Heart of Shadow: Passing the Torch

by TheCrimsonDM


Chapter Six: Sneaky Pony

Passing the Torch
Chapter Six: Sneaky Pony
Written by TheCrimsonDM

The moon was shining through Amber’s bedroom window allowing her to vaguely see the dark shapes the consisted of the furniture in her room. It was about time, and after lighting up her horn just enough to see the time she knew she had to hurry. It just past nine and that meant that she was going to have to sneak out now if she wanted to make it in time, of course her mother was already asleep, she always fell asleep early; but being the only unicorn to teach magic to the foals in Ponyville did come with an early schedule. Twilight would have taken up the mantle of being the local magic teacher, but she has had her hooves full with more political issues, she had barely enough time as is to train Amber.

Amber crawled out of her bed as quietly as she possibly could, and began rummaging through her closet. It didn’t take too long for her to find a dark blue cloak complete with hood. After putting it on and drawing the hood over her head she glanced around her room with a feeling of having missed something. She scanned over her comic book collection, her role playing books, her fantasy novels, and finally her school books. She didn’t see what it was she trying to find until she looked over to the window and saw her money pouch. She was going to require some funds if she wanted to truly enjoy Sweetie Belle’s performance.

Amber opened the window using her telekinesis and lumbered out. She could only hope that her mother didn’t hear anything. After getting out she aimed herself towards The Tossed Horseshoe and began trotting off, tonight was going to be a wonderful night. Sweetie Belle always had the most enchanting voice that inspired ponies to do better and to be more.

***

The Tossed Horseshoe was filled to the brim with ponies tonight. It wasn’t often that Sweetie Belle actually preformed here, and so on these occasions everypony who was old enough showed up. The windows all shown with warm inviting light and many marry drunken songs could be heard being sung. Amber’s excitement was growing as she approached the front door.

Amber walked in with her cloak on, and after seeing all the stallions that were in here as well as her she felt instantly at ease. She walked by them and although she was maybe an inch or two taller than most she felt more at ease around these tall ponies, more like she fit in. She found a private booth in the back and sat down, making sure to keep her hood drawn over her face and covering her cutie mark so that nopony would easily recognize her.

After a few minutes one of the waitress’s walked up to her table and asked in a bubbly tone, “What can a sweet little thing like me get for such a strong colt as yourself?”

Amber gave her a mean look and said, “I’m not a stallion.”

She looked taken aback for a moment and suddenly she raised an eyebrow and said, “Amber Light, is that you?”

“Um… no…”

“Uh-huh, well miss tall pony, how about I get you some mead. Will that make you forget about my comment?” the waitress asked.

Amber eyed her up, this mare was an earth pony mare with a green fur coat and a pink curly mane. Amber smiled at her and said, “Yeah, that’ll do nicely, Bubbles.”

The mare smiled brightly and said, “I’ll be right back, oh and I don’t need to tell you not to tell anypony about this, now do I?”

Amber nodded and stayed quiet, she knew that Bubbles could get into some very deep trouble from both her boss, and Princess Twilight for giving alcohol to an under aged mare, but Bubbles came from the countryside where one was old enough to drink so long as they could see over the counter, Ponyville however had adopted a few of Canterlot’s laws.

It took a few minutes but finally Amber had her mug of mead, and her dark private booth. Soon the show would start and everything would quiet down by a fair bit. It was hard waiting for Sweetie Belle’s show to start but it would be totally worth. Before the show could start however Amber was made aware of five distinctly hooded ponies walking right past her booth and seating themselves in the one next to her. Normally Amber would have left them alone, but the way they were dressed made her worry for the strength of their character.

Amber’s horn began glowing dimly, but thanks to the hood it was nearly impossible for most ponies to see its light. Amber had a perfect spell for this situation, and she was not above using it. The voices of the hooded ponies next to her booth were far too quiet to hear over the clamor around her, so she used a listen spell and the voices of the hooded ponies became incredibly clear as though they were sitting right in front of her.

“Do you think anypony will see us here?” a mare with a rough voice asked.

“Nah, we’re super good here. They don’t like to question the hooded ponies, because we look all secretive and stuff,” answered a much more bouncy and higher pitched voice.

“I… um… Rainbow Dash we need to talk about your daughter later okay?” Said the quiet voice that unmistakably belonged to Fluttershy.

Suddenly it became clear to Amber that she was sitting right next to the Elements of Harmony as they were having a secret meeting. This was both incredibly exciting and absolutely horrifying, if anyone of them discovered Amber sitting here drinking… well it would only mean that Amber would be grounded for the rest of her life, not to mention one of her favorite hang outs being taken away for good.

“Why not talk about this now?” Rainbow Dash asked completely clueless.

