Chapter Eight
“Three Faces, One God”
Cure Ator had never truly felt fear before. His life before taking stewardship of the Royal Gallery had been one of pampered luxury, as he was the son of the former steward and thus a member of a minor aristocratic family. Even the decade or so he'd spent in his sire's old horse shoes had been far from eventful. The closest he'd ever come to fear was when he'd been summoned to the Lunar Princess' chambers, which had only been the once, shortly before the hanging of the painting Ator now found himself standing in front of.
“It's a rank obscenity! Stand out of the way, this instant!”
The unicorn mare was at the head of a whole herd of similar ponies, and stunk of anger and sweat. Her prim, frilly dress and horn-rimmed spectacles framed a face contorted with righteous indignation. Ator's heart hammered in his chest, as he saw that in her magic she had suspended a round, metal container, marked with hazard symbols.
“P-Please, madam, Three Faces, One God is a priceless work of post-Nightmare art--”
“You can see her parts!” the mare shrieked, brandishing the container. “Her dam's parts!”
“Madam, that is rather the point!” Ator said, as fiercely as he could. “Princess Luna is shown as three aspects, a core element of her iconography, and as such--”
“What if a foal saw this? They could trot in off the street, and this would be here, just... waiting for them! Lurking, even!”
“Please, madam, put down the naphtha, before you start a fire!”
“Oh, but sir, isn't that rather the point?” the mare intoned, ominously.
Ator saw her magic pull out the stopper and, before he could do anything about it, the sickly, fatty stench of the naphtha mixture filled the air. The amber liquid sloshed out in a long streamer as she jerked the container about. Ator had never been a combat-minded unicorn, he had refused time and again all the self-defence courses his sire had tried to send him on, but from somewhere deep inside him an anger-filled surge of thaumic energy erupted. There was a flash like a photographer's lamp going off, and Ator was blinded. Somepony shrieked, and he felt himself being piled on by the other mares. Pain radiated out from his withers, and there was a sensation of teeth. Sight resolving in a blur of after-images and tangled hooves, he realized he was being dragged.
“You absolute rotter!” somepony shouted. “You've killed her!”
“I'm okay, Tacit, he only got my mane.”
“Get the rope! Hang him!”
The gallery echoed with the sort of blood lust Ator had only read about in books. Even struggling for his life, he wasn't able to resist the mouths and hooves of the baying mob, let alone the cool, impersonal touch of their combined telekinesis. His heart sunk as he heard flames begin to take hold behind him. Together, the mares moved him out of the Long Gallery and into the East Roundel, a space for displaying the innumerable porcelain fertility statues that had been entrusted to the Gallery over the years. With growing despair he heard and saw some of those delicate creations, mostly votive images of foals, tumble onto the marble and shatter.
Adjoining the East Roundel was the Short Gallery, a curved wing of red and vermillion carpeted floors and great slit windows that let in just the right amount of light to best display the delicate watercolours that were kept there. Fantastical pastoral scenes, imagined mythological pasts, and more rough things too; simple earth pony farmers tending their crops, or gleeful pegasi frolicking in cloudscapes and bathing in pillars of light. These the rioters did not burn, and as he was heaved past them he almost smiled, glad that what were perhaps his last moments alive would be filled with such beautiful things.
Almost, for it was at that moment they reached the end of the Short Gallery, and Ator realised where it was they intended to hang him from. The Purple Room was a relatively small space, fitting perhaps forty ponies comfortably inside at any one moment. It contained only one piece, a statue in bronze, by the infamous third cousin twice removed of Starswirl the Bearded, Starswirl the Unshorn. Perhaps better known for his inappropriate party tricks and spells of mass destruction, the unicorn had once, for a short period, tried his hoof at physical art. The result had been a series of alarming bronzes, at which point he had been censored by the Crown and never allowed near art again.
Celestia Penetro Omnes was a life size version of the venerable ruler, reared up so as to be standing vertical, massive wings spread wide. Even for a polymath from a family of polymaths, it was impressive first attempt. The most intricate of details had been carefully recreated, from individual feathers to bulging veins, to the slightest variations on the gilded faces of her regalia. Every single aspect of the Princess had been captured exactly and perfectly, and besides the colour, one would have been forgiven for thinking it was Celestia herself. All except for one, rather tumescent addition.
