//------------------------------//
// Chapter 4: Finding the Plot 
// Story: Rarity and Spike vs Fantasy RPG Tropes: The Sabre of Omens 
// by SS Nomad 
//------------------------------//

	The next few days were surprisingly relaxing.  The inn attached to the tavern had surprisingly nice rooms at very reasonable prices, and the two of them had decided to stay there for the weekend.  After spending the first day asking all of the local smiths and metalworks if they recognized the craftsmanship of the sabre, Rarity was basically out of leads.  Instead, she decided to take the chance to relax.  Honestly, the town was far nicer than she had initially guessed it would be, and its rustic charms started to really grow on her.  Her only real complaint was that the rest of her luggage had still not managed to show up.
Spike, on the other hand, had no time to waste.  Despite Rarity’s urging for him to slow down, he had spent the weekend talking to every local he could find, looking for someone who he deemed ‘plot important.’  Between that and poring over the library, he spent the entirety of the two days in motion and study.  Rarity truly wanted to object, but at the same time… he almost seemed to be having fun with it.  She’d never seen this sort of excitement and urgency in his eyes, and it was kind of charming.  Surely, he wasn’t harming anyone, so she let him be.  It was his vacation to enjoy, after all.
Rarity was sitting at an outdoor restaurant table, sipping from a cup of tea, when Spike finally came back with pride, a stack of papers and notes in his claw.  She was intrigued, seeing him acting so mature, and sat up.  She honestly wanted to hear whatever it was he was about to go on about, there was just something to his air that made him seem like he knew exactly what he was doing.
Spike dropped his notes on the table and took one page out, sliding it across the table to Rarity, “That good enough for you?”
She looked down at the map she’d been provided, the very distinctly outlined trace along the center leading from Surlin to a temple in the north, “I… wait, really?”
Smug, Spike replied, “Told you, didn’t I?  I’ve spent the past few days gathering information and studying, it looks like that’s the sages’ temple marked on your map.  Same river.  This isn’t a coincidence.”
Rarity was shocked, looking at the map still, “No… I would say it’s not.”
“I told you we found the plot,” Spike added.
“So,” Rarity looked over to Spike’s stack of notes, “What next?  You’re the expert.”
Spike glowed at the statement, cracking his knuckles and shuffling through his pages, “I talked to some trade caravans that head to the area, we can hop one and get there within a few days.”
Everything was moving too fast.  Rarity sipped her tea and stood, looking off to the north.  The road ahead was not one she knew, she was no hero or adventurer, she was just a dressmaker.  She felt so wildly out of place.  Everything in her screamed that this wasn’t her business, that somepony else would take care of it.
She turned to Spike, “I need some time to think.”
Spike just nodded, “Take your time.  The caravan leaves this afternoon.”
Rarity lifted the sabre from its place beside her on the ground and walked off into the town square.  It really was a nice little town.  It reminded her of Ponyville in many ways.  The energy, the kindness of the ponies, the happiness.
She decided to check the train station for her luggage again, an act that had rapidly become her most common excuse to go for a walk.  As she approached, she saw a train loading with ponies, nearly a dozen full families waiting in line for tickets or to board.  It wouldn’t have seemed so out of place anywhere else.  Her mind flashed back to the utterly empty train she had taken to get here.  Something was wrong.
Rarity approached one of the families hesitantly, keeping her sword to her side and partially out of sight, “Um… excuse me.”
The mother turned away from her son to face Rarity, “Yes?  Can I help you with something?”
Something in her tone felt… off.  It sounded almost the same as the conversation Spike had with the bartender.  Cautious, Rarity decided to try her luck.
“Why is everyone leaving town?”
The mare gestured toward the river, a tear in her eye, “All of the families with small farms along the river are getting their crops drowned out by the flooding.  There’s… nothing left for us here.  We’re going to Canterlot to try and find a new life.”
A little surprised that the blunt question just worked, Rarity continued, “What do you know about the cause of the flood?”
“Someone told me the snow caps were melting,” the lady shrugged, “I’m not really sure what would cause that, but it’s swollen the river too much.”
