The Dusk Guard Saga: Beyond the Borderlands

by Viking ZX

Chapter 10 - Making Friends

Alchemy shook his head again as he stared down at the list of “results” he’d gathered, squeezing his eyes shut and trying not to let out a frustrated groan.

Remember what Eshe would say about empty wells, he thought as he let out a long, slow breath. Each one has a cause. You have to focus on the right part of the problem.

He opened his eyes again as he sat back with a sigh, staring down at the spread of small colored vials taking up the corner of the crate he was using as a table. The problem here is, I don’t even know what all the parts are.

“So …” Blade’s voice cut through his thoughts, her semi-laid back tone enough on its own to almost make him groan. “Are we done here, or what? ‘Cause I’d like to take this stuff off. And also stop peeing in bottles.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head as he turned in her direction. The rust red griffon didn’t exactly look happy with her current predicament, holding a very stiff position with her wings outspread, their span so wide they almost touched the edges of the empty storage room they were in. A series of tiny vials filled with various potions had been hung around her body on a makeshift harness, forming lines that were supposed to react with the potions he’d been having her swallow.

The problem was that it wasn’t working right. Some of the potions were changing color while others weren’t. Which, according to his education, shouldn’t have been possible.

“No,” he said, again, stepping up to her and giving one of the potions a faint tap with his hoof. “Not until I’ve got some idea of what’s going on with your body.”

“We already know what’s going on with it,” Blade said, her wings lowering slightly. “Magic and I aren’t getting along. Now can you hurry it up? I’m missing my workout here. These muscles don’t keep themselves toned, you know,” she said, making her chest twitch. The vials hanging across her body shook, colored fluids inside them sloshing back and forth more than they already were.

“Blade,” he said, rolling his eyes and trying to ignore the roll of her muscle. “Saying ‘magic and you aren’t getting along’ is like telling a doctor that you’ve misplaced your wings. Something’s not right.”

“Fine,” Blade said, tilting her head back and staring up at the ceiling. “So my magic is a little off. So what?”

“Your magic isn’t just off,” Alchemy said, stepping back and looking at the arrangement of vials. The fluids resumed their steady back and forth sweep as Blade’s actions stopped, once again reacting only to the slow but steady rocking of the Arrow. “It’s doing things I’ve never seen anyone’s body do before. What I’m trying to do is get some idea of how with these vials … but that’s not working either.”

“So that’s why I look like a discount Hearth’s Warming tree,” Blade said, giving her wings another little shake in emphasis.

“Yes,” Alchemy said, frowning as he turned his head back towards his potion set. “What they’re supposed to do is react to your body’s magic field, but they’re not even doing that the way they’re supposed to.”

“What if I try to fly?” She shifted her wings, the potion in the vials along her wings switching from clear to light blue. “Now that’s cool,” she said, tilting her head and looking at the color as it vanished. “Why’d it go out?”

“Basically?” he asked. “Because you stopped preparing to fly, and so your body stopped circulating such a surplus of magic energy across your wings.” He let out another sigh and dropped to his hindquarters, flicking his tail across the cool wooden floor. I give up. Eshe herself would be at a loss for figuring this out. Then again, he thought as the memory of his old mentor leapt to mind. She still wouldn’t give up. She’d just try something new until things worked out.

“So … are we done then?”

Blade’s voice pulled him away and he shook his head. “Maybe? I’m not really sure. Honestly, Blade,” he said as he looked at her. “I’m running out of ideas.”

Plus, I need to take another dose of my own potion, he thought as Blade shrugged and began pulling off the harness. It’s getting close to time for more. He could feel the faint weakness beginning in his legs. After that, his breathing would become labored and his insides would start to burn as his internal magic went haywire. His head would start to throb, his ears ringing as his system began to deteriorate. And after that … well, he’d never really gone that far. It was a slow but inevitable death, as sure as if he took too much of the potion at one go. Except doing that led to the opposite. One run-in with that had been all it had taken to convince him never to overdose on the potion again.

He shook his head again, ending with his attention focused on Blade as she peeled the harness off of her body, vials ringing out as they collided with one another. Whatever affliction she had, it was clearly only disrupting the magic flow around the surface of her body, and not in a way that interfered with her body’s natural abilities as his own problem did. Which was … completely unique. As far as he could tell—

The vials on one section of the harness turned blue.

“Wait!” he said, jumping across the floor and pressing his hooves against her shoulders. “Stop moving?”

“Uh, what?” Blade asked, though she complied, holding her body balanced on her hind legs, wings folded back and one forelimb over her head. “This isn’t exactly the easiest position to hold, you know.”

“I know,” he said, fixing his eyes on the part of her shoulder the vials had slid over. “Can you go back a step or two? Like you’ve changed your mind about taking off the harness?”

“Well, yeah,” Blade said. “I guess so.” The harness began to drop back into position once more.

“Slower,” he said, his eyes still fixed on her shoulder. “And … stop right there,” he said as the vials began changing to light blue once more.

“What?” Blade asked, looking down. “Oh.”

“Oh indeed,” Alchemy said as he bent forward to get a closer look, making a mental note of the location of the vials. Then he darted back. “All right, you can take the harness off.”

“Just like that?” she asked, pulling the harness over her head once more.

“Yeah,” he replied, watching as more of the vials flashed blue as they slid across her body. “Just like that.”

“You know,” Blade said as she pulled the last of the vials over her head. “If you’re going to stare like that, at least do a lady a favor and buy her a drink first.”

“Wait, what?” He stumbled back, his head snapping up to see Blade grinning down at him. “That’s not—I wasn’t—”

“Relax, Al,” she said, her grin growing wider. “I’m not much of a lady anyway.”