“There! Hang him from that... abomination!”
“Ooh-er, I've never seen one like that before!”
“It's a very good abomination, isn't it, Tacit?”
“Shut up, Dream, this is sick filth!”
“Oh, sorry.”
The mares slapped him down in front of the limestone plinth the statue was sat on with some degree of force. He saw the rope snake upwards, to be looped around the bronze phallus. As they began to fasten a noose with the dangling end, he realised the seriousness of the situation. His mouth went dry, and suddenly all he could hear was the sound of his heart straining away inside his chest. He tried again and again to break free of the magic restraining him, desperately struggling for anything that might save his poor life. His own thaumic grip, wild and unfocused by the panic, grasped at the mares around him. Ator suddenly recalled a fragment of something his foalhood wet nurse had been fond of saying, an ancient kenning. Thauma's grasp is merely a stalwart hoof, unclenched.
“Oof! The bastard hit me!”
Ator felt the feedback sing through his stubby horn, as though it had been struck with a tuning fork. He swung his new-found stalwart hoof about, back and forth, throwing every ounce of his will to survive into the melee. He was rewarded with a crumbling sound, like a rockfall, and he felt something that had once been firm give way through the feedback link. The magic keeping him fastened down ebbed away, just in time for him to see the statue's plinth give way, and the great bronze object begin to fall. The mares around him screamed in panic, and their hooves clattered against the floor as they panicked, they themselves now desperate to flee. Then, the masterfully rendered tip of the statue's inappropriate extra slammed into the side of his head, and the world went dark.
*
At Luna's command, Infra Base had cleared everypony out of the Selenite Court, sending them back upstairs to the Welcome Hall to convene themselves more properly. The bravery of the Adroit Lancers, as well as the general aura of inspiration that Luna emitted wherever she went, had initially brought down the rest of the civilian nottlygna, which had naturally occasioned a moment of levity and joy, threatening to explode into an all-out party. The air still stunk of the medicinal leaf satinal, which had been produced from nowhere en masse and burned for perhaps not entirely medical reasons. Base's mind still rang a little with the leaf's effects; whatever strain the nottlygna had brought out was powerful enough to affect even with secondhoof smoke. If we nottlygna have any magic at all, Base had thought, It is the power to immediately home in on whatever narcotic, alcoholic or otherwise enjoyable substances there are to be had, and consume them.
Of course, sensing that a riotous orgy might be about to break out, the Princess had instructed them all to break up, giving them their various tasks and jobs in order to focus their energies on something more productive. Those that had remained she had moved on, and now it was only herself, and the increasingly-ill looking Zo Nar in the subterranean geode-court.
“I rather hope it is still there,” Luna said, to nopony in particular.
“What's that, Mother?” Nar said, somewhat groggily.
“My quarterstaff, of course,” the Princess said, annoyed, as though it were obvious.
“I didn't think you carried weapons, Mother,” Base said.
“Well, not in modern times, of course, but in the past...” Luna's speech trailed off, and her eyes became unfocused.
“In the past? Was it a thing of the Nightmare's gear?” Base said, heartbeat jumping a few notches, muzzle furrowed in disapproval. “All that was scrapped, last I heard. Some say your sister wrapped the Nightmare's helm and armour in rock and buried it in the low places of the world.”
“I do not remember what befell Mythraegg,” Luna said, after a long moment in which she appeared stunned. “He was a sturdy, ardent thing, as good for laying out an opponent as for cracking open skulls.”
“Forgive me, Mother, but you are a creature of vast powers, are you not?”
“Ah, yes, so what use would I find for mortal weapons?” Luna smiled, sardonically. “Sometimes, Infra Base, 'tis better to exercise strength through knowable means, measured strikes and careful ways, than to simply cast a shadow of divinity over my foes and forever take them.”
“So where do you think it might be?”
“One thousand years, and more, have passed since last I saw him. Though his construction would bear him down the ages well, a single, simple thought by my sister, or the careful work of pony hooves, could have undone him. Unlike the Nightmare's helm, he was of mere physical being.” Luna placed a hoof under her chin and her gaze moved upwards. “But, there is one place that we could look.”
