Chapter 2: Direction
Twilight stared into the fire. Every time it finished a cycle of its erratic dance and the flames fell, she cringed. Under the cover of the ancient trees, that fire was the only source of light, and every suggestion that it was about to go out made her stomach twist.
On the other side of the fire, Fluttershy, too, was twitching and wincing at every downward turn of the flames. The lines in her face were clearly visible, great chasms in an otherwise beautiful landscape.
Twilight didn't want to look at that. She didn't want to look at anything, so she closed her eyes and listened. The crackling fire. Fluttershy's periodic whimpers. A rhythmic clack-clack-clack of wood against wood and then, Rarity shrieking.
Twilight's eyes shot open, and she looked over to where the other four were practising. Pinkie and Rarity stood across from one another with a stick each, the latter stroking a bruised upper arm theatrically. Rainbow Dash and Applejack were standing off to the side, observing.
"Pinkie Pie, that was uncalled for," Rarity whimpered through pouting lips.
"Let's see you try that one when some thug's coming at you with an axe," Dash quipped.
Rarity laughed. It was beautiful, musical.
Practised to perfection, Twilight thought.
"You'd be surprised at what you can do to a man with nothing but a sullen look. Not you, of course. It takes charisma."
Applejack sighed empathetically.
"We get it, Rarity. Yer a whore. But what if it ain't no man what's trying to do ya in? Or jus' one who figgers it ain't worth paying? What then?"
Rarity's face seized up at the mention of the word 'whore'. She ground her teeth, pumped her fists and raised the stick above her head. Applejack threw up her arms, but the blow she anticipated didn't come. Rarity pointed the stick at Pinkie.
"Again."
There was another clack as the sticks connected just in front of Rarity's face and another shriek when Pinkie's swung around and struck her across the calf.
"Oh, now you're just being mean."
"Uh-uh." Pinkie shook her head decisively. "You are just being slow. Quit being such a working stiff! When you fight, you gotta relax! It's not like anyone's trying to kill you or anything."
Rarity let the stick down, closed her eyes and breathed. Twilight could feel the tension falling from her. When she opened her eyes again, the anger was gone. There was just a look of serene apathy.
"I'm ready."
This time, the crack when the two sticks met was deafening, and again, Rarity shrieked. Leaves rattled as her stick disappeared into the underbrush.
"Too relaxed!"
"This time, you really are just making fun of me, aren't you?"
Pinkie giggled.
"Yup!"
Applejack gave Rarity a friendly pat on the shoulder.
"You've been a real hoot, princess, but you gotta scoot over now. It's ma turn."
Rarity snorted.
"Fine. If any of you need me, I'll be over by the fire, spending time with the people who aren't hooligans."
The other three laughed heartily as Rarity left them. Twilight saw the frown on her face. She wondered if they laughed at her often. Rarity was certainly the odd woman out in a town like Ponyville. As she sat down next to Fluttershy, Twilight turned to her.
"Rarity, where do you come from? You don't look like you're from Ponyville."
"But I am, dear. Born and bred."
"Oh, I'm sorry."
"Don't be. It's a compliment, if anything. Ponyvillians are all decent people, of a little..." Rarity turned back to the sparring, which had apparently degenerated into a wrestling match between Applejack and Rainbow Dash, enthusiastically cheered on by Pinkie Pie. "Rough around the edges."
"Then, if you don't mind me asking, how come you're so... uh, you know..."
"Civilized? My parents spent a lot of time around the Sun Court, dear. That sort of thing rubs off."
"So you're a noble, then?"
"I suppose."
"You suppose?"
Rarity's smile was forced.
"I suppose I can still technically lay claim to such a title, yes, but I am not entirely welcome in the Sun Court. I made some life choices that were considered rather inappropriate."
Twilight thought about the first time they'd met. A noble's daughter in a smithy. She could see how that wouldn't go over well.
"I think I understand."
Rarity just poked at the ground, tracing shapes with her fingers. Twilight squirmed, trying to find a change of topic.
"What about you, Fluttershy? How was your-"
"Twilight."
Twilight looked at Rarity through the fire. She shook her head slowly from side to side. Twilight glanced at Fluttershy, and found her to be quivering, clearly on the verge of tears.
Again.
She groaned loudly and hid her head between her arms.
"What about Pinkie Pie? She's so goddamn happy, I bet her story is all sunshine and butterflies. Why don't you just tell me about Pinkie Pie."
There was a long silence which Twilight pretended wasn't awkward. She'd never pretended so hard. She almost began crying herself, but then Fluttershy spoke up.