“Wait, but—of course you—”

Blade let out a long chuckle that echoed through the room. “Nevermind, let’s just go back to the doctor-patient thing. I think it’s a bit easier on you.” She set the collection of vials on the crate and then took a step back, spreading her wings once more. “Whatever you saw, I’m guessing you want my position to be roughly the same?”

“I … I don’t actually know,” he said, reaching for the harness and pulling it across the crate, the vials scraping across the rough wood. Not the best answer. “Actually, for now, yes,” he said, plucking one of the vials free and holding it in his teeth. “Can you work this marker?” he asked, flicking the item in question free of his potion kit and tossing it through the air at her with a twist of his hoof. She caught it without looking.

“Work it for what?” she asked.

“Making marks where I ask you to,” he said, pushing his voice past the vial clamped in his teeth. “Nothing permanent,” he said as she lifted one feathered brow. “It’s medical. Washes right off.”

“Right …” she said. But she nodded, and he stepped forward.

The first thing he did was hold the vial up to her shoulder, right around the area where the vials had began glowing before. He had to bring the tip of the vial closer than he’d expected, but before long the specially treated fluid inside the vial began to change colors, switching from clear to a light, pale, blue.

He moved his head slightly, letting the tip of the vial drift back and forth across the griffon’s shoulder, and watched as the blue began first to recede, and then spread up the vial. He gave her shoulder a few more passes in various directions, noting the way the colors grew and faded, until bringing the vial to a stop where the blue coloration was the most apparent.

“Here,” he said, tapping her side gently with the vial and then pulling his head away. Blade nodded, the tip of the marker making a small ‘X’ over the spot he’d touched.

“So what are we looking at?” Blade asked. He shook his head as he began to run the vial over her side, slightly self-conscious of the fact that his face was so close to her side. He’d barely gone two hoof-widths down her side when he caught the same faint wisp of a color change in the tip of the vial. A moment’s movement later, and he’d narrowed down another spot for her to mark.

“One second,” Blade said, her side pulling away from him as she stepped towards the table. “Find the blue spots, right?” She wrapper her talons around another vial with a faint clink, lifting it free of the harness and then stepping back to the same position. “Fine. But I can handle some of it myself.”

“That’s fine,” he said, giving her a nod. Saves me from having to pry into any delicate areas, he thought as he began moving across her side once more, periodically stopping to have her make another mark. There didn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to the circular patches of magic he was finding—they were spread across her body almost equally, but not quite, as if they’d simply been painted across her body by a painter flicking his brush.

Whatever’s causing this, it must apply only to the surface and leave her internal magic on its own, he thought as he tapped yet another point with the vial. According to the potions I’ve given her, internally she’s entirely healthy, magic-wise. But whatever this is, it’s altered the way her outer field is working. Which explained why the harness hadn’t shown him anything: he’d had her put on the makeshift bit of rope and then attached the vials where a griffon’s external flow-lines should have been.

He took a step back, satisfied with the dozen or so points he’d found so far. A quick glance at Blade’s own hunt showed that she’d found several more in roughly equal locations on the other side of her body, as well as a few more along each of her forelegs, hind legs, and wings.

“So,” Blade said, looking at the curious collection of blue X’s that were clashing against her coat. “What are we looking at here?”

“We’re looking at areas where your surface magic field is particularly strong,” Alchemy said, dropping his vial into his hoof. “For reasons I don’t quite understand yet.”

“Which means … what?” Blade asked.

“Well, you know how we each have an internal magic field, correct?” He said, waiting as she nodded. “Well, that internal magic field is wholly our own, like blood. Our bodies use it and regulate it as needed. We can even project it, which is what enables your body to fly, for example.”

“I get that,” she said, waving a claw. “And I can still fly. Whatever … this … is, it hasn’t messed that up for me.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “What we were supposed to see with that test,” he said, nodding his head toward the harness, “was the natural flow of your body’s outer currents. Each line of vials was along what a standard griffon’s magic flow would look like. Sort of like tracking the path blood takes through your veins, but more like a magnetic field.”

“Ooookay,” came Blade’s reply, her voice slightly less sure of itself than it had been. “And mine’s different.”

“Yes,” he said, nodding as he stepped forward. “For some reason, your body’s natural flow has … shifted. It isn’t to say that you don’t have one, you do, and I would predict that with more experiments, we could find out exactly what the flow looks like and how it still covers the rest of your body, but for now it seems concentrated in these areas.” He held the vial out towards one of the spots on her side and watched as the fluid within shifted to blue once more.

“That’s a pretty nifty potion,” she said.

“Thank you.” He moved the vial to another spot, watching again as the liquid shifted back to clear and then to blue again. “It takes a lot of work to create—it’s why I’ve had you chugging so many potions … and, uh, relieving yourself in a bottle.”

“Peachy.” He could tell by her tone that she was a little less enthused about that one. “I’ll bet that has marketing issues.”

He ignored the jibe as he stepped back. “The problem is now that I know a little bit about what’s happening,” he said, looking up at her. “I still don’t know why or if we should be worried about it. Something adjusted your body’s natural magic field just slightly, and whatever it is seems also to be reacting to exterior magic.” He paused, glancing down at the scabbed over gash along her side. “And your side hasn’t healed yet.”

“Hmm?” She looked down at her side, her beak making a sharp click. “No, it hasn’t,” she said with a shake of her head. “Whatever is was that was making me heal up a little quicker than normal seems to have burned itself out.”

“Huh,” he stepped back again, feeling his legs start to tremble slightly beneath him. He’d need another dose of his potion soon, before his body got any weaker or his breathing started to become harder. “When was the last time you underwent a healing spell?”

“That?” she laughed. “During my last job, so just a few weeks ago, actually. It was right after …” She frowned, the feathers of her brow pressing close together as her eyes narrowed. “Right after … after the battery blew up.”

“Wait, after what?” Blade didn’t respond to his question. Instead she was sitting back, probing at one of the marks with both pairs of talons.