“Because I don’t want to get mad at you in public, i-i-if I did… it wouldn’t be pretty,” Fluttershy explained.

A swift silence filled their table and Rainbow Dash said somberly, “I’m sorry, I should’ve figured that Amber wasn’t trying to be bad. I… I just have a hard time not seeing Trixie inside her sometimes, and although it’s wrong of me, I still judge her for it.”

“That’s surprisingly honest of you, darling,” Rarity said.

“Yeah, well I have four kids and more broken hearts then you can count. I had to learn a few things eventually right?”

Applejack stepped in and asked, “So what does Twilight want from us this late?”


“I’m not sure, but whatever it is she’s been on edge for awhile and-“ Rarity said.

“Rarity your eyes,” Applejack said.

Rarity was silent for a moment but Amber Light could see just the faintest glow of a pale blue light before she heard Rarity say, “Thank you. I don’t want to scare anypony now do I?”

“Bet you wished that you’re kid could hide her other half like that,” Rainbow Dash said.

“She is a beautiful young mare, she does not need to hide herself from the world,” Rarity said. “But… Jade has been having trouble lately. It seems that nopony wants to be friends with her, so she spends most of her time with Sweetie Bell, or hiding upstairs. I saw her watching Amber and her little friends today from the top of the stairs, she looked like she wanted to talk to them but I’m afraid that she was too scared.”

“Well being half dragon and half pony does make a pretty weird combination,” Rainbow Dash said.

Amber Light hadn’t noticed Jade watching them, sure she usually tried to avoid Jade… but it was only because she didn’t know how to talk to the pony… or was that really true? Amber let out a sigh as she began wondering if she had really been pushing Jade away and avoiding her just because she was different. Boy wouldn’t Twilight be upset about this kind of behavior.

“I’m glad to see that you’re all here,” Twilight said suddenly surprising Amber.

Amber looked around but only saw another cloaked pony standing in front of the booth next to her. Amber took a big swig of her mead, just in case Twilight decided to take it away from her. Amber watched out of the corner of her eye as Twilight sat down next to her friends.

“So I bet you’re all wondering why I’m here, well it’s actually very important. Do you remember that fight we did last year, and how hard it was to make the elements work?” Twilight said. After a moment Twilight added, “I’ve noticed the elements effects have been weakening over the past ten years. Last year it was so hard just to get them to activate, and for a pitiful amount of magic that I could’ve done in my sleep. So I’ve decided to finally share my theory with you all, please don’t be upset with me for withholding it from you all, I just didn’t want to believe that this was even possible.

“I believe that we are losing our connection to the elements, and soon we will lose the ability to use them completely. It’s entirely possible that we already lost the ability to use them. So if we encounter another Nightmare Moon, or for the love of all that is bright, another Tirek… we will be in deep trouble,” Twilight finished and it was almost as though Amber could feel the desperation coming from the next booth.

“But, but, but what about Celestia. You were talking to her in private today weren’t you?” Rarity asked her voice laced with fear.

“Yeah, I noticed her arrival today after I saw the sunlight. It’s always much brighter wherever she goes. I had to cut my session with Amber short so that I could speak with her, and I told her about my theory,” Twilight explained.

“Well don’t leave us hanging, what did she say?” Pinkie asked.

“She had a dream, another one of those prophecy dreams. She told me that my theory was correct, and that it was nearly time for us to pass the torch. There will be new element bearers soon, but I don’t know who they will be. I have a theory about who a few of them could be, but other than that… I just don’t know,” Twilight said, her voice sounding strained.

Nopony spoke after that, but Amber took another deep drink of her mead and thought about it. New element bearers, who could they be, what would they be like? After a few minutes of this line of thought she gave up on trying to solve the impossible riddle, and decided it wasn’t worth her time.

The elements would choose their new bearers and those six ponies would have a lot of trouble on their hooves, the only thing that bothered Amber was the fact that this transition would be hard on the current bearers. Would they become teachers to the new one’s offering advice, and helping in any way they could? Or would they feel bitter resentment against them? Amber didn’t know but she just hoped that this didn’t all blow up in everyponies face.

To Amber a world without the element bearers was an impossibility that she never experienced. All her life Twilight and her friends had gotten together to stop the great threats of Equestria, even when they had kids they still saved Equestria on several occasions. Without their heroes what would the ponies of Equestria do?

Suddenly the lights in the tavern dimmed and the stage lit up with an enchanting white light. A slender, curvy mare walked out on stage while wearing a beautifully woven dress of deep blue and purple. The air around the white unicorn seamed to shimmer and her curly mane of light and dark purple glimmered in the lighting. She gave an almost seductive smile to the audience and a wink to the ponies in the back, probably to Rarity since Rarity had drawn her hood down now.

