Sombra and I entered the large building as soon as I had stood up.
Inside, the sun-lit stone rotunda tapestries and murals of tremendous historic value greeted us, the woven and painted Trottish ponies seeming to wink and invite us in.
"Are you seeing all of this?" I whispered in awe, at home among such artifacts and almost believing our quarrels could be ignored.
At least for now.
When I received no reply, I turned around to find an indifferent Sombra, reserved and apathetic as he glanced at everything, looking completely unreadable. "What could you possibly need in all of this?" he asked, not even appearing to find anything slightly impressive.
Ignoring his tasteless remark, I began to rummage through my saddle bags when a third voice, with a heavy accent, joined us.
"Hullo there, may I help you?"
I turned excitedly, glad to see another pony besides Sombra.
A matronly-looking earth pony mare with a light brown coat stood near one of a blue velvet rope. Her green and white mane was pulled into a loose professional looking chignon and her pale gray eyes twinkled jollily, matching her silver employee's vest.
"You speak Equestrian?"
"Aye," she said, nodding.
A bit of hope rose in my chest. No more translating spells.
Sombra's left eye twitched slightly - going unnoticed by the mare - as he leaned toward me somewhat to read the paper I had pulled, currently grasped in aura.
"We have a request from Celestia to put-"
I cut him off abruptly, much to his disdain, causing him to grit his teeth angrily. When I first saw him at the Crystal Fair, I could have sworn that he had fangs all the time, but it doesn't seem to be that way now that I'm around him more. He also should have used Celestia's title when speaking about her, it would be the respectful thing to do, and he's certainly not her peer. Every time he says her name, it's like when somepony says the name of a food they hate, which just sounds wrong since this is about Princess Celestia.
"I have a request from Princess Celestia to put the artifacts known as 'The Runic Journals' into my care." Further ignoring a fuming Sombra, I coolly passed the document to her and gave the mare a polite smile.
She checked the seal, and passed it back to me once more with a curt nod of approval.
"I can help ya with that but I would at least like ta know yer friend's name, Princess Twilight Sparkle."
Friend?! More like fiend!
Sombra-swirl made a face looking somewhere between disgust and confusion as to why she would ask that. "My name is Sombra. No titles."
It wasn't as if he was subtle with his identity.
I was still a little surprised he was able walk around in the street without hassle. After all, Trotland is right next to the Crystal Empire. I don't think they would have taken too kindly to their neighbors being cursed all those years ago.
With a nod of her head toward one of the many clean and well-kept halls our new acquaintance indicated we should follow her.
As we padded past precious relics, hoof-falls softened by carpet, the grey-eyed mare introduced herself as Studio Art and passed time in the maze of corridors with cheerful banter while I read the detailed plaques, and admired the displays.
I'm not sure if anypony out there could understand how wonderful it was to have a silent Sombra and no longer have to listen to his snark.
...At least for now.
"I'm an artist by trade ya see," chirped Studio Art, "love to paint the displays in my spare time. Everypony around here calls me 'Merry Stew Art' though, since I make a mean carrot stew."
This banter continued until we came to a door-filled hallway all with 'EMPLOYEES ONLY' signs, asserting themselves with their gleaming brass letters. Studio Art removed a key ring from her vest and sorted through their golden shapes until finding the correct one.
"Now 'fore I go in here I would like you both to say 'Pretty Pony Pepper Possesses a Plethora of Purple Plums'. But not at the same time. Aye?"
Hmm, an unusual request but not an absurd one like Sombra or Discord might make.
Both Sombra and I said the phrase without trouble.
Studio Art turned to me. "You are from Canterlot, City of the Sisters, by your accent."
She turned to face Sombra, thoughtful look on her jolly face. "Now you were a bit harder to guess, being very non-distinct, but I think I detect an accent similar to that found in Crystal Ponies... although yours sounds off."
I was astounded at her ability to recognize accents while Sombra stood there aloofly, not even looking impressed in the slightest. Not even a shrug.
Studio Art flashed a smile before she entered the restricted room.
"Was she right?" I asked.
He met my gaze. "About the accents? I suppose she was close enough. I did live in the Crystal Empire."
He returned to staring at the murals on the ceiling, with a somewhat distant look in his eyes.
I gazed down the hall watching the occasional tour group pass in the distance, wondering what sorts of Trottish culture they were learning about.
Art? Language? Literature? History?
The sound of a closing door alerted me of Studio's return, with her hoof she passed me a small bag containing three ancient books with crooked pages, faded covers, and random loose leaves and other assorted parchments sticking out.
"Good luck reading 'em. I'm not sure if there is a pony alive who can."
