Chapter 6
“What kinda shockin’ blink do you mean that you ain’t heard of Cranberry Day?” Arteria huffed. “It’s one of th’ most crackin holidays in all Thestralia!”
Everypony in the room looked from Arteria to Ibis. She shrugged.
“I have no idea what she’s talking about,” Ibis said. “I don’t know why you all expect me to be a walking library of random trivia. Though I suppose my vast and cyclopean intellect is to blame.”
“And all you hook-birds put me on flamegas duty for thinkin’ I make up my jabs and here she is breakin’ out words that don’t even make a wink of sense,” Arteria scoffed. “Cranberry Day is the celebration of the founding of the capital of Thestralia, Cranberry Canyon!”
“You realize none of us know anything about Thestralia, right?” Larrikin asked. They rolled over onto their back, stretching and reaching up. “You all live on the ceiling, right?”
“Yes, but it’s rude as a derggo t’ point it out,” Arteria mumbled. “Anyhow one of you shockers must have a hair on it since I got this ‘ere Cranberry Day gift!”
She held up a parcel carefully wrapped in black silk.
“It wasn’t me,” Dawn said.
Berlioz shrugged.
“I never heard of it either,” Phantasma agreed.
Larrikin shrugged. “Did you get food? I got food last time we had a holiday.”
Arteria paused. “I donno. I didn’t open it.”
“Berlioz thinks pony should open it.”
Arteria shrugged and tugged at the silk with the tips of her wings. “Did a proper tiedown on this treat,” she mumbled. “I’d near swear this silk was from…”
She managed to get the hidden knot, finding an edge to the fine black silk and unveiling her gift. Inside was a wooden cage, and looking out through the bars were six tiny glowing eyes.
“No shockin’ way,” Arteria whispered. “This bloke is a six-eyed star spider! They’re th’ friendliest little wall-crawlers in all of Thestralia! Barely even poisonous enough t’ knock you out!”
Berlioz scratched his head. “Spider is present?”
“Is it food?” Larrikin asked. “I honestly have no idea what bat ponies eat.”
“I believe from her reaction it’s a pet,” Ibis said.
Arteria opened up the cage and the spider crawled out, up her hoof and onto her shoulder, making cute spider noises.
“Aw, she’s already a cuddler,” Arteria said, tilting her head to rub her cheek against the star spider.
“Its got something on its back,” Dawn said.
Arteria looked. “Huh. It’s a Cranberry Day card.” She pulled it free with her mouth and unfolded it like a flower. She mumbled to herself, reading whatever was written in it, and froze up. “Oh no…”
“What’s wrong?” Phantasma asked.
“This is awful,” Arteria whispered. “This is the shockin… shockin shockest shockin shock!”
“Is it just me or has her use of slang degraded to the point where her syntax has become totally encrypted semantic garbage?” Ibis asked.
“Maybe it’s a separate dialect where the intonation and emphasis on syllables changes the meaning of the words,” Dawn suggested. “I think there are some old Unicornian languages like that, from the third dynasty.”
“Dynasty nothin!” Arteria snapped. “This is blinkin awful!”
“You got a present. How bad can it be?” Larrikin asked.
“Me shockin mum is coming to the school for the holiday!” Arteria shrieked. “Now if you ladies an’ gents don’t mind, I’m
thinkin I’m gonna flip flap an’ yell until I’ve screamed out all my terror an’ pass out.”
“That sounds fun,” Larrikin said. “Can I join in?”
Arteria nodded. “Sure.”
Larrikin got up and started running around and screaming.
Phantasma sighed. “I hate Cranberry Day.”
“Okay, I’m going to need an explanation,” Dawn said, closing the door behind her. “First, it turns out whatever you said to Principal Starlight convinced her to start decorating the school for a holiday I’m still not sure is actually real. Second, why are you so scared about your mom showing up?”
