Valor and Ice and Shadow
Shining Armor
Despite Sombra’s declaration, it’s his big windigo friend that actually attacks me. Despite its size it’s easily the fastest that I’ve yet seen, diving straight at me like hawk after a rabbit and giving me yet another cone of ice magic from almost point-blank range. It’s powerful, but predictable, and I quickly raise a shield to block it as the spirit peels off. Can those things even do anything else?
I don’t get the chance to see, because the very next thing that happens is a half dozen crystal spikes bursting out of the ruined floor beneath me. I jump to the side instinctively, rolling along the ground and back onto my hooves in one swift movement. Immediately shards of ice descend from on high, punching deeply into the floor. I avoid most of them, but one cuts along the side of my flank, drawing blood. Sombra follows up instantly by breathing a stream of weird greenish-gold fire, which I raise another shield to block.
I think I’ve got the king’s measure now. His tactics were developed during a time when he was a mortal unicorn essentially hunting demigods. He plays rough, invokes all manner of underhanded tactics, and generally tries to avoid anything resembling a straight fight. Hence all the minions, the running, the traps, and now the double-teaming. Even hyped up on solar magic, he doesn’t want to take me on one-to-one.
Rule of thumb: if the enemy doesn’t want something to happen, there’s a good chance that you do.
How to make that happen? Part of me strategizes, while the other dodges around another cone of ice magic and returns fire at the windigo. It’s incredibly nimble though, and my shot doesn’t even come close. Sombra snorts and stomps his hooves. For just a moment, nothing happens… and then two of the room’s pillars morph into enormous clawed hands. The ceiling rattles as they rip themselves out and fly at me. I let them get close, let those razor-sharp fingers get around me, conjure a tiny shield at the last second, and then blast outwards with all my strength.
The claws shatter into a million tiny fragments, which I telekinetically grab and hurl right back at Sombra and his little buddy. Unfortunately he proves to have some ability with shield spells as well, a red dome encasing the both of them almost immediately. The gemstone storm patters off it as easily as rain off a window. I notice that between the demolished wall, the gaping hole in the floor, and the numerous ruined pillars this throne room is starting to get dangerously unstable. I need to end this quickly or take the fight somewhere else, or we’ll bring the whole building down on everypony’s head.
I pound my own hooves into the floor. The building shakes a little, and then the piece of floor Sombra is standing atop… jerks upwards like rake that somepony just stepped on. He goes sailing straight back through the very hole his sun powers melted into the wall.
Funny thing about unicorns: they can’t fly.
So while Sombra is busy screaming and plummeting a good few stories, I take the opportunity to make a mad dash for my frozen wife. She’s on the other side of the vast maw in the floor, so I stretch my wings and manage a glide across it. And who should get in my way but some thrice-damned winter spirit that just doesn’t know when to quit.
“Why are you even working for Sombra?” I shout up at it, even as I raise a shield to block a rain of knife-like icicles. “I mean, are you some kind of bucking moron?!”
It doesn’t respond, except by opening its maw for yet another wintery spray. This time I meet the attack head-on with my own beam of pink magic. The two attacks connect in the middle and form a shining silver orb at the point of contact. I stagger back a little. For a creature famed for being rather cowardly, this thing’s attack is quite powerful.
“Are you capable of – nrgh – pattern recognition?!” I manage, through gritted teeth as the contest between us shifts one way, and then another. I saw Sombra speak to the creature earlier, I know that it must be able understand me. “What did he promise you in exchange for this?”
Our little beam of war continues, and I slowly get the edge. This spirit is powerful, don’t get me wrong, but even freshly off of ghostly possession I’m a trained fighter and an alicorn. Windigoes are not creatures built for fair fights. Bluish-white loses ground steadily to pink. At the last second the demon breaks off its attack and deftly avoids mine, which explodes against the ceiling instead.
