Death is usually not a singular event. Rather, it is a process, as the individual systems of a living creature fail and it slips away into whatever comes after death. This was equally true for creatures of pure magic – including liches.
Almost everything Grogar had been was gone, purged by the Elements of Harmony. The lich was dead, and it would never come back to life. Yet, some of its power yet lingered in the blackened bones that made up its skeleton. Not much, and it was fading fast, but there was enough to jealously hold onto something that did not belong to it for just a little while longer.
But only a little while. As the sun rose across the isle of Tambelon, the last of Grogar’s power finally gave out. In physical terms, this was shown by a crack in the demon ram’s black skull, in its forehead, that split the skull in twain. In magical terms, it meant that the stolen soul that had been the lich’s first and only victim after its apotheosis was released.
The stolen soul raced from its former prison like it was being chased. It was fading fast, being pulled to beyond the pale, but its former home was intact, and was just close enough that…
There was a white, hot flash of light in his eyes as they came back into focus and he blinked rapidly. There was air, and he sucked it in, breathing deeply in and out in great gasping breaths. There was pain, a lot of it, but it was over in an instant, before he even had a chance to cry out.
“I’m alive?” Bray asked. The rational part of Bray’s mind found that to be impossible. The greater majority of Bray’s mind, however, simply accepted it.
The donkey prince looked around. He was lying on a smooth tiled floor that looked quite familiar – remarkably like the floor of Spellhold, to be precise. The lighting was odd, though – perhaps because the place had never been lit by natural light before. The lack of walls explained that: the floor of Spellhold was exposed to the open air, as its walls, its ceiling, and everything that was supposed to be in it, were missing. He could only guess that something had set off the teleportation matrix that he had been setting up before...
Bray stood, looking around confusedly. Spellhold was gone…and the city beyond, Tambelon, was in ruins. Fires burned in several of the city’s blocks, and the devastation that had been caused by the battle of two thousand years previous seemed to have been doubled – there were freshly destroyed buildings, broken streets, burned parks. The castle of Tambelon itself, however, seemed intact, and given the moat that surrounded it and the several hundred feet of cobble stone between the moat and the castle, the city’s fires were unlikely to spread there.
Bray began to trot, looking around, trying to figure out what had happened. He followed Tambelon’s main road – carefully avoiding the fires, though most of them seemed to have burned themselves out. It wasn’t long before he was at the city’s main gates, and therefore, looking down at the black skeleton of a gigantic ram, its skull split in two.
Bray stood still a moment. Grogar…was dead. He was dead. For real, this time. The alicorns must have killed him. He was gone…gone!
“Ha!” Bray exclaimed, leaping forward and bringing a hoof down on the black skull. The bone proved brittle, and it shattered easily beneath the donkey’s stomp. He laughed aloud as he brought his hooves down again and again on the former demon ram, utterly destroying the skeleton. By the time he was done, he was panting, sweating, and wearing a massive grin, while the lich’s skeleton was nothing more than shards and dust.
“I’m alive!” Bray exclaimed happily, running around Grogar’s skeleton happily. “I’m alive! Grogar is dead, and Bray lives! Long live King Bray! Long live King Bray!”
The donkey stopped, chuckling to himself. “Now, to get to work!” he exclaimed, trotting proudly back towards his castle. “First order of business, get these fires out! Easy! Conjuring water is simple enough – ”
Bray stopped after a moment, glancing up. His head was still unadorned, his mane uncovered, as he remembered that Grogar had taken his turban and, more importantly, destroyed the gemstone that Bray needed to cast any spells. Even worse, it had already been his backup gemstone, the former one having been destroyed by Celestia and those short-eared simpleton ponies. For the time being, Bray had no ability to cast any spells whatsoever.
The donkey prince considered. “No matter!” he declared, resuming his canter back into the city. “I can create a new gemstone easily. I can create them by the dozens! I have the resources, in the castle, and the books are right there in Spell…oh.”
Bray stopped again. He realized, quite suddenly, that he had never really learned how to create the magical gemstones that donkeys needed to cast their spells. He hadn’t needed to. That was what servants were for – and, after Grogar had killed all the servants and, in fact, everyone on the island, Bray still hadn’t learned. The information on how had all been contained in Spellhold, right next to the castle. There hadn’t been a reason to.
“Oh…oh no,” the donkey breathed.
He was King Bray of Tambelon, a city that lay in ruins, a kingdom dead two thousand years thanks to his own actions.
He was King Bray of Tambelon, a mighty sorcerer who knew dozens if not hundreds of spells, but had no ability to cast them now.
He was King Bray of Tambelon, alone on an island in the middle of a wide sea, with his only hope of rescue being that one of two alicorns, both of whom hated him immensely, would decide to check in on him.
He was King Bray of Tambelon, murderer of his entire people. And he wasn't going anywhere, anytime soon.