//------------------------------//
// Chapter Four—Where the Games Begin 
// Story: TOH'S Guardian 
// by LiterarySerenity 
//------------------------------//

From their hole near the gorge wall, Rover huddled with his fellow dogs—who were already growing restless and shifting on their haunches. Fido twitched on occasion, but Spot was like a bouncing teakettle, ready to pop from the steam pressure inside. He even made low puffing sounds, which reminded Rover of his dear Granny Woof-Woof (who had found a way of polishing gems by boiling them and also well-known for her stone soups). 

Good old Granny Woof-Woof, with such an accurate aim that it was her trademark to hit targets right between the eyes. And Rover could still feel the impression of the polished granite stone she had thrown while the pack members had chased him away from Dimondia, as a final farewell only Granny could deliver. He still had her gift in his vest pocket and reached in to touch its nice smoothness. 

Ah. Being at the bottom of a dark hole put things into perspective. And it wouldn’t be long now until they went back, if all went according to plan.  

“I can’t take it anymore,” Spot burst out at last. “What’s happening up there? Is the dragon taking the bait?” 

“Okay,” Fido agreed, laughing and clapping his huge paws as if they were about to turn over a rock with possible treasures underneath. “Let’s go see.” 

“Quiet!” Rover snapped at them both. “We have to do this just right, or else the dragon will know we’re here and the whole plan will be ruined. And you don’t want to ruin the plan, do you?” 

“Oops. Sorry.” Fido slapped his large paws over his own mouth.

“Now help me up,” Rover said, and Fido helped him to clamber up the side of the hole. 

Spot, meanwhile, climbed up on his own and shot Rover what he took as an arrogant look on the way past that might have started another fight if they were not all still interested in what was happening in the gorge.


They did not have long to wait before the dragon left the cave. Actually, it was more like he sauntered out of it. He was even stranger up close than when farther away, and as Spot had pointed out he seemed a mix-up of different animal parts all stuck together. It must have been some mutant dragon—Rover guessed—or maybe some other accident of nature. He had heard of weirder-looking dragons, including one supposedly covered in gemstones, who could never look straight ahead and slow as a slug even with its many legs.

Rover wasn’t used to using his imagination, but if there was a dragon like that in the world, it was only fair that one like what he was seeing now.

And as if to confirm his suspicious, the dragon made a show of belching green fire into the air before bending down to gather up the gems one-by-one. He moved slowly, taking his time though looking a bit irritated as most dragons did at being disturbed even for treasures like those stones. 

As he got further along, and closer to the hole they had expertly hid under a collection of leaves and twigs, though, Fido and Spot almost gave them away.

“He’s going to fall in,” Fido announced.

At which Spot barked back:

“Be quiet!”

Then they had to duck down low, as the dragon’s ears perked, he paused in his gem-gathering, and then glanced over in their direction.

The Diamond Dogs held their breaths for so long they almost passed out. Yet then the dragon finally turned back to his task.

Good. He hadn’t seen them, no thanks to Rover’s brother dogs.

But now the dragon was almost to the hole, inching closer and taking forever to get there. His odd bat-like and bird wing fluttered at little when he gathered the second to last one (with the final gem laying right on top of their trap). 

Those wings were so small compared to the dragon, Rover had betted he couldn’t even fly, which was one reason he had gone with the pitfall trap. 

However, even if the creature could get airborne, there was another nasty surprise waiting for him at the bottom.

Rover cackled, despite himself as the dragon stepped onto the branches and went plummeting straight down.

“We got him!” The Diamond Dogs cheered together, hopping out of their hole and howling in triumph. 

“One of Rover’s plans actually worked,” Spot declared.

“Hey,” Rover shot back, the fur bristling on the back of his neck. “My plans are always perfect.”

“Humph,” Spot suddenly scoffed. “Name one.”

With their victory assured, the feud between Spot and Rover might have started right where it left off in the cavern. 

That is, until Fido spoke up:
“Hey, guys. I don’t hear the dragon.”

Rover and Spot stopped and listened.

Fido was right for once.