"I think her parents were farmers. Their land was, uhm, not very good. Pinkie says they spent most of their time moving rocks, trying to make the fields tillable. She came to Ponyville when she was still an, uhm, 'itty-bitty twinkie-pinkie' to live with her relatives. She was always telling stories and having fun, and everybody liked her. She really liked the hero stories, so, uhm, when she was 14, she snuck on board a Viking ship. When she came back, she, uh, she was..." Fluttershy trailed off, looking back and forth, turning her hands nervously. "... different."
Twilight again looked towards the sparring grounds. Pinkie had managed to get solid neck hold on both Applejack and Rainbow Dash, the former under her arm and the latter between her legs, and was now taking turns giving them noogies with her free hand.
"Different sounds about right."
"Why do they do that?" Fluttershy whispered.
Twilight ran a hand through her purple bangs and shrugged.
"They're the kind of people who like to lock horns and fight it out."
"Why can't everyone just be nice to each other?" Fluttershy said, rubbing a spot just below her ribs. Her face smoothed out, fear giving way to dispassionate distaste. She looked like she'd eaten a spoonful of dung.
Twilight combed through the rest of her hair in an almost ritualistic fashion, never letting it fall back onto her chest, catching the ends with one hand as she let go with the other.
"You know Rainbow Dash, don't you? Do you think she'd be happy if she never got to beat anyone?"
Fluttershy stretched out, laying herself out on the icy grass, her tiny harpist's hands covering most of her face.
"No," she whimpered through half-closed hands. "But I don't understand why not."
Twilight sighed. This conversation reminded her of the one time Queen Celestia had made the mistake of putting her in charge of some of the younger seers in the service of the Sun Court. She had tried to explain the metaphysical implications of blood sacrifice. There had been much screaming and crying.
"People are different, Fluttershy. You couldn't get Rainbow Dash to calm down and play nice any more than you could put a collar on a reindeer and call it a dog."
Again, Rarity's crystal laughter.
"Did you hear that, Rainbow Dash? Twilight says you can't play nice!"
"Hey, it's not my fault if you can't keep up with my skills!" Rainbow replied, almost screaming the last syllable as she strained against Pinkie's vice-grip. Her hold diminished for a split second, and Rainbow pushed hard, only to find herself redirected into the ground, face first, and locked in a new iron grip.
"I could keep up with you aaaaall night, Dashie!" Pinkie purred.
"On the other hand, if you wanna call it quits right now, that's fine, too," Dash muttered through a facefull of dirt.
"Okey-dokey!"
Pinkie bounced off and landed in a perfect curtsey, excess flesh jiggling violently as she touched down.
"Well, that was fun! And, as an added bonus, you should all be sliiiiightly less likely to die horribly."
"Don't be gettin' all melodramatic on me now, sugar," Applejack said, crawling off the ground. She stretched her limbs, brushed dirt of her clothes. "Ah ain't gonna die anytime soon."
"Really? You could have fooled me, with they way you were fighting," Pinkie said. All smiles, as ever.
Applejack's eyes narrowed, leaving only a thin stripe of green.
"What're you implyin', Pinkie Pie?," she said, striding forward. There was a strange pressure to her, something like the feel of the air just before a thunderstorm. "You sayin' ah can't take ya?"
Twilight slowed down her strokes, each pass now letting her hair fall back to rest. Fluttershy whimpered. Rarity rolled her eyes. Pinkie didn't move a muscle.
"Of course you can't, silly!" she leaned into Applejack's face until their noses were touching. "You've barely even held a sword before! The very idea that you could best me right off the bat is just be positively, absolutively, mind-bogglingly bonkers!"
Applejack's jaw sawed from side to side, playing a grisly tune as her teeth ground against each other.
"That may be, but you watch it, sister," she jabbed her finger into the soft spot below Pinkie's collarbone. If Pinkie, noticed, she didn't care. "Because one a' these days, I'll catch right up to ya."
"I can't wait!"
Applejack sighed and pulled away from Pinkie. The sense of pressure faded.
"Ye're one kooky customer, ye know that?"
"That's what they tell me."
Applejack shook her head, ponytail swinging from side to side. A smile crept onto her face, so subtle you'd almost miss it.
"Ah gotta tell ye, I sure am glad to have you round, 'cause when them baddies show up, whatever you do, it'll throw em off their guard right quick."
Pinkie giggled, a series of girly laughs punctuated by inelegant snorts.
"Aww, A.J., I love you too."
She enveloped Applejack, a hug in which the farmer nearly disappeared behind a mountain of girl and hair. Rainbow laughed, but Twilight didn't see the funny part. She'd followed the strands of fate all the way to the end, stood at the entrance to Hel and felt Garm's hot breath on her face, but Pinkie's hug was as close to death as she'd ever been.
"There, there, sugar," Applejack's muffled, strangely uncrushed voice said. "That's quite enough, all right?"
