Chapter 17 - The Vault of Bones
Two miles west of the cultist dig site
“Incoming!” The ship shuddered as the sky lit with orange-red light, the bridge rocking underfoot as the Seeker rolled to one side, shuddering under the shockwave of the blast. Blade grabbed the nearby railing, wrapping her talons around the metal and steadying herself as the helm fought to get the ship back on course.
“That was close,” Kalos called from his raised position in the center of the bridge. His talons were wrapped tightly around his own personal rail, letting him stand on his hind legs and see every inch of the bridge as he shouted orders. “They must have a mage on one of those airships. See if we can figure out which one it is and then relay firing orders to the main guns.”
“Yes sir!” came the reply.
“And message the fleet. They need to know that they’re mixing in mages with the … Never mind.” Kalos’s words dropped off as several bursts of orange-red flame burst forth up and down the line of cult airships, arcing up through the sky and then detonating along the griffon line.
Well, Blade thought as the griffon fleet burst through the flames. If they haven’t figured that out by now ... One of the ships had been too close to the blasts; she could see ropes burning along its sides, and figures burst onto the deck, foam spraying from carefully held contraptions. The corvette went into a rapid climb as more gouts of flame and smoke gushed from the sides of the opposing airship, this time cannon fire. Airburst shells detonated near the corvette, rocking the vessel and sending one of the fire responders falling towards the ice.
“I think,” Kalos said as the Seeker shook again, metal fragments rattling against its armored sides. He cleared his throat. “I think that our estimates that their fleet was evenly split might have been a little overzealous.” He turned. “Signal the deck gunners to fire at will. I want ballista taking every shot they can. Full weapons authorization. If they want it, the gunnery loaders are to supply it. Empty the magazines.”
“Yes sir!” The communications officer he was looking at snapped a quick salute before speaking into her microphone. Somewhere on the deck and in the ammunition magazines, through a system that hadn’t been explained to Blade, small speakers and lighters were activating, relaying the griffons in that location their orders.
“Helm,” Kalos continued. “Take us up, then bring us down in a diagonal strike. Navigation, relay our movements to the rest of the fleet.” The Seeker shuddered again, rocking underfoot and groaning as something exploded nearby. The helm officer pulled at a few levers and the frigate began to rise, tilting forward and to one side to give the bridge a better view of the battle. Around them, the previously organized fleet was breaking up, airships moving every which way beneath the mostly cloudless sky, their colors muted under the silvery light of the moon. If not for the flashing rumble of distant explosions, it would have looked almost tranquil, Blade thought. Even the glowing, shimmering purple shield over the distant island that was their goal looked peaceful under the moonlight, despite the fact that the shield most certainly was covering a wide variety of anti-air weapons.
“Where are those ballistas!” Kalos cried. Blade looked at the forward deck just in time to see the first of the ballistas fire, its shot briefly visible as a silvery dart before being lost in the darkness. If it hit one of the cultist airships, she didn’t see it. Moments later the rest of the ballistas followed suit, their own shots arcing off into the night. There was a bright flash followed by a deep thump that resonated through the bridge as one of the main guns fired, rattling the windows in their housings. A bright red shot streaked through the night, slamming into the side of one of the Order’s ships and punching through the side metal. The airship continued on, unabated.
Kalos kept shouting orders as Blade ran her eyes over the line of enemy ships. They definitely hadn’t been made with an eye for aerodynamics or combat, like the griffon ships had. In fact, many appeared to be repurposed, modified minotaur designs: Rounded, ungainly things that weren’t designed to fly through the air as much as they were to shove it away. It wasn’t a perfect match—a few that were easily identifiable cultist-specific airships had a sleeker envelope, though not by much, and the decks of the ship were clearly laid out in a more compact fashion—but it wouldn’t have surprised her at all to find that there was an old, decommissioned minotaur airship somewhere in the pack.
At the moment though, she had to admit that the design was somewhat in the cultist’s favor. Minotaur airships were known for being, like most of their work, clunky and visually unappealing, but structurally solid, with multiple cells split across their envelopes, and a heavily reinforced, modular design. Unless there had been some changes to the blueprints, their ships wouldn’t be fast, but they would be durable.
And armed like hedgehogs, Blade thought as the Seeker rattled once more, this time with a low bang echoing down the length of the ship as they took a hit. She glanced towards Kalos, but he didn’t seem to be paying the noise any mind.
I guess if it’s a real problem, we’ll know about it pretty quick, she thought as she turned back to the window. Down below her, on the ice, she could see the telltale flashes of the two lines of ice-ships trading long range fire. Neither of them had gotten close enough for any real combat, however. Both the Bloodhooves’ and the Cragtooth’s ships were holding back, waiting for their aerial support to engage before they moved forward, lest they be caught out in the open by the more maneuverable airships.
Shouldn’t be long now, she thought as the Seeker kicked, the bridge shaking around her as one of the primary guns fired again. Around them she could see the rest of the griffon air fleet adopting similar tactics, one-third of the fleet dropping while another third rose, splitting the viable targets and coming at the cultist ships from multiple angles. Then, while those ships rolled past, the third portion of the fleet, including the Strike of Dawn and some of the heavier and slower but more well armed ships, would move up to keep the pressure on while both of the other strikes redeployed.
You might be tough, but we live in the skies, Blade thought as she watched one of the cultist airships take a nasty hit from what looked like an incendiary ballista bolt, rivers of fire washing across its decks. A magic sheet swept the flaming fluid overboard, but some of the wood had caught, and the magic user switched his sheet for a bubble, starving the the flames inside.
“Beginning dive,” the helmsclaw said. “Dropping now.”
Blade felt a familiar lightness in her gut as the Seeker began to drop through the sky, cutting down towards the cultist airships—airships that were now coming much closer. The rest of the fleet was carrying out similar maneuvers, dropping or rising through the sky, weapons blazing out at the cultist ships, who now seemed to realize what was going on. Blade risked a look down at the distant ice and noticed that the two fleets were crashing towards each other now, both sending out ranging fire.
A loud boom shook the ship, followed by a rattling noise as an airburst round rolled off the side. Another boom, this one close enough that the flash was almost blinding, and Blade flinched back as something took a chip out of the heavy glass she had been looking through. Part of her wanted to duck, to pull away—What if that glass broke?—but the more rational, curious part of her mind was telling her to stay, and to watch.
