Passing The Torch
Chapter One: The Apprentice
Written by TheCrimsonDM
Inside a dark room two unicorn mares sat around a table, one of them had an orange fur coat with a brown mane. The other mare was a soft pink with a lavender mane that held a single red line running through it. The orange mare looked much older than the pink one, and had bags under her eyes from many days of hard work, meanwhile the pink mare was much younger looking, although she was also a foot taller than the orange mare.
The orange mare rubbed at her sore tired eyes. “I’m the Mistress of Magi,” introduced the mare. “You no doubt have already guessed the reason why you have been granted an interview with us today. You have been given an opportunity to join our circle, but first we must decide as to whether you are truly worthy to join us or not. I will be asking you a series of questions, and I expect you to answer all of them honestly. First of all, what is your full name?”
The pink unicorn looked flatly at The Mistress and answered, “Amber Light, but you can me Light.”
“And Miss Light, what area of magic do you specialize in?” The Mistress asked.
“Fire… er pyromancy,” Light replied.
“That is a common skill, what exactly makes you any better at it then anypony else?”
“I can fire multiple fireballs at the same time?” Light answered unsure of what to say.
A moment of silence passed between the two of them before The Mistress looked down at the file she held in her hooves. “It says here that you were once offered a chance to join Celestia’s school for gifted unicorns, but you declined. Why did you do that?”
“Because Celestia has a giant butt,” Light replied jokingly.
A new voice, one that was very annoyed with Light’s antics now came from The Mistress’s mouth saying, “Amber! Would you please take this seriously?”
“Sorry, okay let’s do this.”
The original voice came back and The Mistress asked, “Why did you decline your invitation to Celestia’s school?”
“Because I didn’t want to leave home, my family, or my teacher behind,” Light replied truthfully.
“That is an… interesting reason for not furthering your education as far as you could,” The Mistress replied.
“Hey, I’ll have you know that my teacher is the best magician in all of Equestria,” Light replied, she knew that it didn’t matter right now whether or not she defended her teacher, but she wouldn’t let an insult like that slide, not now, not ever.
“I…,” The Mistress said while clearly taken aback by this interruption. After a moment The Mistress regained her composer and asked, “How old are you?”
“I’m fifteen.”
“And how long have you studied under your teacher?”
“Seven years.”
“Hmm, and who is your teacher exactly?”
“The Princess of Friendship of course, Twilight Sparkle,” Light replied proudly.
“The Princess Twilight Sparkle?” The Mistress asked in disbelief.
“Ayep, and she’s been training me to be just as awesome as her,” Light said.
The room began to brighten up a little allowing Light to see the hard shapes of the reflective objects around her. The Mistress began to smile before dropping into a frown and saying, “We have one last question for you, what does friendship mean to you?”
“Friendship is… well its family, its people who care about you no matter what. They don’t care if you’re a five foot tall freak, or if you dwarf all the other mares in town. Even if you are brash, or violent, or have a slight temper, true friends will always love you no matter what,” Light answered.
A bright red aura surrounded The Mistress and she began growing in size. Two wings grew from her back and her fur became purple, her mane a dark blue with a purple and red streak through it, and finally she smiled brightly while saying, “Good job, Amber. It’s too bad that the real circle wouldn’t take such an answer, but it is still much better then what I would’ve said at your age.”
Light rolled her eyes and asked, “What like thirty years ago or something?”
“More like twenty two years ago, but yeah that was a long time ago now,” she replied.
The room suddenly became bright, and the light blue crystals that made up the walls, floor, and ceiling came to life sparkling in the rays of the sun light. The purple alicorn smiled brightly as she relaxed. The furniture in the room was made of wood, but even though it stood out it also looked somewhat homey.
“Ah, the crystal room; the last room in the entire castle that’s not converted,” Twilight said while examining the room around her. “You wouldn’t believe how much of an eye sore this castle used to be when the sunlight would hit it just right. Oh, it was blinding.”
“Yeah, and now you have an entire castle made of wood. Seriously, Twilight, it’s a giant tree… what the Tartarus?” Light said playfully.
“I missed my old tree house okay… I mean sure the Golden Oaks Library was rebuilt, but I still wanted a giant tree castle. Is it so wrong for a mare to want to live in a nice relaxing home, and not a shiny, blinding you every time the sun rise’s kind?”
Light relaxed back into her chair and asked, “So what’s next for today?”
Twilight’s grin turned manic and she giggled in a low voice. “Combat training.”
