Scarlet

by Skijarama

Calm

Scarlet waited patiently on the edge of her bed while Windrain gave her one final examination, making absolutely certain that she was fit to be up and about. The mare who had tended to her injuries was a pale-blue pegasus with a neatly braided silver mane and tail. Her cutie mark was a puffy white cloud with rain falling out of it, guided by the wind.

As she worked, Scarlet’s eyes kept wandering back to the still-sleeping form of Primrose. It had been well over a day since Scarlet initially woke up in this bed, and in that time, the small foal had shown no signs of getting back on her hooves. She hadn’t even stirred once. She remained well and truly unconscious, even though her wounds had all but closed at this point.

...Was she ever going to wake up?

“Okay, miss, I think you’re ready to get up and move around,” Wind suddenly confirmed with a smile and chirpy nod. She stepped back and held out a hoof to help Scarlet up. “Come on, up you go.”

Scarlet let herself be hauled back to her hooves. She took it slow, her muscles still burning from the run she had made. She wobbled a little once she was up, but quickly found her balance and held steady. After a second to make sure she would stay that way, she gave Wind an appreciative nod and smile. “Thank you for the assistance, Windrain.”

The pegasus waved off the gratitude. “It was the least I could do, don’t you worry about it. Just take it easy and take it slow for a few more days and you’ll be right as rain in no time,” she replied before turning back to Primrose. Her expression withered somewhat, and she knelt down to check her bandages.

Scarlet watched her for several seconds, wondering if she should ask if she could help. She was quick to reign in that impulse, however, reminding herself that, no matter how much it frustrated her, she wasn’t a medical expert, and thus far, Wind hadn’t needed any of her help. Prim’s health was safe in her hooves for the time being.

Wind glanced back at her after a moment, her eyes softening with sympathy and understanding. “Don’t worry about Primrose, I’ll take good care of her. Why don’t you go and get a breath of fresh air, hm?” she suggested in a hushed voice, nodding slightly for the door. “You’ve been cooped up in here for days. Some sun will do you some good, I think.”

Scarlet was hesitant, but after a moment decided that Wind was probably right. “Alright… thanks again,” she said before turning and seeing herself out.

The room she stepped into took up most of the floor space of the house if she had to guess. The walls, much like the bedroom she had left, were made up of wooden logs. There was the occasional shelf jutting out, loaded with sacks or small boxes, and plenty of unlit candles. Against the far left wall was a large stone fireplace that appeared to be without any wood at the moment. A series of open-air windows were in the front wall, the shutters open to allow evening sunlight to stream inside.

In the center of the room was a simple, square-shaped wooden table with four chairs situated around it, placed on top of a basic brown rug. There were a few other smaller tables and chairs placed around against the walls, accompanied by plenty of crates and barrels for storing supplies.

It was simple but charming. Scarlet smiled softly in appreciation before heading for the front door and nudging it open with her magic. A wave of fresh evening air washed over her, and all at once the tension in her body was considerably eased. She squinted against the sunlight for a second, allowing her eyes to adjust to the view in front of her.

Hoofrest Shire wasn’t a large settlement, by any means. It was even smaller than New Lapiz was. Despite its small scale, it was nonetheless rather charming. A dirt road wound its way between a collection of hills, snaking its way steadily higher and higher up before looping back down and reconnecting with the main entrance of the village, creating a large winding circle. Along the road was a series of modest wooden homes, each one accompanied by a collection of fields where their crops were growing under the sunlight. A few smaller roads cut through those fields, helping to define and clearly distinguish each plot of land from one another. Between all of that, it was largely open grasslands across the rolling hills, with the tall and majestic mountains looming in the distance like a protective wall.

A few foals went scampering by, laughing and chattering amongst themselves as they passed while their families worked in the fields. A few ponies that appeared to be in their early to mid-teens were sequestered away in various spots that they probably thought were isolated and hidden, but were in fact quite obvious, cuddling and talking.

Scarlet rook in a slow, deep breath, allowing the peacefulness of it all to soothe and relax her tired muscles. Sometimes she forgot just how pleasant the smaller towns could be. All her time in Swanrun made her used to big crowds and a rush to get where they needed to go.

“Scarlet, you’re up!” Lens’ voice suddenly called from the side.