This is going to be the future of warfare, she thought as another cannonball burst nearby, followed by a wave of rapidfire fireballs that arced through the air, several of them exploding against the bow and sides of the Seeker. The ship shook, but held, and the few fires that broke out against the deck or the balloon were clearly not volatile enough for the crew to react.
It’s incredible, she thought as the Seeker’s main guns began to fire one after another, focusing their combined firepower on a single ship. The rounds began to chew through the armor, cutting through the gondola’s insides and spewing out the back in an explosion of wood, metal, and flame. They were close enough now that she could see the look of horror on a cultist’s face as he tumbled over the side, wrapping his foreleg around a stray rope at the last second.
A brighter, hotter shot tore through the night sky as one of the guns fired again. It looked like a falling star, white and pulsing with heat as it punched through the damaged airship’s armor and into the envelope. There was a rush of flame that jetted out the opening as the gas lit, the airship bucking as one of the gas-filled cells swelled and then detonated.
What was that? Blade wondered as the airship jerked to one side. They were almost alongside it now, but it wasn’t firing back, though its nearby siblings were, and without apparent regard for its safety. A magical bolt, clearly meant for the Seeker, missed and carved a burning hole across the wounded airship’s deck. The battle was too loud to hear the screams through the darkness, but she could see the panic of the crew as the airship began to drop, the gondola dropping with a jerk as one of the supports burned away.
“Focus on the wounded prey!” Kalos cried as the Seeker rocked again. The communications officer must have done his job, because moments later, just as the bridge was pulling up equal with the limping airship, another ballista bolt darted into the hole left by the ruptured cell. A detonation followed a moment later, and the airship began to drop like a stone, bleeding liftgas as it sank towards the ice.
That was just an explosive quarrel, Blade thought as she watched it go. The frigate was rattling almost constantly beneath her feet now, bangs and thuds echoing from the bulkheads as the remaining cultist ships worked together to focus their fire. But that first shot, the one that made the liftgas explode, what was that? Liftgas is stable stuff! You’d have to get it really hot to make it go like that.
An airburst round detonated right over the forward deck, a flash and a bang loud enough to stun her momentarily. Her vision cleared to show her a spiderweb of chips and cracks across the forwardmost bridge windows. One of them had cracked so heavily it almost couldn’t be seen out of.
“Helm, five degrees north, and tilt us!” Kalos barked. “I want our armored backside in-between us and that next shot before we reload. The props can take hits like that, we can’t.”
“Yes sir!” The horizon began to turn, rotating as the ship moved.
“Check the gunnery crews, and get wounded off the deck before we come around,” Kalos called as the ship shook again. “That hit had to have done some damage.”
The smoke left by the blast had cleared now, and Blade peered out through the damaged glass to see that her cousin had been right about the deck. Several griffons were lying on the deck, dead or bleeding out. As she watched several others began pulling them back toward the rear of the ship, towards the safety of the inside. Hopefully they’d live. If not, they’d died with honor.
“Starboard relay platform took a hit, sir,” the communications officer said. “Crew okay, requesting to remain in position.”
“Granted. Keep us in contact with the fleet.”
“Of course, sir, I—” Her face took on an intense look as she stared down at the board. “Fleet reports use of shadows, sir!”
“General alert status, possible boarders—”
“No response from the boiler-room sir! No—”
Blade saw the faint hint of purple forming in the air over Kalos’s head, followed by the familiar looking void of something that wasn’t night and leaped, her shriek sounding across the bridge as Kalos ducked in shock, his eyes wide. The appearing shadow didn’t even see her coming, his own attention on the crouching captain below him. Blade slammed into him, her claws biting deep into his flesh, burying themselves up to their full lengths against his ribs. He hit the deck hard, his wide, shocked eyes going dim as the side of his head met the wooden deck with a hollow thunk. He was dead before she could pull her claws out of him, his heart lacerated by her attack. There was a metal ping as his long, thin blade, the edge glistening with something wet, hit the deck behind her.
“Thanks,” Kalos said, his eyes wide. “That was close.” Then he turned to his communications officer. “Report!”
“Boiler-room is secure, we’ve reestablished contact!” the comm officer called, one pair of talons cradling her headset to her head. Earlier Blade had tried them on and heard faint voices coming from the other end. She’d guessed, though the officer hadn’t confirmed, that it was tied somehow to the microphones she’d seen in walled boxes around the ship. “There was a shadow there, but the ice unicorn—Frost—was waiting for her. The shadow has been neutralized.”
“Good,” Kalos said. “Anything else?”
“Another shadow near the galley, sir,” the comm officer continued, her voice smooth and steady. “Two wounded, one dead, but they got him. His blade was poisoned, but the medical team is on it.”
“Good,” Kalos said. “Damage?”
“Nothing new,” she replied. “No permanent or disabling damage sustained during the fight.”
“Bring us around, helm,” Kalos ordered. The Seeker began to turn, angling away from the distant purple shield around their target. “Prepare to slow.”
“Signal from the fleet!” comms said. “Additional enemy fleets converging on our position from the east and the north.
“What?” Kalos asked in apparent shock. Half the bridge crew froze at the announcement. “Two?”
“Yes sir,” the comm officer replied. “New orders. We’re to make our run on the shield and drop the insertion team now. Strike of Dawn and Eye of the Storm will cover with their attendant ships.”
“Thunder and lightning,” Kalos said, shaking his head. “Belay the turn! Put us back on course for the island and match speed with the destroyers.” He pulled himself back up into his usual position before glancing towards Blade. “And you’d better get below, with your team,” he said, gesturing towards the rear of the bridge. “We’re not going to have more than one shot at this, so make it count! And somebody get this body off my bridge!”
The rest of the team was already waiting for her in the galley by the time she arrived, clad in their gear and ready to go. The Seeker was shaking underfoot now, faint bangs echoing through the hull as the defensive emplacements on the island fired up at it. It was taking a beating, that much was certain.
“Ready?” she asked, looking at the rest of the group. Hain was wearing his light armor again, as was Barnabas. Alchemy was, as usual, wearing just his combat harness, though from the look of the pockets, he’d brought along plenty of vials of potion for the fight. Frost was just wearing her usual light garb, though it looked a bit looser than normal. A new bow—or at least one Blade hadn’t seen before—was slung around her shoulders.
