The Scrolls of Harmony I: Dawnguard

by Sadie

4. From Ancient Times

It was a difficult position for Twilight. She was standing there, about three metres away from a pony who looked a lot like hostiles she had just taken out. More puzzling, she had stumbled out of a strange sarcophagus, sealed by a magical puzzle. And there was quite possibly an Elder Scroll on her back. Despite the fact that she had no visible weapons, the unicorn in softly glowing armour wasn’t going to take any chances with the stranger. “Alright, we’ll take turns asking questions, me first. Who are you?” The pony in front of her looked down at the ground in confusion for several seconds. In a brief flicker, her irises were a lighter purple, instead of red. It was a bad place to be in, especially with rain coming soon. And night not long after that.

“I... You can call me Trixie. Now why are you...?” Her eyes settled on the two bodies near her. The similarity in clothing between hers and theirs registered quite strongly. “Oh, I see. Well, let me assure that, I’m not as savage as they clearly were. If you will at least lower that weapon of yours long enough for me to... deal with the remains.” Twilight narrowed her eyes. That last bit came across in a very suspicious tone. Everything about Trixie was suspicious, especially the speed at which she detached herself from the dead ones. It reeked of self-preservation. She flicked her crossbow to indicate she had no intention of complying with the request. A huff of contempt came back in response. “Fine. Did Celestia send you? How is she doing these days?”

Confusion began to build in Twilight’s head. Why was she speaking so casually about the Princess? Especially when under threat of death. “Well... For one thing, she isn’t around anymore, at least in pony form. It’s been that way for two hundred years.” Her confusion was mirrored on Trixie’s face as she fumbled at the amulet around her neck. Some sort of sharply carved alicorn; it looked quite old in design, yet gleamed brightly. “Okay, since you asked two questions there... Why do you have an Elder Scroll, and what is that around your neck?” That caused the sort of reaction that Twilight was waiting for. She made a rather poor attempt to conceal both with her head and hoof respectively.

“I take it you don’t know a great deal about the Scrolls, I’ll explain when we’re away from here. Provided you take me home of course. As for this...” The amulet began to glow bright red. Twilight’s magic on the trigger of her crossbow grew tighter in response. It didn’t contain any magic of its own, at least not the sort she could detect. “It’s a gift, from my mother.” The reaction from Twilight amounted to a raising eyebrow in questioning. “Alright, you say Celestia has been gone for two hundred years, at least. I didn’t expect to sleep for that long, but obviously, somepony forgot to wake me. How long has it been since she defeated Sheogorath?”

Another name that only served to confuse Twilight. Trixie seemed to be full of such puzzling mysteries, but it did remind her of another important question. “I don’t have a clue who you’re talking about; all I know is that several thousand years ago, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna managed to defeat Discord and Sombra at the end of the First Era. But, on the note of strange names, why did you call me Azura? For the record, I’m Twilight Sparkle.” Something she said caused what little colour Trixie had in her face to fade away altogether. Under other circumstances, she would have actually shown a little concern for the mare in front of her.

Trixie took a step closer, stumbling back down in her weakened state. All four boots had small studs attached to the hooves, presumably for extra protection. Everything about her had a strange appeal. Apart from her somewhat annoyingly pitched voice. “We need to get away from here, very quickly. I was only supposed to sleep for a few hundred years, not thousands if what you say is true. This place isn’t safe.” The crossbow didn’t falter. It certainly sounded like genuine fear, and she did sound legitimately out of touch with Equestria’s recent events. But nopony could live for thousands of years, apart from the Princesses of course. And there was still a lot of questions to be answered, the sort of questions that had to be asked there and then.

“Fine, forget the last question for now. Tell me why I shouldn’t finish you off right here, and then I’ll leave. Whether you accompany me or not depends on the answer.” Trixie swallowed. That at least was very clear and real. The crossbow moved closer as an extra incentive for Trixie to be quick. She cringed, visibly trembling. Whatever she is, she knows fear. “Good enough for me. Now, get moving. And if anything tries to kill us, I’m only concerned for my own life. Got it?” She circled around while Trixie tried to stand up. The story about being asleep for thousands of years was starting to gain weight as she struggled to take her first step. They wouldn’t get anywhere at that rate. “I can’t believe I’m about to do this... Get on my back, and don’t you dare touch me in any way. I mean it.”

