//------------------------------//
// Heavy Are The Horns Part 5 
// Story: The Ties That Bind 
// by chief maximus 
//------------------------------//

Ember sat up from her rock. "You getting hungry?" she asked.

Spike rubbed his belly. "Yeah, I could eat."

"Cool," she said, standing up and blocking the sun from her eyes with a claw. She scanned through the shrubs and bushes. "Ah, got ya!"

With a quick flap of her wings, she launched off the rocks, her claws landing with a squelch and a crunch. Spike cringed as an ear-splitting screech cut through the mid-afternoon air. Another swipe from Ember's claws silenced the terrible noise. She stood up as she surveyed her work with a smile. She grabbed it, and just as quickly as she'd left, she landed back on the rock with Spike. 

Spike picked up the distinct scent of blood before he saw it on her claws. Spike had no time to form a question before Ember dropped the battered corpse of a rabbit between the two of them. It landed on the rock with a sickening splat.

"Gah!" Spike cried, scrambling backwards and falling off the rock. 

Ember sighed. "You've got to be kidding. You've never had rabbit?"

"No!" he replied, still unable to take his eyes off the dead animal.  

"Yeesh, what did those ponies do to you? Have you ever eaten meat?"

"No, I've been just fine eating gems and cupcakes!"

Ember rolled her eyes. "‘Cupcakes’? Sounds like pony food. Look,  aren't you at least curious what it’ll taste like after I cook it?" 

His stomach grumbled loudly, as if to answer for him. 

"I've been doing OK this long without killing anything. I'd rather not start now," Spike replied, climbing back up on the rock next to her.

"Alright, think of it this way: You didn't kill this rabbit. I did. After I cook it, if you don't like it, then when I visit Ponyville..." Ember sighed. "I'll try some of that pony food you grew up on." 

Spike looked at her. There was something about her that he couldn't quite place, but for some reason, he trusted her. 

"Alright, but don't tell Twilight." 

"Relax; I promise I won't tell your mom on you," she said with a laugh. Ember held up the rabbit by a leg and blew a stream of fire over it. After the fur burned away, Ember turned up the heat to roast the skin and meat remaining. 

As Spike watched her work, the smell of the cooking meat wafted towards him. It was unlike anything he'd ever smelled before. It was rich, with a heavy smell that was just as intoxicating as it was alien. Ember cut off the fire stream , trails of smoke curling up from her mouth as she smiled. 


By now, she'd noticed Spike's expression shift from horror to curiosity.

"Now, are you sure you don't want to try some?" she asked, knowing the the answer by his expression alone. 

"Uhm... well, maybe just a bit." 

Ember smiled, ripping off a chunk of meat and handing it to him. Spike cringed as she did, but took his piece nonetheless. She could tell he was still a bit nervous. "Okay, on three. One, two, three!"

Ember took a bite, and Spike took a cautious nibble. 

"Well?" she asked, swallowing her food.

Spike stayed silent. It took everything he had just to comprehend the taste in his mouth. It was unlike anything he'd ever eaten before. He didn’t want to swallow it—but only because it would mean there’d be  less of it left! 

"It's... it's pretty good."

It's… it's pretty good. Even as he said it, Spike knew that was the understatement of the century. Nonetheless, Spike wanted to play it cool. 

"Want seconds?" Ember asked. 

Or not. "Yes!" he replied enthusiastically. 





Twilight soared over the range, looking for any sign of Spike and Ember. As she flew, she couldn't help but think about what the elder dragon revealed to her. Sure, the history of the dragon race was fascinating, but she couldn't stop thinking about Spike and Celestia. How could her mentor demand a ransom to a species that came to her for help? 

It didn't make any sense. There had to be a good reason… though she simply couldn't think of any. It was so unlike the Celestia she knew that she began to wonder if maybe Balgok was mistaken. But try as she might, Twilight couldn't convince herself otherwise. How many other white alicorns have existed?

She'd have to get to the bottom of this, but her investigation would have to wait. She spotted Ember and Spike and swooped down to join them. 

"Hey, you two!" Twilight said, landing gracefully beside the rock the two dragons sat on. "Something smells good."

Ember and Spike gave each other a knowing look.

"How was your talk with Gam-gam?" Ember asked.

Twilight rubbed her neck with a hoof. "I, uhm... I learned a lot." she admitted. "So, where can we get something to eat around here?"

Ember stood up. "I think there's a town a couple minutes' flight east of here. You might be able to find something besides wheat," she replied, helping Spike to his feet. 

"That would be amazing."

"You guys go ahead, I'll meet you back at the fortress," Ember said, “I’m gonna go check on my dad.” Taking to the sky with a flap of her wings, she left Twilight and Spike alone on the rock.

