Chapter 37: Almost Homefront
Deep inside the Mountain of Canterlot was the cavernous expanse known to some as the Vacuous Arcanum, the most ambitious excavation ponykind had ever endeavored on and completed. It went the entire width and length of the mighty Mountain, and stretched up towards its peak. Chasms and catacombs split off and down into the roots of the earth, so that in cross-section the monolithic peak would seem hollow.
Such Dark things lurked within, relics of lost eras, before there were Celestiaan to keep ponies safe. Some with eyes, some with wings and legs, and some with legs, all equally terrifying. Their command, forgotten but mindlessly obeyed, to protect the mysteries even Celestia dared not contemplate. It was evil down there, in those deepest depths. Pain and hatred had stewed for a thousand years, blacker than the depths of space. Who knew what treasure and horror sat waiting for rediscovery..
The most recent and most meager of the Arcanum's secrets, at the very edge of its enveloping darkness, was Phyte’s secret lab.
A ball of Twilight Velvet’s green and purple dragonfire manifested in the air, and ofter a moment of smoldering dumped out Prosser. In his tumble he knocked over one of the racks of books.
Aurthora Airy peered over the table of alchemical devices laid out before her. “Back already?"
“Lady Velvet was very impatient, and I just never got around to telling her about our predicament.” Prosser jumped to his hooves and quickly brushed himself off. “I doubt she would sympathize even if I had told her.”
“Then how are we going to get back to the surface? You used the last of the dragonfire we found to send her that letter!” Aurthora looked cross. "I am not getting in another birdcage, even the one that sent us here. There is no telling where it could send us!"
“Did you say that was the last of the dragonfire?” Prosser looked over the empty green phials on the ground, which still held a faint heat from the former contents. “Oh dear, I was having so much fun burning things I must have lost track.”
“Councilor, you have trapped us here!” Aurthora groaned. “How selfish of you, when Canterlot is in such need of us!”
“Worry not, my lady. We’ll get out.” Prosser consoled sarcastically. “Ye olde fashion’d way I suppos’d.”
“Councilor…”
“This long forgotten tomb can’t possibly be that hard to navigate. We just need to give it our all, and everything will work out in the end.” Prosser waved away her concerns. “Still, we might as well see what the Mistress had stashed, hidden away from even her little musicians.”
“I don’t disagree about that,” Aurthora explained. “I simply think that we should remember how very alone we’ve become here.”
“You simply have to broaden your definition of company.” Prosser glanced at the withered corpses on the nearby examination tables, but decided they were fine where they were. “I understand your concern, my lady, but remember that I’m me, and mysteries unravel themselves for my very shadow.”
“I fear for the time you meet your match.” Aurthora said, going back to inspecting the equipment Phyte had abandoned.
“I would so fear too, but my match flew north.” Prosser’s smirk almost cracked, but he pushed away any emotion by busying himself. He pushed aside the chemical phials and emptied flasks of dragonfire, and joined Aurthora in investigation of the devices.
It seemed Phyte’s experimentation into the nature of life and death had become more sophisticated over the centuries since convening of the Stars, relying less on necromancy and more on physiology. Prosser inspected the articles laid out before him: There were multiple hoof-sketched diagrams of the bodily systems of each pony tribe, made undoubtedly with living references. In another binder, Prosser found where she had tried replicating interesting injuries on multiple ponies, and comparing how they healed, then repeated the process until they died.
“The Mistress was a sickening mare. It is a shame we could not bring her to justice.” Aurthora said. “Thankfully the hive of her villainy in the form of the Musician's Guild has been purged.”
“Right you are.” Prosser agreed, picking up and toying with various torture devices. “Never more will that sweet music be brought forth.”
Aurthora, disturbed by his words, wrinkled her nose. “Councilor, sometimes it is hard to tell if you really are a amoral bedlamite, or simply act that way for amusement.”
“Don’t worry my lady. An smarmy as I may be, nopony is as antagonized by the this than I.” Prosser tittered, opening up another cabinet of the butcher’s tools. There was a small shelf of strange machines with glass dials and bronze probes like Prosser had never seen before. The machine bore symbols of a sun motif that differed slightly from Celestia’s imprinted besides little stars that reminded him highly of Twilight Sparkle’s cutie mark. Moving on, he went through dozens of drawers with sophisticated torture tools, bizarre segmented skewers and serrated hoof drills, and most horrifyingly of all, meat tenderizers. It seemed Phyte had been doing more with her sharp teeth than just smiling.
