Fís
“Look,” Cobblestone said, “I get why you’re freaking out, but this is not the best time.”
“Not the best time?” Vino bellowed, his face steadily pinkening. “You’ve shoved another soul in Serale’s body!”
“Who’s Serale?” the blonde unicorn on the floor asked curiously. “And why can’t I move anything?”
Cobblestone took a steady breath. “For the third time,” she said to her other friend, the one not currently doing their best to resemble a raspberry, “I don’t know why you can’t really move. I think it’s because I just kind of kick-started your soul. Not everything is working right now. At least you can lift your head, right?”
Serale, or at least the pony currently inside of her, nodded weakly.
Rota, to her credit, was keeping a cool head. Though she had blanched upon hearing the name “Sweetie Belle”, she had only bent low, examined her patient’s extremities, and was currently working a warm herbal paste into her coat.
“I think something may be wrong with her memory,” the Gryphon said. “Granted, the Sweetie Belle I briefly knew didn’t strike me as bright.” She straightened. “The span of an hour should bring all right again, and her blood will froth once more. She’ll be fine.”
“I want answers,” Vino seethed. “Now, Cobblestone. What did you do?”
Cobblestone felt a headache building. It wasn’t helping matters that she was still using her magic to see, plus her broken and definitely overworked horn. “I’m trying to give them to you,” she said, “But ever since you got here it’s been ‘Oh, this is black magic’ and ‘You might have killed her for all we know’, but you haven’t exactly given me much chance to explain, now have you?”
“Who is he?” Serale asked. No, not Serale. Sweetie Belle.
“For the fifth time, Sweetie Belle, this is Vino Hedera of House Hedera. He’s a knight who is supposed to be protecting...well, not you, exactly, but the body you’re in. Now, I know you have a lot of questions, I do too, but would you kindly shut up for one bloody minute?”
This was directed at everyone in the tent, including Rota, who had been muttering something about irresponsible use of magic and running before walking. There was a hurt silence in the tent broken only by the sigh of wind outside. Cobblestone felt her headache lessen immediately.
“Thank you,” she said. “I’d cheerfully slit a throat for some Dragon’s Kiss right now, but that’s not going to happen, so I’d appreciate it if you all would give me a chance to figure out what, exactly, is happening.”
She turned to Vino. “Serale wasn’t waking up. I looked at her, Vino, at her soul. It was burning very dimly.” She held up a hoof, realizing that she was starting to sound like Libra. “Yes, I can see souls. This probably should have come up before now. I can do other things with them. It’s how I survived the prison attack.”
“I tried to give Serale’s soul a little nudge, to see what would happen. I think what happened might have had something to do with the fact that the mountain we’re camped by is apparently chock bucking full of souls. She definitely woke up, but...she also didn’t?”
The fact that she knew damn well that Serale was interacting with some entity calling herself “Belle” wasn’t something that needed to be brought up, at least not now. And she needed to make absolutely sure that whatever happened, she got answers. She needed to know what had happened to Serale, of course, but the odds were very good that Sweetie Belle might have information on whatever thing was showing up in Serale’s dreams.
“I think Serale is still in there,” Cobblestone said, gesturing to the other unicorn’s head in a vague motion. “Just...not piloting the airship, if you get my meaning.”
“Then put her back in the pilot’s chair!”
Cobblestone snorted exasperatedly. “I don’t know if I can,” she replied. “I was barely able to get her up and moving as it is. She was unconscious, Vino, hardly able to get food and water. At least with Sweetie Belle in charge she can eat.”
“For the record,” Sweetie Belle replied, her voice low, “I do feel very hungry. Do you have anything to eat?”
“We’ve got caribou and fungus,” Cobblestone replied without looking at her, still standing firm against Vino. “Eat it and like it.”
“But-”
“Eat it,” Cobblestone said through gritted teeth, her headache back with a vengeance, “And like it. Or don’t eat it. Or eat it and don’t like it. Right now I’m finding it hard to give a damn. I’ll get to you in a minute.”
