“Kera…?” Rainbow’s voice called out. “Kerrrraa?”
If the foal could hear her, she didn’t respond. She simply crawled through the settling dust of the hazy cavern. Sputtering, she tripped over Nightshade’s stirring body and almost collapsed face-first into the glowing book of runes.
With a miniature gasp, she scooped the heavy thing into her little hooves and darted a look to her side.
Nightshade’s muzzle was twisted in pain and shock from the magical blast just seconds previous. She curled up in a fetal position, murmuring incoherent words.
Biting her own lip, Kera grasped the book in her forelimbs and used her rear legs to push away from the madame. She inched like a little tattooed worm across the floor of the place, brushing aside loose clumps of stone and rubble in her path. The warriors’ torchlight cast an orange haze across the place, showing shadows stirring in the distance as the Xonan guards stumbled back up to their hooves.
Before Kera had time to panic, she ran into something else. Gasping, she glanced aside in time to see a familiar hoof-brace rattling into place. The symbol of Odrsjot reflected twice off her green eyes.
Xonan voices rose in the distance. Scimitars and staves scraped against stone. Once more, Rainbow Dash’s voice called out. Kera was numb to it all.
Her lips pursed as she stared harder and harder at the lone inscribed anklet.
“I keep thinking and thinking about it,” Zaid had said, his words reverberating off the edges of the prison cell. “The hoof-brace. It was supposed to guard against the powers of the book.”
Kera merely raised his eyebrows at him.
Zaid continued. “The runes! All those funny looking images that are all linked with the Austraeoh. You think they would all work for her and not against her, y’know?”
Kera fidgeted, gazing at Nightshade, Zetta, and the others as the stallion sighed and continued.
“They gave us the hoof-brace thingies so we could help her. We were elephant jade brown, after all.”
“You?” Kera had stated, squinting.
At some point, Zaid winked and replied, “Who said you gotta be flesh and blood just to be flesh and blood, ya dig?”
A warm breath left Kera. She laid the book on the ground and reached forward with two trembling hooves. At last, she grasped the circular object, picking it up so that she could stare closer at the pointed runes. The jagged arrows glistened in the distant torchlight, as if beckoning her to twirl the brace around in her hooves. Instead, she pushed in the arrows’ direction, collapsing the cylinder in on itself and making the thing thinner. Soon, it had shrunk to the size of a vial, wrapping around itself so that the rune had become nearly indistinguishable.
“I… I think I get it…”
By this time, Nightshade had regained enough strength to sit up. She gazed weakly in Kera’s direction, her eyes blanketed by dust. “Nnnngh… ch-child…?”
“Belle… Pilate…” She droned in a deep, contemplative voice. “I never really left you guys, did I?” That said, she lifted the thing up and slid it over her tiny, tiny horn. Instantly, the hoof-brace lit up, showering sparks of magic all over the foal’s figure. She clenched her eyes shut, grimacing slightly as her tattoos lit up like candles, flashing from head to tail. “I… I understand now…”
“Wh-what…?” Nightshade stifled a shriek as she inched away from the child’s glowing form. “What… are you…?”
Kera took a deep breath. Two sun-bright eyes opened, flickering in rhythm with her pulsating horn. “Eljunbyro.” Just then, the brace at the top of her skull flashed, sending a bright-blue aura in every direction at once.
The light splashed over the book, causing its lavender flickers to relax into a dim glow.
The light cascaded over the Xonans and Basso, freezing them in shock and awe.
At last, the light bathed over Rainbow Dash… and disappeared into her ruby pendant. The Element of Loyalty pulsed once, twice, and then relaxed to a steady shine. Almost instantly, her wingtips stretched out. Blinking, the mare sat up… then stood up. She gazed down at her hooves, almost surprised at how easily she was balancing herself. That was how she knew--just as everypony else in the room knew--that the perpetual dizziness had at last cleared.
Kera tilted her glowing eyes in Rainbow’s direction. It took concentration, but at last her green pupils reformed. “Rainbow Dash. Are… are you okay?”
Rainbow Dash was already flapping her wings. She hovered in place, feeling light as a feather. She glanced at Kera, then stared down at her hooves. She flexed her forelimbs, breathing evenly. Then, with a heavily furrowed brow, she turned until she was icily glaring in the Xonans’ direction.
The guards stared back at her. They rattled in their armor.
Rainbow Dash’s body angled into a veritable arrowhead. Before the visual spectrum could register the blur of her wings, a pocket of air had already exploded from behind her propulsive charge. The very next second, six whole guards were slamming into opposite walls, having been tossed dozens of feet in a single blink.
“Vemielen saat! Oss Tray Oh herannadren!” One shouted. “Rekhar! Rekhar--” His voice limped behind him as a prismatic blur pushed him so hard into a granite wall that his body made a deep, crackling impression.