“Hiya everypony, my name is Sweetie Belle, and although I’m not that good of a singer, I hope you enjoy my music tonight,” the mare said with a practiced nervous blush.

The music began playing, a soft piano that was on stage behind her, played by Bubbles no less. After a moment Sweetie Belle opened her mouth and her horn began glowing, the room became suddenly full of beautiful music. And Amber felt her heart flutter at the sight of the mare singing to the audience. Amber wasn’t usually interested in mares but seeing and hearing Sweetie Belle singing changed everything in an instant. If ever there was a mare that Amber could fall in love with, it would’ve been her.

“Something’s… wrong,” Rarity said quietly.

Suddenly Amber was reminded that she still had her magic spell active.

“What do you mean?” Twilight asked, “Isn’t she singing like normal. I have to admit it’s prettier then I remember.”

“Yeah I’d say, it’s downright sexy,” Rainbow Dash added.

“Rainbow, that is my little sister,” Rarity warned. “Anyway, you are right, her voice sounds a little different, but here is the weird part. Look at the audience.”

Amber looked around the room and at first all she saw was a bunch of enamored stallions, and mares. Nothing out of the ordinary, except for the one who fell over asleep, and the other one that was sleeping, and those two in the corner that were fast asleep as well. Amber let out an accidently loud yawn as she began counting the number of ponies who were falling asleep during the song’s performance. Her eyelids were suddenly getting heavy, but she didn’t want to stop listening to the music yet.

“Twilight, wake up!” Rarity shouted.

The air suddenly became thick in the booth next to Amber’s and then fizzled and popped. Amber saw the flash of red light and suddenly she realized what Twilight just did and the threat of the situation she was now in. Amber stood up from the table and felt dizzy, her entire body was heavy but she pushed herself forward and looked at the table next to hers. Twilight and her friends were gone. They had teleported out of the building. Over half of the room was asleep, and the other half were so absorbed into the enchanting lullaby that Amber feared they would be the next ones to fall asleep.

Amber pushed herself to walk towards the door, and using her magic she grabbed the handle and pulled it open. Her legs were slow, her eyes heavy, but she trudged onward and out the front door. The second she was out the door, it slammed shut behind her and she gave into her wariness and fell to the ground eyes closed. For a moment she just lay there, the clip clopping sounds of hooves didn’t cause her to stir it was only when she heard Twilight’s voice did she actually open her eyes.

“Are you alright?” Twilight asked.

Amber felt some of her strength returning, but her head was still dizzy and she now wanted to finish her drink. She pushed herself up and looked down at the cloaked princess. Even though all she could see was Twilight’s muzzle, that was all she needed to see in order to know that Twilight was upset.

“I’m not going to ask, but if you’re who I think you are. Then you need to head home, now,” Twilight said. “We have a class B threat on our hooves and you don’t need to be here.”

“I can help too you know,” Amber argued.

Rainbow Dash suddenly exclaimed, “Whoa, that’s a mare! I thought that was a dude.”

“Rainbow Dash, please shut it,” Twilight said. “And you, go home, now!”

Amber stomped her hoof against the grass and said, “Fine, but don’t go inside until she’s done singing or whatever. That spell of hers is powerful.”

“I know, now go home before you get into anymore trouble,” Twilight said before turning to her friends and saying, “Okay everypony, we have three questions to answer first. One is that the real Sweetie Belle, two how is she doing this, and three why? Let’s move.”

The five ponies followed Twilight’s lead to the rear entrance of the building and disappeared from sight. After so many years of working with Twilight Sparkle, they didn’t question her methods or her orders unless they were extreme. Twilight had proven to be a very effective leader, and her friends, her citizens looked up to her but Amber wasn’t just a friend, nor was she just a citizen. Amber was an apprentice, which gave her a special right to at times disobey certain orders and stick her muzzle where it normally didn’t belong. Right now was one of the times

***

Amber recalled the list of spells that she had learned underneath the tutelage of Twilight Sparkle, and found just the spell needed for the situation. Her horn glowed and in an instant the world around her became deftly silent. This was a spell that was meant to be used on enemies, specifically ones that used hearing to find their targets, but right now it was working to keep Amber from hearing Sweetie Belle’s enchanting lullaby.

She opened the door and walked in slowly trying to make as little noise as possible. Not being able to hear her own hooves touching the wooden floor was concerning but she pressed onward. After the door closed behind her she instantly got the feeling that this might not have been such a good idea.