“This way,” a griffon said, signaling her and the team to follow him through the ship. “We only have the one small drop bay, so we’re going to need to pack you in pretty tight.”
“Are we getting parachutes this time?” Barnabas asked. “Because last time we tried this, we got pretty winded.”
“The harnesses will work fine,” Alchemy said as they stepped into a large, empty room with a raised walkway ringing it. There was a large but tight seam running down the middle. “Trust me. We’re going straight down this time.”
“Right,” Barnabas said as the griffon passed Barnabas, Frost, and Alchemy rope harnesses similar to the one that Blade and Hain had made for Alchemy at the shipyard. “At least I hope you’re right. I won’t look good as a pancake.” He twisted the harness around his axe.
“We’ll be fine,” Blade said. “Trust Alchemy on this one. Hain and I can slow you and Frost easily enough.” Besides, she thought as she stepped up behind the minotaur. The real worry is that shield being down at the right time.
She looked over at the griffon, who was standing by another one of the metal communications boxes. “Does the fleet want us to take down the shield once we’re inside?” she asked.
The griffon shook his head. “No,” he said. “Leave the shield to us. They’ll have to keep it up, which means less mages available to keep you from getting to your objective.”
“Right,” Blade said as the griffon motioned them into the center of the room, right over the seam. Stopping that key. “Frost, you feel anything?”
“The pressure’s getting stronger,” Frost said as she got into position, Barnabas crouching and then hooking the front of his harness to hers. Alchemy walked up to the unicorn and attached the back of his harness to the front of hers. They almost looked like they were playing a child’s game.
“How much stronger?” Blade asked as she took up position behind Barnabas, Hain at her side, both of them connecting their own harnesses to the minotaur's. They were “the parachute.”
“It’s building,” Frost said. “Sort of like … Sort of like the ice before it cracks.”
Not a good thing, then, Blade thought as she secured her talons against Barnabas’s shoulders. The stance was a little unwieldy, but that wouldn’t matter once they dropped. “Everyone locked in tight?” A series of tugs made their way up the harness as each member of the team checked.
“Good to go.”
“I’m ready.”
“Clear here.”
“Locked in.”
“Then we’re ready,” she said, giving her own harness a short, quick tug and feeling the material jerk against her shoulders. This is going to be cold. She glanced over at their guide as the Seeker’s shuddering increased beneath them, a loud bang echoing through the ship. “Whenever you’re ready.”
The griffon nodded and stepped up next to a small, raised console. “Any minute now,” he said as a white light began flashing. “Brace yourself.” Another bang echoed through the ship, the deck shaking beneath her, and she spread her rear legs slightly, lowering her center of gravity.
“We’re getting close,” the griffon said as the white light began to flash faster. Somewhere on one of the exterior observation ports there was a griffon eyeing the ship’s position relative to the target, and as soon as he decided it was time—
“Drop!” The word had barely registered when the ground gave way beneath her, the bay doors dropping them into the night. She clamped down at her reflexes, fighting the urge to spread her wings and instead tucking them close against her body, only opening the very tips to adjust their course and maneuver the group so that they were falling in a straight stack, Alchemy at the bottom, and her and Hain above.
The sky around them was filled with fire, much of it aimed at the Seeker, but some of it aimed at the two destroyers behind it. Both ships were returning fire as quickly as they could, deafening booms echoing across the sky as multiple guns fired again and again at the purple dome below.
Nice job, Blade thought as the roar of the wind continued to grow, drowning out all but the loudest of the gunfire. Below them, the shimmering, purple shield was coming up fast, but it was right below them. Almost dead center. Perfect.
The shield rippled as another burst of cannon-fire detonated against its surface, shimmering waves of color spreading out in all directions as the magic fought to hold back the assault. She could see the focal points of the spell now, six-heavily defended but quickly constructed emplacements at equal points along the inside rim of the shield’s base. That was where the majority of the mages would be, the bunkers providing them with a source of protection while they kept the spell going. Another wave of shots slammed into the shield’s surface, and the brief flash allowed her time to pick out the hedgehog of defensive weaponry mounted on the bunker rooftops.
They’re determined to hold, she thought as the makeshift anti-airship emplacements fired, sending lightweight shells into the sky. The flashing from the blasts allowed her to pick out the details of the rest of the island, and she ran her gaze over the meager structures, looking for the entrance to their target.
It wasn’t hard to find, but then the island wasn’t that big. A cluster of what looked like temporary structures had been built around a well-lit, central area, with rows of tents spread out about it in a circle. A large, ominous looking stone structure was at the center of the lit space, one end open to the elements. Outside of that, most of the island was bare save for what looked like a few grounded airships.
That’s our entrance, she thought, her eyes sliding back to the stone structure. Time to start looking for a landing site. Before we hit. Provided the shield goes down.
Another wave of shots rolled into the shield, and she saw the edges began to flicker. “Hain!” she called, jerking her head towards the tents on the edge of the dig site. If all the cultists were in the bunkers or in the vault, then the tents would probably be abandoned. “Aim for the tents!”
“Got it!” They began sliding through the air, both of them working in tandem to guide their freefall. The surface of the dome was sweeping up at them now, expanding to fill their world as it came closer and closer.
Come on … Blade thought as the guns fired again, the surface of the shield shimmering but holding. That’s getting really close … close! Close!
The guns fired again, their impact against the shield close enough that she felt her ears pop as the shockwave rippled over her—and then the shield was gone, and she let out a breath she was barely aware she’d been holding as they slipped past the space where the barrier had been.
“Wait for it,” she said, eyeing the ground below. They were still about two hundred feet from the ground and dropping fast. One hundred and fifty feet. One hundred feet. Seventy-five. Fifty.
“Now!” She and Hain flared their wings out at the same moment, muscles quivering as their limbs strained against the sudden resistance. Below them, Alchemy jerked once and then dropped, releasing his harness and falling the last fifty feet on his own. He slammed into a tent, the cloth almost exploding around him as he hit. She had enough time to see the cloth settle over him, and then they were approaching the ground, and she pulled her own release, the knots coming apart and disconnecting her from Barnabas and Frost. Both of them waited for the telltale jerk of being released before pushing away from one another, and she saw both of them land with hard rolls just before the ground rushed up at her, though bereft of the extra weight, she was able to fold her wings and come to a hard but manageable landing.
