Twilight’s revival was put off until the next day, since the priests didn’t keep a Raise Dead spell prepared just in case somepony came in needing one. The party spent the night in town, catching up on local rumors.
The zebras, surprisingly, had been quiet. Since the incident at the mine, the priests had been using a Sending spell to keep in touch with the necromancer on guard at Ghastly Gorge, and he’d reported that things had quieted down. There was still the occasional suspicious patrol, but no zebras had tried to cross.
This was good, because it let him focus on the growing problem of wandering undead. So far, they’d stayed far from Crossroads, but the northern plains were becoming unsafe. One of the ponies at the inn was a farmer who’d moved his whole family back to Crossroads after ghouls – or something – had spent a night scratching at his door and mocking him with promises that they’d eat his children while he watched. He had enough savings that he wasn’t in immediate need, but unless he could reclaim his farm, he would eventually be forced to find another line of work.
Thanks to that, and the still-troublesome Unicorn Bandits, and the rumors of drake attacks in the pass, trade from Bright Valley had slowed to a trickle. The entire village of Crossroads was a trading town without any operating trade routes, at the moment. Their temple was still one of the more powerful (and mercenary) in the entire Bright Valley region, at least, so for now it was keeping the town economy going.
The one specific warning the party received was about Bright Valley’s recent surge in prejudice against the undead. “If you’re going to keep those skeletons of yours, you’d best keep them out of town.”
“I can’t just leave them behind,” Rarity said. “They’re vital to my work!”
"Maybe you could leave them with the Necromancer? Macintosh’s old boss?” Fluttershy suggested
“Kazakh Thul,” Macintosh supplied, since nopony else could remember his name.
“Ugh,” Rarity said. “The last thing I need is to owe him another favor.”
Applejack frowned. “Wouldn’t givin’ him four powerful flyin’ critters to hold off the zebra’s drakes be a favor you were doin’ for him?”
“Obviously, you’ve never tried to negotiate with him,” Rarity said, scowling. “The elven mafia has nothing on that old fool.”
“Your skeletons don’t need to breathe or anything, right?” Rainbow Dash said. “So why not just put them in a barrel or something.”
Pinkie Pie giggled. “With a giant lock and chains, and a warning label on the side --“
“Just a normal box would be better,” Applejack said. “We could walk right past the guards and they’d have no call to search us or anything.”
“But skeletons live in barrels!” Pinkie Pie said. “Everypony knows you hide skeletons in barrels. It’s tradition!”
While Twilight was being raised from the dead, Rarity and Applejack visited the local shops and managed to find four huge boxes which the dragon skeletons could squeeze into, and a mid-sized wagon to carry the boxes and any other equipment, for a few hundred gold. It was meant to be pulled by four ponies, but a large pony like Macintosh would be able to pull it by himself.
By the time they were done, the others were returning from the temple with Twilight in tow.
“Good to see you up and about again, sugar cube,” Applejack said. “Hope you didn’t get in too much trouble on the other side.”
“The last thing I remember is getting my head cut off,” Twilight said. “And although I knew I was about to die, the only thing I could think was that getting your head cut off really should hurt more.”
“You know this means I win, right?” Rainbow Dash said. “You died first!”
“Uh huh,” Twilight said, scowling. “I’m really not in the mood for banter. My head feels like somepony used it to play hoofball while I was dead.”
Pinkie Pie nodded. “You’ll feel better in a week! Or whenever you get your second Restoration cast. Until then it’ll kind of suck.”
“But you don’t remember anything?” Rarity asked, frowning.
“Not a thing,” Twilight said. “Sorry.” She paused. “Do you?”
“Oh yes,” Rarity said. “I remember everything. And I remember it being rather awful at the time, although for the life of me I can’t imagine why I was so revolted by it.”
“Care to describe it?” Twilight asked. “Maybe it’ll spark my memory.”
“Hmm, very well,” Rarity said. “It was like this – the world was still there, but everything was dark. The sky was a swirling vortex of green light that didn’t illuminate anything, and everything was covered in a thick layer of black mold, with a stench like rotting entrails. If I got too close to the mold, little tendrils would extend, reaching towards my spirit, and where they touched they would root inside me, slowly spreading through my soul and turning it cold and black and rotten.
“Despite all that, my body called to me, and I could not resist its pull, even though it meant plunging into the muck, and immersing myself in the squirming filth. I was devoured by the darkness, consumed by the wriggling tentacles of undeath, and bound to the rotting flesh of my corpse.”
Applejack stared at her. “And you can’t imagine why you found that awful.”
Rarity smiled. “Why, all of those sensations sound positively decadent to me now, Applejack.”
Twilight doubled over, looking sick to her stomach.
“Are you okay, dear?” Rarity asked.
“The darkness…” Twilight moaned. “The filth… it’s still inside me…” Her stomach heaved, but nothing came out. She collapsed to the ground, coughing and choking and trying to vomit. “I can’t… I can’t get it out.”