Everypony had fallen asleep by now, even the mare at the piano was asleep. Sweetie Belle continued to sing, as though she was in a trance. Dark purple light was being emitted from Sweetie’s horn and tied ethereal strings around the ponies who were asleep. Amber approached one of the sleeping ponies and nearly jumped back when for a mere second it opened its eyes, revealing a ghostly green light. Amber looked back at Sweetie Belle and despite the fear that was drowning her heart, she pressed onward.

She moved slowly and cautiously through the crowd. She began to hear a faint whispering sound, but as she looked around nopony was awake around her. Not to mention the fact that she couldn’t possibly be hearing anything due to the spell she had activated. She listened in to the whispering but it was strange, it was less like hearing the sound, and more like feeling it.

The closer she approached Sweetie Belle the louder the whispering became until she could began making out words. A dark and quiet voice was echoing in the back of her mind repeating several words in random but rapid succession.

“Dark, dark, blind, night, darkness, sleep, freedom, dark, night, blind, free, eternal, dark, release,” the voice was whispering.

Amber climbed up on stage and looked down at Sweetie Belle, Sweetie Belle’s eyes were closed and she looked almost asleep save for the fact that she was standing upright and singing. Amber unsure of what exactly to do decided to grab Sweetie by the shoulders and shake her. Suddenly Sweetie Belle stopped singing, her eyes opened and a dark purple mist seemed to cover them. The mist flew out of Sweetie’s eyes and the whispering became a howling shriek as the mist flowed up into the ceiling, circled around, and finally flew back towards the rear entrance. Sweetie Belle fainted and Amber was barely able to catch her in time.

Amber quickly released the spell that she had placed on herself, and helped Sweetie lay down while still holding onto her. Sweetie looked up at Amber Light and with her head being held by Amber’s forelegs let out a loud yawn.

“What happened? Where am I?” Sweetie Belle asked tiredly.

Amber gave her a reassuring smile and said, “You’re at The Tossed Horseshoe.”

“But… I was just taking a nap. Spike was sleeping and I thought that maybe I should try and get some sleep too, before the show. Why am I here?” Sweetie asked. Her eyes looked drowsy.

“You were singing a magically enchanted song and everypony started falling asleep, but I stopped you and well now you’re here,” Amber explained.

A loud ruckus from the rear entrance grabbed hold of the two ponies attentions and six cloaked ponies came walking in, one alicorn in particular was stomping her way towards Amber. Suddenly Amber pulled her legs back and scooted away from Twilight, Sweetie Belle’s head hit the floor and she let out a yelp.

“Sorry,” Amber apologized nervously while staring into the enraged eyes of Twilight Sparkle. Normally Amber would say something to try and calm down her teacher, but there was a new look in her eyes, something that Amber was not accustomed to seeing. Amber actually began fearing for her own safety while Twilight continued her approach, until she stopped next to Sweetie Belle.

“Are you okay, Sweetie?” Twilight asked flatly.

“Yeah, I think so. Twilight, why are you so angry?” Sweetie Belle asked worriedly.

Twilight didn’t look at her, instead choosing to stare down her apprentice and saying very slowly, “Somepony decided to disobey me, and now whatever was doing this just escaped.”

Amber suddenly couldn’t stand looking into Twilight’s eyes any longer and so she looked away saying quietly, “I just saved Sweetie Belle. But I dis-“

“NO!” Twilight shouted. “You are going home right now, I will decide what to do about you’re disobedience tomorrow, and until I do I’d appreciate it if you stay away from me. If you are just going to abuse my teaching and put yourself in danger like this then you will end up getting hurt. I am responsible for you, don’t you understand that?”

Amber pushed herself up slowly and said in a hurt tone, “Fine, I didn’t want to help out anyway.” Amber turned around and walked away.

The last thing she heard as she left the building was Rarity saying, “Twilight, don’t you think that you were a little hard on her just now?”

***

Back at home Amber climbed into her window. She tossed her cloak onto the floor and shut the window. She wiped the tears away from her eyes but they just kept coming. After climbing into bed she grabbed a plushy of a pink pony with a blond mane and held it close. Amber Light cried softly, she didn’t know that Twilight would get so mad at her. Whatever Amber had wanted to do, the last thing would’ve been to make Twilight so angry. It wasn’t fair though, Twilight was fighting dragons, and Discord, and all kinds of things when she was younger, why couldn’t Amber do the same?

Amber sniffled and squeezed harder onto the plushy and said, “Why can’t I be good enough for her? I just want her to be proud of me.” She picked the doll up and looked it in its button eyes and asked, “Sophie, what’s wrong with me?” Of course the Sophie doll wouldn’t respond but she still felt better holding it. Amber rolled over and closed her eyes, whatever happened tomorrow would happen and nothing Amber did could stop it. Sleep was a hard won battle that night, but she finally conquered it and fell into the black void where dreams waited for ponies to come and visit.