“Did he say you would get the denizens of the Crystal Empire?” I ask, firing another beam. “Did he promise you Equestria itself?” It twists around my attack with consummate ease. “Unlimited frozen ponies to feed off of forever?” I snort scornfully, looking up at the giant windigo. It’s backing off rather that attacking, and appears to be staring down at me. I don’t know whether or not that’s a good sign, but I decide to press it.
“Do you really think you’ll get anything, in the end?” I ask it. “Look around you. Sombra already betrayed the changeling queen to her death, despite whatever rewards he promised her. Do you really think he wishes to rule over a kingdom of ice and snow for all eternity?” I gesture around. “When I came in here there were many of your kind. Now it’s just you. He sacrificed all of your fellows without hesitation. He double-crossed the changelings when they were of no more use to him. What makes you think you’ll be immune?”
Now I can make out what appears to be a slight widening of the demon’s eyes. It’s not even backing away from me anymore, just looking down. It even cocks its head a bit.
“Think about it!” I urge. “When Sombra is done here, when he’s disposed of all of us, what use will he have for you? With the sun, he’ll have an unbeatable weapon of conquest. And, might I add, a perfect way to destroy you all with little fuss. You saw how casually he threw that fire around earlier, when he was using it on us. Just imagine how quickly he could use it to turn on you. And he’ll have every reason to do it. Face it,” I stare the ice demon down. “If he wins here, you lose. Permanently.”
“Don’t listen to this fool!” another voice barks out.
Both our heads turn just in time to see Sombra hopping back through the hole in the wall, a towering pillar of black crystal visible beneath him. The windigo makes no move to return to his side.
“I promised you rewards beyond your wildest dreams, and have I not delivered?”
Wow, Sombra’s actually worried about this. I just thought I might gain a tactical advantage from introducing uncertainty. But if I can genuinely flip this thing…
“The Crystal Empire is ours! Equestria lies ripe for the plucking! Nothing in all the world will be able to stop us once we dispose of these worthless alicorns!”
“Us?” I ask. “Or you?”
Sombra bares his teeth. “Do you think this prince has your best interests at heart? He only seeks to drive a rift between us so that he can rescue his precious wife! He will kill you if we do not eliminate him first!”
“The way I see it, we’ve pardoned worse spirits than you,” I answer, thinking of a certain chaotic demigod. “Join us and I personally guarantee your safety when this is all over. He’s the one who’s been getting all his allies killed. We don’t do that sort of thing.”
“You’d be surprised, naïve little Shining,” he snorts. “And I would never betray you! We’re in this together!”
“I’m sure that’s just what the changeling queen thought.”
The enormous windigo looks back and forth between the two of us, its expression unreadable. For just a moment both Sombra and I are perfectly still, not wanting to tip the balance in any way. Finally, the demon turns itself fully back towards the king… and breathes a wide cone of cold right at him.
YES!
The startled king barely has time to throw up a barrier of his own to block the attack. The ground around him ices over rapidly, and he even stumbles a little. When the flow of ice magic ceases a moment later, his face is rictus of utter loathing.
“Traitor…” he hisses, sharp teeth bared.
“Says the double-crossing usurper,” I retort, pawing at the ground.
The windigo screeches something in its own language, hovering backwards towards me. I can’t believe I just talked an evil ice demon into switching sides! I suppose I might have picked up more from Twily than I thought.
I take the offensive immediately with a silvery-white lance of light magic. One of Sombra’s hooves begins glow dark purple, and to my surprise he out and out bats the blast aside, where it destroys yet another of the throne room’s pillars. And at that, a portion of the ceiling comes crashing down in an enormous wave of rubble that buries almost half the room. Cadence, thankfully, is far away from that.
All three of us hesitate for a heartbeat. Nobody wants the Imperial Palace to come crashing down. There are still ponies inside, my wife included. Sombra no doubt wants to live in it again. And my new ally for the entirely pragmatic reason of being inside it at the moment.
I use the brief pause to make a flying leap for the hole behind the throne’s dais. It’s a little difficult to stand on, but I make it work.