“Oh… Tartarus.”
***
Walking through the giant tree was always one of Amber Light’s favorite things to do, seeing the unique wooden architecture, the various trophies that Princess Twilight had collected over the years, and last but not least, all the neat little secrets that this castle had in store. From her understanding the castle originally was made of crystal, but Light had never gotten to witness that. Instead what she grew up with was a giant tree with a wooden castle on top that had been grown out of the tree itself. The way that the walls and floors, the ceiling and even some of the furniture were all connected truly fascinated her. The best part was that this place was designed like a fortress to withstand an enemy siege, although to her knowledge that only happened once.
The two of them walked through the castle and down lots of stairs, about five flights of stairs to be exact. When they finally reached the bottom they headed outside and were greeted by the warm embrace of Ponyville’s delightful sun. Twilight stared up into the sky for a moment before a small frown crossed her face and she looked away.
“What’s the matter?” Amber Light inquired politely.
“The sun wasn’t this bright an hour ago…” was all that Twilight would say on the matter. Amber didn’t understand what that meant but seeing the frown made her worry a little.
Twilight led Amber through the town and to the Golden Oaks Library which wasn’t all that far away. The old library was yet another one of these trees that had been grown magically into the shape of a building, only much smaller than the castle. Amber followed Twilight over to the backyard and stopped in front of a weapon rack.
The weapon rack in question was filled with wooden swords, and Twilight levitated two of them. She gave one to Amber who quickly accepted it. Twilight turned to face Amber and without warning swung the wooden sword without mercy towards Amber.
Amber barely managed to dodge underneath the blow, and retaliated with a thrust of her own. Twilight easily flicked Amber’s sword away with her own and moved in with a counter attack. Amber Light stepped back from the first swing, and again from the second swing, finally Amber blocked Twilight’s third attack and stood her ground. Amber swung down with all of her might, and Twilight tried to block only to have her sword forced down to the ground. Amber grinned and said, “Ha, that’ll teach ya for a sneak attack.”
Twilight only smiled and suddenly Amber felt a sudden burst of pain just behind her right foreleg. She quickly kneeled and Twilight’s blade came flying up into the air only to smack hard against the side of Amber’s head. Amber Light fell over and clutched the side of her head with her hooves. Twilight’s sword rose up for another strike and Amber Light quickly called out, “I forfeit.”
Twilight kept her grin as she put the sword away into the rack behind her and asked, “What did you learn today?”
“That you’re a cheating, stupid, putrid, foolish, ugly, stupid,” Amber Light began.
“You said stupid twice,” Twilight interjected.
“Well that’s because it’s true twice.”
Twilight raised an eyebrow and waited patiently for Amber light to recover from the blow. Amber was done with insults, but she was still mad about losing. Amber let out a deep sigh and said, “I lost because I wasn’t paying attention to where you’re focus was.”
“That and the fact that you were still trying to beat me with brute strength. The sword is not a hammer, you can’t just smash it into things and expect to win, it requires finesse,” Twilight explained.
“Well I wish it was a hammer… then maybe I could beat that stupid grin off of your face,” Amber retorted, still on the ground, and still in pain.
“That’s three times.”
“Stop counting how many times I say the word stupid!”
“Four.”
Amber Light growled at her teacher but stayed silent after that. Twilight decided to take this opportunity to put Amber’s weapon away as well before kneeling down and saying, “Now let me look at that wound.”
“Its fine,” Amber said but even so she removed her hooves and let Twilight take a good look.
“Hmm no concussion, and no bleeding. Thankfully that means that I won’t have to hear another lecture from your mother about beating up a fifteen year old… that was… uncomfortable last time,” Twilight said.
“Sorry about that, she loves me after all,” Amber Light said.
Twilight looked back up at the sky and winced before looking back at Amber and saying, “You need to practice, a lot. But if you keep doing as well as you have been, then one day you will be able to beat me.” Twilight gave a pause and took on a thoughtful look. “That’s about it for today, why don’t you go play with your friends or something?”
Amber rolled over away from Twilight before pushing herself up and off the ground. When she stood at her full height she looked down at her teacher and said, “Yeah, I guess I can see what Sophie’s doing…”
Twilight began walking back to the library but stopped just long enough to say, “Stay out of trouble this time, please. I don’t want you and Blackout killing each other, or worse yet, if Rainbow Dash gets involved.”
“Don’t worry, I’d never do something like that,” Amber Light lied.