*
“...which, of course, means obsidian is a very poor material for a striking weapon, but as it is such a strange, black stuff, makes for a surprisingly effective striking weapon.” Luna paused and smiled devilishly. “Do you get it? It is a jest on words! Because a five meter rod of jet black rock flying toward you at several times the speed of sound is very intimidating, but also--”
“Extremely amusing, Mother, but I think Zo Nar has passed out.”
“Oh, fie on you, it was not that bad!”
“No, Mother, look...”
Base dropped onto her belly beside Nar, who had collapsed in a heap against the sweeping staircase that ran up the centre of the Tower of the Day. She placed the tip of her muzzle under the mare’s jaw, feeling for a little throb of life.
“She barely has a pulse,” Base said, grimly.
Luna frowned and sat down on her haunches, her horn lighting up. With a practiced ease, she began to remove the armour that encased Nar. As soon as the cuirass and shoulder-pauldrons came off, the problem revealed itself. Ugly splotches of blood stained a makeshift muslin bandage that ran around the nottlygna's torso. With the pressure from the armour gone, fresh blood erupted from the edges of it, splashing onto the cut granite slabs that served as stairs.
“I have seen this before. In great battles, my soldiers would take much injury, and seem to stand it fine, but fall as soon as victory songs began,” Luna said, the light of her magic brightening and her eyes closing. “Though the cut was slight, it has damaged more within than externally would show.” The Princess inhaled sharply, as though she were feeling the pain of the wound herself. “She has lost much of her blood volume, and is in shock as a result.”
There was a soft fizzing noise, and Base felt a wave of heat rush over her skin, like the opening of an oven door. Almost immediately, the flow of blood slowed.
“I have mended the broken parts,” Luna said, opening her eyes again. “She will need water, and a dose of selenesi clemens.” The Princess stroked Nar's pale cheek with a hoof. “Please make sure she gets a little more than usual. I think this one has suffered quite enough for now. It will be good that she gets some sleep. Surely, I will see her mind soon, and we will reconcile the horrors she has witnessed, and caused herself.”
“I'll take her down to the Welcome Hall.”
“Please do, and when you are finished, meet me in my sister's study.”
“Yes, Mother.”
*
When Base finally made it up the Court of the Zenith, she was quite out of breath. The tower it sat at the top of was almost half a kilometre in height, though the flat nature of the single stair meant a far greater distance was actually travelled in getting to the top. Her anatomy did her no favours in that department. Nottlygna were built for long, flight-assisted bounds, and sudden bursts of extreme agility in the air. Had she taken to the wing, she'd have likely collapsed from the effort before the halfway point, even without the extra load of armour.
Without Celestia, the Court seemed very small. Base trotted through it slowly, heart hammering in her chest. The sun's rays shone mercilessly in through the domed ceiling, still casting a pure white glow, as it was still before noon and the rainbow effect that time would bring. Conversely to the Selenite Court, which had been mostly untouched by the mayhem, the Court of the Zenith was an absolute shambles. Rolls of neatly bound parchment had been cast about all over the unyielding marble floor, punctuating fields of smashed crystal decanters, lost horseshoes, and great puddles of ink. At some point, anarchy had occasioned what looked to have been a food fight, but with stationary materials. Expensive roc-feather quills, their iridium nibs each worth a month of Base's salary, lay soaking in equally expensive wine, shafts broken.
The mare chuckled as she reached Celestia's throne. It was a far cry from the comfy pouffe Luna used. The reassuringly solid object was a block of granite ten metres tall and five wide, layered over with three centimetres of gold, save for where it met the floor, where the naked rock was finely polished and engraved all around with the same, repeating characters. CEL DEI EX SOL REG ULT.
Base sniffed the air, and her chuckling threatened to explode into full blown laughter. The unmistakable musk of energies expended filtered up through the discordant olfactory clutter. Toward the back of the seat of the throne, lipstick kisses on gold and hoof marks completed the picture.
Behind the throne, in a space the designers of the room clearly intended never to be noticed, let alone looked at, was a simple door. Had it not been left open, Base would have been out of luck. It bore the most complex set of locks she'd ever seen, and undoubtedly more in the way of thaumic defense that she could not. This was as far as the mare had ever been before and, in crossing the unassuming threshold, she suddenly felt nervous. It was as though she was invading the sacred, private domain of some terrible monster. No, not a monster. The mother of monsters, a real Echidna. This doesn't feel right at all.