She knelt down and slipped her head underneath Trixie’s side. With a little bit of awkward manoeuvring, she managed to settle Trixie down into sitting behind her shoulders. A strong aura of evil settled over the whole cave, causing both to shiver. “That’s him, I think you know him as Sombra. He’s obviously been waiting a very long time, for me. We need to get away from here.” Twilight found little difficulty in making a steady pace back on the path she had entered from with Trixie on her back. The weightlessness of her armour seemed to be having a very useful effect on her unexpected passenger. But another problem to overcome presented itself at the staircase.

Rainfall. A constant stream flowed down the worn ascent. It could easily pass as a themed waterslide. Even without the weight of another pony, trying to ascend the stairs would be risky at best. There wasn’t a spell that the young Dawnguard could use herself, but Trixie was from another age entirely. “I don’t suppose you know any teleportation spells? Even a ‘dry-the-stairs-we-need-to-climb’ trick will do for that matter.” Trixie hadn’t moved at all since first being positioned on her back. Twilight looked over her shoulder after several seconds. She still hadn’t moved one bit since the question was posed. Could she even use magic in her state?

Her fangs were very noticeable as Trixie bit down lightly on her tongue at last. Whatever was going through her mind was beyond the understanding of a pony only a tiny fraction of her age. “I think I can get us to the top of the staircase, but there’s a good chance I’ll faint in the process. I would have taken a moment to, recover, but somehow I doubt you would have approved.” Purple eyes rolled as Twilight nudged her very carefully. “Fine, but I’ll have to at some point. Get ready to gallop if you so please, you’ll need a running start if we’re to get anywhere.” Twilight felt a very strong urge to knock her off, ignoring it in favour of begrudgingly following her instructions. I swear... if this is going to become a regular thing, I’m dumping her with a nice family of cute bunnies that will give her all the love and attention she demands the moment I get a chance.

Tingles spread all over Twilight’s back. Without Trixie sitting there, she would have simply shrugged it off as the effects of magic. But Trixie was there, and the other possible reasons that she felt tingles burned fiercely in her mind. Bright red magic caused the cave ceiling above them to vanish, letting rainfall cover both of them. Taken from the base of the stairs to the top in an instant. As predicted, Trixie slumped further down her back in an unconscious state. “Oh for crying out loud.” Across the courtyard, a thick darkness began to appear beyond the tree line. Twilight pushed herself into a full gallop away from the entire sprawl of ruins, southward. “Come on, just stay on... Oh Celestia, everything I say is going to sound bad right now.” She took one daring look over her shoulder once they were at a good distance away from the courtyard. What looked a lot like the vague descriptions of Sombra, a dark black cloud with no distinguishable form, poured down the stairs to where they had been not even a minute ago.

“Alright, that’s another point for you. Just don’t get comfy.” Having Trixie’s cloak draped around her body helped keep a lot of the rain off her back. It didn’t do much in the way of preventing mud from getting in under her hooves. Every minute she continued sprinting down towards the caves, more and more gritty dirt pressed sharply with each step. At one point, she had to stop in a shallow puddle after Trixie slid too far back and unconsciously threatened to fall off altogether. By the time she had been secured on with a few weak vines nearby, Twilight was soaked completely. “You’d better be worth all this.” Night was approaching by the time thick forest gave way to smaller trees and a rockier land. She pushed on to the sight of a small cave that was just deep enough to give them shelter from the pouring rain.

Both ponies were sopping wet, drenching the cave floor within the first few seconds. Twilight had just enough strength to cut the vines tying Trixie on before she collapsed into a wet huddle. “You really had better be worth this. I don’t think I’ve ever been so worn out before, in my life.” She would give a great deal for a book on surviving with virtually nothing but her armour and a strange, ancient pony. That spell for drying up water she had mentioned before would have been nice too. She was alive at least, more than what could be said for Zecora.