“Outside,” I growl.
Sombra bares his teeth, but gives the faintest of nods.
Black crystal bursts from underneath the king’s hooves, propelling him upwards at a surprising speed. Before I even have a chance to blink he’s virtually on top of me. He tackles me full on, and we both fall backwards out of the hole. As we go, our hooves intertwine, wrestling one another for some advantage, to force the other onto the bottom. He’s stronger than he looks, and he looked pretty strong to begin with. And then Sombra opens his fanged mouth and bites into the side of my neck. I punch him in the face.
We both hit the ground at roughly the same instant. I impact on my side, Sombra on his back. I can feel both of my left snapping like twigs, along with a few of my ribs. The king looks shaken, but his armor is shining and he’s pushing himself back onto his hooves. It’s a little unsteady, but he’s much better off than me.
Oh hell.
Sombra towers over me, snarling, as dark energy gathers about his horn. But he turns on a dime a rips another wall of crystal from the earth. The reason become evident about half a second later, when said wall freezes and then shatters. The giant windigo engages him while I lie there, blood leaking out of my side and neck. It’s as nimble as it ever was, and Sombra isn’t having any easier time hitting it than I did.
I force myself back onto my hooves even while my bones are knitting, painful at first but rapidly becoming less so. Within five seconds I’ve managed to get off the ground, within ten all the bleeding has ceased and my legs are almost completely restored. Wow, no wonder alicorns are so hard to kill.
“ENOUGH!” screams Sombra in a very plausible Royal Canterlot Voice. “ENOUGH OF THIS!”
The king rears up, yet another pillar of black crystal jutting out to carry him skywards. His eyes are alight with magic, pupil and iris alike disappearing into a brilliant white-gold flare. High above us, the grey storm clouds also begin to glow. No, wait… they’re not glowing, something is shining through them. The enormous windigo is looking upwards in naked alarm.
And then, with an ear-splitting boom, the storm clouds out and out catch fire! No, I’m not making that up. No, it doesn’t make any sense to me either. But a tidal wave of flame explodes from the glowing clouds, rapidly washing over the remainder of them and somehow consuming them like they were made of alcohol-soaked paper. Orange-gold fire rains down on the Crystal Empire, forcing me to encase myself and my ally in a protective dome. Wherever the fire touches the ice it sizzles and melts into steam almost instantly. The air itself goes from frigid to blistering around us.
When I look up in the sky I can see Celestia’s sun overhead, larger and closer than I’ve ever witnessed in all my years. The waves of heat coming off of it blast the last of the storm away, begin to melt the ice. I can see smoke starting to rise from beyond the city’s edge, where the grasslands are.
“DIE!” Sombra screams.
A pillar of fire a dozen ponies wide plunges from on high at unbelievable speed. It’s too fast to outrun, but we’re outside of the warded palace now. I teleport the both of us a good distance, only to feel the ground shake as the fire bores a great hole into the earth.
“DIE! DIE! DIE! DIE!” I can hear him roar.
The sun flares and more fire plummets down. At first there are more streams and pillars of it, but then Sombra starts to get creative. What look for all the world to be flaming meteor strikes begin to follow us. Globs of sun fire track us wherever we run, blasting holes through streets and gardens, parks and marketplaces. My heart skips a beat as one incinerates a house – with frozen ponies still visibly inside.
My next teleport brings us right into Sombra’s face. As one, the windigo and I unleash bursts of magic directly at him from point-blank range. One of the pillars of fire descends atop him before our attacks can strike, washing them away in a tsunami of flame. When it clears, both the king and the pillar he stands atop are perfectly unharmed.
Sombra opens his mouth and breathes more of his golden flame. I teleport again before it can strike, but this one doesn’t follow. Instead it whips around, thinning itself out before gradually forming into the image of a giant serpent. The construct rears up and hisses at us, displaying long, fiery fangs. Why he felt those were necessary, I have no idea.
