Chapter 13
“A false witness will not go unpunished, and he who pours out lies will perish.”—Proverbs 19:9
Fluttershy woke with a throbbing, skull-splitting headache. Groaning, she tried to bring her hooves up to cradle her head. But something was stopping them.
Wha—?
She raised her head from the ground to look down at her body, and felt something like a rough collar chafe against her neck. A rope was tied around her middle, pinning her wings to her sides. Her front legs and hind ones were bound together at the fetlocks by a long rope that trailed up into the air. Her eyes followed the rope to see that it was draped over a wooden beam high above her. The pounding in her head got worse and she lowered it back to the ground. She gasped as a large lump on the back of her head touched the ground and sent fresh waves of pain shooting through her skull. Moaning, she turned her head to the side so that her cheek was pressed against the ground instead. When the pounding had eased up just a bit, she opened her eyes to see what was around her.
She was lying in a dimly-lit room that looked like some sort of cellar or basement. She strained against the ropes binding her legs but they were tight, and after several seconds she was forced to give up. She closed her eyes again, trying to think. How had she gotten here? The last thing she remembered was—
“It’s about time you woke up.”
Fluttershy’s eyes popped open. She knew that voice. But she couldn’t remember it ever sounding that cold before or normally using that many words.
Then Big Mac stepped into her line of vision.
“Big Mac? Where are we? What’s going on?”
The big stallion looked past her. “Where’s the bunny?” he asked, apparently speaking to someone on Fluttershy’s other side.
Fluttershy looked in that direction, wincing as the movement sent another round of pain pounding through her skull, and saw Apple Bloom trotting down a set of stairs to join them.
“He dove into a hole in the ground,” said the young mare. “Trying to dig him out would have taken too long so I just collapsed the tunnel on him. Even if he somehow managed to survive that, he won’t be able to dig his way out before the oxygen runs out.” Turning to Fluttershy, she smirked and added, “Congratulations, Fluttershy. Looks like your little bunny’s really dead this time around.”
“You mean that ... was Angel? ... And the ... corpse was a fake?”
Apple Bloom chuckled. “Just a simple little simulacrum spell I found in one of my old potion books, but it fooled both you and your hodge-podge buddy.”
Fluttershy could think of no way to reply. She had still been trying to adjust to the fact that Angel was dead. Now she’d discovered that the ashes she’d been mourning over were not in fact the remains of her pet. And at the same time she had just learned that while Angel hadn’t had his head stomped in earlier that day, he’d been crushed under a load of earth that evening. Part of her wanted to break down and cry again over her pet’s death, but she still felt too stunned to react.
“But why would you do that?” she finally asked when she managed to find her voice.
“So we could lure you out here, seeing as how it’s time for you to join our other victims,” Apple Bloom said cheerfully.
Other victims...?! Fluttershy gaped at the youngest Apple sibling, not believing what she’d just heard. “Apple Bloom, are you ... are you saying ... it was you?! ... both of you?!”
The Apple siblings both smiled down at her in a way that said clearer than words: Yes.
Fluttershy’s mind was spinning. It’s not possible. They can’t be behind the killings!
She stared at Apple Bloom. “I’ve watched you grow up. I used to foal-sit you. ... You were just a filly when the first murders happened!”
The younger mare’s only response was a laugh which Big Mac joined in on. Fluttershy stared at the stallion. He had been an adult when the murders had happened. Had he been behind them and dragged his little sister into them? Had Apple Bloom lied earlier to cover her brother? She just couldn’t match the idea of a seven-time murderer with the quiet hard-working stallion she’d known for years.
(Earlier that evening)
Angel had been beating on the force field separating him from his owner when Apple Bloom had moved toward him. She had captured him earlier that day, but he had managed to escape, and had spent the rest of the day trying to evade her and her brother. It had been quite cold in the snow but his white coat had provided good camouflage. Unfortunately he had finally gotten caught again and they had brought him back to the cabin to try and lure Fluttershy out.
Now, realizing that Fluttershy might step out from the shield’s protection, he bolted away from the Apples, hoping she would follow him away from them.