A millisecond later, Rainbow Dash was backflipping off him, dodging scimitar swings, and diving into the screaming sea of guards. She straddled one’s chest, repeatedly pummeled his skull until his helmet spit in two, then tossed his body like a living club into two more grunting victims.
One guard tried puncturing her from behind with a poleaxe, but she was already grabbing it with two twisting wings. The feathers alone rotated, snapping the thing like a twig and yanking the Xonan into a pair of bucking hooves. Before the guard’s body could hit the ground, Rainbow Dash had blurred over in time to catch him, swing him by his tail, and club him across the craniums of the last bunch of Xonans scrambling to escape.
At last, a final guard galloped towards the distant exit, leaving his torch behind. Holding her breath, Rainbow Dash spun about like a top and flapped her wings in his direction. Thunder rolled as a cyclonic patch of air roared towards him, lifted him off his hooves, and slammed his cranium against an overhang of rock. He fell down with a groan, adding to the stark silence of the room.
Basso stirred. He stumbled to get up, but then felt a mighty tug to his shoulders. Blinking, he looked up in surprise at Rainbow’s easily hovering figure.
“At ease, ya big lug,” Rainbow droned. “The main event is back.” She spun and looked across the sea of collapsed, unconscious Xonans. “Kera? Kera!” In a blur, she darted over to the foal. “Whoah! Ease up on the eyes there, sparky! What gives?! Was it you who turned on ‘goddess mode’ all of the sudden?”
“I… uh…” Kera bit her lip and pointed up at the brace that was acting as a cap to her horn.
Rainbow blinked. “Huh.” The corner of her muzzle curved slightly. “Guess we now know that Khao royally sucks at accessorizing. Not that I’m the best judge.. heh…”
“Rainbow, I… I…” Kera bit her lip. Moisture steamed at the edges of her glowing eyes.
Rainbow raised an eyebrow. She turned and glanced at Nightshade, regarding her gaping expression with suspicion. She then looked at the pile of rubble past her.
Kera’s lip quivered. Her voice took on a wavering tone. “He saved me, Rainbow Dash. He… he only wanted to fix what was wrong with Nagu’n. He helped me get the book, and he s-saved me. And Nightshade…” She clenched her glowing eyes shut and whimpered. “She… she killed… sh-she killed…”
Rainbow’s lips parted. On strongly flapping wings, she turned until she was looming thunderously over the madame.
Nightshade scooted away, her muzzle stretched between a grimace and a frown. “He’s betrayed Ledomare before. He was only going to turn on us! I swear it!”
Rainbow’s eyes icily narrowed. She jerked forward.
Nightshade flinched--
Rainbow soared over her, past her, and spun in the air. Then, with a deep breath, she flew straight down into the pile of rubble. Rocks exploded in every direction and the whole floor of the cavern shook. Nightshade and Kera shielded themselves as pebbles and shards of rock flew past them. They craned their neck to see a fresh hole in the rubble from where Rainbow Dash had begun burrowing, using both legs and wings in full force.
Basso limped up, standing beside Kera and resting a nervous hoof on her shoulder. The enchanted foal glanced up at him, still sniffling. She hugged the book of runes to her chest and gazed at the rubble, waiting… waiting.
Seconds passed. Minutes--
With a blast of rocks and heated air, Rainbow Dash surfaced, her back to the three equines. She hovered in place, levitating just meters above the mess of stone debris.
Kera and Basso leaned forward, breathless.
At last, Rainbow glanced over her shoulder at them. Her expression was blank. As she pivoted fully around, the others understood why. Dalen’s body hung limply in her forelimbs. The stallion’s neck hung at a sickeningly unnatural angle to his spine. His eyelids were folded shut and his mouth stretched open in a silent, eternal scream.
Kera gasped. Her face scrunched up and she hid her sobbing muzzle into Basso’s foreleg. The stallion patted her gently, though his eyes darted nervously about.
Rainbow Dash floated down to the floor. She laid Dalen’s body gently across the stone, taking careful time to fold his forelimbs across his chest until he looked at peace. The pegasus lingered there, hunched over, suffering increasingly deep and deeper breaths. Finally, her eyes tilted up, slicing the air with a venomous glare.
Nightshade received the bitter end of it. The glow of Rainbow’s pendant swam over her like a crimson funeral shroud. “I d-did what I had to do,” she murmured. “Just as you must do what you have to do!” She pointed at Kera. “Now that she’s found a way to cancel out the book’s effect on your senses, we must make our way to the--”
Rainbow Dash shot at her like a bullet. Nightshade’s jostled lungs were incapable of shrieking as she found herself being throttled clear across the cavern and down a dark passageway beyond.