“That’s it!” she said, her head snapping in his direction as her claws stopped. “The battery!”

“What battery?” She was grinning at him now, her wings shifting as her tail flicked back and forth behind her.

“The magic battery,” she said. “My last employers, they … Well, I can’t get into specifics, but they were using crystals as batteries for magic energy. They would absorb ambient energy and then spit it out as needed.”

“I’ve never heard of anything like that,” he admitted.

“Well, it worked,” she said. “And I probably shouldn’t say anymore on that one. The point is, they were a little unstable.”

“I can see why,” he said with a nod. “All that energy—”

“Exactly,” she said, still grinning. “And I had one blow up right near me. Caught a whole side full of little fragments, and my boss?” She tapped at her shoulder again. “She didn’t take most of them out before she healed me!”

“Wait,” he said, trying to catch his brain up with what she’d said. “Are you saying that there are fragments of that … magic battery inside of you?”

“Yes!” she said, tapping her shoulder again with one talon. “They weren’t very deep. You can feel one of them right below that mark you made. And it’s a battery,” she said, puffing her chest up in satisfaction. “It’s designed to absorb and release magic.”

He almost could hear the mental click inside his mind as everything fell into place. “It adapted to your own internal magic field,” he said,  sitting back as his thoughts began to race. “And any magic that it comes into contact with that isn’t that, it would push away …” He paused, rubbing a hoof across his chin as his ears folded back tight against his head. “Though that doesn’t explain the—no, maybe it does!”

“Blade,” he said, looking up. “What sort of magic were those batteries designed to use? How did they work?”

She shook her head. “You’re asking the wrong griffon, Al. ‘Ambient’ was the best answer I ever got—”

He shook his head. “No, that makes sense. Think about it. If those fragments of this battery you were talking about still work, then they’re interacting with your body’s natural field, which is why your external field is shaped differently when it’s at rest. The batteries are acting as conduits. But if another spell were to interact with your body …”

She nodded, eyes widening in understanding. “Like a fire spell.”

“Yes,” he said, nodding. “Like a fire spell. The batteries might resist it at first, but once it reached a certain point—”

“—they’d switch over and start sucking it in,” Blade finished. “And then since they’re synced with me—”

“—they’d adapt and dump the magic into your own body as best they could, your body’s own field would accept it and you’d suddenly find yourself able to exude fire magic.”

“Or healing rapidly,” she said, lifting her talons and staring at them with wide eyes. “In other words, I’m magic-proof.”

“Magic resistant,” he corrected. “But we can’t be sure, not without a test …” he closed his eyes, running the theory over in his mind. How can we test something this abstract? he thought. We’d need a unicorn to … Hang on, we have one. He opened his eyes, the plan falling into place as he stepped towards the hatch. “One second. Wait here.”

The Arrow wasn’t the largest ship he’d ever been in by a long shot, but it did make good use of the space. The small storage room that they’d been using for his tests was set near the back of the craft, and he’d been forced to move a number of the boxes into the focsle atop the bunks they’d been sleeping in before they’d had the space to move in. Frost hadn’t been happy about the decision, but she’d approved it provided he put the crates back and he’d stayed out of her own personal cabin, set almost in the middle of the ship.

He darted down the hall that separated the rear room from the focsle, ignoring the locked door that led to Frost’s quarters. She wouldn’t be in it. Instead, he passed into the crew quarters, ignoring the crates he’d been forced to stack atop the beds, and turned to head up the steep stairway on the port side of the ship.

“Frost?” he asked as he stuck his head out onto the Arrow’s main “bridge.” It wasn’t that, really, more of a general gathering area with a galley and a social area, but the ship could be steered from it if one didn’t mind having a lower view.

“She’s up above,” Barnabas said, rapping his knuckles against the ceiling. “Up on the flying bridge. Why? What do ya’ need?”

“We need her for a second,” he said. “To try some magic out.”

“Right.” The massive blue minotaur shifted, pushing away whatever it was he’d been looking at on the table and then walking with a somewhat hunched gait over to the mast that ran right through the middle of the room and into the ceiling above him. A ladder had been set into one side of the mast, with a hatch above it for anypony who wished to climb up to the enclosed flying bridge.

“Frost!” Barnabas called, thumping one fist against the hatch. “I’m coming up!”

“What?”

“I’m coming up,” Barnabas said, pushing the hatch open with one hand and then somehow squeezing his massive shoulders through the small opening. “Al needs you down below for some magic stuff.”

There was a pause as Barnabas’s hooves vanished through the open hatch, followed by a further rumble from the minotaur’s deep voice. “I don’t know, Frost, just go help them out, alright? I’ll keep an eye on things up here.” There was another pause, and then a deep chuckle. “Relax, Frost, I won’t scratch your ship. You know I’m just as good at piloting her as you are.”

“—that to the scratch you left on the lift plates near Buoy Rock,” Frost said as her rear legs swung out over the open hatch. Alchemy lifted an eyebrow as Frost began making her way down the ladder, her long, white tail dangling behind her. Had that been a joke?

He ducked just before Frost’s head came into view as he realized what his staring in her direction could look like. The last thing he wanted was for the aptly-named unicorn to think he was—he shook his head as he moved down the steps, his hooves sliding over the wood. You’re not going to go there. Mention looks to that unicorn and you could end up with that long, pointy horn of hers buried in your throat. It wasn’t much of a stretch after eyeing the destruction she’d unleashed on the pirates in the shipyard.

She’s dangerous, he thought as he made his way back to the rear room, where Blade appeared to be playing with the vials he’d left with a slightly bored look on her face. And hard. What could have made her like that? He definitely wasn’t going to ask her.

“So?” Blade asked, looking up at him as he entered.

“She’s on her way,” he said, his words coming out clipped and short.