“Wait Angel!” he heard his owner shout. Looking over his shoulder, he saw her running after him. As she passed the Apples, he felt a brief flash of relief but it was quickly squashed when she shouted to them, “Stay close to me!”
Unable to explain the danger to Fluttershy, he tried to move faster, hoping to put more space between them and the Apples. Then Fluttershy caught up with him and snatched him up. Twisting around, he looked over her shoulder in time to see Big Mac slam the branch he was holding into the back of Fluttershy’s head hard enough to snap the branch in half.
Angel fell to the ground and landed in a snow drift as Fluttershy pitched forward. Clawing his way out of the snow drift, he saw the Apple siblings circling the fallen pegasus. Apple Bloom used her teeth to pull Fluttershy’s glasses off and tossed them to the side where they landed on a flattened icy patch of snow. Big Mac raised his hoof and stomped the glasses into fragments. Apple Bloom then yanked the purple whistle from Fluttershy’s neck, breaking the string holding it in the process. She tossed it aside as she had the glasses, but the fact that it was tube-shaped caused it to roll across the packed snow.
As Big Mac moved after it to crush it as well, Angel leaped out of the snow drift and grabbed the broken ends of the whistle’s string in his mouth, bounding away from the Apples.
“I’ll get him!” he heard Apple Bloom shout. “You take care of Fluttershy.”
Glancing behind him, he saw Apple Bloom running toward him while Big Mac pushed his head under Fluttershy’s body so that she was draped over his back like a set of saddlebags.
Then he was too busy trying to outrun Apple Bloom to watch what was happening to Fluttershy. Fear and adrenaline had given him unexpected speed earlier, but now the exertion and his old age were both beginning to take their toll on him. Dragging the whistle behind him hampered his movements still further.
Finally out of desperation he dove into a hole in the ground. He huddled as far back in the hole as he could, chest and sides heaving as he tried to get his breath back. Then he felt the ground above him shake and clumps of dirt fell on him. Realizing what was happening, he tried to run back up the tunnel out of the hole, but it had already collapsed, trapping him.
The old bunny could do nothing but huddle against the tunnel’s wall, trying to avoid the great clumps of falling earth by being as small a target as possible.
(Now)
Fluttershy couldn’t believe it. She’d just heard the Apple siblings unapologetically admit to committing the murders, but she still couldn’t believe it.
When she finally found her voice again, all she could ask was, “Why would you do it? Why would you murder those ponies?”
“You really never thought to suspect us, did you?” Apple Bloom chuckled. “As for why ... Oh, let’s just say we wanted to see if we could get away with it.”
This can’t be happening. “But Applejack? Your own sister—?”
Suddenly the cruel amusement vanished from both the earth ponies’ faces and their expressions hardened.
“What did you find out about Applejack?” Apple Bloom demanded. “Tell us! What happened to her?”
Fluttershy stared at the young mare, confused. “You ... you killed her. Didn’t you?”
“Oh, we wanted to.” Apple Bloom muttered. “We wanted to so badly. But then she disappeared.”
Then Big Mac nudged Apple Bloom with his hoof. “We don’t have time for this. Her mix-and-match partner could get back at any moment.”
Apple Bloom sighed. “You’re right. She doesn’t know where Applejack is anyway. Let’s get to work.”
Big Mac moved over to the rope that was looped over the beam and connected to Fluttershy’s fetlocks. He grabbed the free end of the rope and began backing up. Fluttershy gasped as she was yanked around onto her back and lifted into the air. Hanging upside down by her hooves, she felt the blood rush into her head as she revolved in the air.
“Careful,” said Apple Bloom. “We don’t want her to suffocate all at once.” Then she grabbed the end of another dangling rope, and the rough collar around Fluttershy’s neck, which she now realized with horror was a noose, jerked tight. She tried to scream but all that came out was a choking cough. Then, as Big Mac kept pulling her upward, the noose tightened until she couldn’t even squeak.
Head pounding and lungs screaming for air, she could only look down at the two ponies below her. Around the ropes in their teeth, their faces were set in sadistic grins she never would have thought to see there. Then as the pressure around her throat grew more painful, her vision began to blur and fade.