Pinkie Pie patted her on the head. “You’ll feel better in a week,” she said. “Really!”
Twilight felt nauseated enough to want to ride in the wagon, as the party set off for Bright Valley. As always, the road between Crossroads and the city was well-maintained and surrounded by small farms and villages. For some reason, however, despite their disguises as ordinary ponies wearing ordinary merchants’ clothing, the farmers and other villagers kept staring at them as they passed. Nopony said anything, they just paused in whatever work or conversation they were having, and stared intently at the party until they were out of sight.
“Did you notice?” Applejack asked, quietly.
“Yeah, they’ve all got those weird necklaces,” Rainbow Dash said. “Like the troll was handing out.”
“Let’s add them to our disguises, and see if that helps,” Rarity suggested.
With the fake amulets clearly visible, the party still attracted attention as they passed, but after a few seconds the villagers would look away, confused.
“Oh, great,” Twilight said. “They’ve all been charmed by the blue metal.”
“You know what this is?” Rainbow Dash asked. “We thought it looked kind of familiar but none of us could place it.”
“Um, yes?” Twilight said. “I spent a week under a loyalty spell while I waited for it to wear off, remember? Those amulets are made of the same blue metal as all those cursed weapons we recovered from the mine.”
“Oh. Oh, Kara take those fools!” Applejack snapped. “We turned them in for safe-keeping, and those hay-brained morons turned right round and sold them, didn’t they!”
“We don’t know that for sure,” Twilight said. “The zebras might have managed to infiltrate the countryside and seed it without our help.”
“Except the troll said that it was given the amulets by an orc,” Rarity said. “Not a zebra.”
“I just hope it hasn’t gotten to the city,” Applejack said. “The last thing we need is to have to deal with a whole city full o’ zombie slaves.”
“It was a light charm spell that compelled its victims to distribute the blue metal to new victims,” Twilight said. “Calling them ‘zombies’ is a huge exaggeration. Not that this isn’t something we need to deal with.”
“Yeah, I getcha. I just thought for a second that we might get a chance to go home and rest for a spell, without some world-shattering disaster dogging our tails,” Applejack said.
“You’re from Bright Valley, then?” Twilight asked.
“Among other places,” Applejack replied, with a smirk.
“Everyone’s from Bright Valley,” Rainbow Dash said. “I mean, like, it’s huge. There’s more griffons in Bright Valley than in the Griffon Mountains.”
“I’m from Bright Valley too!” Pinkie Pie said.
“I thought you grew up in the zebra lands, with Rarity?” Twilight asked.
“Nooo! I ran away to the zebras to study alchemy, but my family’s from Bright Valley,” Pinkie Pie said. “Oh! You can all stay at my house! It’s really big and we’ve got plenty of guest rooms, and my mom’s super-nice. You’ll love her!”
“Don’t see why not,” Applejack said. “No place better to lie low than on private property.”
A few hours before dark, the party approached Bright Valley. The rumors they’d heard in Rally were that most of the orcish military had been pulled out of the city as part of the general recall, but looking at the ranks of orcs and ponies standing guard on the walls, and the flights of griffons and pegasi circling proudly overhead, one would not imagine the city guard undermanned.
Or underequipped – without exception, every guard wore a gleaming breastplate or chain shirt of bright blue metal, and their spears and axes were also of the same make.
“Oh come on!” Rainbow Dash cried, spotting the glint of blue from the fliers, first.
“This is… impressive,” Twilight said. “It was only a week or two since we were here last, and they’ve already replaced the guards’ weapons and armor? That’s an almost unbelievable level of efficiency for a military bureaucracy.”
“I disagree,” Applejack said. “That is a completely unbelievable basket of horseapples, right there.”
Rarity laughed. “Who would have guessed that the secret to effective government is to place the population under mental control?”
“Actually, mister headband says that it’s been tried before, a lot of times,” Pinkie Pie said. “But a Crown of Command Economy always goes bad. Really really bad. I hope we’re not too late!”
Judging from the amount of traffic going in and out of the city gates, the economy did not appear to have collapsed just yet. As they joined the line and approached the checkpoint, they could see that while most travelers were waved through without any trouble, anypony not wearing a blue amulet was stopped and searched thoroughly, while a group of ponies took them aside to talk. In most cases, they were given amulets, and the inspection was called off.
“We’ll be fine,” Applejack said. “We’ve got amulets, right? As far as any of them know, anyway.”
When the party reached the checkpoint, the guards looked at them strangely, seeming to be confused at the sight of their amulets, just like the villagers had been. Still, they were about to wave them through, when an earth pony guard in the back, who looked like she was dozing off instead of participating in the checkpoint, suddenly leapt to her hooves and pointed at Rarity. “Undead!”
The other guards drew their weapons. “I knew there was something off about them,” an orcish guard said, with a scowl. “I can’t get anything on them from Harmony.”