The king smiles, horn glowing. The pace of the great balls of fire picks up. Even as we have to dodge around them, he breathes more of the fire. Now instead of one serpent there are three. Just as we emerge from yet another teleport, they lunge. The windigo and I leap in opposite directions. One of the vast golden snakes gets between us as it towers over me, rearing up to strike.
I conjure still another shield as the fanged maw envelopes me. The snake bites repeatedly, attempting to find some purchase for its fangs on the smooth pink dome. Its coils wrap tighter and tighter around me, cooking the air to scalding levels even inside my protective spell. But now it’s right where I want it.
I gather my energy and force the shield outwards into a pulse. The snake is just fire bound by magic – subject it to enough stress, and all the shape dissolves. Before the sun’s flames can fade away I seize them and fling the whole stream right back at the king. Sombra does absolutely nothing as the flames wash over him like a purifying tide. Only… when they’re gone, he’s still standing there. He looks down at me, smirking.
And then my world dissolves into a wild yellow blur of heat and pain. One of the falling fireballs caught me dead-on while I was distracted. My skin blisters, my coat catches fire, and the fire even gets directly into my eyes. I’m not ashamed to admit to screaming a bit. Ok, a lot.
As I roll along the ground, screaming and pawing at my own face, I get treated to the sensation of multiple razor-sharp objects piercing my hide, unleashing a horrible burning pain that wracks my entire body. On total instinct I throw up another barrier. Coming to a stop, I lie blinded and shivering on the ground as my body struggles to repair itself.
Thankfully my eyesight recovers first, allowing me to rip out the small black crystals embedded in my side. Blood flows liberally, but I’d rather not have black magic plugging the wounds. I get to wince as another fireball explodes atop my shield, but for the moment the barrier holds firm.
Then my ears get treated to a piercing, agonizing shriek loud enough to shake the earth, shattering half-melted ice and glass alike. The sound is coming from the enormous windigo, caught in the flaming jaws of one of the serpents. It looks as though it disposed of one only to get grabbed from behind by the third. At any rate the ice spirit is writhing and screaming as the fiery serpent shakes it back and forth. Somehow the windigo is catching fire, steaming pouring from it. The snake rears back and whips its head around, flinging the spirit like a toy. It crashes into the side of a home and lies there, smoking.
Sombra laughs deeply, another pillar of solar fire whipping around him, He twirls it like a toy for half a second, then directs the lethal stream directly at my downed ally. I close my eyes and concentrate, summoning whatever energy I have left. I appear directly in front of the windigo, just in time to raise a shimmering pink barrier.
The fire crashes down atop my shield like a hundred thousand tons of brick. The golden light envelopes everything, catastrophic and blinding. I have to close my eyes against it. The flames rush on and on. I drop to my knees. The air grows hotter and hotter, becoming scalding enough to burn the insides of my lungs when I take a breath. So I just hold my breath and pray we survive this.
It takes what feels like hours, but eventually the solar fire does let up. Around us somepony’s yard has been reduced to a charred, glassy crater almost ten feet deep. The smoke is thick enough to bar all sight, until a powerful wind comes out of nowhere to sweep it away.
“You defended that worthless creature?” Sombra looks down from his pillar. “After it froze your dear wife? Why?”
“What… can I say?” I manage, taking a big gulp of air. “I’m a stallion of my word. Unlike you.”
“That thing is useless now. You might have attacked me from behind while I was distracted, fool!” he shakes his head. “Typical for your kind.”
I give a glance backwards. My winter spirit ally does look… well, crippled. The windigo is laying sprawled out on the ground. It has twin gaping holes in its semi-ethereal form, and small puffs of steam and smoke are still rising from across its body. Its icy blue eyes are almost gone. It’s looking up at me, with an expression I don’t recognize.