Buried deep under the earth and snow, Angel stirred. The earth was pressing down on him, crushing him. The oxygen was leaking away quickly as well. But he still had the whistle with him. With no other options available, he sucked in as much of the remaining oxygen as he dared, and blew into the whistle as hard as he could.
Far from Sweet Apple Acres, Discord had tracked down new sets of Apple Family documents and was currently floating in the air on his back next to a copy machine he’d conjured. Hands behind his head, and his one eye half-closed behind his sunglasses, he alternately hummed and whistled various tunes, not really needing to concentrate on the documents as they floated in and out of the copy machine.
Then a shrill blast exploded inside his head so loud it almost broke his eardrums. The draconequus doubled over, clutching his head as his long body spun in a circle. Out of reflex, he twisted his heavily-pierced ears shut but it did nothing to block out the noise bashing off the insides of his skull.
Fluttershy!
Both he and the copy machine vanished in a flash of light, leaving the papers to float lazily to the floor. He had put a spell on the whistle that would allow him to teleport right to wherever it was being blown. He'd expected to end up back in the cabin, but instead he found himself outside a good hundred yards from the cabin. He looked around but saw no sign of Fluttershy.
However the blast in his head still continued to shrill. Then he realized that the noise seemed to be coming from underneath his feet. Swinging his lower body backward off the ground so that he was floating in midair, he flicked a finger upward and a large chunk of earth ripped out of the ground right where the sound seemed to be coming from.
What in the world?
He pushed his sunglasses up onto his forehead to get a clearer view inside the hole he'd created, and saw a white rabbit blowing on the whistle he'd given Fluttershy. He flashed the bunny out of the hole and into his paw to get a better look at it. Holding it by the scruff of the neck, he yanked the whistle away from it. Immediately the noise in his head was silenced. Sighing in relief, he turned his attention back to the squeaking and struggling bunny, which he now noticed looked quite old. Old and familiar.
Is that Angel?
Squinting his empty eye socket, he raised the bunny for a closer look and on the way up it grabbed his scarf in its teeth and yanked at it wildly.
"Stop that!" Discord snapped. The bunny continued to squeal and flail about, clearly trying to communicate something.
"Oh, hang on a second," Discord muttered irritably and snapped his talons right in front of the bunny's face. Immediately a deep breathless but still stentorian voice exploded from the bunny's mouth; an effect that would ordinarily have made Discord laugh, but the words that came with that voice effectively slammed the door on any humor he might have been feeling.
"They've got her! ... We've got to … stop them! They're ... going to kill ... Fluttershy!"
Galvanized into action at those words, Discord slung the bunny up onto his shoulders where it hooked its claws into his scarf. Then he flashed the two of them to just outside the force field-protected cabin. Seeing the new set of tracks leading away from it, he swooped through the air in that direction.
Still flying, he snapped his talons and his eyeball flashed into his paw. Tilting his head back, he tossed the eye into the air like it was a piece of popcorn and it plunked into its socket. He pushed down on his eyelids, then pushed them back up. An image sprang out of his eyes as if they were film projectors. He watched the images while at the same time keeping his eyes trained on the ground below. In the images he saw Apple Bloom and Big Mac approaching the cabin with the struggling bunny. He saw Fluttershy come out, exchange words with them, then chase after the fleeing bunny. He saw Apple Bloom and Big Mac snatch up branches and follow her. Then as they topped a hill Fluttershy caught up with the bunny and the Apples caught up with her. Big Mac swung his branch, bringing it crashing down on Fluttershy's head so hard Discord cringed just watching it. Then Fluttershy plunged out of sight over the hill and the Apples followed her.
As Big Mac continued to pull her higher and the noose around her neck drew tighter, Fluttershy knew she couldn't hold out much longer. Her eyes were squeezed shut in pain and her lungs felt as if they were going to burst.
Then, right when she felt as if her head was about to pop off and her life was about to be snuffed out, the ropes binding her suddenly snapped as if they were made of spaghetti. No if about it, they had turned to spaghetti! Barely conscious, she plunged toward the floor, but then a golden glow surrounded her, halting her fall in midair before lowering her gently to the floor.
Before the Apples could move toward her, Discord suddenly appeared in front of them, dressed in SWAT gear. He flung his arms out to the sides and both the Apples went flying into the far wall where they slid to the floor and lay there, stunned.