"Huh, she sure seemed to be in a hurry," Spike commented as he climbed onto Twilight's back. 





As Ember quickly took her leave, she hoped the small village would distract Twilight and Spike long enough for her to check on her father. As she glided through the air, she held the scepter in front of her. The face of a young dragoness stared back at her from the Bloodstone. There weren’t many magical artifacts that the dragons possessed, but among those they did, the Bloodstone Scepter was by far the most powerful.

In all honesty, she thought it silly that a stick with a red rock in it had the power to command dragons across the globe. But silly or not, the Scepter clearly altered the life of its bearer immeasurably. She had seen her father rule for as long as she could remember … and witnessed the toll ruling would occasionally take on him.  

Ember sailed on the breeze, spying the peak of the fortress in the distance. The smoke rose high into the sky, mixing with the clouds themselves. It would be a bit of a flight yet before she would get there. 

Ember mentally steeled herself as she flew. She was actually grateful for some time to gather her courage. What she had told Twilight and Spike was a half-truth: she was going to check up on her father, but she was also going to get an answer to a question that had been eating at her ever since Torch first told her of her mother. A question Spike had helped her realize she needed an answer to.

Ember needed closure, and she would get it straight from the source. 





Ember landed at the fortress. After she took a few steps toward her father's chambers, she stopped. Her stomach was tying itself in knots as she thought about what she was going to say. She gripped the scepter tightly as she clenched her teeth and closed her eyes. She had to do this. She had to know what happened.

Ember felt a fire rise inside her. Why had her father never felt the need to mention her mom until now? 

Anger. That was the fire, and she'd have to harness it if she wanted to make it through this. Courage alone wasn't enough. Ember knew it had to be fueled by anger. 

Torch’s room was by far the largest in the fortress. Her father was sleeping, as he often did nowadays. In fact, Ember would even venture to say that sleep seemed to be all he did anymore. 

Her stern expression softened as she took in the once fearsome and mighty Dragon Lord. 

Ember sighed. She nearly turned back. 

"Dad?" she asked, her voice echoing through his chamber. 

Though Torch was a solid sleeper, one thing was certain to wake him up from his slumber.

"Ember..." he whispered, shifting his massive head. Torch opened his eyes, focusing in on his daughter.

"Have you eaten today?" she asked. 

"The only thing I hunger for is seeing you succeed." 

Ember rolled her eyes. That meant no. She would worry about ensuring he ate something later. Right now, she was on a mission. 

"Dad, what happened to Mom?"

Torch looked away. 

The pause was unbearable. It felt like it had dragged on for hours before she forced his attention back to her. "Dad!"

He turned back to her. 

"Please. What happened?"

Torch sighed. "I… I let her go. I should have ordered her to stay, but she was just so stubborn!" Torch slammed a fist into the floor, leaving a small depression in the rock and seeming to shake the entire volcano.  

"Mom left?" Ember asked. "But, where did she go?"

Torch looked at her pleadingly. Such a sight made Ember uncomfortable. A powerful, unflinchingly strong dragon like Torch being … vulnerable? This was her father —  former Dragon Lord Torch for goodness’ sake! He was her rock, the source of her strength when she was feeling weak! Yet now, the roles had been reversed. 


Torch forced himself to continue, though he wanted to look away. Ember looked so much like her mother. But if he was to tell Ember  of her mother's fate, then he would look her in those eyes that Cinder had given her. 

"When you were an egg, our kind looked forward to another generation of dragons emerging from the Sacred Peak. Your mother and I were no exception." Torch closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "But a plague spread among the eggs. I tried everything: every mage, every healer, any dragon who even thought that they might know how to reverse the pestilence. Your clutch seemed lost, and our race faced a devastating loss.

"A legend spoke of a rare plant, growing in the far north with healing properties beyond comparison. Our bravest dragons left in search of it. 

"One of them... was your mother." 

Torch reached a talon out of his hoard, gently wiping the tear from his daughter's eye. Something he hadn't done since she was just a hatchling.
"I told her that I would go. I told her that I should be the one to brave the frozen wastes to save our kind's eggs. I was the Dragon Lord, after all."

He smiled as that same gentle talon found its way underneath her chin. "She insisted I stay. ‘The Dragon Lord must stay here and rule,’ she told me."I should have ordered her to stay."

"You... she..." Ember stammered. "But... so does that mean she's still out there?"

"Ember, it is best to accept her fate. She has to have made her journey to the Shadow Lands."

The fire rekindled in her heart, coming back as an inferno. "Did you even look for her?" Ember shouted. "Or did you just write her off?" 

"I had a daughter to raise! I had our kind to rule! I had already lost her, I wouldn't risk leaving you, too!" he roared back.  

Ember hadn't seen this much energy in her father since she claimed the Scepter for herself.