Rainbow Dash sat down beside Twilight. The sweat glistened on her face and her chest heaved, still winding down from the exercise.
"Hey, Twilight?" she said.
"Yes?"
"How far do you think it is?"
Twilight sighed and flicked her hair back over her shoulder.
"I don't know. The Sky-Queen had the elements of harmony, and she kept them in the hall she shared with her sister. I can't find anything that tells us what she did with them after she imprisoned the Night-Mare, but I do know that that hall was located deep in the heart of the Everfree forest. I also know that it was abandoned a thousand years ago. I can't even be sure if there's anything left of it, but it's all we got."
"The heart of the Everfree?" Rarity said. "That sounds like it could be very far, indeed. How big is the Everfree, Rainbow Dash?"
Rainbow shrugged.
"Nobody knows. We never go so far in that we can't be back by nightfall, but I've climbed into the trees, and you can't see the end. Nothing even gets in the way, it's just trees all the way to the horizon. Now that you mention it, I've never even heard of anyone who's seen the other side."
"Oh, my. That sounds really, really big," Fluttershy whispered. Rainbow Dash nodded in agreement.
"That's for sure. Hey, Applejack" Rainbow said, turning towards the blonde. "You've got family all over the place. Any of them ever been on the other side?"
Applejack shook her head.
"Ah reckon they ain't. All our farms are on this side of the forest, an if pa or any of his pals ever ever did go there, ah'm positive I'da heard th' stories."
Their collective eyes turned to Pinkie. She just held her hands out, palms up.
Don't look at me, I ain't got shit.
Twilight sighed and poked at the fire with a piece of wood.
"It doesn't matter, anyway. They could be at the other end of the world, and we'd still need to get them."
"You're absolutely right, dear," Rarity said. "The length of the journey doesn't matter, but I can't help but feel that the, ah, direction might be of some relevance."
"I know. I've been trying to search the weave, but every thread I grasp just twists and loops and intertwines with itself, then disappears where it shouldn't, only to reappear somewhere entirely different. I can't make sense of it. This place is messed up."
"I know what you mean, dear," Rarity said, her voice smooth as honey. She was trying to comfort Twilight, and Twilight knew it. That was something every Völva did; look beyond the words, study the intent. It was one of the many reasons she didn't get along with people; she was tired of hearing waiting requests under generic pleasantries and muffled cries of 'Don't eat me!' under every token of respect. Even when she spoke to people who were genuinely concerned with her well-being, she couldn't help but be disgusted by the mask they put on when stepping into the role of 'caring friend.' Rarity, however, didn't seem to be wearing a mask, and just for that, Twilight decided to reward her with a smile.
"What are they, anyway? The Elements, I mean." Rainbow Dash leaned against her arm propped against the ground. She yawned, revealing a few missing teeth.
"I don't know." There was desperation in Twilight's voice now. She had spent her entire life guarding against the frightening void of ignorance, and here it was, grabbing a firm, toothy grip on her buttocks. "Powerful magical artefacts. They're obviously very old, and I don't think the Sky-Queen or the Night-Mare made them. The only reference I found that talks about what they actually are is a brief mention of what they're made of. Not that it helps. They were 'forged over the flames of brilliant minds,' 'bound together with ties of blood' and that sort of thing."
"Sounds like dwarven work , if you ask me. They were the ones who forged a fetter out of fish-breath and mountain-roots, after all," Rarity said.
"That's what I thought, but it's a little more complicated. You see, there are six Elements, and at least five of them have names, each representing a virtue one ought to possess. They are the elements of Honour, Cunning, Hospitality, Loyalty and Mercy. I don't know what the means, exactly, but-"
"Mercy?" Rainbow sputtered. "What the hell kind of virtue is mercy?"
Like a slingstone, Rarity's stare smashed into Rainbow Dash. She leapt back, mouth hanging open as if she really had been hit.
"It is not noble to be cruel towards one's enemies, Rainbow Dash. It is a despicable thing to do, to hurt a person simply because you can. Take from a man everything he owes you. If that includes his life, so be it. But do not take out your anger through petty acts of viciousness. That is the behaviours of a thug, and I really thought you were better than that."
"Of course I... I didn't mean... shut up!" Rainbow replied, turning away from Rarity's glare. Her hair caught the light of the fire, turning the rainbow into seven shades of red.
"As I was saying," Twilight cut back in. "I don't know what that means, but it doesn't matter. We need them."
"Ah know that sugar, but how're we gonna find 'em if we don't even know where ta look?"
Twilight felt the desperation in Applejack's voice, and it only compounded her own worries. She slumped together, head between her legs.
"I don't know!I thought I'd be able to glean something from the weave, but I can't make heads or tails of it in this place. I don't think anyone could."
"What about the enchantress?"