Satisfied that they wouldn't be getting up soon, the draconequus flashed himself to Fluttershy's side. Yanking off his SWAT helmet and goggles, he knelt next to her and tried to tug the noose off her neck. To his horror, he found that even though he'd turned the noose to spaghetti, it had already cut so deeply into Fluttershy's throat that he had difficulty getting his fingers under it. Ripping the spaghetti strands away, he tried to recall what one was supposed to do in this sort of situation.
CPR? Shock treatment? He wasn't sure. He'd never bothered to learn what was needed to save a strangled pony. He tried to check her pulse, but his fingers were shaking so much when he put them to her battered neck that he couldn't tell if he'd felt a pulse or if it had just been wishful thinking. He rolled her onto her back and put his ear to her chest. Was that a heart beat? He thought it might be a very faint one, but once again the tension in his own body and the rabid beat of his own heart made it difficult to be sure. Then he moved his ear near her mouth but felt no breath.
No breath, that’s not good! "Fluttershy." He shook her shoulder gingerly, wanting her to wake up, but at the same time not wanting to risk injuring her farther. But Fluttershy's head just flopped limply from side to side. "Fluttershy! Oh, no. No, no, come on, Fluttershy, breathe!"
But she just lay there, so pitifully terribly lifeless, with that dark imprint of the noose showing hideously through her pale coat.
Fluttershy’s lungs begged weakly for air but her constricted windpipe seemed paralyzed, unable to open. She thought she felt trembling fingers on her throat, then vaguely registered that she was being rolled over onto her back. Something that seemed to be covered in rings and spikes pressed lightly against her chest. Then it disappeared and she felt the same sensation briefly against her muzzle before it disappeared from there as well.
Then she heard Discord's voice distant and muffled as though through a fog, and struggled to respond.
Discord? Oh, thank goodness you arrived in time! she tried to say but all that came out of her throat was a raspy wheezy whistle. Oh, my goodness! she gasped inside her head. Is that me?!
Tears blurred Discord's vision at the realization that he'd gotten there too late to save his friend. He was about to scoop up her body and cradle it to him, when Fluttershy's eyes suddenly flew open and a hideous rasping whistle came rattling out of her throat. That whistle was followed by another equally raspy one as she fought to suck oxygen into her constricted airway. Her vision swam and she struggled to focus on the face above her.
Even with its piercings, over-sized fang, scruffy beard and eyebrows, and different-sized pupils, it was undoubtedly the most beautiful face she'd ever seen.
"Oh, thank goodness," Discord sighed reverently, nearly going limp with relief. “Thank Celestia.” He stroked Fluttershy’s cheeks and forehead with a sort of gentle desperation as she continued to gulp down air in great harsh gasps. Before he could stop them, the tears in his eyes slid down his snout and dripped off to land in Fluttershy’s eyes, causing her to blink rapidly.
"Hhhhh-ord!" she wheezed, trying to say his name. Then an old bunny slid down from the draconequus's back, and hopped over to nuzzle Fluttershy's temple with his head. "Hhhay-jil?"
"Shh. Don’t try to talk now." said Discord, continuing to caress her face as she rolled onto her side, still wheezing. "Just concentrate on breathing." In that moment, he felt like just leaning right down and covering her face with kisses but he restrained himself, knowing he should probably give her as much room as possible to breathe.
Then he heard several groans from the other side of the room and snapped his head up in that direction. The Apple siblings were getting back on their feet. Discord's eyes narrowed to slits and his lips pulled back from his teeth. He raised his claw and a gold aura surrounded each of the ponies, lifting them into the air and dragging them toward him. They struggled and squirmed in his magical grasp but could not get free.
Then pale blue-green beams of light suddenly shot from their foreheads toward him. The beams struck his claw and the draconequus recoiled with a yelp, shaking his claw as if it had been burned. The gold aura around both of the ponies disappeared and they tumbled to the floor. As they landed, light blue-green flames erupted from their bodies. When the flames cleared a second later, dark-colored pony-like creatures stood in their places.
Changelings! Fluttershy gasped inside her head but all that came from her throat was a wheezy "Hhhhh-hings."