Vino scraped at the ground, clearly agitated. His ears lay back, and Cobblestone was unpleasantly reminded of how similar he looked to when he had been ready to fight Brightsteel, what seemed like a lifetime ago. She felt her headache coming back.
“Look,” she said. “I don’t know how to put Serale back in charge of her own head, because it never occurred to me that something else could either be in there or show up and take over. So until I get some answers from Sweetie Belle, after she eats her damned food, we’re stuck like this.”
“This would not have happened if you had restrained yourself in the first place,” Rota said moodily. “I was gone for less than a minute.”
“And there would be your mistake,” Vino replied, his voice tense. “I can’t blame you, seeing as she’s been unconscious during the worst week of my life, but you should know Cobblestone has a track record of reaching for magic she doesn’t understand how to use yet.”
The remark stung more than it should have. Cobblestone hadn’t considered that Vino might blame her and possibly Serale for sending them up here in the first place. She felt hot anger welling up inside of her. The headache began to unfurl lazily from her temples and base of her skull, curling down her spine, across her forehead, and into her teeth.
“Magic that saved your hide,” she said, attempting to ignore the way the brazier’s light was causing her vision to white out in some places. “Or did you forget that?”
Vino’s face was stone. “And I returned the favor after you blew off your horn and were beaten to an inch of your life,” he said, “Or did you forget that?” He didn’t give her a chance to retort. “As far as I’m concerned,” he said coldly, “We’re even. More than square, since I’ve also been the one out getting the snot kicked out of me getting food for the two of you.”
Cobblestone flinched at that again. He had a point. For a week, she’d been out of commission, and while she was certain that the thane wouldn’t let her or Serale starve while he thought they were worth something, there was no reason Vino would have been excused from making his own contributions. And despite those, he was still probably little better than a thrall in the eyes of the tribe.
And she hated being useless. It was a death sentence as a thief, and she’d made a point to always be doing something, working on something. It had been part of the reason she reached for things she couldn’t grasp, did things she shouldn’t do. It was a part of her as deep and rooted as the sinews of an oak. And it had also been the reason she had accidentally sent them all to this desolate wasteland, and the reason a strange consciousness was currently inhabiting one of her best and only friends.
Something deep inside of her clicked, and she knew with a terrible cold clarity exactly what it was she would have to do, knowledge that had been building behind her headache breaking into her head like water from behind a dam.
“You know what?” she said, unable to keep some small amount of venom from her voice, “Fine. You want me to be useful? Sit down, shut up, let me work.”
She turned to Serale, whom she had already started to think of as Sweetie Belle. “Change of plans,” she said. “You give me answers now. You eat later.”
Sweetie Belle, to her credit, did nothing but nod.
“First question,” Cobblestone said. “Who are you?”
“My name is Sweetie Belle,” the unicorn replied, brushing a strand of blonde out of her face, an entirely unfamiliar gesture compared to the poise Serale normally exhibited. “I was born in Ponyville, a small town on the edge of the Everfree Forest. I had two parents, named Hondo and Cookie, and a sister, named Rarity. She was a designer, and also the Element of Generosity.”
Cobblestone arched an eyebrow. “Your sister was one of the Elements of Harmony?”
“One of them, yes,” Sweetie Belle said quietly. “But she was a designer first. She had a really good eye for gemstones.” She frowned. “For some reason, you remind me of her,” she said, perplexed. “You look nothing like her, and you don’t act like her, but I could see you two being almost like twins. It’s strange.”
“You know that happened nearly four hundred years ago, right?” Cobblestone asked.
Sweetie Belle arched an eyebrow. “No, I’d just thought I had dozed off for a really long time,” she said, her words colored by sarcasm. “I remember the war. Probably better than anypony alive right now, except for the Princesses and Twilight Sparkle herself.”