Sombra took one look at the books and looked as if he was going to puke. What did he have against a few old spellbooks, being a master conjurer himself?
...
As soon as we were out of the stone city and among the landscape, which was beginning to turn into tundra the farther north we went. I decided to attempt to 'hit the books'.
"No wonder she wished me luck reading these! They are all written in runes!"
But I could manage.
"Don't care. Unlike you, Purple Eyesore, I'm trying to find proper routes up into Arctic territory, after all you wanted to go up there."
I noticed he was reading the scroll I had occasionally seen him read on the train.
"What does that say?"
He didn't turn his gaze away. "It's just a simple, one of a kind, ancient, highly detailed, thousand plus year old map of mine of some territory up north of here. Roughly. There was a suspicious valley that was always rumored to be Starswirl's and that he lived there and all his written knowledge is there. Typical stuff like that."
"Oh." That seemed a little too descriptive to be true, and I had heard very little from Sombra that was likely to be true. Maybe later I'll nab it to see if it's true. Some nice revenge for my poor journal. I still can't believe he did that. He even showed it to Cadan-
Suddenly, Sombra swiped my hat. He just turned around faster than I thought he would - I don't think I'd seen a pony other than Rainbow or Pinkie move like that - and whipped it right off my head.
"Hey! Give that back!" I tried to grab it from him with my magic but he teleported away, seeing what I was about to do.
Now he had his sword out.
Nervous, I teleported over to him.
He poised the sword under my hat, both enveloped in aura.
"Stop!"
He shoved the sword in my hat. It disappeared.
"What did you do!"
He looked over towards me. "Calm down, there's nothing wrong other than you existing." He gave me my hat, which I promptly snatched from him.
"Nothing wrong! How did you do that?! Where is your sword? Why did you just do that-"
"My sword is in your hat."
"How? You didn't even perform a spell on either object, you just stuck the thing up my poor hat! This is a gift, you know."
Sombra-swirl rolled his eyes.
"Here let me spell this out for you: I-D-O-N-O-T-C-A-R-E. Now will you let me explain something to you, or will you just sit there and yell about your hat all day? I thought you wanted to find the Oh-So-Powerful Starswirl the Bearded's sanctuary."
The Starswirl part was mimicked in a terrible falsetto, which barely did anything to disguise his contemptuous tone, in fact, it only made it stand out even more.
"Fine."
"Well thank you ever so much." he smirked, again with the falsetto. "Why I thought you'd simply never shut up, dearie. Now, will you LET ME SPEAK FOR ONE BLOODY MOMENT?!"
I stepped back, startled by his shouting. "Y-Yes! I said you could - go on - please do - lecture me on the magical properties of my own hat." My trembling voice was only lightened by a slight bit of sarcasm.
"Finally," he muttered. His gaze shifted away from me, refusing to make direct eye contact. "I suspected you had an enchanted hat when it never came off unless you wanted to, provided you were focused and conscious, and some less obvious reasons. You had let your guard down so I took it from you and noticed runes carved in the gold rim around the gem."
"So my hat can store things inside?"
He shook his head. "Your hat has a different enchantment. My saddlebags have the bonus you are thinking of, this hat has a much more complex spell."
"Could you show me...?"
He nodded and snatched the hat back from its place on my head. From his bag he produced a charcoal stick and drew the 'six' rune that activates spells on it. He then placed it on his head, cocking it forward with a hoof. With his magic he lit up the rune and the hat began to grow bigger and bigger before it fell and swallowed him.
I stared as it landed softly on a patch of thin snow, rune no longer glowing and reduced to normal size. I picked up the hat and shoved it my bag, hearing it crumple next to some of my papers. Now I could finally get something done and have some peace of mind.
Spreading my wings I decided to follow the general direction toward the valley on Sombra's map which he dropped when he decided to steal my hat. The wind was favorable and I had at least six hours before I even had to consider making any kind of camp.
I didn't even have to feel ashamed if I was spotted. Trotland is very deserted in the north east.
And that's just where I was.
In the north east.
Alone.
Without my friends.
...
Freezing.
The chilly tundra weather was not much more like that of the Arctic.
And it was freezing!
I was now stuck in the middle of a landscape that was nothing more than desolate frost ridden rolling hills with nothing as was beginning to darken.
I didn't even have any good gear!
Landing with a thud, I laid out everything I had and levitated the objects around me.
The Runic Journals?
No.
Scarf?
Another 'no'.
Bag of crackers?
Empty.
Wormy apple cores that I somehow did not notice because of the faint shimmer of magic disguising them until they were probed?
Sombra's fault.
Important documents, train passes, and other things Celestia sent me?