“Not too fond of her, are you?” Blade asked quietly, her wings shifting.

“Ah … if you mean that I don’t care—”

“Relax, Alchemy,” Blade said as hoofsteps began echoing down the hallway behind him. “It’s cool. So,” she said, her voice rising in volume so it was clearly audible. “What are we going to do?”

“Well,” Alchemy said as he felt a chill pass by his hindquarters. Frost stepped around him, her head held high, eyeing him like she would look at something stuck to the bottom of her hoof. “Frost, we need you to cast a spell of some kind on Blade—lightly at first!” he warned as the mare’s horn began to glow a light purple. “Something directly at or on her, though. And then you, Blade,” he said, turning towards the griffon. “Hold that vial far enough away from those points that just the very tip of the mixture is—yes, that’s perfect. Thank you.” He glanced in Frost’s direction. “If you would?”

She didn’t say anything, instead choosing to simply nod and light her horn. A faint chill rolled through the room, and Blade pulled her wings tighter around herself, shivering as a spirals of frost began to appear on the floor.

“Don’t move the vial,” he said, cautioning her. “It needs to stay right where it is.” He took a step closer, watching the end of the vial carefully. Nothing had changed yet.

“Increase the effect,” he said without pulling his eyes away.

“I am,” Frost said, her voice almost as cold as the room was becoming. “If it’s not having an effect, then—”

“Wait!” he said, his eyes going wide as the blue began to spread up the base of the vial. “It’s working! Don’t stop!” He could see the blue climbing up the inside of the vial, the potion slowly making the change from clear to blue as Blade’s magic field began to swell.

“Whoa,” Blade said, her wings spreading slightly. “That feels weird. Okay, Frost, you can stop now.”

“What does it feel like?” Alchemy asked as the purple glow vanished from Frost’s horn. The blue inside the vial began to fade as well, draining down towards the tip like something was siphoning the color from it.

“It’s like a … a cold energy.” Blade shook her head. “It’s kind of hard to describe. I can feel it inside my chest—it’s a bit like that feeling you get when you wake up on an icy morning.”

“Can you do anything with it?” He took a step forward, a memory of her burning talons flashing to mind.

“Well … I’m kind of new to this,” Blade said, spreading her wings. “But hang on.”

Her wings swept downward, bringing with them a chill rush of wind that sent a faint shiver running down his back. He glanced over at Frost, but she shook her head. The cold hadn’t been her doing.

“Yeah, I felt that,” Blade said, sitting back on her hindquarters and lifting her talons. A faint frost began to build across them, spreading across the potion vial she was holding and painting a thick film of mist—or was it frost?—across the glass as the potion inside began to freeze.

“Well, cool,” she said, looking up at him. “Magic resistance ... and reuse.”

“Incredible,” he said. “Absolutely amazing.”

“No kidding,” Blade said, grinning. “Kind of explains a lot of the luck I’ve had with magic lately.”

“Well, it’s still only resistance, rather than outright immunity,” he said, shaking his head. “I don’t think you’re immune. Frost here could probably tell you that despite her affinity for ice, somepony else using ice magic could still hurt her.” Frost gave Blade a barely apparent nod. It was better than nothing, at least.

“Every little bit helps,” Blade said, grinning as the last of the ice faded from her talons. “Plus, I can think of some neat ways to make use of this.”

“And you haven’t had any trouble with your own innate magic?” he ventured. “Flying? Weather control?”

She shook her head. “Not that I’ve noticed.”

“Amazing.” He wasn’t sure how else to put it. “The battery fragments react to incoming magic, absorb it, and then feed it into your own magic field. All the while being completely at ease with your own, natural rhythm.”

“Yeah,” Blade said, chuckling. “All that technical stuff. How about simplifying that for me?”

“Basically, if I’m reading what I see right, if somepony attempts to cast a spell on you, they’ll need to work harder to achieve the same level of effect it would achieve on another griffon. In effect, you’re a bit like a minotaur now, except I’d expect there’s a much lower upper limit to how much magic you can actively resist, since your ... enhancement, comes from an artificial source.” He could feel himself talking faster and faster as his mind pushed forth theory after theory. “But to balance that out, unlike a minotaur, which actively resists any and all magic, your body now incorporates it. So, if someone were to use a healing spell on you—like your last employer did—your own body’s natural field would exhibit traces of that spell each time it cycled through the crystals!”

“Which is why I was healing so much faster for the last few weeks,” Blade said, nodding. “Cool.” Her wings lifted as she twisted her body, the red gash the knife at the docks had left her clearly visible against her lightly-tanned coat. “Guess that explains why this didn’t heal over,” she said with a slight shake of her head.

“Still, the application of such a discovery—” he began.

Blade held up a claw. “Easy there, stormrider. We figured it out. That’s good enough for today.”

“But—” He almost choked on his words as she shook her head.

“Nope, universal knowledge and all can wait.” Blade tossed the vial she’d been holding atop the crate with the rest of his equipment. “Unless there’s some other test you want to run that’s directly—and I mean directly—related to figuring this out—one that won’t require another couple of hours,” she clarified as he opened his mouth once more. There was a faint click as he snapped it back shut. “Barring that, I’m done for now. We’ve got a mission to worry about, I need to practice, and now I’ve got something new I’ve got to figure out. So,” she said, one eye narrowing as she fixed it on him like a hawk. “We good?”

“I—” There was no sense to be had pounding his head against a wall. She wasn’t going to consent to anything now that she knew what was going on. “Fine,” he said, slumping back. “No more tests. At least we know what’s going on now.”

“Hey,” Blade said as she stepped across the room, her talons tapping against the wooden deck. “If it makes you feel any better, once this is all over there’s a friend of mine who knows a mare that’d be all over stuff like this. But once this job is done, got it?”

He pulled his last card. “And what if this does turn out to be hazardous? The gems, I mean?”