Even if the dragon had fallen into the hole, they should have heard furious noises like snarls or growls coming from down in it. Flames should have been spewing out into the open air. They should have heard something.

Anything.

But there was nothing.

“Spot, go check on the dragon,” Rover ordered, realizing he sounded uneasy but not caring.

“Why me?” Spot returned, knees knocking together. “This was your plan. You should do it.”


The two glared at each other for a moment, and then did the next best thing:

“Fido, go look in the hole,” Rover said.

“Yeah. See if the dragon is okay,” Spot added.

And Fido, as always amid these stalemates, agreed.


“Okay. I’ll go check on the dragon.” Fido practically pranced over to the hole, beginning to say, “Mr. Dragon, are you all—” Then he paused, eyes bulging in surprise. As Rover and Spot watched, Fido started to slobber. 

And why did he look so happy, all of a sudden?

But it was Spot who asked the question:

“What are you doing?” 


“Hey dogs, you should see all the great gems in here. They’re big and pretty,” Fido said.

“Of course, there are gems down there,” Rover retorted, drawing closer despite it all. “They were part of our plan. And what about the dragon?”

“The dragon isn’t here,” Fido insisted, which made Rover and Spot start. “But these gems are much bigger and shiner than the ones we put out.” 

This news made Rover and Spot dart over to Fido’s side at the hole, where they saw he had told the truth. 

The dragon was nowhere in sight. It was as if he had vanished into thin air.

Yet in his place—or where he should have been—there were a heap of large, rare gems from Fire Rubies to Baby Blue Sapphires. And all of them sat upon a silken pillow on what appeared a wooden board on the bottom.

“Ooooooooh.” The three Diamond Dogs said in unison, and Rover forgot all about the strange disappearance of the dragon or even his plans (as did his brother dogs). Instead, his thoughts involved stuffing his pockets full of those great gemstones.

And before he knew it, Rover was down in the hole alongside Fido and Spot, grabbing at the bounty and barking in pleasure.

It was only then that some odd sense told Rover they were in trouble. The wooden board beneath them lowered ever-so-slightly, and he paused just long enough to hear the sounds of something tensing underneath.

Where had Rover heard that kind of sound before?

Spoing!

And then they were sailing through the skies.

***

The spring beneath the wooden board released at a snap of the fingers, sending the Diamond Dogs shooting out of the ground like rockets. Discord put on sunglasses so he would not have to squint while watching them pass over the gorge, and the Everfree Forest. Depending on how much of the treasure they had greedily shoved into their pockets, they should land at different points in the woods. So if those dogs had gone up without touching a single gemstone, the launch should have carried them to a nice soft bunch of moss that would have been like landing on a bunch of feathered pillows. They would have walked away with nothing less than rattled nerves. 

Unfortunately, the Diamond Dogs were true to their natures and had wasted no time in grabbing all the gems they could. So as a result, they went to quite a different and much rougher part of the forest. Discord judged it would have been in the briar patch where the Briar Rabbits lived. Like Timberwolves, these creatures consisted of bits from the forest, though thankfully they only stuck to their patches and would attach themselves to any pony foolish enough to enter their territory (forced or otherwise).

So that was that. 

Mischief managed.

However, Discord did not quite get the same thrill from their expulsion as he had when tormenting their kind in the Appaloosan Mountain Ranges ages ago. And this was probably because of his conscience prickling him just a like the briars the Diamond Dogs should be experiencing at that moment—or, namely, what Fluttershy might have reacted if she been around to see his short nostalgia trip. 

“Discord, how could you do something so nasty?” Fluttershy would probably have said. “You know better.”

But it wasn’t like Discord had failed to consider this fact and not tried to give the Diamond Dogs a sporting chance to leave without incident. Besides, perhaps falling in the briar patch would teach them a valuable lesson about stealing from the Tree of Harmony, and Fluttershy (like the other ponies) were big on learning lessons.

In any case, now he was free to do as he pleased again, and a contented weariness tugged at him.

Sleep.

That sounded good.


So Discord returned to the cavern and willed a fine bed of clouds to appear in the warmth of TOH’s radiance, flopping onto this lighter-than-air mattress, stretching out, and drifting off to sleep.