But there was something different about these changelings. Unlike the ones she'd seen years ago, these ones looked more pony-like than insect-like, and as they flew into the air their bodies seemed to grow transparent as if they were made of glass.
The changelings sent another blast at Discord and the draconequus yanked his flak vest wide open, revealing a large bloodless hole that went clear through his body at chest height. The beam shot through this hole to smash into the wall behind him. The gaping hole in his chest sealed itself back together before he closed the flak vest again.
The changelings were both almost completely transparent, little more than gleaming outlines, but then Discord made a move as if brandishing a whip. A line of brightly-colored glow-in-the-dark paint hurtled through the air to splatter the changelings and a good portion of the wall behind them. Then they turned and shot their magic at Fluttershy.
The pegasus tried to move her legs, to get out of the way, but each of her limbs seemed to weigh a ton. The beams shot toward her and Angel, but Discord was already there, snatching them off the ground. Angel ended up sandwiched between them, clinging to his owner's mane. Fluttershy's head and limbs flopped bonelessly as Discord wrapped his arms around her and twisted about to take the blast on the back of his flak vest. The force of the blast propelled him toward the crumbling wall, but he swung his lower body about so that he struck the wall feet first instead of squashing Angel and Fluttershy against it. Looking up, he saw the paint-splattered changelings fly up the stairs.
"I'm going after them," he said, straightening up with Fluttershy still dangling from his arms.
The two changelings were both flying off in different directions when Discord flashed himself outside. Tucking Fluttershy under one arm, he snapped his fingers. Duplicate Discords appeared below them and chased after the fleeing changelings. Each of the changelings fired off magical blasts at their pursuers that seemed to vaporize pieces off the duplicates but those pieces just regenerated. The duplicates herded the changelings back together, but as soon as the changelings were close enough to touch they shot another larger blast of magic at the Discord duplicates. This time the blast disintegrated the duplicates completely, and neither of them reformed.
Realizing that they were stronger together than apart the changelings now zoomed off together rather than trying to split up again. If it weren’t for the glow-in-the-dark splatters still coating parts of them, their transparent bodies would have been completely invisible in the dark. Discord shot after them, conjuring nets, walls, sheets of flypaper, anything to catch the changelings, but they either dodged these things, or blasted through them with their magic.
The draconequus gritted his teeth as the changelings continued to evade his attempts to catch them.
Dodge this! he thought, snapping his talons and this time putting all his rage into it.
The branches of the trees in the orchard below them burst into flames that clung to the branches like blazing leaves but did not spread down to consume the trees' trunks. Then there was a monstrous creaking sound as the trees began flexing their branches and yanking their roots out of the ground. The burning trees started wading through the snow to form a burning forest. When they neared each other, several of the trees seemed to melt together to form much larger trees. The large trees used their branches to snatch up the smaller trees and hurl them into the air like discuses. All of this took time to describe but it happened in the space of just a few seconds.
The burning trees hurled through the air after the changelings, spreading their branches out like flaming nets. Reaching the changelings, they closed their branches around them, trapping the changelings in giant twiggy fists. The trees fell back to the ground, causing several of the still earth-bound trees to leap out of the way as they plowed through the snow.
A short distance away, Discord hit the ground feet first in a skid. With Fluttershy still dangling from his right arm, he thrust his eagle one out to break his fall so his face wouldn't smack into the snow. Straightening up, he walked toward the burning trees that had captured the changelings and snapped his talons, extinguishing the flames.
Fluttershy scrabbled her hooves against his arm, and looking down he saw that she was trying to push herself higher to breathe more easily. ("Oops.") He quickly shoved his claw under her hindquarters to boost her up. Fluttershy sucked in several wheezy breaths as she took in the scene in front of her. Smoke curled up from the uncharred branches but apart from that there was no movement. After several minutes with no sign of the changelings stirring from their traps, Discord flew over and snapped the tuft at the end of his tail. The trees opened their branches and two charred figures fell to the ground.
"Are they—?" Before Fluttershy could finish the question, Discord turned her head away from the sight with his eagle claw. "Are either of them still alive?"
After a moment Discord sighed. "No."