“What? The battery bits?” she asked, pausing by the exit. “We know what’s causing it now. If something goes wrong, I’ll just cut them out.” She brandished one of her claws for effect, the razor-sharp edge gleaming under the magilights. “Anyway, I’ve got exercise to do.” She turned and moved down the hallway, ducking into the focsle and vanishing from sight.

“Do you still need me?” Frost’s cool voice almost made him jump, his tail twitching with surprise. She’d been so quiet, he’d completely forgotten that she’d been standing behind him. Which means you’re overdue for a potion dose, he thought as he turned to face the long-legged mare. His awareness was slipping.

“No,” he said after a moment’s consideration. “That was it. Just some magic—”

“Good,” Frost said, turning away and trotting towards the hallway. “Tell Barnabas I’m getting some rest.”

“Right, fine. I’ll do—” The door to Frost’s quarters slid shut behind her, and he found himself speaking to an empty room. “That …” he finished lamely. He could feel his thoughts starting to drag now, slowing down, like the chill of the room was freezing the synapses in his brain. It wasn’t that though, he was starting to go through withdrawal.

He stepped over to his potion kit and began collecting the assortment of tiny vials back together, placing them in one of the lower drawers. He could empty the vials out later, unless he thought up another test for Blade to take.

Not likely, he thought as he dropped the last one into place and slid the drawer shut, the vials rolling against one another and producing a melodious ringing. And since it doesn’t seem to be harming her in any way, I doubt she’s going to want to get it tested anytime soon. Unless it reacts badly somehow.

His potion kit rattled as he lifted it, his neck shaking under the heavy weight, and he dropped it back down on the crate with a sigh. I waited too long, he thought with a shake of his head as he lifted the latch over one of the smaller drawers and pulled it open. I need a dose before this gets much worse. He could feel his hind legs trembling beneath him, the shaking growing worse by the second, the strength leaking out of his body like water from a cracked barrel.

Row after row of tiny, thick-walled glass vials stared up at him from the cloth-lined confines of the drawer he’d pulled open, each one sparkling under the magilights. His shaking grew as he reached out with one hoof, gently prying one of the small vials free of its confinement, and he had to close his eyes and focus, willing the hoof to stop its jittery motions. It helped. Somewhat.

The blue fluid contained within the vial seemed to pulse with each shake, a glow from within playing strange patterns across his coat. He stared at it for a moment, watching the glittering color swell and fade in a distant pulse that almost felt more regular than his own breaths. No, it was more regular than his own breathing now.

It was kind of sad, in a way. Here my special talent is alchemy, and now I literally can’t survive without it. He could feel his breathing growing more labored, the motion of his chest growing jerky as his muscles failed in their duties. The burn in his insides was starting now, a low glow of pain that reminded him of the time he’d swallowed fireweed.

But at least alchemy is my special talent, he thought as he popped the rubber cork free from the vial. Otherwise, I’d probably be dead now.

He downed the potion in a single gulp, the magic-infused liquid burning as it poured down his throat. It hit his stomach hard, like someone had punched him, his guts twisting as the potion forced itself into his systems. Then it exploded outwards, a burst of burning energy that swelled through his muscles and limbs like an oncoming wall, pushing away the shaking, the weakened feelings, and replacing them with iron strength. The muggy feeling inside his mind vanished, his thoughts becoming sharp and clear once more. He stared down at the now empty vial, checking to make certain that he’d consumed every single drop of the expensive mixture.

It was done. There wasn’t anything left. A sigh escaped him as he corked the vial once more, dropping it back in a separate drawer he’d set aside just for his own treatments. The drawer with the remaining doses of potion slid shut for another eight or so hours, depending on how much he pushed himself over the rest of the day.

His strength returned once more, he lifted the kit easily, setting it on his back and then making his way down the hallway towards the focsle. It slid into place under his bunk, and he glanced at the crates he’d pulled out of the storage room, deciding to move them later.

Climbing the ladder up the side of the mast was a bit trickier than it looked, though he suspected it was probably easier with his enhanced strength. The wooden hatch rattled as he pounded one hoof against it.

“Barnabas? It’s Alchemy. I—” The hatch flipped back, his hoof catching air for a brief moment he pulled it back. Barnabas was staring down at him, an amused look on his face. “Oh. Hi.”

“Need a hand?” the minotaur asked, holding out a hand.

“No,” he said, shaking his head and pulling himself up through the opening. “Thanks though.”

“No problem,” Barnabas said, leaning back and looking out through the glass once more. “What’s going on?”

The upper bridge was smaller than the combination bridge, galley, and social area that made up the space below it. It was just a bridge, without any of the flair or niceties of the lower cabins. Long, wide, tilted windows made up the majority of the walls, giving the pony—or minotaur—behind the ship’s wheel an almost unobstructed view in all directions, though they were probably the reason the bridge was a bit colder as a result. Barnabas himself was sitting in a swivel chair behind the wheel, a hoof up on the control panel and a bemused look on his face. His horns were just inches shy of the ceiling, and with a start, Alchemy realized that the minotaur wouldn’t be able to stand at his full height at all.

“Yeah, it’s a bit cramped,” he said with a grin, tilting his head back and tapping a finger against the ceiling. “But I’ve got to be honest, before we put the roof on it, it was a lot colder up here. Personally, I’ll take the warmth and relaxation over being able to stand any day. Besides,” he said, laughing as he turned and looked out across the ice. “At least the place is big enough I can stretch my back out if I lay down.” He lifted a massive hand to shade his eyes, as if staring at something off in the distance, and then turned back to look in Alchemy’s direction. “So, what’d ya’ need?”

He shrugged. “Honestly, not much. Frost wanted me to tell you that she’d be resting in her quarters until later.”

Barnabas nodded. “I figured as much when she didn’t come right back here. You guys get everything you need? Or was she being unhelpful again?”