Something clicked in Rarity’s head, “Is is mostly just small farms on the river’s edge?”
The mare nodded, “The larger farms, like the Wheatfield family’s, can afford the irrigation needed to be farther from the river, so they bought up a lot of the land farther inland, but all of the old family farms along the river wouldn’t sell to them.”
Motive.  Rarity turned to look into the distance, her eyes narrowing, “Thank you.”
The mare just smiled and said good bye as Rarity left without ceremony.  The situation had changed.  The tragedy had a face now.  She was willing to shrug it all off when it was just a river, but seeing that many families displaced, and having good reason to believe that it was caused by greed… Rarity stamped her hoof.  She had to do something.  This was just wrong.
She exhaled sharply and looked down at the hilt of her sword, her eyes locking on the star at the center of the map.  The sages’ temple.  She knew ponies wanted to blame them, but… it didn’t feel right anymore, given what she’d just heard.  Either way, they were involved in all of this somehow, and they almost certainly knew something about the sword.  If she went, she’d both be able to get a lead on how to help all of these ponies and learn more about how and where this sabre was crafted.
“Are you an adventurer?”
Rarity started, turning to face the voice.  Beside her was the colt who was with the mare she’d just talked to.  He was standing there, staring wide-eyed at the sword and up at Rarity.
“Don’t you need to be with your family?” Rarity asked politely.
The colt took a deep breath and asked, “You’re some kind of adventurer, right?  That’s why you have the sword and are asking stuff?”
Rarity’s words caught in her throat for a moment before she replied, “Perhaps I am.  Why?”
“Nopony would listen to me, but I saw something,” he started to explain excitedly, “Somepony was going around in the night time, sticking big sticks in the ground and staring at them.”
“Where,” Rarity asked on reflex.
“In our farm, before the flooding,” he answered.
Rarity nodded, comforting the foal, “Thanks, I think that might help me.”
The colt lit up, “Wow, really?  So you’re trying to fix the river?”
After a pause, Rarity smiled, “Yes.  Yes I am.”





Spike spun around as Rarity opened the door to their room at the inn, nearly tossing his stack of notes from the table, “Oh, heya, you’re back.”
Rarity went to toss her sabre on the bed, instead leaving it casually in midair near the door, “What else did you find out about everything?”
Bolting upright, Spike spread out his notes on the table, “Here you go.”
Rarity looked over the rather thorough notes.  Details on the differences in the river’s course, the particular snow caps that were melting the fastest, and other related subjects dominated the pile.  Other than that, much of it was just possible plans to get north.
“Do you have anything about who got displaced?” Rarity asked.
Spike seemed a little confused, but stood up to shuffle through his notes and pull up a map he’d gotten of land ownership in the region, “I hadn’t really taken the time to compare them, I just kinda grabbed this on impulse because it was a map.  I… woah.”
Rarity and Spike stared at the map of land beside the map of the flooding.  It wasn’t a perfect fit, but damned if it wasn’t convincing.  The river had rose and devoured the family farms, but in almost no places had it rose high enough to encroach on the major farms beyond them.  Spike looked over to Rarity to confirm that they were both seeing the same thing, and she nodded.
“So… it’s not the fate of Equestria?” Spike commented, almost disappointed.
“Doesn’t seem that way,” Rarity replied, “but at least a hundred ponies will lose their land and livelihoods, for what, some rich prick to get a little more land for their mega-farm?”
Spike was shocked to hear Rarity talk like that, but liked the passion in her voice, “So.  What do we do?”
“We figure out how they’re doing it,” Rarity spat, “and we stop them.”
Spike looked impressed, “You’re pretty fired up.”
Rarity immediately realized how she sounded and took a deep breath, trying to explain herself, “I can’t abide by this sort of thing.  Ruining lives just because you want more money, more power…”
With a nod, Spike replied, “So.  We find out how they’re doing it.  That means go north, yeah?”
“I’ll write Twilight,” Rarity confirmed, “tell her we’ll be here for a while.”
Spike stretched and looked down at the notes, “I still feel like I’m missing something here.”
