//------------------------------// // 42 - Lust // Story: Just Roll With It // by sunnypack //------------------------------// Chapter 42: Lust In which Harmony tries something new and almost dies. That's the title of my book when that happens. These crystals are chock full of energy, let me tell you. Not the nice, ‘I’ll help you’, kind of crystals more like the, ‘I’ll explode if you make the smallest mistake’ kind. I did manage to make them glow weirdly, if that counted as a thing. “Are you done in there yet?” Lapis was pacing. I could hear the heavy thuds of her massive limbs come crashing down on the wooden floorboards. For the sake of the floorboards, I thought it would be a good idea to answer her. “Yeah,” I called back. “Just a sec.” “What’s a sec?” “Never mind. Just let me finish.” I heard a less than subtle sigh of frustration. “Fine! Don’t make me come in there.” Lapis was not the type of dragon you wanted to get on the bad side of. Even if you dismissed her prodigious size, the way she held herself, more like a hunter’s crouch than a noble pose of a Matriarch’s daughter, kind of made you forget what pithy little complaints you had the gall to think about. Despite this, even I could tell she was nervous, and the way she paced like a phantom haunting a grave, spoke volumes about how serious this event was. In the time that Lapis had been away, I had thought to use the crystals combined with some unique matrices I was developing to hopefully dazzle the Council of Elders. Gees, even their name sounded intimidating. For once, I didn’t think making something up on the spot would cut it. My stomach was doing leaps and bounds to let me personally know what kind of a screw up I really was. I forced my hand to stop shaking as I opened the door. “Harmony!” The dragoness split into a ferocious smile. She hugged me. In a Lapis kind of way. “I… can’t… breathe!” Lapis didn’t seem to hear me. “I’m so glad you didn’t run away! I might have burned down the house.” I chuckled, but when Lapis only looked worried, I straightened up and cleared my throat uncertainly. “I know what you’re thinking. Do I have something that will blow them away?” Lapis grinned at me, nodding expectantly. “The answer is… no, not really.” “What?!” she shrieked. I was suddenly exposed to a lot of teeth. Big, sharp teeth. “Wait, wait!” I yelled, waving my arms frantically. “I might not have something right now, but I was working on something crazy that actually might blow them away.” Lapis glared at me suspiciously, her stance changing from indignation to wary curiosity. “What’s the problem then?” I sucked my lip through my teeth as I tried to piece together the information. I beckoned to Lapis. “We should probably do it outside,” I said, kicking open the door and leading her out. I did it partially because the magic was unstable in its current configuration and could blow my face off, and partially because I didn’t really trust Lapis not to burn the house down, if I wasn’t impressive enough. Glancing back, there were alot of additional scorch marks and claw marks that ‘characterised’ the floor, as my dad would say… I snapped back with the shake of my head, returning the heart of the matter. I couldn’t dwell on the past, the future was what we were here for. “There’s something wrong with the way that I’ve been doing these spells,” I started as we came into the clearing. “So… can you fix it?” Lapis asked. I shot her a look. She shrugged. “Unicorn… or whatever magic you ponies and you do is completely different to what dragons use. You have to use spells, incantations and concentrations, we just feel it inside and sort of… let it out?” She shrugged self-consciously. “At least, that’s how we’ve always done it.” “Right,” I replied, while drawing on the ground. The matrices were intricate and detailed, nothing I could ever envision in my mind. If you were clever enough, or practiced enough, you could mentally project the matrices in your mind, so the spell achieves the form through burning a path along the lines. In other cases, you could use raw magic, but that tended to produce unpredictable results, or even blow up in your face. Adept unicorns or alicorns tended to use simplistic matrices, bolstered with raw magic and their imagination. Unfortunately, as a human, I had trouble picturing them in my mind, even when I transformed into a unicorn. I barely scraped by in practical assessments. “It looks kind of pretty in a unicorn-pony sort of way,” Lapis commented when I finished. “Thanks,” I said, rolling up my sleeves. With a gesture and a click, the matrix on the ground lit up, each array sympathetically starting up with the focused injection of magic at the centre. “This is what Discord and I have been working on.” “Discord?” Lapis asked, eyes glowing with interest. “A friend of mine,” I said dismissively, flicking a hand as if to swat away the importance. I liked Lapis, but we needed to focus more on the task ahead than risk getting into a kerfuffle over the dangers of a draconequus. Who knew what side Lapis was on in that argument? Not important. Lapis pursed her lips, but seemed to drop the issue. Her critical gaze that scanned the lines showed that she was much more interested in the demonstration I had planned rather than sating her passing curiosity. “So, what’s the little problem you have?” “This,” I said, snapping my fingers. The matrix glowed briefly before plunging into darkness. “So…?” Lapis trailed off, looking at me in askance. “Yeah that about sums up what I think as well,” I replied with a heavy sigh. I paced around the edge of the drawn lines and tapped several points. “I was going to use something similar to these—” I drew out the crystals from my pocket and showed them to Lapis “—to augment what I wanted to do, but these don’t hold magical charge very well.” Lapis took one of the crystals and inspected them, before placing it back in my hand. “These look suspiciously similar to a hearthstone in a dragon,” she said with shaded eyes. “Where did you get them?” There was no mistaking the tone, or the threat, that