*

Twilight woke beside a small fire, the crackling of drying sticks had disturbed her soaked sleep. Somepony had removed her helmet to allow her head to rest on a black cloak. Trixie’s cloak as she came to realize when sitting up. Trixie herself was still quite wet from being out in the rain, recently too. I can’t believe she actually went to the trouble of starting a fire while I was asleep. And I’m dry too... She couldn’t feel any aura of unfamiliar magic on her, which left her with the worrying thought that Trixie’s magic left no trace at all. You never know... I mean she has been stuck in a stone coffin for thousands of years. Still, she looks like the sort who would at least ask... “While I was gathering kindling, I encountered one of the ponies mentioned on that scroll of yours. It fell apart due to the soaking it got before you ask. But needless to say, it was not a pleasant encounter. I didn’t see any others on my way back here.”

It didn’t reassure Twilight in the least. The fire and the offering of her cloak as a makeshift pillow were nice, but it wasn’t going to win over her trust just like that. “For the record, it’s my mentor’s scroll. She sent it shortly before disappearing, right near that place I found you. And on the matter of scrolls...” Trixie shuffled only slightly at the mention of the object on her back. “I don’t care where you got it, or why it was buried in that place with you, only because I wasn’t sent to find them. But, I think you owe me an explanation about why you called me Azura. I’ve never heard, or even read about that name before, and quite frankly it’s kinda creepy.” Trixie shuffled again, further into the cave. She didn’t want anything nearby to hear what she had to say presumably.

“Azura was... a good friend of mine. My mother hid me away in the sarcophagus for my own safety, while Azura put up a magical barrier to protect the sarcophagus. She promised me that she’d come back two hundred years later, when things had settled down in Equestria.” A shuddering exhale came as she was reminded of how poorly her plan had turned out. “You just look vaguely like her, and since you were the first thing I saw...” Twilight didn’t respond. It sounded reasonable, and that bothered her greatly. Everything Trixie had said so far seemed reasonably truthful. There was no real reason to doubt anything she said. And yet, she couldn’t let go of the fact that she had a lot in common with ponies who had so far been downright evil.

Hunger began to set in after the silence endured for some time. She had been counting on eating back at Ponyville, not ending up in the Everfree Forest. And without any knowledge about the local plants, she couldn’t even risk eating a single flower. Still, her attention remained focused solely on Trixie, in complete silence. Both weapons were close by, and she could draw either one at a moment’s notice. Whether it was on Trixie, or something else she didn’t really care. The mysterious unicorn chose to watch the constant downpour. Her cloak remained with Twilight, who had taken to wrapping it around herself for warmth. It raised yet another concern over the fact that Trixie didn’t seem to be bothered by her wet state in the least. At some point, Twilight found herself drifting off into sleep again. The combination of the small fire keeping her warm, and the ambient rain outside helped bring great relief to the stress placed on her during the day...

“You still think I’m a monster; that I’m going to kill you at the first chance I get. Don’t you Twilight?” Twilight startled awake from what had led to a very odd dream about ice cream lands and cotton candy trees. Trixie’s question had her fiercely on edge. A little bit of dried mud that had set in her mane caught her hoof when she tried to clear her face. Something definitely wasn’t right about her sudden decision to speak. “Don’t deny it; I’ve had that stare many times already. Ponies will take one look at anypony of a kind they don’t understand, and automatically assume they’re all evil. Especially ponies like you.” Twilight’s jaw clenched in response. She didn’t take kindly to a direct accusation out of nowhere, especially from the pony she had gone to great lengths to rescue.

“I joined the Dawnguard, to protect Equestria against vicious Changelings. There are plenty who live a normal life with us, and that’s fine with me. But all I’ve seen of ‘your kind’ so far is a pair that acted like savage beasts. And what I’ve read about them makes it pretty clear that it’s some sort of disease. I think I have a right to be uncomfortable around you.” It definitely felt like she was being baited, for what purpose only Trixie knew. The sort of behaviour she had waited for the strange pony to display this whole time suddenly felt out of place. It was too deliberate. If there was anything she had underestimated about the opposing unicorn so far, it was her intelligence. She may very well have been alive for a very, very long time before getting into that sarcophagus.