"No matter how many times we told her, that mare refused to stop being bad." Phyte mumbled, idly spinning the mechanism of one of the drills.
Loud clatter from behind them echoed through the immense cave. Aurthora whirled around to face the intruder while Prosser jumped beneath a table.
It was Sel Lech Sabonord, at the edge of their light. He was looking slack jawed, his struggle to understand the presence of the other two evident on his brow. A set of hiking equipment lay at his feet where he’d dropped it.
“What are you guys doing here?”
“Oh.” Aurthora relaxed. “Captain Sabonord, this is a relief most welcome.”
“No, really. What are you doing here?” Sel trotted over to them.
“Is that a formal inquiry, Sir?” Prosser peered out from beneath the table. “As an official of the realm, I’m not obliged to tell you anything unless you have the proper authorization.”
“It is a long story. The councilor and I were taking inventory of the material you seized from the Musician’s Guild, stored in Castle Magoria.” Aurthora explained. “We decided to test one of the magical birdcages. Unfortunately, embarrassingly, we decided to test ourselves. We should have known better. It led here, apparently.”
“That was completely stupid of you. That cage could have killed you!” Sel said frankly. “Do you have any idea where this is?”
“The Vacuous Arcanum.” Prosser offered, getting to his hooves once more.
Sel scoffed. “No, it’s- Wait... What?”
“Forget I said anything.” Prosser coughed. “Please, explain it to us.”
“Well…” Sel was hesitant. The more he thought about it, the more suspicious their story seemed. Still, he obliged. “We are under Canterlot, and maybe even inside the Mountain. It’s about half-an-hour’s trot to the chasm Astral punched under the Opera House.”
“I told you we could walk it.” Prosser smirked at Aurthora.
The viscountess weathered the councilor’s smug satisfaction. “This is a big place to be so close without anypony knowing.” She looked into the dark emptiness past the limit of the torches’ light. The very edge of one of the monolithic statues was the only visible proof that the cavernous hollow wasn’t empty.
“Phyte and Astral knew.” Prosser pointed out.
“And other ponies.” Sel immediately regretted his words. He had sworn to himself that nopony could know about Lady Sunset’s return to Canterlot until he had at least spoken to her, which was the very reason he had returned. His disposition shifted to extremely nervous.
“What other ponies?” Aurthora asked.
“Probably Celestia. Heh, the old bat was old enough to have been there when it was made.” Prosser chuckled.
“So Captain, you must have found this place when Lady Velvet told you to investigate the Opera House, but why did you not tell her?” Aurthora was showing her curious side now that she was away from Blueblood. “And why are you back now?”
“Maybe she already knows. I'm back for... reasons.” Sel elucidated.
“Reasons.” Prosser repeated snidely. “Oh boy, I love reasons.”
“If it is something private we will give you deserved privacy.” Aurthora bowed. “But it astounds that anypony could have personal business in a place such as this.”
“No. I’m…” Sel thought furiously. “Assessing a security risk. I suspect that a, um, rogue group might be staging themselves from one of the tunnels branching off of this main cavern.”
Aurthora frowned deeply. “Then this is a serious matter indeed. I’m coming with you.”
“You really shouldn’t.” Sel protested.
“I stand by Lady Velvet for the same reason I stood by Blueblood: I want to lead and protect my hometown.” Aurthora insisted. “Let us fight these rogues together!”
Sel bit down on his lip hard enough to draw blood. He wanted so badly to speak to Sunset, when he knew it was very likely that her ambitions were of a nefarious nature. If the pony she’d had with her was really Twilight Sparkle, like he had thought he’d heard, the mares deserved an opportunity to reveal themselves or get away before they inevitably came to Velvet’s attention.
Once Velvet knew, all bets were off.
“I guess.” He sighed. “Just stay behind me, and don’t attack anypony unless they attack first.”
“I shall abide by your constraints, Captain.” Aurthora nodded. She pulled her shortsword and scabbard from where she’d set them during her investigations and affixed its belt around her barrel. “Let us go then.”
“Uh, see you later Councilor.” Sel gave a curt wave to Prosser before he and Aurthora cantered further into the mountain, in search of the possibility of danger.