She settled back into her covers. “I grew up with two great friends, went to school, watched one of my role models destroy half the town and flee into the Forest, went to college, became a journalist.” She took a deep breath. “I watched Equestria rip itself apart, then I fell in with Twilight’s rebellion. I met one of my old friends, and freed Princess Luna from her cell beneath Canterlot Castle, where she had been held. Then, after she tried to kill us, I met up with my other friend, who tried to kill us and succeeded in killing the stallion I loved.”
Cobblestone blinked. It was like hearing one of Libra’s lectures on the history of the Kingdom, but seen from a completely different angle. Like watching a thunderstorm from above.
“After that, things went pretty south, pretty quickly. Celestia marched an army into the Everfree, I joined a small group of fighters to hold them off. I watched one of my friends kill the other, and then killed her. I almost died. Then, when Celestia’s army finally reached the Regia, I did die. So did the child I was carrying.”
There was silence in the little tent, aside from the shriek of the wind outside. Cobblestone noticed that while Sweetie Belle’s face was calm and composed, there was a definite pain behind her eyes, a pain that spoke of profound betrayal and horrific loss. If not for the fact that she had died soon after, Cobblestone felt sure that that pain would have killed Sweetie Belle eventually.
“So why are you in Lady Serale?” Vino asked.
Sweetie Belle shrugged. “I was called,” she said. “Your friend..” she trailed off. “What is your name?” she asked. “I know you told me, but…”
“You can call me Cob,” Cobblestone replied.
“Cob, then. Your friend woke me up, and I came out. Though I’m not sure what you think I was before I woke up. I’ve certainly never seen you before.”
“Do you mean that I summoned you?” Cobblestone asked. “Are you a spirit that got pulled into Serale?”
Sweetie Belle considered that. “In a way,” she said slowly. “I am Serale. Or Serale is me? Or...how can I put this? Serale is...is green. And I’m blue, or yellow. I am one part of the whole.”
“Are you saying that you’re a part of Serale?” Cobblestone asked. “Like a separate personality?”
Sweetie Belle shook her head. “Is your mother a part of you?” she asked. “A part of your personality? I’m more like a parent, or a relative. Or did you not know how Serale was born?”
“Do you?” Cobblestone retorted.
Sweetie Belle shook her head. “But I can guess. Twilight Sparkle is her mother, but she was a scientist long before that. And she would have wanted to learn everything she could have about soulbinds. The best way for that to happen would have been experimentation.”
Cobblestone frowned. “And what’s a soulbind?”
Sweetie Belle opened her mouth, but nothing came out. She frowned, then tried again. “Odd,” she said. “I know the term, and I know that I know the information. But it’s hard to recall it. I can’t remember.”
“I might be able to fix that,” Cobblestone said. She tried to peer into Serale’s soul again, but a lance of white-hot pain from her horn put and end to that right away. Her vision went with it, too, leaving her blind for the span of ten or so seconds, before she could muster the focus to regain her magical sight.
“Okay,” she said weakly, feeling a wave of nausea flowing over her, “Maybe not. At least, not right now. Uggh.” She staggered and nearly tipped over, but caught herself just before slamming into the brazier she knew was directly to her right.
Sweetie Belle looked at her with concern. “Are you alright?” she asked. “You look sick.” She peered at Cobblestone, her head tilted quizzically. Her ears twitched in surprise. “You’re blind!”
“And you’re incredibly rude,” Cobblestone replied. “While we’re stating the obvious, Vino’s got a hangup on the pony whose body you’re in, Rota over there is both a Gryphon and older than dirt, and it’s bloody cold outside.”
“I beg your pardon?” Vino asked, sounding flummoxed. “I’ve got a what?”
“You’ve got a great flank,” Cobblestone said without missing a beat. “Shut up, I’m working.”
She turned to Rota. “You obviously know a little alchemy,” she said to the aged Gryphon. “Can you whip up Dragon’s Kiss? I have an idea.”
Rota sniffed. “I’ve been gathering herbs on the side of this mountain for three centuries. Dragon’s Kiss is no problem.”