“No, we got what we wanted,” he said, nodding as he bent down to flip the hatch shut. Barnabas’s outstretched hand stopped him.

“Leave it open,” he said, grinning. “It’ll let some warmer air move up here.”

“Right,” Alchemy said, shrugging as he sat down on a nearby locker. “Anyway, she helped, and we figured out what’s going on with Blade.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah,” he said, shaking his head. “Apparently she got injured on her last job and it left her with some battery crystal fragments lodged in her skin. She wouldn’t tell me much about either, but the prognosis is she’s not dying, she’s entirely fine, and appears to have a little bonus resistance to magic.”

“Huh,” Barnabas said, one eyebrow lifting. “Well, at least we don’t have to worry about our contact dying halfway through this job. The last thing I want to do is do all this work and then find out we’re not getting our share of the payday because our leader died from some lucky shot.”

“You’re not at all surprised by her being magic resistant?” Alchemy asked.

“When you’ve been around the Ocean enough times, you learn to roll with things,” Barnabas said. “I’m no doctor or shipwright; I leave that to the sapients whose job it is. I mean, look at you.”

“Me?”

“Yeah, you,” Barnabas said, a faint laugh rumbling across the room. “You’re a quarter my weight on a good day to look at you, but you can throw someone my size over your shoulders like it’s nothing from what I hear.” He turned his attention back towards the view outside the windows. “Everyone’s got a story, Alchemy. Me, you, Blade, Hain …”

“Even Frost?” The words were out of his mouth before he’d even considered what he was asking, and he held his breath as Barnabas nodded.

“Yeah,” he said at last. “Even my sister.”

Might as well ask. “And what story is that?” he asked, watching the large blue minotaur carefully. If he doesn’t like this question …

“A hard one,” Barnabas said after a moment. The jovial tone normally so prevalent in his voice felt subdued somehow, as if even acknowledging the question hurt.

“I apologize,” Alchemy said, shaking his head and rising from the locker. “I shouldn’t have—”

Barnabas let out an almost barking laugh. “Relax,” he said, leaning over and holding a hand across the open hatch. “If you really want to know, I’ll give you the short version. It’s as much my story to tell as hers.”

“Well, all right,” Alchemy said, settling himself on the locker once more. “I’ve got to admit, I’m a little curious how her name ended up so literal.”

“Literal?” Barnabas shook his head, his horns just barely missing one of the ceiling’s supportive beams. “Frost doesn’t even come close, Al. She should have been named ‘Ice.’ That’d fit. Frost just isn’t cold enough for what she’s become.” He let out a long sigh, his entire body sinking forward.

“Look,” he said, turning towards him once more. “I won’t lie, it’s not a pleasant story. And as you could probably guess, it starts with the cult. Ever heard of the Purge?”

He nodded. “Once or twice. Most ponies don’t like talking about it.”

“I don’t blame them,” Barnabas said. “The Purge was what happened when the Order of the Red Horn started getting really public, making alliances, all that.” He waved his hand. “Anyway, they basically gave the entire Ocean an ultimatum. If you were a unicorn, you joined the cult. Or they … They made your life difficult.”

“And?” Alchemy prompted when Barnabas didn’t say anything for a moment.

“At first it was just the cult acting out,” he said. “I was just a young ‘un at the time. Thirteen and eager to prove myself on the Ocean alongside Aeliana—my older sister. But then they started roughing up ponies who wouldn’t give. Beating them. Torturing them. And then ponies started dying.”

He let out a long sigh. “Frost’s parents were earth ponies. I guess they knew what was coming. According to their neighbors, they were making plans to emigrate to Equestria. They’d kept Frost hidden, worried about what would happen if the cult found out.” His shoulders heaved with a massive shrug. “And of course they did. They stormed the whole town. All of Greyhost. Dragging ponies out on the street, beating up the local security force, setting fire to homes …”

“They killed her parents,” he said, his voice flat. “Murdered them right in front of her while she was hiding in her house. And they would have found her too, except we happened to be nearby—us Cragtooths, I mean—and came in to see what was happening. The cult made it clear we weren’t welcome and we … well …” His hand tightened into a fist, the muscles of his forearm standing out. “We disagreed.”

“After the fighting was over, half the town was dead or burning. Aeliana and I found her crying next to the bodies of her parents after we chased off the cult. With the cult breathing down their necks, nobody in town was too keen on taking a young unicorn filly into their responsibility, so we took her with us.”

“No wonder she’s so distant,” Alchemy said, staring down at the floor. “Losing both her parents like that.”

“Actually, that wasn’t what did it,” Barnabas said with another shake of his head. “She was always cool, don’t get me wrong, but she got over the loss of her parents, or so we thought. She was Aeli and I’s little sister, a part of the family. She was funny, clever, and skilled with magic. Sure, we took her on raids and stuff, but the Cragtooths have never been that rough, especially with Captain Titus in charge.”

“What changed?”

Barnabas’s eyes took on a distant look. “Sagis happened,” he growled. “About six years ago. After he’d started his real push to take the Ocean. Long story short, Sagis killed Aeliana, and after that, Frost just shut down. I don’t know if it brought back memories she’d buried from her parents’ deaths or what, but ever since then, the only thing she’s cared about has been killing each and every last member of the Order. She got cold, she got distant, and she turned herself into a weapon.”

“I’m sorry.” He wasn’t sure what else he could say.

“Hey, stuff happens,” Barnabas said, reaching down and adjusting the ship’s wheel. The Arrow tilted to one side as it made a slow roll around a distant outcropping of ice. “I mean, yeah, it’s terrible. Do I miss Aeliana? Sure I do. But Frost? I miss her a little too. I worry sometimes that it’ll never be enough, you know? That she’s pushing out everything that makes her who she was. Sometimes I still see glimpses of her, you know, when she smiles or something. But those are pretty rare these days.”

