “And, heretofore, you have not been proven to have committed any offense, outside of, perhaps, trespass.”

“I would note thine use of the word ‘proven,’” said Check.  “Thy trust is hard won.”

Fannar nodded.  “It is a merely a matter of caution to not be overgenerous with it.”


---


After dinner had ended, the guardsponies and Síofra were led to the smaller building attached to the main house.  Long, padded benches ran along its walls, fencing in a small hearth that had been opened to allow a tiny amount of heat into the room.  Still, Storm was glad for the camping bag and the blankets it contained.

And he didn’t fail to notice that there was only one exit, the one they’d just come through.  One cage for another.

“Well, that was pretty good!” said Crack Shot, who didn’t really look for much in a dish besides the bottom of it.  “Plus, I think that I might’ve won those dudes over.”

“Probably not the servants, though,” said Storm, as he kicked off his shoes and pressed a hoof into the bench padding.  “Still, it probably went smoother than with me.  Who knew mine grammar was so broken?”

“My grammar,” corrected Check, levitating his champron onto a corner where the benches met.  “‘Grammar’ begins with a consonant.”

Storm sighed as he removed his bags and took out his journal.  “Et tu?”

“I don’t think the servants were all that worried about me,” said Crack Shot, with a hiccup.  “Least not with ‘Greasy’ here mad doggin’ ‘em.”

“Yeah, about that,” hissed Síofra, now that she had the chance.  “‘Greasy’?  How did ya ever come up with a name as wojus as ‘Greasy’?”

Crack Shot shrugged off his gear and sat back on one of the benches.  “You’re goin’ all incognito, right?  We had to come up with some kinda fake name for those guys, didn’t we?”

“Ye had one! It was Síofra!”

“Yeah, but that one’s ours.”

“Not that ye ever use it,” she muttered, as she padded around the room.

“Besides,” continued Crack Shot, “nopony I know’d come up with a name like Síofra.  It’s suspicious.”

Síofra narrowed her eyes.  “But they’d come up with a name like ‘Greasy.’”

Crack Shot nodded.  “When I was younger, I had a neighbor with a dog named ‘Greasy.’  It’s totally a dog’s name, which makes it a wolf’s name, since dogs are pretty much just wolves on easy mode.”

Síofra growled slightly and curled up beside the hearth.  “It still ain’t much of one.”

“You would if you’d seen this dog.  Anyways, why were you starin’ at the servers like that?”

“I wasn’t staring at them, I was staring at the servingware they were bringing out.”  She let out sigh.  “Did ya see how it was decorated?  The sylvan scenes playing across it?  That was art and no mistake.”

“Heh, maybe we can convince ‘em to let us leave with a doggie bowl.”

Síofra sighed again, wistfully.  “Gosh, that’d be a dream…” 

“Changing the subject,” interrupted Storm, “something’s been bugging me.”

“What’s up, dude?” asked Crack Shot, as he lay back on his bench.
 
Storm looked around the room, a structure made almost entirely of the caribou's ice.  “I’m not sure, but… if you could turn simple water into dishes, into houses, into nearly anything, don’t you think you’d want a good supply of it?”

Crack Shot hummed to himself.  “Yeah, probably, though I’d definitely want a good water supply around even if I couldn’t.”

Storm nodded.  “But where would you get it from?”

“Heck, I dunno.  Rivers, lakes, rain.”

“If I’m not mistaken, Storm would have you consider that last option,” said Check.

“So yer wondering about that too, then?” said Síofra.

Crack Shot sat up.  “So, like, what are you guys gettin’ at?”

“The weather out there brought a lot of snowfall as we all saw, and something has to be feeding those waterfalls,” said Storm.  “Might be a relationship.”

“But if that were the case, then why did all of this just start happenin’ recently?” asked Crack Shot.  “These guys have probably been here for a really long time, right?  Wouldn’t this have been goin’ on before?”

Storm cleared his throat.  “Surely thou dost not—” he bellowed, before being cut off.

“Yeah, yeah, alright, I got it, dude,” growled Crack Shot.  “So if, hypothetically speakin’, they are behind it, how do we convince ‘em to tone it down?”

“I think the bigger question is if ye truly want to make it yer quarrel if it comes to that,” said Síofra, looking between the guardsponies.  “Might get political.”

“Actually… perhaps it would be best for us to dispense with the hypotheticals,” said Check.  “We will have occasion to discuss it with them tomorrow.”

He pulled himself onto a free bench and laid his head on his hooves.

“I think our wisest course of action would be to make certain we are fresh in the morning to do so.  But…,” he trailed off, as he rolled onto his back and stared up at the ceiling.  “Let us hope that we did not make an ill impression tonight.”


---


They were awoken the next day by a rapping on the door.  Storm blinked his eyes open and was surprised to find himself covered in a light sweat.  He rubbed his eyes and looked at the ash of the night’s fire, surprised that the little flame and the littler aperture for its heat had warmed the room so thoroughly.

Check and Crack Shot were stirring on the other benches, and Síofra’s fur appeared to have shortened into a summer coat sometime during the night.

The door shuddered with another hollow staccato.

“Yeah?” yelled Storm.

That was enough of an invite for whoever was outside, and the door slowly swung open, letting in a rush of cold air.

A pair of antlers came through the doorway, followed by their owner, a young doe with a pair of purple lines swirling across her face.  Which was, rather fittingly, quite doe-eyed at the moment.

“Uh, hi there,” said Storm.  “…Erm, I should ask if you understand me, I suppose.”

The doe blinked.

“Oh wow!” she said at last.  “They were telling the truth!  And yes, I think that I understand thee, though thou mayest tell me if I don’t.”

“I think you got it,” said Crack Shot, sitting up.  He gave a wide yawn.

Check stood from his bench and bowed his head towards the doe.  “Is there something we may help thee with, Miss…?”

“Fjóla,” she offered.  “And I have been sent here to bring you to the Thing.”

“Huh,” said Crack Shot.  “Do you remember what it is, exactly?”

Check, who had caught the capitalization, said, “I believe she might mean the assembly of goðar that Fannar had mentioned.  Would that be correct, Fjóla?”

Fjóla nodded.  Then she caught sight of Síofra sitting up, and her mouth fell open.  However, this was not for the same reason as the servants last night.

“And I see she was no lie, either!”  She knelt down.  “I’ve never seen a wolf with eyes or fur like hers!  …Well, not that I’ve ever seen a wolf…”

Síofra looked between the guardsponies uncertainly.

“Greasy, was it?” asked Fjóla.  She extended a hoof and clicked her tongue.  “Here, Greasy!  Come here, girl!”

Síofra narrowed her eyes.

“She’s just, uh, wary of strangers,” said Storm.  “But you said something about some… Thing?”

“Ah, yea, I did!” said Fjóla, standing up and brushing her legs off.  “Usually they do not occur this time of the year, but an exception hath been made for you three.”

Storm felt a sudden chill apart from that of the open door.

“That seems like a lot of hassle for just us,” he said.  “I mean, we wanted to see how things are faring here, and maybe to ask some questions about the weather, but calling an assembly for it?”

“Verily, most of the goðar are very interested in hearing what you have to say about the weather,” answered Fjóla.

“Huh, convenient that we’re all on the same page,” said Crack Shot.

“And… would there be any particular reason why?” asked Check, quietly.

“Well, yea, of course,” said Fjóla, giving him a quizzical look, before shifting her gaze to Storm and Crack Shot, the two pegasi of the group.  “Most of the goðar wish to know why you’re causing it.”