Around them, the crowd screamed and backed away, leaving them alone against five guards, with more on the way.
“Wait, please,” Fluttershy said. “There’s no need to fight. She’s not a bad undead!”
“Undead are unable to experience Harmony,” the orc said. “If any of you who are alive lay down your arms and surrender, we’ll allow you to take her body back to Crossroads for resurrection after we destroy her.”
Twilight stood up from her perch on the wagon, and stared down at the guards. “That is not acceptable. We are Adventurers, agents of the Empire, and you do not have the authority to tell us who or what we may associate with. She is with us, and she will not be molested!”
“Oh crap,” one of the guards in back whispered – quietly, but not too quietly for most of the party to make out. “What do we do? If any of them get away --”
“We’re not ready for this,” another responded. “Let them through, for now. We can deal with them later.”
As soon as they finished talking, the guard Twilight had threatened lowered his weapon, and stood aside. “You should know that undead are not allowed in Bright Valley, and we scan for them constantly. We’ll let you violate this rule for now, but you’re going to run into trouble every time you encounter a patrol. We recommend you finish whatever business that thing has in this city quickly, and remove her before she becomes even more of a problem.”
“Your recommendation is noted,” Twilight said. “Let’s go.”
“Ha!” Rainbow Dash said, once they were away. “That was crazy. I thought we were going to have to fight them.”
“Yeah, that would have been totally crazy,” Pinkie Pie said. “There’s like a million of them, and only seven of us, and they’ve got that creepy Harmony thing going on. You know what else is crazy? We are, to even be in this city. Ha ha ha ha ha, isn’t that crazy?”
“Come on, I think I know how we can lose the tail they’re tryin’ to pin on us,” Applejack said. “Would be easier without a pony-loving cart, though,” she grumbled.
Applejack led the party into the back alleys of the city, until they were thoroughly lost, but taking routes that took them through places where they couldn’t be seen from the air, and where any guards trying to follow them would stand out, badly. She also had them change disguises often. After about half an hour of that, she left them in a large covered alcove that was once an entryway to the city sewers, before it was bricked over. She took Rainbow Dash out on a quick shopping trip, and they came back with a tarp to cover the wagon, along with several large sheets of lead.
Rarity squeezed between the boxes as the rest of the party hurriedly wedged the lead sheets into place to block any further attempts to magically detect undead. It would have been better to have the lead lining inside the boxes, since anypony looking under the tarp would see the lead immediately, but that was for later. For the moment, this would serve.
Thus shielded, and with new disguises again, they made their way to the upper class district. The district was walled and gated, but Applejack’s calm assertion that they had a delivery for the Pie Manor got them through without incident.
Pinkie Pie perked up as they approached her childhood home. The others were not so confident, seeing the state that it was in – the lawn was unkempt, with what were once topiary wildly overgrown, and the grass almost knee high. The mansion itself was stone, and designed to look like a castle, with crumbling gargoyles looming from its stylized turrets and crenellations.
To Pinkie, none of that seemed unusual. “Oh, I can’t wait to see my family again! They were always really sensible folks so I’m sure they haven’t been taken in by this whole Harmony nonsense, and if they are we can just dispel it, right?”
“Maybe,” Twilight said. “The archmage who treated me didn’t think that was an option.”
“Or maybe he just wanted an excuse to put a loyalty spell on you,” Rainbow Dash said. “We can try anyway, right?”
Pinkie was already knocking on the door, excitedly. Before long, it swung open, and she leapt through and gave the pony opening it a huge hug. “Eeeee! I’m so happy to see you again –“
She stopped staring at the pretty young leatherwing in her arms. “You’re not my mommy. Or my sister.” Not letting go, she leaned forwards to give the stranger a glare. “Who are you?”
“I’m one of the maids?” the young girl said, smiling nervously. “Who should I tell the master is visiting?”
“Oh!” Pinkie Pie said, looking around, and letting her go. “Yeah, I guess this place could use some cleaning up. I’m Pinkie! Pinkie Pie. You can tell them Little Pinkie is here if you want, but Pinkie Pie is probably the proper pronouncement. I’m here with my friends to visit for a while, before we go back to stabbing people. Bad people, I mean. You know, monsters and things.”
The maid bowed. “I’ll inform the master immediately. It’ll be good to have family in the house again.”
“Well,” Twilight said after she left, as they walked into the foyer to wait. “I didn’t see any blue metal, at least. But how long has it been since you’ve visited, Pinkie? It sounded like only your father was here.”
“Yeah, weird,” Pinkie said. “I mean, sure, I’ve been gone for about ten years, but I’m sure it’s nothing bad. Maybe mom just went off to become a pirate or something. Or, you know, maybe the maid meant ‘more family’. Like, more than just my mother and father and all my sisters. Maybe?”
“As long as we’ve got somewhere safe to sleep,” Applejack said, stretching herself out to lounge on a long bench.