“Have you ever tried talking her out of it?”

Barnabas shook his head. “Useless, my friend. I’ve tried. She’s fixated on revenge. The most I can do is work with her, try my best to keep it from eating her up inside, and do what I can to find the little filly I used to know hiding somewhere inside.” He let out a loud sigh. “I can’t give up. She’s my sister. I love her.”

For a moment they were both quiet, the faint groan of the ice and creak of the ship filling the space left by their respective voices. Alchemy shifted his weight, searching his mind for something to say. I don’t even know where to start, he thought. I mean, I’ve known ponies that have died, but—

“How about you?” Barnabas asked. “You got any family?”

“Just back in Equestria,” he said quickly. “Parents. Older sister, older brother.”

Barnabas nodded. “Someday I hope to take Frost there. There isn’t much of a life for her here.” The minotaur frowned.
“So what about you?” Alchemy asked after a minute or two of silence. Barnabas’s ears twitched in surprise, as if he’d forgotten Alchemy was sitting there.

“What about me?” the minotaur said, snorting.

“Where’d you come from? How’d you end up on the ice? Were you born here?”

“Born here?” Barnabas let out a short laugh. “No, I wasn’t born here. I was born in the pits, back in the homelands.”

“So why come here?”

Barnabas fixed an  eye on him, his expression curious. “You know much about the minotaur homelands?”

“No,” Alchemy said, shaking his head. “Never been there.”

“Well, that part doesn’t surprise me,” Barnabas said with a laugh as he reached down alongside the helm and pulled out a small collapsible table, follow by a deck of cards. “You know how to play Three-cut?”

“Well enough. Got a hand-holder?”

Barnabas grinning at him as he pulled one of the small, spring-loaded devices out from the same place he’d pulled the cards. “Of course,” he said, passing it over. “My sister’s a pony, remember? No fingers.”

“She’s got magic,” Alchemy said as he set the holder in front of him.

“Hah!” Barnabas shook his head as he flipped the deck into his hands. “No thanks. She’s good enough with her magic as is. There’s a reason professional games don’t allow magic use.”

“She’ll cheat?” Alchemy asked as the cards began to hum in Barnabas’s hands, edges rubbing against one another as he shuffled them.

“To be honest, I don’t know,” Barnabas said, his eyes staring off into the distance, as if the minotaur was deep in thought. “All I know is every time I let her, she usually wins.” He gave the cards a final shuffle and then cut the deck. “So, Three-cut?”

“Three-cut,” Alchemy said as Barnabas began dealing them their hands. “So, how did you and your sister end up on the ice then?”

“It’s a bit of a simple story, driven by a complex heritage,” Barnabas said, picking up a card. “You said you’ve never been to the minotaur homelands, but what do you know about us?”

“Honestly?” Alchemy said as Barnabas discarded. “Pretty much that it exists. You guys do a lot of metalwork and exports. You know, basic stuff.”

“Do you know how our government is set up?”

‘No,” Alchemy said as he drew and eyed his hand. Nothing solid. He tossed a card onto the discard face up. “I know it’s matriarchal, and you guys have tribes, but that’s about it.”

“That’s actually a pretty apt description.” Barnabas grabbed the card Alchemy had tossed on the discard and replaced it with one of his own, a nine of hearts. “Basically, it’s a pretty simple system. There’s about one female born to every four males. Which means that the den mothers—a bit like griffon matriarchs—kind of rule the roost, so to speak.”

“Sexual dimorphism is that high?” Alchemy asked, his hoof halfway towards the draw pile. “One in five is female?”

“It’s higher in some clans,” Barnabas said, shrugging. “We live with it. Anyway, we’re not actually unified. Every tribe has it’s fiercely held boundaries inside what we’d call ‘the nation,’ but we’re not really unified.”

“What about trade deals?” Alchemy asked, picking up a card. A three of diamonds stared up at him. Lucky! He dropped the nine of hearts onto the discard, face down. Barnabas eyed it for a moment before continuing.

“Trade deals are done with the city-states that will be affected,” he said, drawing a card rather than gambling on Alchemy’s bait. “If your deal will effect three city-states, three city-states are who you’ll deal with. If it’ll affect ten, you’ll deal with ten.”

“Sounds unusual.”

“I won’t claim it’s the best,” Barnabas said, tossing a five of spades onto the discard, again face down. “But it works. It has a few drawbacks, though.”

“Like what?” Alchemy asked.

“Like space.” Barnabas shook his head. “There’s a few iron-clad agreements between everyone, but one of them is that no city-state can cover more than a certain amount of territory.”

“Sounds fair.”

“Yeah, well, here’s the problem,” Barnabas said, eyeing the face-down card that Alchemy had tossed on the discard pile. “Once all the land’s been taken up, where do you go? We’re on a peninsula. The Griffon Empire sits on our west, and we’ve got ocean on all the other sides. I’m calling your bluff, by the way.” He tapped the top of the discards with one finger. “Face it.”

Alchemy grinned as he reached out and flipped the card, revealing the three of spades. “Sorry,” he said, pulling two cards from his hand and laying them on the table. The four of diamonds and the five of spades. “No bluff. Pass it.”

Barnabas let out a groan as he slid the three of spades over to Alchemy’s side alongside the two cards and then grabbed the next two from the discard pile, laying them face-down in front of him. “That’ll teach me to try and go for the easy bluff,” he said as he dealt Alchemy two new cards. “Anyway,” he said, drawing and discarding. “When you combine that small space with a nation like that, competition to be the one to take a house and earn a spot as a husband is pretty high.”

“A spot?”

“One to four,” Barnabas said. “Polyandry.”