underscored her words. “They’re from the north. Mined from the stone up there,” I said, while rubbing the stones together. They clinked and clacked as I moved them around in my hand. “Tempora told me to investigate their strange properties, but strangely it feels like they have none.” Lapis sniffed the crystals and wrinkled her nose. “They don’t smell appetising either.” “Anyway,” I continued belatedly, “I was hoping you’d have some idea of what to do.” Lapis eyed the crystal and the complex matrices on the ground. She tapped a claw to her chin in thought, then cocked her head. “What does this spell do anyway?” I blinked at the dragoness, then realised I hadn’t explained what it did through all this time. “Oh silly me,” I said, “it’s harmonic magic.” “Harmonic, what?” I tapped my lip as I tried to frame my thoughts. “How much do you know about me?” Lapis cocked her head. “Only that you’re the heir to the pony throne, yet you are not a pony, but that is the extent.” I shrugged uncomfortably. “I’m actually not from this world.” Lapis snorted, then blinked at me when I simply stared at her. “You’re serious?” I pursed my lips and crossed my arms as her brows drew together in consternation. “But you’re… I don’t… how is that possible?” I flicked a hand in dismissal. “The how is not important, just what I can bring to the table.” I gestured at the matrices. “The idea behind this is that raw magic is like the energy back on my world. It’s made of different types of magic without a purpose, it’s a bundle of mismatched magic that ultimately makes it unfocused and not very useful.” Lapis nodded warily. “So what have you done about it.” “If I’m right about my theory, I believe that magic can be refined and amplified using these special crystals from the north. If they harmonise at the right resonant magical bandwidth of the crystals, then potentially, the magic will become coherent and focused. It’ll be pure, undiluted magic power.” Lapis looked at me with an indecipherable expression for a while. Then she shook her head. “That…” I leaned forward with a smile. “That went over my head,” she admitted with a sheepish grin. I sighed and threw my hands up in the air. “Yeah, well, I would give you a demonstration, but I can’t hit the right magical ’type’ of these crystals.” “Ah,” Lapis grumbled, “and you thought I might be of some help?” I circled the inscribed pattern, tapping my chin as I thought about it. “Yes… and no. I want to try something.” I gestured for Lapis to stand in front of me. Looking curious, Lapis shuffled over and stood in front of me. Rubbing my hands together, I placed both of my hands around Lapis’ head as she eyed me apprehensively. “What’re you doing?” she asked in a tone laced with a healthy dose of suspicion. “I’m going to get a feel of your magic.” “What?” “Your magic,” I said patiently, gesturing with my hand. “I want to get a feel for it.” Lapis shrugged, then gave me a nod of assent. I took her head into my hands, feeling its weight. Lapis’ head was bigger than a pony’s and certainly bigger than your average human, having her teeth so close was also slightly disconcerting. I took a deep breath and let the magic flow to my fingertips. Concentrating, I gathered them in the very ends of my fingers and then extended them out towards Lapis. She gasped. I paused. “Are you alright?” I asked. Lapis opened her eyes briefly, I hadn’t even been aware she had closed them. “No,” she replied with a confused blink. “It just felt… odd.” “Are you alright?” I repeated. Her behaviour was beginning to make me worried. Lapis shook her head and gave me a smile. “It’s alright, little one. Pony magic just feels strange unless you’re used to it.” “Okay. Let me know if I do anything and it hurts.” Lapis laughed. “Oh you’ll know when you’ve hurt a dragon.” I grinned and raised my hands again, but before I could start, I felt the need to mention something else. “Lapis, I think I should tell you something.” “What is it?” “ I think you should know that I’ve never actually done this before.” “Harmony?” “Yes?” “You shouldn’t have told me.” “Ah, okay.” Despite our mutual misgivings, the second time around was more of a success. I sent in tiny probes of my magic and got a feel of hers. It’s difficult to describe it, because it felt so alien, but dragon magic feels… rough. Pony magic always feels smooth and loose, but dragons feels coarse and tight somehow. If magic had moods, dragons would be angry and aggressive, if that made sense. “Wow,” I said, sucking in a breath. “That was crazy.” Lapis shook her head. “Yeah, don’t do that again. I probably should have asked earlier, but why did you do that?” I snapped my fingers. “To try and replicate the ‘texture’ of dragon magic.” I pointed to the matrix. “Maybe the crystals will react to something similar to dragon magic instead of pony magic.” I pointed to the matrix and snapped my fingers expectantly. Nothing happened. “Or I could just be full of hot air, that’s a possibility.” Lapis gave me a smile, but it looked a little more nervous than before. “There’s not much time, Harmony. We must be away soon, you will have to arrive a few days before the meeting convenes. Do you think you can get it ready by then?” I bit my lip, weighing my options. “I’m going to have to, aren’t I?” Lapis nodded. “For the both of us.” —————— Lapis left me alone to let the staff at the castle know that she was taking me to the dragon lands, while I contemplated my infuriating spell. What did these crystals want? How was I supposed to trigger them. My finger hovered over the limiters of the spell, but I retracted it, berating myself. Last time, Discord had been there to save me from my stupid self, but right now, if I tried, I would probably get myself killed. I looked at my hands, wondering what the heck I was supposed to do. Wait. Hands. Raising both of my hands, I gathered power in my left and right hands. Rough on the right, loose on the left. I clicked my fingers. Snap. The crystal glowed… and stayed glowing. “Yes!” I cheered, jumping up and down. “I am the best—” Then the explosion hit me.