"Oh," Fluttershy said numbly, not sure how to feel. She knew she should feel relieved that her would-be-murderers were now dead, but she just felt overwhelmed. Why had those changelings seemed so different from the ones she'd seen before? How long had they been disguised as Apple Bloom and Big Mac? And what had happened to the original Apple siblings?
Feeling there was nothing they could do with the charred changeling husks, Discord and Fluttershy decided to go back to the hideout to see if there was anything they could learn about the changelings. Exhaustion had caught up with Angel so he just clung to Fluttershy's back, only half-awake. Discord flashed them back to the hideout and Fluttershy saw that it was Sweet Apple Acres' old root cellar. Still holding Fluttershy, Discord flew down the stairs. One of the walls had been mostly demolished by the changelings' blast, revealing another room behind it.
And lying there, squirming on the floor of that room ...
Were Apple Bloom and Big Mac both hogtied and muzzled with what appeared to be changeling webbing.
"Oh, my goodness," Fluttershy wheezed. She tried to fly out of Discord's arms to go help the bound ponies, but the draconequus hung onto her.
"It might be another trap," he warned, and Fluttershy felt her face flush. How could she forget that so soon after it had nearly ended her life? Before she could give this much more thought, Discord raised his free hand and a ball of fire erupted from it. Drawing his arm back, he hurled the fireball at the Apple siblings. Their eyes went wide and they started thrashing about, yelling through the webbing that was muzzling them. The fireball engulfed the two of them. Fluttershy tried to scream but it only came out as a pathetic whistle. Then the fireball vanished, revealing that the Apple siblings were not burned or even scorched. Instead they were soaking wet as if someone had upended a tub of water over them.
For about five seconds, the Apple siblings just lay there. Then they started struggling and yelling through their gags again. Only this time they sounded indignant rather than afraid.
Fluttershy hadn't moved but Discord could feel her heart beating wildly against his arm. He put his hand on her shoulder and she flinched.
"You just threw fire at them. You could have—"
"All it would have done is soak them. As it just did. If they were changelings, I figured that since they didn't know the fire wouldn't hurt them, they'd drop the act and try to get away."
"Oh," Fluttershy whispered, realizing now that Discord had been trying to protect her.
The draconequus snapped his fingers and the webbing detached itself from the Apple siblings, jumped to the floor, and skittered away like gummy spiders. The Apple siblings both sat up, spitting, swiping the water out of their faces, and stretching the cramps out of their limbs.
"Humph! You’re welcome.” Discord said in a louder-than-normal voice and both the Apple siblings started, realizing that they’d heard that voice before ... but from a different source. Now they stared at the draconequus, taking in his mixed-up body, the ink designs that decorated that body, the scarf and flak jacket he was still wearing, and the studs and rings scattered across his facial features.
“Fluttershy,” said Apple Bloom. “is that—?”
All Fluttershy could think to say was "Um, Apple Bloom, Big Macintosh. Meet Discord ... Again ... As he really is.”
It took the Apple siblings a bit of time to adjust to the fact that the visitor they’d thought was merely a somewhat odd-looking pony was actually far more than that. But once they had, they, the old bunny, the pegasus, and the draconequus began trying to piece together what had happened that day. It all began to fit. Apple Bloom hadn't lied about being in Applejack's room. She really had been off with the other fillies and they'd seen a changeling disguised as her in Big Mac's memory.
They learned from Angel that a changeling had snuck into the house disguised as Fluttershy and had snatched him while they were outside. This changeling along with its partner had tied him up and told him that they had planted a fake corpse for Fluttershy to find, seeming to enjoy the pain it brought him, knowing that Fluttershy would not come looking for him. Then they had captured Big Mac shortly after Fluttershy and Discord had left him. One changeling had snatched Apple Bloom right after Fluttershy had visited her, ("So that was a changeling, I saw going into the house. Not Big Mac,” said Fluttershy.) while the other had turned transparent and had flown above the trees, using its magic to break any branch Fluttershy got close to. By then Angel had managed to chew through his bonds and escaped while the changelings dragged the Apple siblings into the root cellar. The changelings had revealed themselves to the Apple siblings, saying that they intended to kill Fluttershy before doing the same to the Apple siblings themselves.
