As the trio passed the time in cave the search was getting into full swing. Princess Celestia had sent her most trusted guard, Shining Armor to investigate inside the castle and the whereabouts of every guard. He in turn had gathered the ponies that he thought he could trust completely and set to work. They interviewed every guard, a monumental task and searched the castle for anything amiss or guards unaccounted for. This was something very difficult since multiple guards would be on leave at any given time. Even Princess Luna woke up from her day sleep to help Shining Armor and his men. It was a serious matter when any pony was in danger but it was something even more grave than that. Small or large they had a conspiracy of some sort within their own ranks. This was something that neither princess would stand for.
Around Ponyville, up and down the tracks and inside all of the towns that the rails ran to ponies searched for any clue that might lead to locating Lightning Jolt or the guards. Pegasus flew through the air searching the area around the tracks till they reached the end of the line. Earth ponies and unicorns searched in the villages and towns. They interviewed every pony that would talk to them to gain any possible clues. None could give them any but a large number joined in on the surch. Fluttershy had even rallied her animal friends to help.
None of them thought about it but it was a beautiful sight. A large number of ponies banding together to surch for a single pony whom many of them did not even know.
Rainbow Dash found herself winging up with the Wonder Bolts and soaring up and down the tracks as well as all the surrounding area. They dipped into Ghastly Gorge just below the lip of the ravine walls and flew its length. They saw the quarry eels leering out at them from their burrows and spotted a huge dragon like creature that appeared to be sleeping. What they did not see was the low entranced cave under the shadow of that beast.
* * *
Valentine and Ember Light had sat silently listening as Lightning Jolt told them everything that had happed when the guards had come to take her.
"What sticks out the most for me is that they had insisted that Princess Twilight Sparkle not send any letters to Princess Celestia until morning," Valentine commented at the end of the tale.
"Me too," Ember Light replied. "If they planned a dirty deed then they would not want Princess Celestia to know anything was up until it was over giving them time to escape. It's a very good thing to know though. If they didn't want Princess Celestia contacted then she did not order it."
Lightning Jolt was not so sure. Having come so close to being killed she did not want to take any risks. "I guess so, but what if Princess Celestia knew Twilight would be upset if it was something serious and she didn't want to explain it to her."
"No, Lightning Jolt," Valentine shook her head. "The princess is not like that. The most she might have done was to take you to trial without telling her the full story at first but that I even doubt. She would not outright lie to her student and she would not order you to be killed and thrown out of a train car like garbage. Not even if you had done something as bad a Discord had and if you had I'm sure that we would have heard about you."
Lightning Jolt could not argue with them but the fear left behind from her near murder and the unknown reason why still lay heavy on her heart. She just shrugged. "Alright, the problem to deal with now is getting out of this cave." She looked at Valentine. "Do you want to fight the dragon thing?" She said putting on a joking grin even though she didn't feel it.
Valentine laughed. "I'd rather not fight to the death unless I have too."
"This cave keeps going." Ember Light suggested nodding towards the darkness behind him. "It’s likely to lead to a dead end but we should at least check it out. Who knows there might be a exit... then again we could just end up getting lost in tunnels until we starve."
"Well, it's probably our best bet. Lead the way." Valentine said to the unicorn. He stood up and focused on his horn. After a moment a soft glow filled the cave and they started off into the low cavern tunnel with Ember Light in the front.
"If you don't mind me asking, if creating light is your talent why do often have to focus so much? Many unicorns do it without much effort," Valentine asked.
"It takes extra effort for me to create a small light." He explained. "What would be a small push of magic to most unicorns that would create a normal light would for me, make a blinding one."
"So how did you ever discover that you had your cutie mark?" Lightning Jolt asked just to draw her mind away from the nagging fear inside. "I mean if you can't really see it, how did you know when it appeared?"
He laughed. "I didn't for a long time, no pony did. Well, I take that back, my mom did. She kept insisting that it had appeared but we didn't believe her. I actually got it very young."
"Well, tell us the story." Valentine insisted.