Whatever might have happened next is lost, because the remaining serpent chooses that moment to lunge forward at us, fangs bared. I brace my legs, spread my wings wide, and launch myself horn-first at it. At the very last second I enclose myself in the smallest possible shield, and punch directly through it. I keep going, bursting out from the dissolving beast to smash right into the pillar that Sombra is standing atop. I come to a sudden, rather unpleasant halt, but the inky black crystal cracks… and then topples over, king and all.
I’m on him before he has a chance to recover. I tackle the king myself, and we roll, wrestling one another once again. I get the upper hoof this time, rolling over on top of him. He bites the side of my right wing. I jam my horn into his face – he just barely manages to get his eyeball out of the way. It cuts along his forehead instead.
Abruptely, the unicorn’s body dissolves out from underneath me, becoming that hateful black smoke. He reappears a good few yards away, blood running down the side of his face. For just a moment the two of us stare at one another, panting audibly as we both bleed. The difference is that my wounded wing seals itself up within a second or two, while his forehead continues to slowly ooze crimson.
“Alright…” Sombra says, breathing heavily. “That does it. I’m ending this farce. You will surrender to me, right now.”
“Uh, no.”
Has he gone insane or something? Did I hit him hard enough to rattle his brain? Why in the infinite hells would I surrender?
“You will surrender to me,” he repeats. “Or else I shall steer the next wave of solar fire directly into the palace throne room.”
My eyes go wide.
“You may be fast enough to avoid most of them,” he says. “But as for dear Princess Cadence… I am afraid that she is rather indisposed, is she not? She could only watch helplessly as she’s liquefied by the sun, and then buried beneath a thousand tons of ruined palace. And you know as well as I that you cannot teleport into that room. Not while my wards are in effect. Of course, you could always sacrifice her for a chance to stop me…” Sombra looks up meaningfully, grinning mockingly.
“You monster…” I hiss. “She’s helpless!”
“Somepony calls me a monster. Oh shock and alarm,” he rolls his eyes. “Perhaps next you’ll swear that I’ll never succeed? Tell me that the power of friendship and love and happy unicorn rainbow sparkles will save the day?”
I bare my teeth.
“No?” he smirks. “So, prince charming, what’s it to be? Will you lay down right now and surrender, or will you watch as I incinerate your dearly beloved? Hmm?”
“I…” my voice catches in my throat.
“Last chance, dear Shiny,” Sombra says, horn lighting up. “On your knees or she dies. Three… Two…”
“Stop!” I call out, hoof extended. “I… I… I…”
“You what?” he demands. “Say it.”
My legs tremble, and then fall out from under me.
“I… surrender.”
“Ha!” Sombra throws his head back. “Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Aha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha HA HA HA!”
I can’t really do anything but sit there and watch the king laugh. Tears roll down my cheeks. Everypony in the Crystal Empire… I’m sorry. I failed you. I just can’t beat him. And I can’t lose her… I’m sorry. I can only pray somepony better than me will be able to do what I couldn’t. I’m so sorry.
“You are weak,” Sombra mocks as he saunters rather easily up to me. Black chains spring from nowhere to wrap tightly around my horn. “You put on a good show, little fool, but in the end you could not rise above pathetic nature of your kind. Had you any strength worth mentioning you could have sacrificed a piece that was no longer useful for a chance at victory. Thanks to your infantile attachments, you have lost everything. But then, mewling weakness is in your blood. You are as weak now as your sister was the day Tirek returned. Fickle chance saved her then. You will not be so fortunate now.”
I can’t even bring myself to look up at the king, even as I see his hooves right at my face.
“But I’ve wasted enough time talking. It’s time for you to d-”
Sombra’s voice is cut off by a sudden, rapid drop in temperature, enough to send shiver down my spine and freeze the tears on my cheeks…
Wait, what?
I look up from my own self-pity party and what do I see? An all-too-familiar cone of icy-cold magic enveloping the both of us. Only, Sombra’s standing between me and the source, so he’s getting the full brunt of the localized blizzard. When the blue-white magic fades away just a moment, he’s the one encased in ice.