The deeper in a pony went, the more they would realize why the Everfree Forest had gone uncolonized for a thousand years. If the harsh jungle of the fringe wasn't enough, packed as it was with harsh plants and animals, the depths of the forest proved wholly unsuited to even meager pony subsistence, or indeed, survival.
As Twilight walked further in the Everfree, the dense forest floor began to dip. The shaded leaf-litter began to squish underfoot, and soon she was trudging through mud under a sparse canopy. The forest open up into a bleak brown bog, dotted with hammocks of gnarled and dead trees. Out of the shadows of gnarled roots and rotted trees, animal eyes of all types followed the alicorn's progress.
Twilight paused to cast Able Airy’s categorization spell again. Her vision of the world darkened, but lit up with glowing aura denoting reptiles. There were thousands of them before her, but a particular gold aura, bearing the tag of ‘dragon’, stood out several kilometers deeper south.
“Spike couldn’t have wandered this far himself. And I don't see that changling going to so much effort to hide him this far away from the castle.” Twilight mused darkly. Somepony beside Chrysalis had moved Spike away, either during the battle in the throne room, or while Twilight was getting the spell from Canterlot. “Either way it’s bad.”
There was a slight mist rising off the muddy water, and with the cloudwalking spell Twilight could avoid a wet trudge. She could have teleported, but did not want to risk drawing unwanted attention to herself; She had no idea what creatures the mire hid.
The bog was almost as noisy as the forest, the croaking frogs and insects constantly reminding Twilight of her heightened hearing. The pale moonlight reflected distortedly off the still and stagnant water, and every once in a while Twilight thought she saw ripples emanating from the hammocks she passed.
Refreshing the categorization spell. Twilight followed the tag to a raised bank, a tangled island of gnarled trees and twisted vines. In the shadow it looked as final and solid as any castle wall. Or perhaps Twilight could see an actual castle wall, or at least part of one, for it appeared that the thicket held an ancient watchtower from from the same era as the Everfree Castle. The spell told Twilight that Spike lay within that tower.
“Spike!” Twilight called. “Can you hear me?”
The bog responded by growing quieter, the amphibians and insects shying from Twilight’s intrusion. Twilight burned away the darkness of the thicket with light from her horn and then, after a moment of consideration, began casting jets of fire into dry vegetation. The vines curled and evaporated and the trees disintegrated into ash. Twilight pressed forward into the island behind her path of destruction; Spike had tough scales and would feel no more of the fire than a tickle.
The mound of filth-stained marble Twilight had seen was not a watchtower like she had thought, but the walls of a cistern-like structure sunk into the island. Infuriatingly for Twilight, Spike’s golden tag had moved, placing him some ten meters below her and the ground.
“How the hell would anything under the water table be kept from flooding?” Twilight wondered. Then again, the tapestries and books in the Everfree Castle had remained mostly untouched by a thousand years of total neglect. There must have been some subtle magic at work.
Twilight jumped down to the bottom the the cistern. A hole, roughly a pony’s length in diameter, was bored into it’s center. A stone cover, engraved with small suns and moons, had been pushed to the side. A redundant barricade, a rusted grate in the dark hole, had been pried apart, and the surrounding stone had been recently scratched and cracked by something sharp. The creature that was getting away with Spike was strong.
“Spike! Can you hear me!” Twilight called down the hole. She cast a flare of magical light down the well, but it dissipated before it found the bottom.
Twilight pulled out her sabre, took a deep breath for courage, and jumped into the hole.
As soon as Twilight was out of the moonlight she was assaulted by the same conflicting magical auras as were in the chasm by the castle: Powerful forces of Dark and Light, the light blooming and pushing at her with overwhelming energy, and the dark sucking and consuming so as to pull everything it touched into its void. Twilight lost all coordination in her limbs, and she hit the bottom of the hole in something of a splat, rolling down a pile of bones from animals who’d fallen into the same deathtrap.
Using the last of her stored magic, Twilight tried to cast a magical shield around herself. Though the Light threatened to smother her spell and the Dark worked to subvert it, she managed to complete the cast and seal herself away from them, giving her a moment to reassert control over her rebellious body.