"I lived with my family in a small farming town. This one night a filly from my school had wandered into the nearby forest and had gotten lost. By the time they realized that she was gone it was pitch black. Most of the town joined in on the search, including my parents. In their haste they didn't notice that I had raced out after them wanting to help. I was the same age as the filly and they would not have allowed it. When I got to the forest it was just so dark. I saw a few unicorns lighting up their horns but the space each one illumined was very limited. I thought how great it would be to have a light shining down to brighten up the forest for us. I was too young to understand much of what I was doing so I had no reserve. I lit up my horn and shot light up above the trees with all my might. The entire sky lit up and the ground below was almost as bright as daytime." He paused and laughed. "I remember ponies throwing themselves on the ground in panic thinking some disaster had just happened. I didn't get what their problem was and just called out, 'Hey I lit it up for you, let's go find her.' Oh, the looks they have on their faces," He laughed, "Anyway we found the filly pretty quickly after that and I was the talk of the town. At the time I couldn’t understand why. What was the big deal?
"When my mom took me back home and gave me a bath she noticed that the coloration on both my flanks had changed slightly. She said that the hues had shifted. It was still the same colors but how they faded into one another was diffrent. It was very subtle but she noticed. That’s moms for you. She showed my dad and siblings telling them I had gotten a cutie mark but it was just the same color as my coat. It sounded too ridiculous to them and they didn't believe her. It wasn’t till years later when she found a unicorn who knew spells that would make a cutie mark temporally change color. He used it on me and sure enough, it was there. It was a ball of glowing light and normally it was just the same color as my coat, just like my light usually is."
"Usually?" Valentine asked.
"I can change hues and shape it." He replied. He made the light on his horn tighten into a ball, float off the tip and then begin to grow. Once big enough it began to shapeshift and turn opaque. It was still obviously light or at least it gave off light but you couldn’t see through the shape. Soon it had become a perfect mirror image of him. If not for the fact that it was glowing and lighting up the cave walls one would not have been able to tell the difference. Ember Light's horn flashed different colors and so did the figure. "This side of it really doesn’t have a use but it is kinda’ fun." He said. The figure melted and shrank into a ball. With a flick of his horn he drew it back.
"Pretty neat, I think." Lighting Jolt said. "You could get a lot of bits if you went into entertainment."
"Can you create an image of anything?" Valentine asked.
"Pretty much. Now tell us your story." Ember Light responded. "I don't understand where the flower comes in but are good at fighting with swords or is that just symbolic?"
"I can fight with just about anything." She said looking back at the cutie mark. "But yes, I think it's more symbolic."
"Do you come from a family of warriors?" Lightning Jolt asked but Valentine shook her head. "No I come from a long line of medical and first responder ponies. Everypony in my family is either a doctor, nurse, ambulance cart worker, firepony or some kind of rescue or help pony. It is my family's legacy. I was the odd ball. You see, even when I was a little filly I was always getting into fights. I didn't start them... most of them anyway. When I got older I was in every dojo that I could walk or run to. My family hated it. Their the very peaceful, helpful kind of ponies and that is a great thing to be, me though, I just never felt much of a call for any of those trades. I also loved to fight. Don't get me wrong, I don't like or even want to hurt other ponies. I love the competition. The hoof to hoof or wooden sword matches, I love it and I'm good at it too. I won most of the tournaments that I entered. Even when I lost I was still glad for a good match. Every time that I knew I was facing a good fight it was a thrill. I love a good fight the same way any sports addict likes a good match.
"Anyway I think my family probbly would have been fine if it was just that but my getting to brawls in streets and in school was another matter. They never said it but I'm sure that they thought of me as some kind or reckless, violent pony. I tried slacking off for them but whenever a bully wouldn’t listen to reason I resorted to what I knew. I could take it if they threw insults at me but when they picked on other ponies I just couldn’t. If they tried to lay their hoofes on some little filly or foal that couldn't fight back then it was on. I could not just stand by and let it happen.
"I always knew that fighting would be my cutie mark but for years it didn't appear. I believe that was because I thought I was to be some grand master winning tournament after tournament or teaching battle skills. My cutie mark did not appear because I had the wrong idea about it.
"So what was it for?" Ember Light asked. Both he and Lightning Jolt were eager to hear the end of her story.
"Well, I had these fighting skills for the same reason my brother had his medical skill, or my sister her firefighting skills and so on." She replied.
"I don't understand," Lightning Jolt said.