She tucked her sore wings against her sides, ignoring the cries of relief from her burning muscles as she took a quick look around at the nearby tents, checking to see if anyone had noticed their descent. Luck was with them. With the multiple airships overhead, no one appeared to have seen their landing.
The shield snapped back into place just as a new wave of shots burst forth from the two destroyers, but as they slammed into the shield Blade could see that they’d fired fewer numbers than before. They didn’t need to drop the barrier anymore, just keep the ponies sustaining it preoccupied so her team could make the assault on the vault.
Speaking of which … She panned her eyes across the makeshift landing site. “Everyone okay?” she asked, keeping her voice low. “Any injuries?”
“It hurt,” Barnabas said, shaking his head as he picked himself up from the cold dirt. “And my eyes are watering, but that’s about it.” He reached over his shoulder and grabbed the handle of his greataxe, the sheath letting it loose with a faint click.
“I’m good,” Hain said, giving his wings a quick flap but otherwise showing no sign that they’d just dropped almost a half a mile through the air.
“Ready,” Frost said, her bow already drawn, her eyes searching the nearby camp for signs of cultists.
One corner of the demolished tent was thrown back, Alchemy striding out with a pained look on his face. “I always forget how much that hurts,” he said, shaking his body as if he was a dog throwing off water. “Had a nasty break that time, even if the tent did break my fall. Left a bit of a crater, too.”
“You good to move?” she asked. The orange earth pony nodded, his short-cut white mane bobbing in the dim light.
“Right.” She turned towards the dig site, eyeing the large magilights ringing it. Fortunately, most of them were aimed inward, towards the dig. They’d have a bit of an advantage getting close if there were any guards. “Let’s move. Alchemy—” She glanced in Hain’s direction as she spoke, checking to see if the griffon disagreed with her orders. “—you take point. Frost, follow behind. Keep in sight at all times. We’ll follow. You see guards, hit them fast.”
“I can do that,” Frost said, lifting her bow.
“Good. How’s the pressure?”
“Still rising,” Frost said, her eyes narrowing. “It’s definitely getting stronger.”
“Right.” Blade looked up at the distant lights. “Then let’s move fast.”
They darted between the tents, moving down the rows at a fast sprint and occasionally circling around the odd larger structure that someone had set up. No one emerged to stop them, or even to shout in warning. The cultist’s camp was deserted, completely empty. Everyone was either manning an airship, helping defend the island or … down in the vault. She didn’t like the uneasy feeling the last one gave her.
The camp came to a sudden end, the line of tents stopping just shy of the ring of towering magilights. There was a depression in the ground, a dug out pit with the stone structure at its bottom, the arching entrance at the front just high enough that the tip would have been above ground level had it still been buried. The diggers had excavated it in layers, leaving steps of wide, level ground taller than she was leading down to the opening. A rough wooden walkway alternating with stairs made its way from one end of the pit to center, but Alchemy ignored it completely, jumping over the edge of the pit and rising high into the air before dropping down out of sight. Frost followed him a moment later, dropping into the pit with her bow at the ready.
By the time Blade dropped over the edge, spreading her sore wings slightly to glide past the first few levels of dirt, the two guards standing by the base of the entrance had already been disabled, one by an arrow through the chest, the other by what looked like a very fast strike from Alchemy. If the caved-in ribcage was anything to go off of.
“Inside,” Blade said as she dropped to the ground next to the opening. She could see an entryway of sorts inside, a high-ceiled room with a row of free-standing pillars running down each side. Magilights had been hung by wires along the roof, but the bright, white light did little to detract from the dull, ominous grey of the stone. At the far end of the room she could see the stairway down into the rest of the vault.
“One of them might have gotten a spell off,” Frost said as they stepped through the opening and into the entryway. “But I think it was a misfired attack. No way to be sure, though.”
“Great,” Blade said, glancing at the stairs and then picking up speed. “Then we’d better—Watch out!”
A sharp whine filled the room, a piercing, buzzing screech filling her ears as a transparent, grey surface swept towards her. She dove to one side, noting as she did so that the magic appeared to be sweeping over every surface it passed seamlessly, almost as if it was passing through the stone itself, and then it was rolling across her body, its high-pitched shriek echoing through her head. She hit the ground in a panic, looking down at herself and then back at the strange magic as it swept over the rest of her team, continuing onward until it reached the entrance, where it vanished.
“What was that?” she asked, glancing at the rest of the team and then down at herself. Nothing about her seemed out of place—she hadn’t changed colors or anything, and there was nothing apparent that she could see. The back of her mind itched, and she felt adrenaline flood her system. Did it do something to my head? She didn’t feel any different, but if that had been some sort of mind-altering magic, wouldn’t that be the point?
“It felt like a scanning spell,” Frost said, shaking her head. “Sort of like a medical scan, but different.”
“So the cult knows we’re here,” Blade said, the itch in the back of her mind fading. “What about the itch in my head? Anyone else feel it?” Alchemy and Hain both nodded, though Barnabas just shrugged. Lucky magic resistance.
“It felt almost like a probe of some kind,” Frost said, frowning as she lit her own horn. “ I didn’t detect anything past that. I think that’s all it was. Just a scan.”
“Right,” Blade said, feeling slightly more at ease as she turned towards the stairs. “Then we need to move. Now. The cult will be on the move.”
“Actually,” Frost called as they moved onto the stairs, their movements echoing down into the vault. “I don’t think that was the cult!”
“What?” Blade asked, looking back at her. “Why not?”
“It didn’t feel like the cult,” she said. “If it happens again I’ll try and pin it down, but something was different.”
Blade felt another shiver of alarm crawl down her back at the mare’s words. Maybe they were already too late. “You think it’s that king?” Her talons scraped against the rock as she slipped on the smooth stone, and she flared her wings slightly to catch herself.
“I don’t know,” Frost admitted. “I’ll try to pin it down—voices!”
Blade snapped her head back to the front as shouts and yells began to echo up the stairwell at them. She could see the bottom of the stairs now, a flat, stone landing with only a single exit: a wide, tall, stone doorway that opened into one of the vault’s other rooms.
“There they are!” a unicorn shouted as he ran in the doorway, pointing up at them with one hoof. There was a red band around the base of his horn. A chosen. “Sound the ala-aaaiiigh!” Frost’s arrow had punched clean through the stallion’s outstretched foreleg. A second arrow followed a moment later, cutting the echoing scream off abruptly.