The scene froze. For a moment, Twilight was afraid time had actually stopped, but the crackling fire continued its nuanced dance. All heads turned towards Rarity. Pinkie was the first to speak up. Way up.
"You can't be serious!" she screamed, grabbing Rarity by the collar. "She eats people, Rarity! Eats. Them. Right. UP!"
Rarity grabbed her hands, pushing them away from her throat gently, but firmly.
"She's also the only person I know of who lives in the Everfree Forest. If anyone can tell us where to find the hall, it's her."
This time, all eyes turned to Twilight. Apparently, they expected her to weigh in on the exchange.
"Do we have any options? At all?"
Nervous glances. Shrugged shoulders. Silence. Pinkie mouthing "Eats people."
"Didn't think so. Does anyone know where she lives?"
"It's not hard to find," Rainbow Dash said. "Believe me."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"You'll see."
"Fine. Let's just get some sleep. We'll set out at daw-. In the morn-." Twilight slapped herself in the face.
Goddamnit, Night-Mare. Not just our light, but our time-keeping, as well?
"When we wake up."
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Chapter 2 is live. Constructive critiscism is appreciated, especially if you have something to say about the technical quality of my writing.
FUS RO DAH?!
This is a very good story so far. Good plot and all that. Perhaps you could venture into the characters mind though, get their opinions or way of thinking. Otherwise it very good. I will check often for updates.
My only complaint is that it's a lot shorter than the first chapter.
My only complaint is that it's a lot shorter than the first chapter.
I concur with Jacky.
26052
Wouldn't be if you knew how long the first one took him. :p
And once again you have done an damn good job at bringing in canon elements into this story and making work. Good job Thunderclaw
Nice update, as it was an interesting take on the origins of Pinkie Pie and Rarity in this tale.
As I can tell that Pinkie's origin must have been one crazy one, if she ended up that strong enough to take on both Applejack and Rainbow Dash in a fight.
I must say that was some twist on the Elements of Harmony in this storyline, as they fit the Viking theme of this story.
Also I can see whom the girls will be meeting up with if they want to find the Elements in this storyline.
Please do keep up the good work upon such a great storyline like this one as I cannot wait to see what happens next.
I did notice a misspelled word or two and both chapters, but over all this is an incredibly good story.
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This really is an alarmingly good story, and I really hope you pick it up again and continue, because I want to hear more. The only things I will point out are that some of the dialogue reads better in a British accent than the voices of the actual characters, which can be a little jarring if you're not prepared for it, and that the description feels a little spoilerish. Other than that, spot on! Keep at it.
I must say, this is an excellent story, well written, very accurate to Norse terminology and exciting. I do hope you plan on continuing this story, I'm sure all of us would be interested to read more
90035
I'm working on the next chapter as of right now. I'm a tad slow, though, as I'm sure you've noticed. As for the dialogue, that's probably because, as a European non-native English speaker, I'm mostly influenced by British English. That, and I just like the sound of it. It's a valid point, though, and I'll try to keep the dialogue more in tune with the original portrayal.
The reason the description is the way it is is because I don't want people to feel like they've been gut-punched when the grimdark kicks in.
123949
Spoiler alert. But consider that there might not be a conflict. I mean, imagine you're a scandinavian iron age farmer, and Thor drops in on you, and demands to stay for a bit. You let him, and you dote on him, because he's frickin' Thor. You don't immedietly stop worshipping Frigg and Odin just because he's there (unless he's being a cunt about it and demands you only pay attention to him, which is arguably a very Thor thing to do). In fact, you may dote on him specifically because you know he might pass a good word on to Frigg, and as a farmer, Frigg's blessing of fertile lands is more important to your daily life than Thor's protection.
And you can't forget that these gods are more like humans than what we now associate with the term. They're superhuman, yes, but a lot their power derives from their knowledge of magic and access to superior tools. They're not even naturally ageless, or particularly hard to kill.
Ha! I knew the great thunderclaw would not abandon us!
now that I know your not dead, I would like to ask a few questions...
1: Are Celestia/Luna considered to be goddesses by the people of this world or simply powerful rulers
2: Dragons of Norse legend are often feared due to their relation to Nidhogg (the great devourer). Would this mean that dragons of this world are a hunted creature? and if so, is spike a special case?
Sorry if you mean to explain this later in the story, they've just been on my mind since I started reading this.
Anyway, great to have you back, looking forward to more great chapters of MLV
19526
Your picture...It scares me. Especially since I know who it is....
Great. Simple great.
...please tell me your going to continue this?
321467
I'm working on it. It's just that I have a lot of other things that demand my attention. Largely school and writing things that aren't fanfiction. A week just isn't as long to me as it used to be.
Oh, and did you know? Rhyming is freaking hard.