Valentine smiled. “Neither did I for a long time.” She nodded at her cutie mark. "That appeared the day my sensei explained it to me. I had come into the dojo upset after one of many argument with my family becouse I had gotten into yet another fight at school. I was pretty upset this time and quite worn out from it. The leader of the dojo took me aside and asked why I had gotten into the last fight. It was because of some colts who kept shoving a shy little pony around. He just nodded and told me that I was no different in my purpose than my family members. I helped ponies. I wasn’t getting into fights just to fight I was doing it to defend ponies. I did it because I cared about ponies. He explained it simply that the more you cared about something all the quicker you will be to defend it and will do so all the more fervently. My talent was just as important as those my family had. It's best to make peace and avoid fights if you can but there are ponies who will not listen to reason, who will refuses to live peacefully. It like when the princesses defeated Sombra or when Spike did. He wasn’t going to be stopped. He didn’t care about peace. If you don't fight them then you and more importantly others will be harmed. Don't get me wrong, if somepony is willing, even if your views on life are a different as night and day you can get along. It usually takes both sides to compromise but it can be done; But when a pony is not willing it does not matter how much you push for peace. In that case not standing up to them only makes it all the more easy for them to trample you and others.
"I realized then that, yes I love fighting and was good at it but that was my talent so that I could defend ponies when it was needed. When I realized that my cutie mark appeared. The blue lotus is from the Dojo, the swords for fighting but the heart for the motive, the purpose.
"That's pretty awesome." Lightning Jolt said.
"I think yours is awesome." Valentine said. "How did you get It?"
"Oh, it’s no interesting a story like you two have. Rainbow Dash decided to teach me how to make clouds shoot lightning. I was pretty nervous and then scared after I tired and got shocked the first time. Somehow later on I got the gumption to try again and I just started slamming into clouds. They would explode while blasting out their entire store of lightning. Then poof, somewhere during it my cutie mark appeared. It's kind of a useless talent now that I think about it."
"Oh, nonsense." Ember Light replied. "It's awesome and there's no way it's useless."
"I do like it but any pegasus can bust a cloud or create lighting." Lighting Jolt said with a shrug.
"Not all at once." Valentine said studying it. "Perhaps it's symbolic, it's something about your character."
"I don't know, maybe. What could it mean if it is?"
Valentine just shrugged. "If it is symbolic then it's probably up to you to find out."
Soon their discussion was cut short as the cave began to narrow and became more difficult to navigate. They had to duck and crawl under low points or suck in their stomach and squeeze through gaps. It was the worst on Ember Light who was the biggest of the three. It was good that he was in the lead for if he could force himself through then the two mares knew that they could fit. On the up side it felt as if the cave was sloping upwards at least but the problem was that the cave kept getting more difficult. Just when Ember Light thought they were going to have to turn around (Which would have sucked since they would have had to scoot backwards) he saw light that was not his own. He was leading his friends through a low spot where they had to crawl on their bellies when he saw the long line of jagged light cast on the floor.
"I see light!" He called squeezing his frame through the tunnel faster as the two mares cheered behind him. Thankfully the cave winded up enough for him to stand up and though it would be a tight fit he could even turn around now. He never knew that he would ever be so thankful for something so simple as that. As the mares crawled in one after the other they saw the source. There was a crack in the cave roof that reached from the surface all the way down to them. It was at least forty yards up and rather narrow.
"That's going to be a hard climb and a tight squeeze." Ember Light said. "We'll probably have to dig out some of the walls as we go. You two are smaller so you should go first."
"What if you can't fit? We're not going to leave without you." Lightning Jolt responded.
"If I can't fit then the two of you can go for help." He replied. "Besides I can use my magic to help push you up."
"Your magic won’t work as well on me." Valentine said walking up to him and looking up at the cave ceiling. "If you noticed that when the unicorn guard tried to grab me with his magic his hold slipped off. I had a unicorn who I used to know cast a spell on me that in simple terms made me to be like a greased pig with it comes to magical holds. The only reason you were able to stop me from falling is because you shaped you magic like bowl beneath us. If you hadn’t I would have gone splat." She grimaced slightly. "I never thought that spell could be a disadvantage."
"Either way, I think that you should at least try to get through first." Lightning Jolt said. "I'd rather not leave you down here if we don't have to."
"Me too." Valentine agreed.
"Well stand back if you don't want to get showered in dirt. I'm goanna have to dig." Ember Light said raising his forelegs and starting to paw as the earth.