Alchemy jumped, clearing the last fifteen feet of stairs and barely stopping as he slammed into the landing at the bottom, leaping forward and through the doorway in a rush. Shouts rang out beyond it, cries of anger and pain mixed with the recognizable snap-hiss of magical firepower. Blade followed his example, pushing away from the stairs and throwing herself towards the bottom, spreading her wings as she neared the end of the stairs and shooting through the doorway with a burst of speed.
The room was chaos. She didn’t recognize the room from the pictures they’d been looking at, but the layout was simple enough. It was long and rectangular, its center in line with the doorway she’d entered and lowered, almost as if the creator had wanted its occupants to walk through it at chest height with the rest of the room. Statues were set on raised plinths at regular intervals along the path, flanking the walkway, and behind them, on either side, were pillars half-shrouded in ice. The room had never been fully excavated.
Alchemy was locked in a melee battle in the center of the room, his hooves flying, though he seemed to be doing more dodging than attacking. There were more than a dozen cultists surrounding him, several of them close enough that they were swinging hooves, but many of the rest were standing back and launching spells or looking in her direction. It was only a matter of time before one of them hit.
Blade let out a shriek, extending her claws as magic rose up to meet her. She didn’t bother to dodge, letting the first two blasts of fire sweep over her, the heat around her rising, rising, and then sucking into her body. She emerged from the flames smoking but alive, the closest mage having only time to open her mouth in shock before Blade’s now-flaming talons met her throat. The mage fell, smoke curling from her corpse, but Blade had already moved on, heading for the next available target. A roar behind her told her that Barnabas had entered the fray, and she saw Hain fly by overhead, his knife stabbing out as he descended and catching an unaware cultist in the back.
A magic bolt hit her in the side, spitting against her armor and kicking her hindquarters back, and she spun, spreading her wings and dodging the chosen’s next shot before shoulder-checking him to the ground. His head hit the stone, hard, and she turned to see Alchemy land a hit that sent a cultist flying into one of the bowing statues, bouncing off of the outstretched stone … wing?
Three cultists bolted for the far exit, and she tore her gaze away from the statue just in time to see Frost cut down two of them with her arrows. The third managed to make it into the next room, cutting around the doorway as an ice arrow cracked against the doorframe. It was only because she was looking at the doorway that she saw the oncoming glowing grey wall before the familiar rising whine began to fill her ears, and she threw herself up, climbing into the air. The translucent magic moved much quicker this time, sweeping through the room and everything in it. Again she felt the faint, familiar itching in the back of her mind, but this time it felt more urgent, almost curious. Her ruff prickled, feathers rising as the light swept over her, her stomach twisting as she felt … something … she couldn’t say what ... brush against her mind. Then it was gone, the glowing grey wall moving past her and the rest of the room and vanishing through the doorway to the stairwell, the whine going with it.
Focus. She shook her head and dropped out of the sky, tackling one of the two unicorns that had been battling Hain. These two had at least had the sense to pull short blades from somewhere among their robes and use them, but Hain was holding them back, and as she fell on one of the pair, the old griffon darted forward, his knife pushing aside the other’s blade and then making short work of him.
The last cultist went down in a heap, the back of his head slamming into the base of one of the statues with a dull, wet thunk that echoed around the room. Alchemy stepped back, dropping into a neutral stance once more before relaxing and turning for the door.
“Frost!” Blade called, spotting the ice-blue mare at the end of the room. “Did you check it that time?”
“The wall?” she said. Blade nodded. “It’s a scanning spell. But it’s mental, too. It’s not doing anything but skimming the surface, but it’s definitely probing at our heads. It’s not leaving anything.”
“Is it the cult?” Blade asked. Frost just shook her head.
“I can’t tell. It doesn’t feel like any of the magic they use but it’s hard to tell,” she said. “And that pressure is still building.”
“Then we’d better move,” Blade said, turning and then pausing as the rest of the group rushed past her.
“Blade?” Hain called, stopping as the rest of the group ran out of the room. “What are you looking at?”
“The statue,” Blade said, looking up at the same stone carving that had caught her eye earlier. “It’s a griffon.”
“What?”
Blade looked up and down at the rest of the statues along the walkway, eyeing them. Each one was a different species … but none of them was a unicorn. In fact, none of them were even ponies.
Diamond dog, griffon, minotaur, and … She frowned as she looked at the statues flanking the exit further into the vault. Is that a jackal?
“Blade,” Hain said as distant shouts beginning to echo up at theme from further down the vault. “We need to move. We might not have much time.”
“Wait,” she said, stepping up statue’s base. “Why no unicorns?”
“No unicorns?” Hain paused, taking a closer look at the rest of the statues. “You’re right.”
“Why would a unicorn supremacist have statues of races all deemed ‘inferior?’” She asked as she stepped up to the base of the statue. There was something written there, still caked with ice that hadn’t been properly scraped away. She brushed it with one talon, the ice breaking free and falling in small clumps.
“Maybe because they’re bowing,” Hain said, turning towards the doorway. “Come on! We can’t get split up!” A distant roar echoed up the hallway. Barnabas had engaged someone.
“Just a second,” she said, her eyes tracing the ancient words carved into the stone. “There’s something written here. Probably on all the statues.” She narrowed her eyes, thinking back on all the hours she’d spent trying to make sense of the same markings on the Seeker. These looked familiar, but she wasn’t sure … Wait.
“This one says ‘praise,’” she said, tapping the glyph. “And this one …” It looked familiar, but she couldn’t quite place it. Bones? No, not with that first bit so close by.
“It’s probably ‘Praise Sombra,’ or something like that,” Hain said, shaking his head. “Now come on, kit, let’s—”
“No,” she said as it clicked. Of course she’d seen it before. It was a word that hadn’t changed too much over the last thousand years. A similar symbol was still used as a logo by several military groups. A chill ran down her spine, her mouth going dry as she translated the full phrase. “It says: Praise death.” She glanced over at the older griffon, who had paused in mid-sentence.
“Praise death?” he repeated. “But …”
“Hain, whoever it is that cult is about to wake up, we need to stop it fast,” she shouted as she turned and ran past him, bolting into the hallway at the end of the room. “Because I don’t think it’s who they think it is!”