Base couldn't help but stifle a gasp as she beheld the study. Circular, like the disc of the sun, and with easily enough space for a squadron of ponies to practice flying in, the room imposed itself in her mind. Right in the centre was a monumental black desk as tall as she was, and from beneath it radiated patterns of black marble and red quartz, forming the rays of the iconographic star. At each of the ray points were doorways, and Base's internal map quickly realized they could not possibly extend into more rooms. The tower simply wasn’t that big.
Princess Luna was going through her sister's things. Whilst the study was quite sparse, there was still a mishmash collection of ancient drawers, cabinets, smaller desks, writing slopes, and a number of other strange objects on gold stands that Base didn't recognize. Piles of books completed the arsenal, and though the study was replete with every other item of furniture one might expect from such a place, it had no bookcases. Instead, the leather bound tomes were piled neatly here and there, so great in volume that they spilled onto the grand jet desk itself.
“And to think, they have the gall to call her the Ordered God!” Luna said, as she noticed Base begin to trot toward her. “It is as though she has Discord for a secretary!”
“What are you looking for, Mother? Surely, your weapon is not just in amongst her things?”
“No, Mythraegg is not here.” Luna sighed. “I am looking for one of sister's scrying orbs.”
“You're going to scry for it?”
“Before I realised the dire state of the capital, I was attempting to reunite the bearers of the Elements of Harmony. I may have accidentally revealed a little too much of our nation's past, and this greatly disheartened them,” she said, picking up a cabinet in her magic and giving it a suspicious shake before setting it down. “I believe Loyalty may be in the caves beneath the city.”
“She won't be there, Mother, we sealed those after the incident with the changelings.”
“What, really?” Luna paused her rifling. “Are you certain?”
“Yes, Mother, I oversaw one of the blasting crews myself,” Base said, stopping a respectful distance from the Princess. “With respect, I'm surprised you did not notice. The explosions were quite fierce. We had some unicorns from the Honourable Order of Pyros come down with us. It was very exciting.”
“I am sure it was,” Luna said, deflated. “Our plans evolve by the minute. We shall have to find Loyalty on the way. Honesty remains in Ponyville, as does Laughter. Generosity is, luckily for us, disposed by a worse version of what affects our countrymares. Kindness will not have strayed far, though.”
“Why do we even need them?”
“So that we might sway Twilight from this path my sister has set her down, and avert disaster.”
“Can you not merely ask?” Base wrinkled up her muzzle in confusion. “I have never met the Princess of the Dusk, but nopony ascends to that position without goodness in their hearts, or a will to defend equinity.”
“She dwells in places that I can never go again,” Luna said, suddenly avoiding looking Base in the eyes. “Once an addict, always an addict. All I can do is see to the safety of my little ponies, and assist the Elements in preventing their friend following in my hoofsteps.”
“As you say, Mother.”
The Princess nodded her head in assent, and trotted out along one of the quartz star's rays, heading toward the easterly door. At that moment, Base realized how utterly silent Celestia's study was. Hooves on rock should have made at least a noticeable clatter, but it seemed as though the room was somehow stealing away the sound. Equally, at such a high altitude above the ground, the roar of wind was never far away. Even within the padded, palatial luxury of the Court of the Zenith it had been audible. Now, it was like she had stepped into a bubble of nothingness.
“You have been to the Hidden Delight, have you not?” Luna said, looking back at her.
“Oh, yes indeed, I have.” Base suddenly found herself smiling, and she sighed deeply.
“Do you know that my sister has her own demesne?”
“Is that where we might find your weapon, Mother?”
“Amongst a great many other things, yes,” Luna said, placing a silver-shod hoof very carefully against the eastern door. There was a sound like distant chimes being rung, piercing in its lonesome quality. Luna kissed her teeth. “She is truly unchanging. I would have thought that she would have moved the entry locus in a thousand years.” She pressed down on the ordinary-looking, hoof-shaped wooden handle. The mechanism clicked.
Luna tapped the door with the tip of her hoof, and it swung open. With a soft swish of ethereal mane, she went through. Base followed immediately, with no small measure of trepidation in her heart, but feeling that she might be far safer at the Princesses' side, no matter where she was going next, than alone in the study of the Dei Solis.