Cobblestone nodded to herself, and then picked up another bowl of caribou and fungus, and began to wolf it down as quickly as possible. She looked at Vino and Sweetie Belle, both of whom were faintly green. “Look,” she said through a full mouth, “I’m about to get smoked out of my mind, and that’s something you don’t do when you’re hungry.”
Vino frowned more deeply, which Cobblestone had not supposed was possible. “Why are you trying to use narcotics at a time like this?”
“She is using the herbs for Dragon’s Kiss in an older style,” Rota replied, rummaging through her bags and withdrawing a few bundles of dried grasses and flowers. “They are much more potent when they have not been brewed into a tea, but they are much less predictable. Other shamans and priests will use them to bring warriors into their prime. I gathered much over this week, in preparation for the hunt this morning. Several young bulls and cows will come into their own tonight.”
“But why are you getting smoked out of your mind?” Vino asked.
Cobblestone finished the bowl and set it to the side, loosening the collar of the cloak that she had draped around herself to keep warm. “I’m not doing it alone,” she said. She looked at the other unicorn, settled into a position of repose. “I was able to get into Serale’s head twice before, once with this stupid cracked horn. I can do it again, but I’ll need the Kiss.”
Vino scraped at the ground nervously. “And you know this will work?” he asked. “You sound very confident.”
Cobblestone grinned, the expression less comforting and more unhinged than she realized. Had she a mirror, she would have remarked on how much she resembled the pony she called “Dis” in that moment. “I know this will work like I know that the snow will kill me if I leave this tent,” she said. “I know this will work like I know that blood flows in my veins and the sun sets in the west. It will work. I will make it work.”
Vino and Rota both took a step back. Sweetie Belle, still unable to move much, could only flinch. Rota grabbed her staff, resting her weight upon it, looking old as ever. “This is foolish,” she said. “All you will do is injure yourself further, and I will not help you heal from such an idiotic undertaking.”
Cobblestone gave her a flat look. “I need to find out what’s going on in Serale’s head, so I can help her heal,” she said, “And for that, I’ll need Dragon’s Kiss, because while I’m sure this mountain is lovely in the springtime, we’ve got things to do back where it doesn’t snow every damn day. So give me some drugs.”
Rota stared at her intensely, and Cobblestone was made aware of the fact that while the Gryphon before her was aged and much slower than she had been centuries before, she would have little problem in dispatching a unicorn with a shattered horn and an attitude. Even Vino, she suspected, would not be too much of a challenge for her. Her eyes flicked to the dragon skull topping the staff, and Cobblestone wondered if she had simply found the skull, or if it had been taken.
Rota took another small bundle of herbs from beside the tentflap, and tossed it towards Cobblestone. “This should be sufficient,” she said, indicating the small pile of dried plant life on the floor, visible as a scratchy blur to Cobblestone’s world of blue light and deep shadow. “You will likely be done by the time I return, at moonrise. Should you finish much earlier, simply strike the bell outside the tent. I will hear it, and come to you.”
Cobblestone said nothing, but bowed her head in assent. “Thank you,” she said sincerely. “For everything. For getting me healthy again, for claiming Serale and I before the thane. That was you, wasn’t it? I didn’t dream that?”
Rota nodded sharply. “I did,” she said. “Not for you. For the gods, who demanded it. For the thane, who would have been brought to wound-weeping for the keeping of you. For them, not for you.”
Cobblestone turned to Vino. “I’d offer to let you stay,” she said, “But getting smoked is easier when it’s just one or two ponies. And no offence, but you’re kind of big, and I don’t want you stealing my high.”
Vino couldn’t help but let out a chuckle at that. Cobblestone could feel a half-grin spread across his face, but it died when he looked at Sweetie Belle. “Bring her back safe,” he said, “But not if...whatever this is will hurt you. We’ll figure something out if this doesn’t work, just don’t overreach, okay?”
Cobblestone scoffed. “Since when have I ever been anything but responsible with magic?” she asked.