“Well who is it then?” Hain called as they burst out of the hallway into another room. This one was square, the floor divided into nine equal segments, four of which—one in each corner—were raised to about knee height. Strange chunks of stone poked their way free of the ice around the edges, carved into geometric shapes that seemed to serve no purpose. The door on the far side of the room connected to another hallway, while two more doors at equal points to each side led elsewhere. Cultists were rushing out of one of them, their horns aglow.
The center of the room was a chaotic melee, and she dove into the fight without bothering to answer Hain, her talons lashing out at the closest target and cutting tracks down a cultist’s side. Alchemy blurred past her, moving so fast he almost appeared to be teleporting as he ducked under a chosen’s attack and then brought his hoof into the pony’s face. Barnabas was on her other side, roaring as spells bounced off him, each one making him move just a little faster, hit a little harder.
An answering roar met Barnabas’s from down the hallway, and Blade looked over to see a bruin charging down the hall, his body swelling under the influence of his strange magic. Another four chosen were behind him, followed by another mage, this one levitating several swords alongside himself. Barnabas answered the bruin’s roar with a yell of his own and then charged to meet the enchanted unicorn head-on, his axe smashing the pony’s head aside with one mighty swing before the pair crashed into one another.
Blade took another initiate down, her long talons making quick work of the armorless pony. Typical magic user, she thought as she rounded on another one, slamming them into the ground and then using his body as a springboard to launch herself at another mage. No armor, all magic. The mage’s horn lit, two swords dropping from under his cloak and cutting through the air at her from both sides. She blocked both with her talons, the shock of the impact reverberating up her forelegs as she came down in a mighty headbutt, her forehead meeting the mage’s just at the base of his horn. He fell back, the magic glow vanishing, and she took him down.
She turned. Alchemy was dueling the remaining mage, dancing around his four blades so quickly she again was almost convinced he was teleporting somehow. Nearby, the bruin had five arrows sticking out of his body, another appearing in his back as she watched, but the massive unicorn was still trading blows with Barnabas.
Hain darted in to assist Alchemy, his knife glinting in the light as he struck one of the mage’s hovering blades. The mage stumbled under the telekinetic backlash, thrown off by the attack, and Alchemy seized on the weakness, his front hooves pounding a rapid tempo across the pony’s face. The blades—and the mage—slumped to the ground.
Another heavy thump echoed across the room a moment later as the bruin fell, dead at last, eight arrows in his body. Barnabas let out a satisfied laugh, slapping his dented armor as he picked up his axe once more.
“Come on,” she called, waving them further forward. “We’ve got to stop them from using that key!”
Another whine filled the air as she stepped into the hallway, the translucent grey wall once again rushing over her and setting her teeth on edge. Again, something tickled the back of her mind, only this time she felt another new emotion flowing through the wave … Amusement?
“Got it!” Frost called as the wall continued onward. “It’s definitely not cult. I don’t know what it is. It doesn’t feel like unicorn magic.”
“Tartarus!” Blade shouted as they burst into another room. This one she did recognize from their studies. It was long and rectangular, twice the length of the first room the they’d entered, and much wider. Raised stone walkways stretched around the outside of the room, slanting ramps leading downward to the main floor, which was almost a full ten feet below the entryway. Strange slopes made trapezoidal shapes wide enough to fight on. Here and there were frozen bits of ice that no one had bothered to excavate, and she could see why as she noticed the faint, white bone poking through their surfaces.
And at the far end of the room, two ramps ran up the wall to converge on the doorway out. She knew where they were. There was only another short hallway, some sort of atrium, balcony area, and then they’d reach the vault itself. All they had to do was reach the far door.
Easier said than done with the near two-dozen cultists littered across the room, some with crossbows, others with swords, and a few with spells. But she knew she couldn’t wait. Whatever was about to happen in the next room, it couldn’t be good, and she let out an echoing shriek as she dove towards the closest cultist, ignoring the pain as a bolt of magic found its way through her armor.
Shouts filled the air as the two groups clashed, and everything faded away to violence. Strike. Block. Dodge. A crossbow bolt struck her wing and she pushed through the pain as she took down cultist after cultist. The rest of the team was alongside her, working in tandem as they cut their way towards the center of the room.
Praise death. The phrase echoed in her mind as she took down another mage, grabbing the stallion by the horn and ignoring the burning sensation along her talons as she slammed his head against the ground. Was the phrase abstract or a name? A lot of individuals and groups had gone by the name over the years, and a lot of those were pretty infamous. Some more than others.
Bad is bad, she thought as Alchemy batted a crossbow bolt from the sky and then darted after its owner, pinning the cultists against a wall. But anyone who gets a tomb like this made … Doors are locked for a reason.
Barnabas cleaved a mage almost in half, roaring as more spells slammed into him. He had an arrow sticking out of his shoulder, and he snapped it off with a casual backhand. Frost was firing again and again, her arrows streaking out so quickly she appeared to be painting a continuous stream. Ice had grown over parts of her body, shielding her from the cult's returning strikes. Hain was striking with precise, quick cuts, ignoring the blackened portion of his wing.
A pair of roars echoed across the room as two bruins, so identical they might have been twins, moved in concert down the distant ramps and began galloping towards them. She saw Alchemy throw his head back, sucking down another dose of his potion, and then he exploded forward, rushing to meet the pair of enraged mares. The crack of his hoof meeting one of their jaws echoed across the room, stone beneath his hooves breaking away in small chunks as the charging bruin came to an abrupt stop.
Once again a whine filled the air. Once again the grey wall swept across them. Once again, her mind tingled, and this time she was certain she could feel something probing at her thoughts, alive and aware. It felt … happy. Like it was laughing, not at her, but at the whole situation.
Then it was gone and the fight raged on. Most of the cultists were down now, the bruins and a few holdouts all that was left. Alchemy was a blur as he darted between the pair, redirecting their slower, clumsier attacks and pummeling them mercilessly. Blade watched in amazement as he caught one of their blows and shifted, twisting the mare’s foreleg and yanking her body around before her joint reached the limits of its range with a jerk. Alchemy continued onward with the motion, lifting the bruin into the air and flinging her into the wall.
Blade dropped the mage she’d been beating and jumped to help as the second bruin bore down on him. The first was still getting up, but she didn’t look much worse for the wear, and only let out a shout of rage as two arrows appeared in her chest. One of them began to spread, and the mare battered the ice away with a casual blow.
“Release the behemoth!” someone was shouting. “Release the behemo—” The voice cut off with a gurgle.