“Oh.” Alchemy paused for a moment, his hoof on the draw pile. “That’s … I didn’t know that.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Barnabas said, letting out deep, rolling laugh as he looked at down at him. Apparently he hadn’t hidden his confusion as well as he’d thought. “I myself find monogamy a little bizarre as a concept, so fair’s fair, huh kid?” He let out another  laugh as Alchemy finished drawing.

“Anyway,” he continued, “with so many males, competition to be a husband is pretty fierce. For that matter, so’s competition to be allowed to be a wife.”

“How do you get approval?” Alchemy asked, discarding another card. Face up this time.

Barnabas took it. “It varies from city to city,” he said. “But most of it is exactly what you’d expect. Prove yourself better than the other alternatives somehow. Move up in station. Prove you’re a good parent. A good fighter. It varies from den mother to den mother, since they call the ultimate shots on who gets to inherit property and voice what the city needs, but the way things are, you’ve got to prove you’re worth a coveted spot.”

Alchemy raised one eyebrow, his ears twitching as the ice let out a particularly loud crack. “It sounds like a setup ripe for confrontation and competition,” he said.

“It is,” Barnabas agreed. “How do you think we invented the cannon? Somebody getting back at somebody else and proving they could take their place by inventing a weapon to wipe them off the map.”

“That almost sounds like anarchy.”

“It almost is anarchy,” Barnabas said, grinning at him. “That’s why a lot of minotaurs these days leave."
“Really?”

“Well,” Barnabas said as he set three cards down—all one color—and then drew two more before discarding. “It’s kind of a dual-reasoned thing. You can settle down somewhere else; though most don’t do that.”

“Why not?”

Barnabas shrugged. “Well, it could have something to do with the fact that we don’t reproduce well outside of our homeland, for whatever reason.”

Alchemy paused, his hoof halfway toward the discard pile. “You don’t?”

“Nope.” Barnabas took a quick look ahead of them, his eyes narrowing as he peered out over the ice and checked for obstacles. “Don’t ask. We don’t know.”

“Fair enough.” Alchemy drew another card, and then laid down four cards in sequential order, though of different suites. Then he drew three new cards and discarded on to the discard pile, top down. Barnabas took it anyway, laying down another set of three like colors. “So what’s the other reason for leaving?”

“Fame and fortune!” Barnabas said, grinning. “What else, eh?”

“That what you and your sister came here for?”

The grin faded a little. “Yeah,” Barnabas said, nodding. “Fame and fortune. She wanted a place as a den mother and wanted to prove she had it in her to get it. I wanted to increase my standing, make something of myself. So we came here.”

“That’s it?” He’d have thought it would have been a bit more complicated than that. “Fame and fortune?”

“That’s it,” Barnabas said, nodding. “And for the record, I don’t blame my society for it. We’re small in number. That’s just the way life is. We have to prove we’re good enough for a spot.”

Alchemy shook his head. It still sounded foreign to him, especially after growing up in Equestria and then living in the Plainslands. Still, if he says it works, then I guess it works.

“I can see you’re not very fond of the idea,” Barnabas said, chuckling as Alchemy grimaced in embarrassment, his cheeks growing hot. “Don’t worry, I’m not offended.”

“And who knows,” he said, shrugging. “I’ve heard reports that our birth rates are starting to slow, that we might be looking at a social upheaval in another few-hundred years. Who knows?” He shrugged again, the tips of his horns just missing the ceiling as he shook his head.

“Anyway,” he said, reaching over and giving the wheel a small twist, the Arrow leaning just to one side as it slide around some obstruction or rough area on the ice. “That’s the basic answer, with explanation attached, for how I came to the Ocean of Endless Ice.”

“Fame and fortune,” Alchemy said. “Sounds like you joined up with the right group.”

“The Cragtooths? I’ll second that,” Barnabas said. “I wanted action, but I’m no speciesist bully either.”

“Isn’t robbing and looting a bit like being a bully as is?” Alchemy asked. He grinned as the minotaur gave him a mock look of hurt.

“It’s not when you call it protection,” he said, dropping a card face down on the discard pile. “And if you’re going to be dropping insults like you’re dropping cards, I’d say the best thing to do would be to start sharing your side of the story.”

“My side?” Alchemy asked, his hoof hovering over the discards. “Well, you already have the basics …”

“Exactly,” Barnbas said, snorting. “The basics. What about the not-so-basic. Why didn’t you just go home to Equestria when you got hurt?”

“I did,” Alchemy said, drawing the card and letting out a sigh of relief when he saw that it was one he could use. “I was there for a few months, but …”

“You didn’t fit in?” Barnabas asked when he didn’t answer.

“That,” Alchemy said, laying down his cards, drawing and then discarding. “That, plus I didn’t like being seen as a science experiment. And the cost of glitter.”

“The cost of glitter?” Barnabas asked. “What’s that have to do with it?”

“It’s a bit of a long-winded explanation,” Alchemy said, grinning as the minotaur began sputtering.

“Long-winded—!”

“Or maybe I could put it better in zebra terms,” Alchemy said. “It’s a patient explanation.”

“Patient?”

“Their word for long and technical.”

“And here I thought you were a super-soldier or a mercenary, not a philosopher,” Barnabas said, laying down another three cards and replacing his hand.

“Wouldn’t a super-soldier count as a mercenary?” Alchemy asked, lifting one eyebrow. “And I’m closer to a scientist. Technically, I’m an alchemist.”

“Bah, semantics!” Barnabas said, waving a hand. “Make with the story already. It’s your turn to talk. What made you come here for glitter?”

“My condition,” Alchemy said, picking up another card. Where to start? “You see, ethereal crystal has reactive properties with magic, so it’s a very high-demand potion catalyst, especially for high-quality potions …”

Barnabas leaned back, intertwining his fingers behind his head as he listened. Outside the windows, the endless expanse of ice slid past as the Arrow continued its journey east.