That is when she saw it. Like the first time she saw the nightmare altar it was like something out of a dream. It was a granite pyre, a single chiseled stone piece embellished with radiantly burning gemstones. In the abject darkness Twilight would have had an impossible time judging it’s size, if not for Spike curled around the base of the stone fire’s brazzer, as if gleaming warmth from the dead rock.
Twilight began to crawl through the miasma of magic to the base of the pyre, encompassing Spike with the protective ward. By the faint light of the false flame she could see no marks on him. He was shivering, but to Twilight’s joy, otherwise unharmed.
Her eyes adjusted to the penetrating darkness. The hole around them was something like an antechamber, a voluminous room of the same stone as the structure above. Perhaps the top was not so much of a cistern as an entrance to the underground section. The builder had assumed any visitors could fly.
Her gaze once again wandered to the pyre statute, so garish and ostentatious, but also subtle compelling, resounding in Twilight’s mind as something of great importance. Magic, she reasoned, as it was sitting in veritable pool of uncontrolled energy. Perhaps it was even the source, for the peculiar heat it radiated equated partially to the overwhelming positive magic she had felt on entering.
The longer she looked, the more the pyre looked like a mirage or illusion, with the sculpted flames writhing and fluttering like a real fire. She could almost hear the crack and pop of the fake charred logs in the fake brazzer. She felt a certain distress or urgency whenever she blinked, as though the pyre was demanding her perpetual and unbroken attention. In return, it promised heat and comfort, an alien affection that could burn those that came too near. Perhaps that was why thousands of creatures had martyred themselves in the dark pit. Perhaps that was why Spike had been drawn to it from kilometers away, and had been driven to claw apart stone and iron to reach it.
Whatever the pyre was, it was not something to be taken lightly. When Twilight had time, if Twilight had time, the secrets of the forsaken artifact could be investigated, outside of the dark and leaching pit in which it resided.
Feeling strong enough to stand upright again, Twilight got to her hooves and put Spike on her back. She prepared a teleportation spell. “Let’s get out of here.”
To Twilight immense shock, something answered her from the pitch blackness. “Come back soon.”
Overcome by surprise and panic, Twilight let lose her spell. Twilight and her small passenger disappeared in a flash of purple. With the magical barrier gone with them, the thick darkness flooded into the vacated space.
They reappeared at the base of one of the Everfree Castle’s walls. The rush of adrenalin gave Twilight the energy to gallop to the campfire where Applejack, the unconscious Dash, and the fillies were. The fillies scurried away in fear again, but Applejack jumped up to aid the alicorn.
Twilight remained standing just long enough to blurt out “I found Spike” before collapsing from the cumulative effect of fifty hours of unbroken activity, adrenaline crash, and magical, mental, and physical exhaustion.
A bit earlier
Experiencing the natural reaction of any willful stuborn creature being told what to do, Astral Nacre prepared an indignant tirade against Ancepanox’s dictates. The pure insolence that the black alicorn must have had, to abuse the generosity and offered friendship of a god, passed into near insanity. But Ancepanox teleported away, and Astral was left screaming into the air.
She stopped her tantrum just short of trampling the pony underhoof: the unconscious Ripple Wreath. Astral felt the impulse to renege on her promise to Ancepanox, and simply destroy the young knight. He was helpless, sleeping in the ash clinging tightly to his ornate wolf helmet, but Astral, though impulsive, knew that she would be throwing out a great opportunity if she failed Ancepanox.
Astral needed magic if she was to truly take her place at the top of the world. But that beautiful and devious Ancepanox was too clever to rush into an agreement. It was Astral who would bear the upfront cost, as it were, in being burdened with Wreath. Ancepanox had marked her territory, spreading her filth curse onto him and foisting him to Astral.
It was as though the black alicorn in the field had been different mare from the one in Canterlot. In the throne room and at the feast, it had been obvious that Ancepanox had been out of her depth, alone and unprepared in a potentially hostile city. Velvet and her retainers were uncertain, and Astral was beginning to realize Velvet had hosted the young alicorn mostly to spur jealousy from her goddess daughter.
The pony who had unleashed her wrath on Glori was a nightmare in many definitions of the word, and Astral had relished seeing the resulting extermination. Ancepanox had moved and acted in just the right ways to stir fear and panic in the camp, and as the clash intensified Astral had seen the black alicorn battling a dozen knights and defeating them, one by one: Using the sabre to slice their flesh, crushing them with magic, mixing their blood and bile within them with her horn, getting close and consuming their souls, OH! The variety of that depraved massacre had elated Astral and formed within her mind a certain kinship with the nightmare viscountess.