“I seem to remember something about snowballs,” Vino replied. “And dropping more snow on some guards. And…”
“Nobody likes a sarcastic knight,” Cobblestone said. She reached out, almost by memory and the sensation of his closeness, and chucked him gently on the shoulder. “I’ll be fine. And I’ll bring her back, too. Now go.”
There was nothing left to say. The tent was empty, except for Sweetie Belle and Cobblestone. Cobblestone turned to look at the other unicorn. “I’m assuming you’re alright with this?” she asked. “I don’t know if this would be like killing you.”
Sweetie Belle shook her head. “It’d be like putting a puzzle piece back into the frame,” she said. “Sure, I lose my individual edges, but this is not what I’m supposed to be.” She inhaled deeply. “So what next?”
Cobblestone wasted no time. She rearranged some of the furs so she could lay nearer to the brazier, and without ceremony, dumped all of the herbs into the fire at once, sending a cloud of smoke through the air, smoke that smelled bitter and earthy and a little spicy. With the tent flap closed and tied shut, the air in the enclosed space became almost sweltering, relieved only by a small opening at the top of the ceiling.
“Now we wait,” Cobblestone said, already feeling the world go fuzzy around the edges. Gods, she had missed this feeling. It was like stepping back into a cloak that was already well broken in. Her teeth buzzed, her mind cleared and expanded, she felt like she was floating. She lay down on the furs, luxuriating in the feel of them, soft against her.
Sweetie Belle’s head bobbed weakly. “Strong stuff,” she said with a cough.
Cobblestone grinned, wide and curling. Already, her headache was diminishing, but the ideas, the plans, they remained as clear as ever. Clearer, even. She reached for her horn, noting that it no longer hurt, only tingled a little. She tried to make eye contact with Sweetie Belle, though it wasn’t strictly necessary.
“I’m going to try and take a look at you with my soulsight,” she said, feeling just as calm as she sounded. “Try to focus on whatever a soulbind is. This might feel strange, are you ready?”
Sweetie Belle nodded. “I’m ready. Good luck.”
Cobblestone drew down her mental defenses, which had been steadily crumbling as it was, and forced as much of herself into her horn as possible. The world beyond the tent became visible, the massive monolith of roiling colored flame that was the Horn of the World looming over her like a judge, and she turned to the spring-green blaze that was her friend, and poured herself into it.
The first thing was the breaking of chains and the clatter of stone, of a damp vault and a massive crystal, a diamond twice her size. There was pain, and the smell of ozone and clay. There was the impression of cold, of lips that did not know how to speak, of legs that did not know how to move. She was like a child, only just born, but knowing she was meant for something greater. A purple face swam into view through just-opened eyes, and the world went black again.
Cobblestone felt herself jerk, and then something new.
The hiss of cooling metal, a screech of protesting ore. A pile of dragon scales and a smelter burning with a pure flame, blue-white. Mostly white. The oil that the sword had been thrust into hissed, and the blade came forth, still bare and unadorned, missing hilt and pommel and those things which would make it whole. It was the black of the space between stars.
A bright moon, the scent of the new-gathered harvest. A tower in the distance and the sound of nearby chanting. The feel of rune-studded robes, the robes of a Magus. A sense of power and righteousness. A sense of a new beginning.
Time had passed, years at least. A castle carved from a mountain, an order founded and a country in the process of being built. An order, acceptance. A farewell to a place that was as familiar as anywhere else in the world.
She jerked again, but Cobblestone kept at it, feeling for the strands of thought that might let her bring it all together.
White towers, a city hanging impossibly from the side of a snow-capped mountain. A grand palace with floors of burnished bronze, polished enough to reflect frescos of heroic deeds long since passed. A fountain square, a statue, three ponies of three races, one of whom was familiar. A secret sealed away in crystal, just as everything had been before.
A new place, a northern place. A crumbling manor, newly rebuilt but still ancient. A small town, hardly more than a mining settlement, but it would one day be rich and beautiful beyond compare. Another statue, three ponies back to back. One held a star in her hooves, and they all guarded another story beneath their hooves.