“Rainbow!” Kera shrieked, flashing a horrified look in the direction of the ruby glow. She stomped her hooves. “Rainbow, wait! Please!”
No response.
“Uhhhhh…” Basso sweated.
“Quick!” Kera dried her tears and hopped-hopped at the stallion’s side. “We gotta go after her!”
“Is that even possible now?”
“Just move!” Kera squeaked as he lifted her up onto his backside. She gripped onto him and the lavender book as Basso galloped at full speed, bounding helplessly down the corridor in pursuit of Rainbow’s angry exit.
Wow, that's a lot happening at once. I always sort of figured it'd be Kera who figured out the book, ever since she started carrying it around. I guess it was just stuck on "handicap mode" and now it's on "triple Dash's aweesomeness" mode.
Also, Nightshade is about to have a very bad time.
The Rainbow's anger is completely right, yet so wrong. Truly, I have no idea what to think about it.
backyardgaming.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/race_for_the_pennant.png
Can't hit what ain't there.
Also, does anyone find it interesting the "Innavedr" is the one who wields "Ordsjot"?
Hmm. I wonder if this means that those two have an alternate definition.
Poor Dalen. Rest in Peace.
Rainbow's back! And she ain't taking any prisoners!
Dalen. Another victim of the insanity and Chaos that is gripping this world. Another pure soul forced to twist and bend into something wholly unrecognizable at the hands of his own people...
No work out today, ):(.
People keep giving Nightshade the time of day; Shell too.
There is no worth to these two characters. They have spent the blood of hundreds of thousands of innocent lives and no longer are worthy of any recognition, or even pity.
At some point it is too late, and they are Beyond Redemption. That time has long passed.
Dash is back, full force. Dalen is dead.
Is it just me, or is this series dragonballing?
~Basso
She...
She's fine now.
Rainbow Dash...
Odrsjot.
It.. cured Rainbow Dash?
YEAH!
Nightshade just doesn't understand Loyalty, does she?
The thing is, how much strain is that brace putting on Kera? And what happens to Dashie when she takes it off?
3618781
No. No she does not.
This is Australia...
Two chapters in one day! It's Christmas come early!
Ouch, too bad Dalen bit the dust. At least it'll be fun to watch Nightshade get beaten up.
There's a fine line between right judgment and hypocritical judgment. Unfortunately, Nightshade has never been anywhere close to that line.
3618836
Have you ever joined the Austraeoh group?
I made a post about it right here
Or have the direct image here. If you must comment (as if that's gonna happen) please do it in the forum I linked above, not here.
th01.deviantart.net/fs71/PRE/i/2013/322/7/3/roarke_and_armor_by_apple_tank-d6uox5q.jpg
Rainbow Dash is healthy again! And angry! YAY!
WHHHAAATTT!?! Two Chapters in one day!!?!!?
*ahem*
So Rainbow is back in action, and Kera is important finally. Alright, I need help with this...
Rainbow is Austraoh
Belle and Pilate are Eljunbyro
so who are Odrsjot and Innavedr? Is it Kera and the book, or is the horn gauntlet thing one of them also? im so confused!
Now that is a really impressive turnaround. Basso needs food.
I wonder if Dash is about to feed a certain dragon some Deadly Nightshade?
Hey, at least his head didn't explode.
3619965
Although he is the only pony to have died from falling from great heights so far. Given the sheer number of ridiculous falls, you'd think that he'd have company. Nah.
3619806
Eljunbyro is the "second wind" of austraoh, or something.
This means that Eljunbyro is everything which helps rainbow dash get over her personal problems so that she can keep her motivation while flying east. This means that we have to define dash'es most relevant personal problem at the time of her death/rebirth. That would be her inability to have any companionship. Her original friends died, then she became suicidal, then she left behind someone she loved, then she quickly staged a social revolution without forming any deep emotional connections to anyone, then she gave herself up in a last ditch effort against force she could not possibly win against to save ponies she had just met.
At her time of death, dash had suffered a long line of losses which kept taking away all of her reasons to want the world to keep existing. There is a good chance that all of her friends manage to do the job of eljunbyro just by existing.
Then again, this chapter seems to be suggesting that she is getting a more literal magic flying boost as her second wind, so maybe Eljunbyro has more than one job or more than one meaning.
If it has more than one meaning, then Odrsjot and Innavedr may refer exclusively to world-flame-book spells or they might refer to events rather then individuals. Maybe austraoh doesn't even have a related spell.
Disregard that last comment.
Damn. Kera went Avatar state, and Dash went super Saiyan. Well, at least the awesome is back.
But alas, it came with a cost.
Now that the embodiment of awesome has returned, let the badass butt kicking commence.