Scarlet turned to face him, seeing that he had just emerged from a rickety old shed off to one side of Apple and Wind’s home, his saddlebags slung over his shoulders and a relieved smile on his face. She briefly eyed his bags before smiling at him directly. “Yes, I am, finally,” she replied in greeting before focusing on his bags again and raising an eyebrow. “Are you going somewhere?”

“Huh?” Lens tilted his head in confusion before following her gaze. His eyes lit up with realization. “Oh! Oh, no no no, not at all! I’m just, uh, I was… here!”

He lit up his horn and withdrew Primrose’s lamp from one of his pouches, levitating it over to Scarlet for her to see. “Apple Juice was kind enough to lend me his old shack for our stay, and I’ve been using the space to try and study this thing again.”

“Without your tools?” Scarlet asked with a raised eyebrow, gingerly taking the unusual artifact in her hooves. “I imagine your progress has been slow if that’s the case…”

“It has,” Lens admitted with a sheepish nod, his hoof scuffing in the dirt. “But, hey, I’ve had three days!”

“And what have you found out?”

Lens excitedly took the lamp back in his magic and stood next to Scarlet’s side, pressing right up against her. “Okay, so, I didn’t notice these runes here before,” he began excitedly, pointing out the ancient arcane symbols that Scarlet had noticed in her initial examination. “Kinda obvious that they would be there, in retrospect, what with how old this thing is and the nature of the enchantment. You don’t usually get wards this intense and layered without magic runes like these. Old Ponish, Hippogyphian Marks, Somnambulan Hieroglyphs - which, by the way, are absolutely fascinating in their own right-”

“Lens, Lens,” Scarlet suddenly cut in with an amused smirk. “Focus, please. You’re rambling.”

Lens’ face turned a faint shade of red, and he coughed into his hoof, a display Scarlet found more than a little adorable. “R-right, yes, well. Ahem. Anyways,” he cleared his throat before going on. “My Old Ponish is, er, shall we say, not very well developed, but I know enough about them to know what these runes in particular mean.”

Scarlet raised an eyebrow. “Is that so?”

Lens nodded and pointed each one out in succession. “Uh-huh. Each one is loaded with magic, but in the end, to cut a long story short, they add up to create probably the most powerful sealing spell I have ever seen!”

“A sealing spell?”

Lens nodded, grinning from ear to ear. “Yup! I dunno what exactly it’s sealing though, and all of my attempts to see through the wards have led to some pretty intense backlash. Whoever made this thing, they really did not want it being messed with.”

Scarlet eyed the lamp, a feeling of distrust slowly starting to creep into her mind. “So, is it possible that whatever is inside of this lamp is dangerous?” she questioned carefully, narrowing her eyes at the artifact in question.

“I don’t think so,” Lens replied without missing a beat before pointing out one rune in particular. “See, if the idea was containment, then this rune wouldn’t be here. It’s a ‘release’ rune, meaning that somewhere in the jumbled mess of wards, fail-safes, countermeasures, and redundancies, there is a way of opening this thing up and letting out whatever is inside.”

Scarlet’s eyebrow went right up. “Are you sure it’s already filled?”

Lens hesitated for a second, his prior exuberance wilting just a little. “Er, well, I can’t know for sure,” he admitted, rubbing the back of his head. “It could be that this thing is empty and just waiting for something to be put inside… but considering that Primrose and her family have been guarding this thing for generations, it just seems kind of odd that they would be trying to protect what’s essentially an empty box.”

Scarlet hummed in consideration, focusing on the lamp for a short while. Eventually, she turned to Lens and gave him a small smile. “Well, if nothing else, we know more about it now than we did before,” she said quietly before leaning over and giving him an affectionate nuzzle. “Thank you for that.”

Lens went rigid from the display of affection but was quick to return it, smiling pleasantly. “I wanted to do something useful for a change,” he whispered to her. “Ever since I got mixed up in all of this, you’ve done most of the work.”

“Don’t sell yourself short,” Scarlet scolded him lightly with a firm look and reassuring smile. “If it hadn’t been for you, Prim would have bled out while I was fighting Silent, and we wouldn’t have gotten the help we needed from these ponies if you hadn’t run to call for help after I passed out.”

Lens’ cheeks turned a faint shade of red, and he awkwardly looked off to one side. “Well, yeah, but…” he stammered, rubbing the back of his head.