Rarity tilted her head, “Did you overhear anything about ponies sticking poles into the ground?”
With a look of confusion, Spike recalled, “I overheard one thing, I didn’t take it to be related.  A mare said she’d spotted some ponies surveying the edge of her property a few months ago.  They…  You’re thinking they were trying to portion the land before they cleared it?”
Rarity sat up, the idea making sense, “If whoever’s doing this is doing it for the land…”
“Do we check it out, or go north?” Spike posed.
With a deep breath and a long moment to consider, Rarity replied, “North.  All the evidence is under the water right now.  If we poke around the big farms, I doubt it’ll get anywhere.  They’d just deny everything.”
Spike nodded in agreement, “Well, the caravan’s in a few hours.”
“Then let’s pack up,” Rarity commanded.
Spike stacked all of his notes and shoved them in his bookbag, “Well… let the adventure begin, I guess.”
Rarity stared down at her single bag in frustration, slowly realizing that the other two wouldn’t make it to her in time, and grumbled, “I guess we’ll have to make due.”





“So do you go north often?” Rarity asked, striking up another oddly blunt conversation with the caravan leader.
“Yup,” she replied, “There’s a few little towns up north that we trade with.  We make the rounds every few weeks.”
“So if you’re up north, have you seen anything out of place since the floods started?” Rarity pressed.
The mare stopped to think, “I’ve seen a few out of place looking carriages heading up toward the mountains, but I never really thought too hard about it.”
Spike leaned into the conversation and called out, “Tell me more about these carriages.”
“Normal type, drawn by two stallions, rather ornate,” the trader replied.
Spike nodded in satisfaction and went back to chatting with one of the other caravan members.
Rarity smiled at the mare beside her, “Well, thank you, if I come up with anything else to ask, I’ll bring it up.”
The caravan leader smiled and went on her way.
Spike stepped over, “Hey, I forgot to ask, did she offer you her name?”
Rarity seemed shocked for a moment, “Oh, dear me, I don’t think I asked.”
“Nah, that’s a good thing,” Spike replied, “if she doesn’t have a name, she’s not plot important.”
“Wha-” Rarity shook her head, “you’ve said that before.  What in Equestria do you mean.”
Spike plopped one of his claws into the other, “If somepony walks up to you and gives their name, it’s because you’re expected to remember it.”
Rarity cocked her head, “Well, yes, of course they expect you to remember it.”
“No, no,” Spike shook his head, “It’s narratively important.  Seriously, how many ponies have given you their name so far in this town?”
Rarity raised a hoof to gesticulate her answer, but found herself frozen, “Um… well there was… she… no, wait I…  The bartender?”
“Nope,” Spike replied, “I was paying special attention for if he did.”
“What about the Wheatfields?  They have a name,” Rarity explained.
“The who now?” Spike asked, sitting bolt upright.
“The Wheatfields.  They own a big far-” Rarity froze, “Spike, we have exactly zero evidence that they’re the one’s we’re looking for.”
“Circumstantial evidence is still evidence,” Spike retorted.
“We don’t even have that,” Rarity shot back, “All we have is… literary analysis.”
Spike groaned in defeat, clambering up onto a wagon, “Yeah, I suppose.  It’s still them, though.”
Rarity levitated her bag to join him, climbing the back of the wagon to sit among the boxes of trade goods, “Well, at least we don’t have to walk it.”
“Keep an eye out for those carriages.  We should spot one on the way,” Spike noted, settling into his seat.
With a light sigh, Rarity halfheartedly replied, “Will do.”
The caravan leader called back to them from her place in the wagon’s harness, “You two ready?  We’re about to head out.”
“Ready!” Spike yelled forward.
With a slight lurch, the pony pulling the wagon set them in motion, on the path out of town, headed north.  Rarity sighed and relaxed, only barely feeling guilty for having another pony walking so she didn’t have to.  She brushed the dust from her fetlocks and leaned against the wall of the wagon.  She was still hesitant about all this, but she knew what she was here for now.  She had a goal.
Finally, she had accepted her quest.