I get a glance behind the king. Floating there just a foot or so off the ground, looking pained but determined, is the giant windigo. It has one hoof over the gaping hole in its essence, and a faint mist trailing from its mouth.
A faint crunching noise yanks my attention back to Sombra. I can see his eyes rolling frantically about inside the ice, feel the pressure he’s exerting against it. Small cracks are already starting to form as he desperately struggles to get free. This won’t hold him for long.
But it’ll hold him long enough.
Bereft of any magic and lacking the time to pry chains off of my horn, I opt to use what weapons are available to me.
My horn impales King Sombra right through the chest.
It bursts right out through the king’s back, messy with blood. Sombra manages to make the vaguest of grunts heard through the ice. He’s still locked in position, but his eyes do manage to widen, staring down at me as his life’s blood drips from his chest. I can feel his pucntured heart beating slower… and slower… and slower… and slower…
And gone.
The chains begin to weaken, falling from my horn as their master’s strength dies away. I don’t remove it. This time, I want to be sure. Strength of the Crystal Heart, don’t fail me now. I gather all the mystic energy I can find, every last drop from all across my body, and send it right up my horn. With closed eyes and gritted teeth, I concentrate and summon the biggest, baldest shield of light magic I can manage.
From inside Sombra’s body.
Somehow, impossibly, I swear that I can hear the sound of one last scream of denial, one last curse of hate, as my spell consumed King Sombra from the inside out. It doesn’t last but a second as the flash of white bursts out and consumes us both. When my eyes can see again, Sombra is just… gone. As though he had never been at all.
The effort of it all catches up to me in that exact moment. I stumble and fall back to my knees, gasping desperately for breath. As the adrenaline rush fades away, I realize for the first time just how much I’ve been expending. Just about all of it, really. I’m out. The windigo could easily take me out, right now. I’m too weak to stop it.
But instead, the ice spirit just… stares at me. Its blue eyes meet my own, as the both of us clutch wounds and struggle to recover. It hisses something in its own incomprehensible tongue.
“I… don’t…” I manage, between my gasps. “Understand…”
So the windigo just looks at me again, cocks its head, and… nods once in utter silence.
I take just a moment, and then return the gesture.
“I…thank you…” I tell it, hesitantly. “I need to go… to go look for my wife.”
The spirit nods again.
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That was beautiful. I was afraid you would have to use some Deus ex Machina to get Shiny out of that situation. Instead you used to good magic of friendship as befitting the show. (of course, the fact that Sombra is an untrustworthy dill-hole didn't hurt either.)
Awesome. Great chapter. I enjoyed it.
Woe, this as a great battle. I was honestly expecting Shining Armor to die in the wake of the battle , I definitely didn't expect him to be the one to end it. Definitely Snake Staff you know how to make a riveting story that always keep me on the edge of my seat, I can never truly know what to expect how your stories will unfold. Still I wander if there going to be a stand off between Shining Armor, Cadance against Celestia and Luna. After all Celestia has come with her army on route, I would expect her some payment for coming to the aide of the Crystal Empire, and I would also imagine that she would have questions for them about how Sombra managed to unfold his plan so well right in the middle Of the capital of the Empire.
I suppose that she might use this as an excuse to legitimize of her taking Cadance's foal away from her. I wander how things are going to unfold fro here on now know.
Dammit, I have a paper due in 30 minutes. Oh well.
Friendship is magic. Indeed.
A brilliantly effective end to Sombra's plans.
Hah. Fickle chance isn't quite so fickle though, isn't it?
... In fact, most likely if Shining hadn't proven his sentimentality, the windigo wouldn't have felt it was worth it to save Shining. Betrayal is a big deal, and refusing to betray your ideals even in the face of death and defeat is a very compelling argument. It is probably literally that sentimentality that led to Sombra's downfall.
Every character sounds like they're the same. Similar psuedo-noir narration, similar disinterested disdain, similar dialogue, even.