With a resounding bang the stagecoach landed and Double Emboss was jolted awake. The pinging of gravel against the iron and ponyoak frame filled the little cabin, along with the sound of dozens of hooves struggling to slow down and the general ruckus of whinnying and relief that the end of their journey bore. Emboss' breath came out clear for the first time since taking off, and through the panes of heavy crystal glass afternoon sunshine came pouring in, warming his bones most pleasantly. Emboss nudged Truth gently with his magic. The mare was firmly asleep, draped over his withers. He smiled and snuggled back into her weight. She hasn't slept like this in years.
Somepony tapped on the glass very enthusiastically, and Truth gasped as she woke. “Come on, ye bastards!” the tapper shouted, heavily accented voice dull but still somehow managing to be alarmingly shrill. “Welcome to Port Dauphine!” With that, he trotted along to the next carriage, away and out of sight.
With the quiet, sleepy activity of freshly-woken travelers everywhere, Emboss and Truth disembarked from the stage. The landing strip was a long, approximately rectangular, blob of gravel in a flat field just outside the port itself, which quickly began to fill with ponies who spilled out of their carriages and other aerial conveyances with no particular fanfare. The air lay hot and turgid over everything, and what had begun as a welcome warmth soon turned into an uncomfortable and oppressive heat. Emboss felt sweat begin to prickle under the straps of his panniers as he put them on, absently rifling through them to make sure nothing had been misplaced on the way.
“Horns up,” Truth mumbled. “Here comes somepony.”
“Quo vadis, laddy?” said an ancient looking pegasus, clad in gray and blue armour, who was missing an ear and what seemed to be most of his left wing. “Objecta declarat, anything at all?”
“Pardon me?” Emboss said, after an awkward pause where his eyes lingered far too long on the denuded stump poking from the stallion's left side.
“First time here then,” he concluded, and grumbled with a sound like tar being poured at the end of a long tunnel. “D'ya 'ave anythin' t'declare, an' what is the purpose of yer' visit?”
“It's the tax inspector, darling,” Truth said.
“Oh, right, gosh, sorry, I wasn't expecting this.”
“Wasn't it in your book?” She smirked, sardonically. “Port Dauphine is a Special Tax Zone.”
“Yer sister’s right there, laddy,” the pegasus said, tapping the front of his armour, where there was a rather worn looking double-fish crest.
“This is my wife, sir.” Emboss frowned. “We've nothing to declare, and our business is our own.”
“No word of a lie?” the inspector cocked an eyebrow in disbelief. “Well, lucky you, eh?” He licked his lips. “I'll just put down 'pleasure' as the purpose of yer' visit, then.” He ambled off without further questions, after giving their scant baggage a quick once over.
“Hmph, 'sister', indeed!” Emboss wrinkled his muzzle.
“Didn't you see his eyes? He was blind as a bat,” Truth said, fussing over his pannier straps, adjusting them so that they were more to her liking. “We've far yet to go, and stranger cultures still than this to see. Why, they still speak our language! You'll need to be more tolerant if you want to avoid being dinner.”
“You wouldn't have thought they were speaking Equuish, the way he was going on. All that 'quo vaddis' stuff, and the accent!”
“Equuish is a slatternly thing, darling, a craven whore that lets herself be taken roughly from behind in alleyways by anyone, be they pony or otherwise, that cocks her a kindly smile. We should think ourselves lucky that they are not hooting and chirping at us, as they might be wont to do, what with all the gryphons hanging about.”
“Is enunciation too much to ask for?” Emboss sighed. “You're right, I suppose.”
“Naturally.” Truth grinned, then looked over toward the distant city gate. “What now, then?”
“Passage, for one thing. I expect that will take time to organize, so first we should find somewhere to stay.”
“Did your guide have anything to say about where might be good for that?”
“Actually, I don't know very much about Port Dauphine at all.”
“Ah, just lots of useless trivia about the sload, then.”
“Slath, and it's not useless. Who knows when stuff like that might come in handy?”
“You know what would be handy right now?” Truth started to trot toward the port. “A travel guide to this city we're in.”
“Did you happen to bring one?”
“I was too busy endorsing your spur of the moment quests to save the world,” she said, shooting him a devilish look. “Not to mention ensuring the fruit of these loins didn't starve in our absence.”
“What loins? These loins?”