Then Ancepanox had gone back to her uncertain, timid mode. Bah!
Ancepanox had clearly felt that Astral’s aid in that slaughter was not kindness enough to clear the air of the misunderstanding in the throne room. In fact, Astral had become positively furious at how liberal Ancepanox had been with her disrespect. She was still feeling the sting of the words, the accusations and implications, a welt on her pride she would have to bear if she wanted Ancepanox’s help.
What was more, Astral would have to bear Ancepanox’s abuse because the nightmare alicorn had been powerful. It was like something she remembered Foaly Flux saying once. “It’s the prerogative every pony to take what he or she can.“ Everypony had the right to mistreat anypony that could not stop them. By that point of view, it was an incredible grace that Ancepanox only bothered Astral and did not torment as many ponies as Astral had, considering that the black alicorn outmatched the god of life.
Yes, the display of power against Glori had clarified the true nature. Ancepanox had every ounce of dark purpose as she’d claimed, maybe even more, for when she had truly unleashed herself against the camp her savagery had been incredible. Ripple Wreath was the only once she’d show mercy to, if the curse she’d laid upon him could be considered anything better than death.
Astral had not been wholly faking the self-reflection and regret about her brutal nature. Her little creations in the opera house had suffered and were suffering. She was not so blind to think it was entirely the fault of the materials. If only she could be more powerful, something great could be made from the mundane. Not anything perfect, like what Velvet thought ponies could achieve, but at least something passable, at least something that would not scream for hours on end before going braindead.
The beginning on the path to that end, as dictated by Ancepanox, was the miserable Ripple Wreath. Astral had not the first clue to entering ponies’ minds and dreams, like Ancepanox had, so she could only guess as the existential torture the young knight must have been experiencing.
“Get up.” Astral demanded. “It is a long flight back to Canterlot.”
Wreath did not stir, and it came to Astral’s mind that he should be woken up before he was gotten up. Are you proud of me yet mother, Astral grumpily thought.
She leaned down to the earth pony and nudged him with her nose, or at least where a nose would be on the snout of a pony not comprised of writhing sinew. Just by touching him she felt a chill, like a cold breeze blowing over her heart. The Dark magic inside him was still ravenous, despite Ancepanox feeding it with the souls of Wreath’s former comrades.
Fed up with it all, Astral whispered into Wreath’s ear. “Listen to me you ingrate nightmare. If you don’t relax your hold on your host I will stomp his head so far into the ash you will be praising Celestia once you wake up in Tartarus.”
It was a lame and impotent threat she knew, but the effect was no less for it. Ripple Wreath began to stir, trying to curl up to protect himself from the world.
“That’s not going to work son, so get your flank up!” Astral bellowed.
With military precision, which was to say hasty scrambling, Wreath got to his hooves. He tripped over his wolf helm and became tangled up in the ropes of one of the collapsed tents. Back in the thick ash, Wreath resigned himself to a chewing-out. “My apologies mother, I submit myself to your puni-” The realities of his situation came rushing back. He slowly raised his head to look at Astral. “Oh buck, this isn’t home.”
“Greetings, sir knight. I am Astral Nacre, the god of life. Viscountess Ancepanox has given me wardship over you.” Astral spoke clearly and authoritatively, like Velvet would have done. “For an undetermined time, you are my responsibility.”
Wreath’s wide eyes turned unfocused. “Oh gods... Ant sepax… She did something to me. I could feel them in my head! I can’t explain it…”
“Lady Ancepanox.” Astral corrected. “And I can explain it, metaphorically. She wadded up all the emotion her curse was feeding off of and shoved up way up in you, twice. Before that she also infected you with said curse, so that it would keep you from dying from the wounds she herself dealt you. She is now, in a word, your progenitor.”
"My... progenitor?" Ripple Wreath sat up. "This feels so surreal." He rubbed his head. "I am... infected."
"Oh hush. You should be glad an alicorn took notice of you." Astral was getting impatient with the lad.
“My thoughts are not fully my own. Cursed I am then, truly. My world is lost to me. I am part of yours hers, and yours.” Wreath mournfully breathed, and descended into whispered mutters. “I’m sorry… I’m so sorry...”