Not helpful.
Crumpled sticky note reminding me to obtain outdoor gear?
Irony.
Magic hat with Sombra inside?
No.
Wait- why was the crystal, a clear diamond, glowing like firelight?
I levitated the hat closer to my face, almost pressing the gem to my eye. It didn't seem to reflect fabric on the other side, like it should have been able to. Now that I think about... when was I ever able to see the fabric on the other side?
That glow did look awfully warm...
I examined the brim of Sombra - or Starswirl's? - rune which was unsmudged.
I knew complex enchantments could exist, but exactly what kind of enchantment was it?
Hoping to get answers, I pulled out the books from the museum. These were probably spell books and would be able to explain something about mystery hats. Flipping through a tattered gray-silver volume and skimming over the runes, a small slip of paper fell out.
Worried that it may be a note or an important bookmark I picked it up in aura, carefully examining its ancient appearance. It wasn't a bookmark. The runes on it translated roughly to 'activate' and were definitely not written in Sombra's script. I couldn't make out everything on it - it was written in some kind of calligraphy that any scholar would find impressive, and the grammar was so dated that I was puzzled after trying to figure out more than three words.
That aside, I was able to see that this was a very important slip - there were no smudges and I'm certain enchantments to prevent aging were in place. The general idea of the spell - which was either just complex or showy, maybe even both, was to return something important. A pony, maybe? The whole thing was pretty mind boggling.
Maybe this had a useful enchantment on it? Useful to me, that is.
It wasn't in Sombra's writing and it came from a book Princess Celestia recommended - one that probably had to do something with Starswirl the Bearded!
On the train one of the things Sombra told me that brief spells like this could only be cast by arcane masters who were somewhat immune, due to their mental ability, of foolishly ambiguous spells and wouldn't perish in a power surge.
I put everything down in the sparse snow, dusk was almost over. Concentrating on triggering the spell I watched as my swirling magenta aura flashed with sparks of white, a symbol of arcane magic.
Nothing happened.
Was it a dud?
A cold wind and the further sinking of Celestia's sun caused me to snap back to my original focus: the hat.
I reexamined the gem's gilded frame border, noting all the carved runes.
According to my little rune guide book the runes laid into this gold spelled out something along the line of '...dwell comfortably within...'
How that works on a hat... Well, it was time to find out before I froze solid. I placed it on my head and tilted it back after putting all of my things back in my saddle bags, minus the apple cores.
My horn lit in aura, charcoal rune glowing pure, flaming white.
Here goes nothing...
...
"I thought you would never figure it out." Sombra said.
Dazed, I blinked my eyes a few times and stood up slowly.
Apparently, my tundra surroundings had been replaced by a circular gray-walled room with a giant sigil in the middle of the floor on which many fragmented images were layered and distorted by the cosmic snowstorm appearance that swept across what would have been a neat, cleanly drawn symbol.
The image varied in aesthetic but all had one similarity. All were maps: topographic, aerial shots, weather reports, groundwater diagrams, and even a complex outline of where Sombra and I had been travelling and a rather kooky looking compass.
Although the room was large it was furnished quite modestly. At the northernmost point - according to the compass - was a large many faceted window and all sorts of pull strings, astrolabes, clockwork mechanics,levers, and more compasses.
Towards the right in the following order was a large chest, a polished wood bar table where a dish of hot apple pie and two spigots protruding from twin barrels. Next to those were small stacks of neatly ordered cutlery.
Next, to the eastern part was a single untouched bed with plain covers. Then there was an enormous bookshelf with sixty tidy books, all in order.
Just like my library...
Focus. Directly to the right of said shelf was a round table, like you would find in a kicthen, but no chairs. Nearby, stood a chimney-less open hearth, curiously emitting no smoke, which was casting a deep yellow-and-shadow glow across this... place.
Adjacent to the hearth was a very plain couch.
Finally, pleased with my surroundings I took a step away from the center sigil's edge and drooped my saddle bags on the floor.
"So, what bizarre pocket dimension is this?" Pocket dimensions were immensely advanced magic and came in astounding variety but could be very dangerous. They were also associated with demons. I was horrible at them, but Celestia and Luna clearly weren't if this is what they could build.
Sombra, who had been examining the sigil's offered maps, directed another one of his eye-rolls at me. I didn't get a good look at him since I arrived, and I didn't really want to, but when he spoke next, his declaration was slightly slurred:
"All hail Purple Eyesore, Sovereign Queen of Lack-Wits. Esteemed Lady of I Cannot Distinguish That I Am No Longer In The Trottish Wilds But My Own Dear Hat."
I sighed. It seemed as if nothing would change.