Eh, Dalen's fine, just give him some painkillers.
But seriously, I'm surprised he died. Deaths really aren't common in this series for named characters, especially for a character like Dalen, who's been in a significant amount of chapters.
...Let her have it, Rainbow.
Kill me! By which I mean her! Kill Nightshade!!
A revelation in the light of day:
You can't choose what stays and what fades away.
YES! I mean, NO! I mean... finally some real danger! ...being a literary masochist can be hard.
The wind most frantic. I have no idea what the metaphysical implications of this chapter mean and I love it. Well, we do know now that the symbol in itself does have power after all - because most certainly that hoof-brace isn't the Odrsjot itself. With that, the old question whether the book is the Innavedr or not resurfaces, to me at least. Given that thingy she just did, Kera is now a more attractive candidate than ever before. I mean, how come she carries the Wind with her. What does that mean "never left me"? It is the Spark that the Wind is bound to, not some filly. Either this is a crossing over between their personal bond and their destiny - which would of course fit the general theme - or this is truly the Innavedr at work. Curious. This just reminded me that the precise functions of both the Innavedr and the Odrsjot are still not known to us. The Spark ignites the world, the Wind grants her the power she needs - and the rest?
It's super awesome to have kick-ass Rainbow Dash back, and doubly awesome that Nightshade is one of her first ass-kickery targets! Maybe things are finally looking up.
3618296 Well, think about it like this. Austraeoh (RD) found Eljunbyro (Pilate and Belle), who in turn are planning to adopt Kera (Innavedr), who figured out how to use the book (Odrsjot). It's a progression sequence.
And continuing my previous "Rainbow Dash is the Doctor" theme... HIT IT!
I love this chapter! Well, except for the fact that Dalen kinda died.....
You got your body...
The Dash is back!
Poor Dalen
IIIIIt's Dashie's Evasive Maneuvers Get-Backing Adventure!
At this point, I honestly think that Nightshade deserves it. She's just such a bitch. Also, goddammit Zaid. You forgot to wear it on the horn idiot. These are my thoughts so far.
-MASH
P.S. Once more! Let's go!
IIIIIt's Dashie's Evasive Maneuvers Get-Backing Adventure!
At this point, I honestly think that Nightshade deserves it. She's just such a bitch. Also, goddammit Zaid. You forgot to wear it on the horn idiot. These are my thoughts so far.
-MASH
P.S. Once more! Let's go!
Shit...I'm dead...at least it was a noble death doing the right thing, saving Kera and all. I think I had a great run in the end...
3618296 I think you have it backwards. When Kera first saw the book in chapter 71 of Innavedr,
And since Kera is the only one who figured out the symbol, and how to use it, it's not a stretch that she may be Odrsjot?
Edit: This opinion may be outdated, since I'm so far behind everyone else at the moment.
Poor Dalen. I didn't think he'd be making a return. At least he did some good, in the end.
Also - Dash is back, and Dashier than ever!
And she's immediately faced with a moral dilemma. I don't want Dash to kill Nightshade. I feel like she'd be horrified with herself if she did, especially in front of Kera. It's hard to say what should be done, really.
Also also: Kera has super powers. Which makes sense, but still, it's cool to see her finally realize her importance.
Onward!
So is Kera another part of Eljunbyro? Or maybe she's Odrsjot? Or maybe, since Eljunbyro is the rebirth of Dash's wind and flame, maybe Eljunbyro will always be with her?
I don't know.
-Spirit
Well, Nightshade, you reap what you sow,and you'v ebeen sowing some very bitter crops indeed. TIme for a righteous flasnk-kicking
Finally.....Let's see just how merciless Rainbow can be.....Nightshade is in some deep shit.
remnants put it perfectly...LETS DO IT!!!!
That was awesome. Rainbow Dash is back full throttle, and now I await Rainbow's choice of dealing with Nightshade. Let's hope she makes the right choice.
Damn, I was holding out for Dalen... maybe a bit of a beatdown is what Nightshade needs to shake some sense into her.
I kinda hope Rainbow kills Nightshade, though I don't think it'll happen. Who knows though, Rainbow seems angry enough that she might be willing to accept that blood on her hooves.
Dash is back in action, though at a very heavy price
Well, at least Dalen's not going to come back crazy. Much as I dislike the idea of Dash killing someone off, Nightshade's shit has to stop.
Odrsjot. Kera is odrsjot.
6263887
Heck yes!
She's back!
Oh that was a neat setup.
I'm guessing Kera figures that a) the bracelets didn't work because they were meant for Eljunbyro and not Rainbow, b) the true Eljunbyro are Belle and Pilate, and c) her becoming part of their family gives her a claim to it as well.