When Trixie turned her head back towards her, the red of her eyes took on a very menacing glow. “But I’m not a Changeling. They’re an offshoot of my race; they only feed on love, not other ponies. They don’t need to kill to survive.” Twilight glanced at her sword with a shudder. This was the information she had held back before, very chilling facts that caused a sick feeling to form in her stomach. Feed on other ponies? Is that what she meant by ‘dealing’ with the bodies? “You’ve heard and seen enough to make up your mind about me. And Celestia has bred her kingdom to hate anything that doesn’t live in complete harmony with her ways. Even if it’s as simple as satisfying hunger. She may or may not remember me, but I know you would gladly be done with me.” The purple aura around the silver hilt grew strong enough to cast light down the blade. Twilight was struggling hard to conceal her rising anger. “So, why don’t you?”

In a rush of white and purple, Twilight had Trixie pinned up against the wall by her neck. Her right hoof pressed firmly against her jaw to keep her from doing anything with the fangs she had displayed before. The magic pointing her sword at Trixie’s heart was concealed by their bodies from the outside world. Twilight wasn’t going to take the chance that more feral ponies would find them “I don’t know what you are... or how old you are... But any trust you may or may not have earned, you just blew by insulting the Princess like that. And since I get the feeling you’ve been baiting me this whole time, I’m not going to wait for excuses.” Until then, she hadn’t made full eye contact with Trixie. When their eyes finally did meet, her own grew very large. That’s not possible...

She sword thrust forward right into the cold body of Trixie. There wasn’t any sort of reaction associated with death, simply because there was no life to extinguish. “Behind you.” The body before her crumbled away into smouldering pieces of dust, as the familiar studded leather wrapped around her throat. Trixie had her hoof firmly locked around her neck, which in turn allowed her to graze the exposed surface with her fangs. She had been defending herself to a projection in Trixie’s image. One that was deliberately created to antagonize her into attacking. All part of one very clever and simple plan to get her distracted. And now, she was entirely at the mercy of Trixie. The fangs she felt pressed against her neck could easily kill her before she could swing the sword behind her head.

“You see, Twilight. As a pony who lives beyond death, I am granted with a natural ability for Illusion magic, in this case simulating life. I could have killed you at any time I wished...” Twilight stumbled forward as Trixie unexpectedly released her. There was no scratch on her neck from the sharp teeth. No physical harm had actually been done to her. “But I didn’t. Whether you believe it or not, Twilight, the undead do have a sense of gratitude. You rescued me from that sarcophagus, and you trusted me when I teleported us out of the tomb.” By then, Twilight had dragged herself to the other side of the fire in order to put something between them. The prospect alone of an undead pony was terrifying, especially since Trixie looked just as alive as any other pony. And apart from that horrible test, she hadn’t shown any sign of being a nasty character. “And, I do hope that you will still consider escorting me home. I could definitely use help with navigating this new Equestria.”

Twilight rubbed her neck out of habit, born from fear. “Look, I don’t know anything about undead ponies. But mark my words...” The breath she took was shuddering, and deep. “If you ever pull a stunt like that again, I will make sure that you really die. Until I decide otherwise, you don’t get within one metre of me at any time. Agreed?” Her silence was long and hard. Eventually, Trixie nodded to her relief. “Fine, just stay away from me. It’s been a pretty bad day, so try to do your... feeding quietly. I need the rest.” This time when she settled down with her head on the folded cloak, her eyes avoided the owner altogether. Enough nightmares would come, without seeing the source of those bad dreams right before closing her eyes.

Comments

[RobotsDisguisedAsPonies]

Ahhh, I adore how Trixie is so and Twi is just so angry/confused.All that information she knows that Twilight's never heard of (or rather, read of) is sure to get on her nerves. Watch out where you drop her, Twilight, unless you want Bunniculas too! *brick'd*

[nukestar]

Sombra is Molag Bal and Discord is Sheogorath, although I wonder who the Daedra are, not to mention the nine divines