“Don’t be so melodramatic!” Astral dragged Wreath to his hooves. “You and I are bound, but if you wish to make this more tolerable, simply act with me how you did with that mare knight, Glori Sabonord.”
“And you will treat me like Glori did?” Wreath questioned. “Will you train with me? Will you teach me language and strategy? Will you keep me by your side, even when it is inconvenient? Will you inspire me to be loyal to you, and then in your only display of weakness, forsake me to alien monsters who puke their corrupting filth all over me?” Tears formed at the edges of his eyes.
“Perhaps the lattermost of that list.” Astral mused. “But not while you’re my ward. You are, for reasons beyond credulity, valuable to me. Now, are you going to follow me back to Canterlot by your own volition, or will I have to force you?”
“I shouldn’t be sad. The sooner I accept that this is my lot in life, the less miserable I will be.” Wreath bent down and scooped up his wolf helmet. He brushed off the ash and stared at it’s crumpled visor. “Or maybe I'll wake up soon. In fact, it is much more likely this is a fantastic dream than a skinless thing is telling me she is in charge of me."
"Impious scamp! I'm a god!" Astral Nacre barked. "Believe it or no, but obey me all the same!"
Wreath scowled slightly, like he was getting tired of being demeaned. "I’m not dead, so there will be more chances for me.”
“Oh sure, opportunities will abound, as soon as you shut up so that we can be going.” Astral said. “Now, where do you belong?”
Wreath donned his wolf helmet, and hung his head as he trotted around to Astral’s side, assuming the subservient position of two steps behind. If there had been a sun in the sky he would have been in her shadow.
“Very good, lad. I may grow to enjoy this.” Astral praised. “Let us to Canterlot then.”
The unlit nature of the underground labyrinth only served to heighten Sel Lech’s anxiety about his situation. There was a strange claustrophobia about it, for even when the walls and ceiling of the Arcanum were far away, the darkness was close, pressing in, hanging over Sel and Aurthora.
"This way." He whispered, motioning to the hole cut into the smooth dark stone.
"How do you know?" Aurthora asked.
Sel didn't answer.
They entered the tight passageway, creeping along in silence. Their breaths, hoofsteps, and the crackle of the torch were the only sounds.
Sel wondered how Sunset Shimmer would react to being confronted. The lady had always been a talented magician, and Sel could only guess that her decade in exile had only strengthened her powers. With Aurthora with him it would be more difficult to convince her of his non-hostile intent. He wished he’d thought of a better excuse and gone without the lumbering viscountess.
Aurthora’s sword clinked again against her side, a sound that echoed in both directions along the passage.
"Sorry captain." She adjusted her belt. "This is much more anxious than I thought.
Sel really knew very little about the mare, despite her always being in the background of dealings with Blueblood. “Why did you have your sword with you if you and the councilor were just going through Phyte’s things?” Sel asked.
“If it did not make Prince Blueblood nervous, I would always wear my sword.” Aurthora drew the gleaming iron blade slightly out of it’s scabbard to show it off. “I have the martial tradition of my house to uphold. The ponies of house Airy were once the greatest spellcasters in the western marches, vassals of house Highmoon. As a young mare I thought I would naturally be as strong in magic as most other mares in my family. However destiny saw fit to bless me in other ways, so that I may serve Canterlot with my sword.”
“Highmoon? I've never heard of them. I thought immediate houses ruled the western marches.” Sel wondered aloud.
“House Highmoon is extinct, and history is not kind to memories.” Aurthora sighed. “They were once a very powerful lineage of lords in the northernmost peaks of Unicornia, but an alliance was formed to the end of their annihilation, and their demise was total. Celestia stood idly by, as their castles were burned and their sons and daughters slaughtered. My predecessors of house Airy took the viscounty and castle of Draftkel here in Canterlot, which had once belonged to the Highmoons.”
“That’s… terrible."
"Reading history, one sees similar stories repeated throughout the ages, and the unification of Equestria changes very little in that regard. Learning the fate of the Highmoons was one of the first things that made me doubt the system Celestia presided over." Aurthora agreed. "Her harmony and peace can be so easily disrupted by her momentary apathy."
"Indeed Lady Aurthora. Yet I’m afraid that the impending civil war could bring more extinctions like that.” Sel shuddered. “I’m particularly afraid of ours.”