She took a quick look around the rest of the room as she neared the bruin. There were only a few cultists left, and as she watched, Hain and Frost took two of them down. She turned and raked her claws across the bruin, her talons barely penetrating the mare’s enchanted hide.
A deep, steady rumble was filling the room, another roar echoing from the exit hallway. Something big was moving down it, but she didn’t have time to look as she ducked a blow from the bruin.
“Behemoth!” Frost called, a slight note of panic in her voice. “Behemoth!”
“What’s a behem—! Oh ...” Blade said as the hulking figure burst through the doorway. It was an earth pony … or at least it had been, before … something … had been done to it. It was more than twice the size of the bruins, its skin stretched so tight over swollen muscles that it had split in several places. Blood and pus oozed from open sores across its body, and there were heavy metal shackles around each of its legs. A single look at its eyes told Blade all she needed to know. Whatever this pony had been—whoever it had been—it was completely mad with pain now, a creature of insane terror and suffering. Everyone seemed to freeze, even the bruins, as the brute slammed its hooves against the floor, shaking the room and letting out a mad howl.
“We need to put it out of its misery!” Barnabas called, moving first and ramming one of the bruins with his shoulder. The bruin stumbled back and then fell, sliding down one of the slanting ramps and coming to a stop near the behemoth. The brute’s eyes snapped to the fallen pony and it reared back, its head reaching past the upper level. It brought its forward hooves down atop the fallen bruin. There was a heavy crunch, and the enchanted cultist stopped moving.
“It’s an earth pony they did something to!” Barnabas yelled. “Experiments! We’ve just got to—oh pits.” Familiar purple voids began to appear in the air, four shadows teleporting in around the room.
“Just kill it!” Barnabas shouted as the abomination began to gallop forward, its eyes brimming with madness, foam leaking from the corners of its mouth. Then he jumped away, and Blade was forced to dodge as a shadow’s blade cut through the air where her neck had been, the unicorn vanishing before she could respond.
Another grey wall swept by, the whine filling the air and the same feeling of distant amusement filling her mind. Breath hissed through clenched teeth as a shadow’s blade tore at her left side, cutting through the gap left between the armor. She caught the mare’s head with the side of her wing, ignoring the pain, but missed with a follow-up as the mare teleported anyway. Alchemy and Barnabas were both fighting the behemoth, mostly dodging and trying to wear it down, while Hain was working to keep two shadows off their backs. The other was dueling Frost, though Blade had a feeling she knew how that would turn out.
She feinted, leaving an opening but failing to connect as the mare ported away once more. She wasn’t going to be fooled by such an easy measure. There was no way around it. Without a real opening, she couldn’t get one of her own.
She let her wing hang out, wide open for a solid hit, bracing herself as the mare appeared, spearing her short blade right through it. She bit back the pain, clenching her teeth as she pulled her wing in, tugging the blade free. The shadow hesitated as her magic was disrupted, and then her eyes went wide as Blade’s rear leg caught her in the throat. She vanished, only to appear a few feet away, hacking and clutching at her crushed windpipe.
Blade winced as she tugged the shadow’s weapon free. The she stepped up to the frantic-looking mare, flipping the thin implement in her talons.
Not worth it. She slammed the mare’s head into the stone; once, then twice. The shadow slumped, unconscious.
There was a shout from behind her, and she turned to see Alchemy fly through the air before slamming into the far wall. He slumped to the ground, either unconscious or dazed. The behemoth let out another roar and swung at Barnabas. The minotaur stepped aside, but the shadow teleporting in at his back came in too late to move, and the hoof slammed into her, knocking her across the room. An arrow met her path mid-flight, and her strugglings ceased.
There was a scream of pain as Hain finished the last shadow, and then it was just them and the behemoth. Come on, Blade thought as she leapt into the air, her one wing giving her a little extra lift. We need to move! She landed on the behemoth’s back, the creature letting out a surprised shout as her claws dug into its tight skin. The skin began to peel back as she cut into it, revealing the reddened flesh beneath it.
“Come on!” The distracted behemoth’s head snapped to one side as Barnabas’s axe cut into it. It let out a roar, jerking and lifting a hoof. An ice arrow burrowed itself in the meat of its foreleg, ice growing across its hoof and jerking it down beneath the sudden weight.
With an angry yell, Alchemy launched and hit the other side of the creature’s head, a crack echoing across the room as the jaw shattered. Blade was thrown from its back as it bucked, grunting in pain as she spread both wings to keep herself from being smeared against the ceiling. Another wall of ice began to engulf the monster’s other hoof, and it let out a confused roar as the ice froze its leg to the ground.
“I am putting you,” Barnabas said, hefting his axe and winding it back. “Out ... of your ... misery!” He swung the axe forward with the last word. A sickening crunch filled the room as the blade bit through bone, and then the minotaur dropped to one side, sagging with an exhausted sigh as the behemoth went limp, its head falling to the ground, no longer connected to its body. It had been decapitated.
“We can’t stop!” Frost called, running up as Blade came in to land by the body. “The pressure’s spiking! Whatever they’re doing, they’re almost done!” An electric hum began to fill the air, the stone quivering slightly beneath them.
“Alchemy, healing! Poison antidote!” Blade snapped. The earth pony complied, rapidly pulling small vials from his harness and tossing them at the team before tugging his own free and downing it. “They’re small,” he said as Blade swallowed hers. “But they’ll help.”
“We need to move!” Blade shouted, tossing the empty vials aside and running for the end of the room, the rest of her team behind her as they entered the short hallway. Just one more room and then—”
“Stop right there.” Blade slid to a halt as they burst into the next room. It was the circular one she’d seen pictures of, with two stairways winding along to the wall to the door on the far upper side. The floor in front of her was covered in glowing magic, along with glowing wires and all manner of magic implements. The voice itself had come from a mare standing up by the door, grinning as she looked down at them. Her cutie mark was a wire snare made of magic.
“Tripwire,” Barnabas said as he saw the mare.
“Indeed,” the mare said, smiling. “You’ve killed a lot of my shadows tonight, but don’t expect to make it through this room alive. I’ve coated every inch of that floor and the stairway with traps. The only safe spots are where you’re standing and where I’m—”
For a moment Blade thought that the mare had grown a second horn, but then Frost stepped up alongside the group, lowering her bow as she stared up at the stunned cult mage.