“Not to mention you used a barrier to buy us time to think of a plan back in Shimmervale,” Scarlet went on, relishing in watching the stallion squirm. “And I’m pretty sure you used magic to keep Edge from cutting out my throat.”

“Okay, okay, I get it!” Lens whined, swatting at Scarlet in a vain attempt to make her be quiet. The two shared a quiet laugh at that before the stallion shook his head and gain a quiet sigh. “Still… I had to do something while you were out.”

“And you did,” Scarlet replied quietly with a slow nod. The two fell silent for a moment, allowing a warm breeze to wash over them.

Suddenly, the sound of somepony clearing their throat behind them caught their attention. Scarlet spun to face the new arrival, but alas, Lens would end up turning in just the right way that caused the two to spin into each other. Their necks collided into each other from the side, and both of them soon found themselves falling to the ground in a heap of limbs and rapidly mounting embarrassment.

Scarlet huffed indignantly before lifting her eyes to see who had just had to bear witness to that. She was greeted by the quizzical face of Apple Juice, his eyebrow cocked at an angle to betray his confusion. “Er… howdy, there.”

“...Hi,” came Scarlet’s blunt response before her horn lit up, and she lightly shoved Lens off of her. The two rose back to their hooves, dusting themselves off and trying to forget that that had just happened.

Apple smirked at them. “Well, Ah hope Ah weren’t interruptin’ nothin’. How ya feelin’, ma’am?” he asked, nodding towards Scarlet.

“Like I just fell in the dirt,” Scarlet deadpanned before shooting Lens an irritated pout. “Which was not my fault at all.”

Lens shied away from her, lifting his hooves in a placating manner. “Hey, it was an accident!”

Apple Juice shook his head and chuckled at their antics before turning and heading for the door. “Right, well, Ah’m gonna go ahead and get a start on supper. Probably won’t be more than an hour or two. Ah’ll holler when it’s ready,” he told them before slipping inside the house and disappearing from view.

This left Scarlet and Lens all on their own in relative quiet. She glanced over at him every so often before looking awkwardly at something else, her mind doing some rather impressive gymnastics to try and think of a way to break the silence and get the conversation going again.

Eventually, her eyes landed on the path in front of her, and a thought occurred to her. Slowly, her lips curled up into a smile, and she glanced back at Lens. “Come on… let’s go for a walk,” she suggested, her legs already going into motion.

Lens blinked at her in confusion, lagging behind a bit before cantering to catch up. “A walk? What for?” he asked curiously.

Scarlet looked directly ahead and took a deep breath. “I have been completely immobile for a few days now, Lens. I need to get some strength back in my legs,” she informed him, and she knew that was technically true. She drifted a little closer to him and gestured around at the peaceful little town. “But more than that… I just want to take a little bit and smell the roses, as it were.”

Lens hummed in thought. After a moment, his curiosity was replaced with satisfaction, and he drifted closer to her in turn. “Alright, fair enough. Let’s walk,” he agreed.

Scarlet’s smile grew, but she elected to say nothing else for the time being. She focused ahead on the path, savoring the fresh air, and genuinely peaceful atmosphere around them.

Comments

[JMP]

Well, glad to have Lens around. I'm hoping Primrose will wake up soon. And that the inevitable storm is far off.

[harts fire]

things are looking up with a good bit of luck maybe that will find out more about the lamp.

[Workable Goblin]

Hmmm. I bet you anything that lamp is holding either one of the Princesses or Chrysalis. I also bet you anything it's going to end up opened before the end of the story.

[vren55]

9889833
If it’s a princess I bet it’s princess twilight

[MixMassBasher]

Is it possible that Discord is sealed inside there? Or Chrysalis?

[The Voice in the Water]

Glad Scarlet and Lens had a chance to just be ponies for a little while, and not have to be looking over their shoulders for Silent. And… we got a little more information on that damn lamp.

[tom117z]

“Yup! I dunno what exactly it’s sealing though

Or who, perhaps...?

[My Little Epona]

9889964
Or King Sombra even. It could be anyone............

[mustangdrew4]

Since no one has mentioned it... that last scene with Lens and Scarlet was just friggin adorable!

[RegMoDII]

9889964
If it were Chrysalis it would lend more credence to why primros' family would be guarding it so religiously but it wouldn't explain why the council wants it. I think it's a map