“Worry not, young captain.” Aurthora consoled. “Once these terrorists in this mountain are dealt with Lady Velvet’s position will be secure. We shall not perish whilst our actions are pure.”
They were nearing the point that the passage opened out into the cavern Sel had seen the odd machines in. Sel came to the pailing realization that he hadn’t brought a weapon. He was surprised Aurthora hadn’t called him out for that fumble earlier.
Not that it would matter very much if Lady Sunset decided to kill them.
“Could you cast a little light please?” Sel asked. He wasn’t good enough to cast it himself.
“Do you want to give up the element of surprise?” Aurthora scowled.
“Well, not necessarily…”
“Because I would prefer a straight fight as well.” Aurthora drew her sword fully. “These traitors will pay for their plots against Canterlot.”
Sel’s eyes widened in apprehension. “Uh, my lady remember not to do anything rash.”
“It would be rash to hesitate.” Aurthora replied deftly. She turned and charged into the cavern. “FOR CANTERLOT!”
Sel dashed after her, expecting to hear the whine of magic and the crunch of Aurthora’s bones. But when he stumbled into the large subterranean room, he saw that it was entirely empty. There were no ponies besides Aurthora and himself, and the bronze and glass machines had been moved too.
“It’s gone.” He gnawed on his already torn lip.
"Unfortunate." Aurthora sheathed her sword. She took the torch from Sel and circled the room with it.
The only evidence that there had ever been anything there were many large imprints in the dust, and two sets of slightly differing hoofprints.
"Captain, what did you see exactly, that is now gone?"
Sel rubbed his cheek vacantly. "Hard to explain. They were magical machines."
"Would you be able to describe them to somepony more knowledgeable, somepony from the university perhaps."
"Never mind it my lady. I have missed my window of opportunity." Sel cleared his throat, trotting back to the passageway. "The next time we encounter the outlaw will be at a time and place of her choosing."
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Next chapter coming very soon, probably tomorrow. (Edit:Who knows actually. I've been getting less time to write) Most of it is written because I was going to include it in this chapter, but it made for janky progression of time. And if their's anything I dislike (besides those traitorous Flems and Walloons), it's jankyness.
(I'm only kidding Belgians, I love you and your country very much.
)
Allow me the liberty to reverse the established order here, because I'm going to tell you a story. It's a cautionary tale that every human being should know, that could ring all the truer for authors.
It's called Too Many Cooks.
i.huffpost.com/gen/2283394/thumbs/o-TOO-MANY-COOKS-facebook.jpg
You see, author guy, I'm beginning to fear that your's adding too many cooks to your story. I was holding off on this comment until I got to the part in this chapter about the pyre altar, and I said aloud to myself "it's another godddamn cook."
Take it from me, too many cooks spoil the broth. Don't get your story too caught up in itself that it can't progress. For example, the four thousand words in this chapter detail a timeframe of at most, an hour and a half. I want progression, and I want to so badly. Don't get me wrong, every word you've put to the proverbial paper is still excellent, consistent to the story, and interesting. I'm just saying is all.
Now you, author guy, are asking yourself "what the hell am I going to do with all these cooks?! There's too many of them!" I'm not sure I have an answer for you. My best suggestion is to wrap up things for a couple of your plot lines so that there's room for more when you inevitably introduce them. Like a psychopathic murderer, you've just gotta start killing the cooks. Cull the cook population to a more manageable amount.
I won't pretend to know what that means in the context of your story. It seems like every plot line is playing the long game, and we won't know how frekkin anything turns out until much much later. That's okay though, because this is updating much faster than a lot of other fanfics.
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You don't seem to understand that too many cooks fills our heart with so much love.
It would be metaphorical paper, not proverbial paper.
Gotta go fast
But really I just write when I have time, when before I'd just play games and browse the internet and other time-waisting things. There's an argument to be made that writing FIM fanfiction is a waste of time, and I would have to agree with it, but you know, I find something worthwhile about it. The worse I feel, the more I feel the compulsion to write. So, I hope you're happy for me saying my writing will be in a lull over the winter break.
And as for addressing the very real problems you bring up, I'd tell you to just wait. I'm becoming seriously tempted to make some maps or some other utility so I'm not referring to some garbage that exists only in my mind. The limiting factor is my artistic ability, which if you've saw the old cover art you should know is pretty much garbage.