“You should stop talking so much,” Frost said as the mare slumped forward, her eyes rolling back into her head as she fell from the balcony. Tripwire’s body hit the floor, and Blade stepped back, shielding her eyes as the room filled with brilliant flashes. When she could see again, nothing was left of the cult mage but a scorched, charred corpse.
“Go!” she shouted, moving for the stairs now that the magic was gone. “Move!” Another wall of grey swept through, and this time she could almost hear the laughter, not harsh or cruel, but almost … almost like the thing making it was enjoying what it saw.
They ran down the hallway, the electric buzz growing louder and louder around them. The floor was vibrating beneath them, the stone itself humming with energy. Up ahead she could see the doorway into the vault room itself, and beyond that the triangular stone arch. Sparks of grey energy were bounding up and down its length, and she could see a faint distortion around the edge of the stone, like the world itself was twisting. A chanting sound had filled the air.
“Stop!” she shouted as she burst out into a wide open room. Almost a dozen cultists were clustered around the base of the giant slab the arch was standing on, and they turned as she entered. Atop the slab was a single, red unicorn, standing in front of a familiar-looking, floating crystalline object. It was the key. And Sagis’s hooves were already on it.
“Stop them!” he cried as Frost loosed an arrow. A mage swatted it from the air. Blade jumped forward, diving towards the unicorn as magic filled the air around her. The whole cavern was humming with power now, arcs of pure energy jumping from the key to the slot it was floating over and back again. Something pressed her down, hard, and she lost track of Sagis as she lashed out at a cultist, the rest of her team at her side.
“Sagis!” she shouted, shoving a cultist out of the way and giving herself a clear view again. “Don't! It’s not—!”
“King Sombra will rise again!” The unicorn’s voice echoed above the din as he rose up, lifting his hooves high in the air, and then drove them down, slamming the key home. The entire room seemed to freeze, everything stopping as the crystal dropped into place with a dull but faint click.
Then there was a massive crack, a wave of energy blasting out from the key and blasting across the room in a wave, knocking everyone to the ground as the archway began to glow white, energy building up along its sides. As one, every unicorn in the room doubled over in pain, clutching at their horns as arcane energies began to build. Then, the energy snapped towards the center of the archway.
The vault opened.
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So it begins....
I can't wait for the next chapter!
I thought for a minute that this might be your version of Arimaspi, but then I remembered that there's no AU tag. I can't wait to see who it is!
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I totally agree with that. It is also one of the reasons I really like the griffons here. It is kind of refreshing to read about a society where one's oaths are so highly regarded and taken so seriously, with all the benefits and shortcomings that can come with a system so strict.
Praise death.... So chilling
And that cliffhanger--aarrghhh!!
I swear I can hear Boss Fight music starting. I must be hearing things...
so, grogar? it fits with the no ponies part.
Tripwire didn't take improved monologuing and paid the price.
Action level: Very High.
Betcha next chapter's gonna be "Part 2".
Ohhh FUDGE.... For some strange reason I suddenly feel the need to mobilse something massive and heavily armed right now....
So this is the end of Disc 1, and we start next chapter with a new party in Disc 2?
This came to mind as I read those last few paragraphs.
No One can stop Death.
Well I certainly picked the wrong chapter to finally get caught up on.
Also, one big thing that had been bugging me this whole story was the fact that Sombra was sealed in (or at least near) the Crystal Empire, and this place didn't seem that close to it, but throwing out the fact that the Cult is apparently letting someone else out still caught me by surprise. Good job, Viking
Well I doubt it's Grogar, since he ruled over equines. My guess is it's a Gryphon Necromancer
6241099 You and me both dude. Something with a lot of piano I think
-Angel of Team Angelfang
Is it just me, or did an entire scene get doubled?
This sentence seems weird.
So, if Alchemy is an imperfect Captain America, then I predict Frost is eventually going to have to freeze him in a block of ice when his serum finally goes out of control. I mean, you know Cap x Iceberg was the biggest ship he was ever a part of. (Sort of. Technically both him and the iceberg were sort of frozen to the ship.)
But seriously, Frost and Alchemy make a great team. The chemistry between them is really heating up.
6241747 I think the Sea of Endless Ice was what happened to the Crystal Empire.
Behemoth sure was some creepy lovecraftian monstrosity.
Can't wait till the next chapter.
Death's not such a bad guy really. What can the harvest hope for, if not for the care of the Reaper Man?
static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/deathwithcat_8690.jpg
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So you say, but I get the distinct feeling this Death wears a crown and insists on arriving at midnight.
Good work, as usual! If only Sagis did his homework...
Whatever is in the vault (my "money" is still on Griffimhotep), you did an excellent job making it menacing with the little glimpses we got this chapter. You could have had it laugh malevolently or do something else obviously menacing. You could have made it sound angry or insane. Instead, you made it even worse. It's amused at what it's seeing. It's having an unironically jolly time watching the living slay each other. It almost wouldn't seem menacing at all, except there's a hall of statues with the common inscription "Praise Death!" There's something alien in there. Something that's watching the characters we love slay all those that oppose them like we would watch horses fight over a large rubber ball. I get the feeling that everyone here is seriously out of their league on a scale they can't imagine, and that's terrifying in a Lovecraftian sort of way.
Good work, man.
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I know, right? Their colors even complement each other, if you think of it. Can chemistry thaw the ice queen? No, but perhaps Alchemy can!
I ship it like FedEx.
So exciting! I'm on the edge my seat. It's been a while since a story made me do that.
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Hey... Where's the damage count?
I like the damage count...
Time to grab the popcorn, because this is going to be one heck of a final showdown. Think most of us called it that Sombrero wasn't in the vault. OC villain most likely. Oh boy. Watch as it decimates friend and foe alike to add to its power... or sit them down for a nice cup of tea. Best bet is to get the key parts together and hope that it can grant a Deus Ex Machina, because they really had no plans to deal with this..
At the end all I could think of is the Valut from Borderlands.
Well, well, well ...
It's been quite the adventure for all of you to get here, hasn't it?
IS THAT YOU TALKING TO US OR SOMBRA TO THE GRIFFONS PONIES AND MINATOR IN THE ROOM
TELL ME! 
Tripwire forgot to read the Overlord List.
I'm so happy.
Someone in a fic just... took the intelligent route and SHOT THE BITCH.
THANK YOU.
So much.