Emboss cantered after Truth, catching up to her and nipping her playfully on the rear. She whinnied in gleeful surprise and began to go faster, which sparked a rather foalish game of tag that only stopped when they noticed the extent of the disapproving looks they were getting from the rest of the crowd. By the time they slowed down, they'd reached the end of the landing strip where it transitioned into a wide stone path, with a prominent central furrow which age and the passage of millions of hooves had worn.
Compared to Canterlot, Port Dauphine seemed rather unassuming, as though slapped together at the last moment. It had no sensation of age, no feeling of torpid grandeur, or of moving on timescales and at speeds too slow and complex for mere mortals to really understand. This was a twitching, stinking city, one that sang life in all its many forms. Clustered around the gate, which was reassuringly narrow-looking and set into a forty-foot tall granite wall, were hundreds of stalls and shops, spilling out away from the port and consuming the pathways that lead up to it. Many were little more than a wagon and some gaudy signs propping up a battered tent; others were more impressive things, with vaulted tarpaulin ceilings hiding bubbling cauldrons of oil, in which strange foods were being mercilessly deep-fried.
Emboss coughed reflexively as the wall of smell and noise assaulted him. By now the density of the crowd had doubled, splitting off into two distinct groups; those who were stopping to get something to eat or buy souvenirs of dubious quality, and those who barged or expertly slipped past the distractions, eager to get inside. The queue to get through the gates, as they were narrow and restrictive for the purposes of defense, was already building.
“Perhaps we should wait for a while? Until it calms down,” Truth said, as a mare carrying what appeared to be the entire city's supply of pears on her back collided with her. “Oh, bloody Hades!”
“Good idea, breakfast?”
“Breakfast,” she concurred, somewhat wearily. “Just don't eat anything a gryphon sells you.”
“That's a bit racist.”
“Gryphons are carnivores, darling.”
“I know, but that does that mean they aren’t going to bring our kind of food to mark--” Emboss was interrupted by his own brush with the crowd, being forced to take evasive action at the last moment to get out of the path of an oncoming barrow, which was being drawn by a determined looking colt wearing spectacles. “Look where you're going!”
“Sorry, guv!” the colt shouted, barely pausing to look behind him before carrying on.
“Look, over there,” Truth said, pointing her horn at a cluster of stands that was set off from the main drag into the city. “I see apples.”
Staggering out of the crowd was like stepping into the eye of a hurricane, and Emboss took a moment to dust himself off before joining up with Truth, who'd trotted off ahead as usual. There were indeed apples to be had, piled up high into buckets, alongside pears, little individual pallets of oats and raisins, grapes and mangoes. Beside that was a long all-you-can-eat trough, filled with cabbage, kale of both kinds, and a veritable arsenal of other greens, at which was stood a group of earth ponies, chatting and eating idly. On the other side of the stand cum restaurant were a few bigger shapes, which Emboss didn't immediately recognize.
“I take it all back,” his wife said. “Eat everything those gryphons sell you.”
“Hah!” He shot her a grin, realizing that the creatures working the stand were a pair of full-blood gryphons. “I told you.”
Suddenly, something began to vibrate against Emboss' left side. A shard of fear shot through him, heart racing in his chest. He quickly unclasped his panniers and dug around in them with his magic, feeling for the object. It was a slight sensation, but one which all Canterlot staff had been trained to fear.
“Changelings!” he shouted, loud and unsteady. “Changelings among us!”
One of the earth ponies turned and looked at him disdainfully, as if Emboss had just complained that his gazpacho was cold. Nopony else paid him any attention besides that, other than a collection of annoyed expressions and uncomfortable glances.
“Look, look here,” Emboss said, pulling out a thin, metal disc covered in utilitarian runes. “This is a Changeling alarm, we got them after--”
“Jes' stepped off the stagecoach, eh?” one of the gryphons said, looming up over the counter and peering down at him with hoof-sized gold eyes. “Be eyein' this a moment for me.” He tapped a metal sign nailed to the front of two small barrels that were being used to dispense water. Operated by the KIND PERMISSION of Hive Boundless Joy, in conjunction with Her Majesty Princess Celestia. “We'all Changelings here, friend, hive care deeply f'community outreach, dig?”
Truth grabbed the disc Emboss was holding up and jammed it back into his panniers.
“I do apologize for my husband,” she said, patting his withers, still frozen, his plains-dwelling prey-brain temporarily overloaded by the sudden appearance of angry carnivore shapeshifters. “I think the pressures of a big city have gotten to him.”