"They told us they were behind the murders and they killed Applejack because she was snooping around," said Apple Bloom, then a look of agony crossed her face. "They said they were disguised as us when they killed her … that she died believing Big Mac and I were the murderers."
The big stallion nodded, unable to bring himself to say "Yup."
"That's horrible," Fluttershy breathed. But in the back of her mind, she thought of what the changelings had told her. Why had the changelings told Big Mac and Apple Bloom that they'd murdered Applejack, but told her that Applejack had disappeared before they could kill her? Who had they been lying to?
Apple Bloom and Big Mac decided that they wanted to spend the night at the hospital, both to be near their grandmother, and to tell her what they'd learned if possible. Discord flashed the group to a shadowed corner outside of the hospital, and, once the Apple siblings were safely inside, flashed himself, Fluttershy, and Angel back to the cabin. Angel slipped off Fluttershy's back, headed straight for his bed, and sprawled out on it.
Fluttershy went over and nudged his back with her hoof. "Angel, you can't go to sleep just yet. You need to eat something first."
The old bunny opened one cloudy eye and gave her a look that said, "Do I have to?"
"Yes, you do," said Fluttershy firmly. "I'll go make you a salad and—"
Discord snapped his fingers and a salad appeared right beside her.
"Oh, thank you, Discord," she murmured.
"Mm-hmm." He nodded absently, picking up the urn and pouring the ashes into his paw. He studied them for a bit before letting them pour into the fireplace, and wiping his paw on the fur of his lower back. "I thought so. They used a chunk of wood as the base for the simulacrum."
At Fluttershy's urging, Angel ate a few bites of the salad before rolling over and going to sleep. Fluttershy would have preferred it if he'd eaten all the salad but decided to let him sleep since the day's events had clearly taken a lot out of him.
Plonking down on the couch, Discord conjured a plate of sandwiches and flashed Fluttershy over beside him. "If he had to eat, you should as well," he said, holding the plate out to her. Still feeling rather shell-shocked, Fluttershy didn't feel much like eating, but her stomach disagreed because it let out a loud growl. She took a sandwich, and began chewing it automatically. Eating it turned out to be rather slow going as her throat hurt almost too much to swallow, but hunger pushed her on.
Discord chewed on a sandwich of his own, not taking his eyes off her. He took in the bruises and scrapes on her body, especially the ones the ropes had made. While she worked on finishing her sandwiches, he flashed out of the room, and reappeared a few seconds later with a tube of ointment and bandages. Picking Fluttershy up, he settled her on his lap so that she was lying back against his thighs, lifted one of her front legs into the air, and began massaging the ointment into the abrasions the ropes had left on it. Fluttershy just lay there numbly and let him work his way through all four of her legs.
It wasn't until he began to work on her neck that Fluttershy let out a long shuddering sob.
Discord jerked his hands away from her. "Sorry, did I hurt you?"
"N-no," she choked out, trying and failing to hold back more sobs. "It's not that, it's just that ... that ... I was so scared! ... And I thought Angel was dead, and then it turned out he wasn't. And then the Apples tried to kill me, and then they turned out not to be the real Apples, and then there was the whole thing with Applejack and ... and ... I don't know..." She buried her face in her hooves as the force of her sobs shook her whole body.
Then she felt his hands grip her gently by the shoulders. "It's all right now, darling. Do you hear me? You're safe now."
She mopped at her tears before looking up at him, embarrassed. "I know. But I just can't seem to stop crying."
Remembering how dazed she'd acted earlier, he suddenly understood. All her feelings from earlier: terror, relief, shock, and many more feelings were trying to express themselves at once, and were now pouring themselves out through tears. As she looked up at him, drowning in a chaotic storm of her own emotions, he realized that she needed an anchor, a lifeline ... something or someone to help her make sense of what she was going through.
He lifted her from his lap and, leaning back, set her higher up on his body, closer to his chest, and wrapped his arms around her. "Go ahead and cry then. Just get it all out, dear. Trust me, it'll help."