Cobblestone felt a nagging sense of familiarity, but couldn’t place it. The images came fast now, much too quickly to allow a distraction.
A final statue, long since lost to time, but found once again. The crumbling ruins of a shattered city, gazing out across windswept plains. The ghosts of ancient legions, the dead laughter of a mad and departed god. Another secret. One task, one belonging only to her, done.
One task remaining.
A long search, a hard slog. Permission had been given, a task needed to be completed. This was the way of things. There was a flowering, a ripening, a harvest, a barren time. A flowering again. She wandered leagues in days, searching, preparing nightly for her task. Her destination changed often, but she was patient, she had time.
Finally, in the end of a ripening, it happened. There was a small house, a lake and some lima beans growing. There was a knock at the door, a pause, and then the sound of hooves.
Cobblestone felt flutterings of anticipation and fear that were not entirely her own.
The door opened, a face peered out, blue fur and lined features behind a prismatic mane, faded to pastels and greys. Magenta eyes, aged before their time, the mark of battles long since passed. They narrowed, then widened in surprise.
No. Not you, you died. We mourned you. We-
There is a flash, the pegasus falls back. She enters the cottage, closes the door behind her. She draws a sword, black as night. There is little room to swing it, but there is enough. The pegasus backs up, backs up again. She wears an expression of horror, of confusion. And then, she hits the wall of the cottage.
Do what you have to. It’s time I paid the piper. See you soon, kiddo.
She swings, there’s resistance, and then she has passed it. There is a spray of something warm on her face, soaking into her robes, invisible against the black. There is a beat, and she stares at the sword, not wanting to see what she had wrought.
The sword burns, sullen red flame. It would have been brighter, once upon a time. Time and old wounds had done some of her work for her. She sheathes the sword, turns to look directly at Cobblestone.
Remember this. Remember what I have shown you. Find where Harmony lies.
And then she puts the sword through Cobblestone’s chest, and everything goes black.
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Was Dash thinking in Scootaloo in her final moments? A bit surprising, considering how obsessed was she with her dead marefriend and how little fucks she gave about Scoots, back in the war.
So basically, Saitama is needed ASAP.
Maybe he'll actually have a decent fight!
*Later* Saitama sighed, "As usual, just one punch..."
What is going on I am so confused.
OK, I got nothing for this. The part about Vision is clear enough, but as for the vision... *error, incomplete data, please restore backup copy of reality* And just incase it was missed, you confuse the hell out of me sometimes.
Well, I think it worked.
I very much like how sassy Cobblestone has become with a headache. It is very amusing.
Just what is the story behind that sword of Twilight's?
Remind me, in the earlier stories, out of the Elements of Harmony, besides Twilight of course, who died during the war? Who could have died and been brought back? Unless this is Sweetie Belle, showing that her soul has been around and 'reborn' before.
Most likely, I think it's Rarity. Lets go with that.
7471773 Twilight was the only Element that died during the war. The Mane 6 got together at the end of Dusk's Dangerous Game, for Twilight's wedding.
All three of the CMC died, Spike died, Rainbow Dash's marefriend died...Spike wouldn't need a sword to kill someone, her fiance had no reason to kill her and she wouldn't tell Scootaloo that if it were Scootaloo killing her.
Applebloom, maybe? The whole brainwashed to murder Celestia's enemies thing.
7473567 Well I couldn't remember if any of the Main 6 died, but I doubt it was Applebloom. If it was Rarity, it had to be Sweetie Belle then.
I bring up those 2 cause we see that Serale has Sweetie's Soul tied to hers. And Sweetie Mentions:
With Serale being tied to Sweetie's Soul, I am betting Cob's soul is tied to Rarity. So the 'vision' we saw, we don't know who it's from. Rarity or Sweetie. But if Sweetie and the CMC were the only ones to die, and not Rarity later after the war as it was a long time between the war and that scene, then it has to be Sweetie's vision inside of Serale.
7474866 And don't forget the penultimate chapter of Stormsinger! Clues abound there as well!