“Canterlot plenty big, and y'wouldn't be acting the fool there, Greenie knows,” the gryphon said, sternly. There was an awkward moment of silence, then he smiled broadly and laughed. “Y'ponies, always good to make a changeling laugh.”
*
Cure Ator woke up. Memories from before whirled into his mind, but it was as though he was sat in the eye of a hurricane, and the images of his fate at the hooves of the mad mares didn't really bother him. Even the recollected sensation of the bronze member slamming into the side of his head, the sheer weight of the statue it was attached to bearing down on a single point proved boring. He opened his eyes and saw the outcome lying on the floor in front of him. It was like a jousting lance had speared a grape, though with far more in the way of bloody bone fragments and globs of gray matter. After killing him, Celestia Penetro Omnes had fallen on its side, shattering the marble floor as well. Hm. What a shame.
Ator placed a hoof on what remained of his corporeal form's head. The braincase had been totally pulverized, along with much of one end of the jaw. Did I always look that old? His eyes moved down toward the body's withers and barrel. Was I always so fat? Eugh. And that mane style! What kind of fashion is that supposed to be? Decrepit stallion chic? Ator sighed deeply and stood up. His incorporeal form felt numb, but he was surprised at how many little aches and pains had built up down the years, of which he was now free. Well, I seem to be taking this dying lark fine. Ator's muzzle furrowed. Aren't there supposed to be... Well... Great feathery Valkyries to carry me off? No, that's gryphons. Let's see... Im'Waha'i? No, that's zebras. Greenie? The Dog in the Desert? What comes for ponies when they die? What happens now?
Ator looked around, searching for an answer. The gallery was full of thick black smoke, which glittered and sparkled. Fourteenth century Nightmare Adventists, cor, what a bunch of posers they were, with their bloody sparkly magic paint. Nightmare, yeah, it was a nightmare alright, a nightmare to keep clean! Why did I waste my life in here, looking after all this worthless toss? I never even got married! Celestia take me for a concubine, I never even got drunk!
Though his thoughts were angry, his incorporeal body registered no such change. The steady, ghostly feeling of a heartbeat pulsed in his chest, thudding along as though he were asleep. He trotted back the way he'd been dragged, out of the Purple Room and into the Short Gallery. Bright orange fire, burning ferociously in the presence of so much ready fuel, curved up and around the walls. Where it touched the delicate watercolors it destroyed them immediately, spewing more smoke in a flash of curling paper. It didn't sting his eyes and, when he smelled it, the sense was so fleeting that he realized it must have been a neurological trick, merely a forced memory bubbling up to the surface. The same was true of the feeling of heat; a blast furnace turned down to the feeling of a warm fire in winter.
“Look! There's the atheist!” somepony shouted, from behind him.
Ator spun around toward the sound of the voice. A little herd of ponies, each wearing a different strange hat, came thundering up to him, all looking very eager and excited. They were wearing overstuffed panniers, which were spilling rolled up scrolls and other articles of stationery onto the floor, where they seemed completely unaffected by the ongoing inferno.
“Sir, sir!” said one, who was wearing a helmet with horns on it and talking incredibly fast. “Terribly sorry to hear about your recent demise, but there's light at the end of the tunnel, yes there is! I have for you today a once in a lifetime offer – pardon my pun there sir, just a little psychopomp humor, har har – yes indeed, a once in a lifetime offer! Valhalla! What does that word mean to you, sir? No! Don't answer, I can tell you--”
“Don't listen to this charlatan, sir!” said the pony beside him, who was wrapped in a white sheet that at one end draped over his flank and at the other covered most of his neck. “Not unless you want to spend eternity drinking mead and stabbing things!
“Oh, and that time would be better spent frolicking in fields and spending time with your loved ones? Who wants to do that?” The helmet wearing stallion made a sarcastic face. “Ten billion years with your weird uncle and his pigeon fancying anecdotes, sounds great!”
Ator disappeared. There was no fanfare, no great show of light or sound or color. He was simply there one moment, and not the next.
“Pants. We missed him,” the horn-helmeted one said, sighing.
“Don't worry, chap, plenty more where that came from.” He adjusted his sheet and glanced about. “This Thiasus is only just begun.”
*