Needing no further urging, Fluttershy buried her face against his chest and let the tears fall. His dragon tattoo pulled itself farther up his body so it could stretch its neck over his shoulder. It slid its head onto the part of his chest Fluttershy's face was currently pressed against and proceeded to move its head back and forth as if rubbing it against Fluttershy's head. The wasps on the sides of his neck swarmed down to the base of his throat. However, they couldn't move any closer to Fluttershy with the dragon in the way, so they just hovered nearby.
Other times Discord would have smacked the tattoos back into their original positions, but right now he was too busy concentrating on Fluttershy. He stroked her back and rested his cheek lightly against the top of her head. Strange that he of all creatures would be called upon to guide her through the chaotic turmoil that was currently overwhelming her. But as she clung to him, her crying muffled against his chest fur, he felt that there was no other part he'd rather play.
As Fluttershy's tears finally thinned out, she heard Discord say in a soft but clear voice, "Happy Hearth's Warming."
Fluttershy's eyes widened. She'd completely forgotten that it was Hearth's Warming. "I'm sorry, Discord. I wanted to do something special for you for this Hearth's Warming…" She trailed off as he put his paw gently against her neck.
Unbidden, the image of her lying lifeless on the floor with the noose marks standing out on her neck like some ghastly collar sprang up in his mind. With it came the memory of the agony he'd felt in those long seconds before she'd taken that first breath. Taking care not to put too much pressure on her bruises, his fingers found the pulse in her neck. With that pulse came the confirmation that she was alive. Bruised, bloodied, and aching, but alive.
"Right now, knowing you're here and safe is all I need," he said, rubbing small circles over her pulse before letting his fingers slide from her neck to her cheek.
Fluttershy had thought she had no more tears left to cry, but those words proved her wrong. "Discord, that's ... that's so sweet ... I don't know what to say..." Then she buried her face in his chest fur again as a fresh bout of crying overtook her.
She felt his arms wrap around her again, and his hands caress her back. Then his beard brushed against her cheek as he put his mouth close to her ear, and murmured, "There now, Fluttershy. There now, I won't let go."
True to his word, he didn't let go. He held her until she'd cried herself to sleep.
For the first time since she had been recovering from nearly freezing to death, Fluttershy slept with Discord's body wrapped around hers. Little did she know that the draconequus was doing it as much for his own sake as for hers. He hadn't been able to completely shake the image of her lying there limp and lifeless from his mind. Nor could he forget the sound of her struggling to breathe. Now he needed to be able to hear and feel her deep steady breathing (broken now and then with an occasional soft snuffle) to reassure himself that she was still alive.
He had rolled his upper body over enough so that Fluttershy was lying on her side, facing him with her mane tumbling over the first of his body coils. Moving carefully so as not to hurt or wake her, he slipped his lion limb underneath her head, and shifted so that he was propped on his elbows above her. Her expression was peaceful, beautiful almost, but it was marred by the fact that her face was damp and blotchy from crying. And the bruises from her attempted strangling were still vivid and unlikely to fade for days.
"Nopony's ever going to hurt you like that again, Fluttershy," he whispered, leaning down and touching her forehead with his own. "I promise you, if anypony ever tries to harm you, they'll have to go through me."
Drawing back, he hooked one of his talons underneath her bandages and slid them back away from her forehead, using his magic to stretch them in a way they never could have stretched ordinarily. Then as if to seal the deal, he tilted her face upwards, brought his own head back down, and pressed his lips against her now-exposed forehead. When he'd kissed her earlier, it had been no more than a quick peck, but now he took his time. He wasn't sure how long he kissed her and was mildly surprised to realize he didn't really care.
Then Fluttershy snuffled and he pulled his head back, gently replacing her bandages and watching to see if his kiss had accidentally awakened her. As he raised his head from hers, his beard tickled across her face, causing her nose to twitch but not causing her to sneeze. Her eyes flickered open but she still seemed to be at least three-quarters asleep.
"Discord," she murmured, and he shifted back onto his side, still supporting her head with his paw. Yawning, she turned her head, and pressed her forehead against his throat just above his scarf. "Thank goodness you arrived in time," she murmured, dropping back off to sleep.
"Oh, amen to that, my dear," he whispered, resting his claw against her chest, where he could feel her heart beating in time with the pulse in his wrist. "Amen to that."