"But then how could you have hatched me without her? How was that even possible?" Ember shot back. 

Torch growled. He didn't appreciate the one black mark of his rule being thrown back in his face, by his own daughter, no less. He lowered his head, coming nose to nose with Ember. 

"I saved our race! I saved you!"

"Why? So you could raise another version of yourself?" Ember asked coldly. 

Torch bared his teeth, his anger finally bubbling to the surface. But instead of roaring back at her, he managed to speak calmly: "You're all I have, Ember. I lost Cinder, I didn't want to lose you, too."

Ember didn't know what to feel. Anger was there, but so was sadness and confusion. Ember closed her eyes, feeling a line of tears flush from her eyes. Damn those ponies and their infectious emotions. 

"She's still out there. I'm going to find her."

With that, Ember quickly flew out of the chamber. 

"Ember, no!" Torch called after her. 

As Embler kept flying regardless, Torch burst from his hoard with a furious roar and exploded out of the side of the mountain, quickly spying his daughter heading north. He chased after her, but she already had a fairly large head start,and unfortunately for Torch, he was not as quick in the skies as he used to be.





"Uh, dude, are you sure we're supposed to be up here?" Fizzle asked, the winds of the high peak buffeting against both of them. 

"Do you want to save the dragon race or not?" Garble shouted back over the wind. "It's just a little further!" 

They both braced themselves against the hostile weather, trudging through the ashen landscape to the mouth of a cave. They made it through the gale, shaking themselves off in the shelter. 

"Alright, we're here," Fizzle said after a series of sneezes. "I don't see anything. You know that was just a legend, right?"

Garble turned his head. "I told you, the legend is true! She's seen it! Follow me." 

Reluctantly, Fizzle followed him down deeper into the cavern. The farther down they ventured, the hotter it became. Before long, they found themselves at a wall. 

"Well. Here we are," Fizzle said dryly. "Where's this monster of unimaginable terror?"

Garble didn't dignify that with a response. He turned to the wall and traced a claw in the shape of a doorway, before speaking a series of words that Fizzle didn't recognize. The shape Garble traced began to glow a brilliant blue as ancient runes began to inscribe themselves on the cave wall. Eventually the stone disappeared, leaving a doorway leading deeper into the cave.

"How... how did you even..." Fizzle asked as he followed him through the doorway. There they found a seemingly bottomless pit. 

"Duh, did you forget there's an old-as-dirt dragon whose job it is to keep track of ancient legends?" Garble replied. "All I had to do was pretend like I cared about any of that crap, and she spilled the beans about this ‘Spirit of Fire,’ no problem." 

Fizzle gasped. "Dude! No! I was with you just because I thought you were upset and needed to vent, but I'm not helping you release something that could literally destroy the world!" 

"I thought it was just a legend?" Garble turned around. "What are you gonna do? Rat me out to big, bad, Dragon Lord Ember?" 

Fizzle stared blankly at him. "Uh, yeah!" He flew towards the entrance, but the stone wall that Garble opened slammed closed. Fizzle bashed his head into the barrier, falling to an unconscious heap against the wall.

"You aren't going anywhere," Garble growled. "We're in this together."

With that, he turned back to the pit and smiled. "Time to remind the world what the dragon race is all about."





Twilight and Spike sat in a hole-in-the-wall diner, Twilight devouring a hayburger, while Spike picked at a plate of gems. 

The town they found themselves in contained a whole mix of different races, with a menu to match. Spike liked the gems well enough, but ever since his dietary adventure with Ember, he'd been craving something more... savory. 

After Twilight had finished inhaling her burger, she wiped her mouth and looked to Spike. "So, did Ember mention anything about the Bloodstone Scepter while you two were taking in the sights?"

Spike scratched his chin. "Uh, not that I remember. Did that old dragon you talked to tell you anything about it?"

Twilight sighed. "Actually, she did. She mentioned that once the previous Dragon Lord gives up the Scepter, they... well... die."

He gasped. "Seriously? Then that really was why her dad's been feeling so weak!" He pushed his food aside. "She told me her dad wasn't himself since she took the Scepter, but she couldn't figure out why." A realization crashed over him like a tidal wave. "Sweet Celestia... her dad is dying because she took the Scepter."

Twilight nodded gravely. "She needs to know what's going on, but I just don't know how to tell someone something like that," she said, resting her cheek on her hoof in defeat. 

"Well, if anypony can figure out a way, it's you," Spike answered, trying to lift her spirits. 

She managed a grin. "Thanks, Spike. I'm going to visit the fillies' room, and then we can head back." 

Twilight got up and trotted away in search of the bathroom, while Spike flagged down their waitress. 

"How quickly can I get an order of rabbit, to go?"