“My mom…” Arteria sighed. She gave the spider a few more pets, stroking along its abdomen. “Alright, so that’s one hefty loop-de-loop of a tale. I ain’t spied any of you about even one shard of that broken mirror.”
“Would it be too much to beg you to use normal Ponish?” Dawn groaned.
Arteria thought carefully for a long moment. “Yes.”
“I think I’m going to get you a thesaurus for Cranberry Day,” Dawn said.
“I don’t gloam on what a thesaurus is but if it’s anything like a hook-bird, I’ve already got a pet, and she’s a sweet little girl.”
Dawn sighed. “Arteria, come on. I just want to help. Tell me what’s going on.”
“I guess if you wanted to know why I’ve got th’ wing shivers about my mom, I gotta go all the way back to the story that my mom told me when I was ear-high to a stalagmite.” She cleared her throat and started speaking in a more formal tone, obviously reciting from memory.
“After the Day of the Nightmare, our ancestors were labeled enemies of Equestria. They had supported Nightmare Moon, and when she was banished they had no leader, no cause, and no allies. They had been honorable and clever ponies in their own way, but now all the crimes of their master landed on their heads.
“Celestia could have shown us mercy, forgiven us our crimes, but she turned her gaze away and allowed us to be put on trial. For the crimes our ancestors committed, our bloodlines were banished for all time from any place where the sun might shine upon us. As we had supported endless night we were no longer to see the day.
“Hundreds of us were driven into the deep caverns of the earth, the endless black miles of tunnels and darkness. The way back to the light was sealed behind us, and we were supposed to die forgotten and blind in the bowels of the earth. Instead, we thrived and forged a new land of our own.”
Arteria coughed, dropping back into her usual tone.
“Thestals are all descendants of those criminals,” Arteria explained. “Mostly pegasus ponies but you prolly got the echo of that one just from me havin’ flip flaps even if they ain’t all fluffed. Also got earth pony an’ unicorn in there distant somewhere. Prolly how we can walk on the roof.”
“Interesting,” Dawn muttered. “So that’s why there’s so little known! It really isn’t on any map, and it’s part of the history Celestia wanted forgotten.”
“Yeah. Princess Luna found out about us right after she came back an’ even took a few of us into her personal guard,” Arteria said.
“Honestly I’m almost more surprised you can speak for that long without saying something using made-up slang.”
“It ain’t made up!” Arteria protested. “There’s plenty of topsider lingo I don’t got a bite on. Can’t blame a bat for not crawling when they can fly, you grok me?”
“I grok like half of what you’re saying,” Dawn said. “Let me see if I understand - with Luna back, presumably Equestria has started trying to open up dialogue with Thestralia, and we’re celebrating one of your fake holidays--”
“It’s a real holiday! I even got a present. That proves it’s on the deep down.”
“--One of your obscure holidays,” Dawn corrected. “Because they want to… make you feel included?”
“More like they want me mum to feel included,” Arteria mumbled, rubbing her mane. “I don’t like to wag my wingspan like a filly with the biggest lake-bug in her craw but she’s sort of a big bat down there. It’s like, uh, well, you know how th’ mares in Canterlot that hang the tightest are from important families?”
“Sure. Most of the nobility is war heroes or old money or had really famous and powerful sorcerers in their lineage.”
“Right on. Our greatest heroes are the ponies who helped us tame the wilds. The rockrangers an’ hookbird wranglers who kept us alive through them early times. My family is descended from Black Bread Nelly, a mare who went an’ fought off a whole derggo raiding army on her own. She lured ‘em into a tight canyon an’ held the ground wearin’ armor bodged together from a box of scraps.”
“Oh. I get it. Your family is nobility, huh?” Dawn frowned. “Why is that such a big deal? I knew a lot of nobles and you’re… well, you’re in the upper half.”
“Is that good or bad?” Arteria asked.
“Good! You’re like, a million times better than some ponies. Like Azure.” Dawn groaned. “At least I don’t have to worry about her showing up.”
“No, instead you gotta keep your ears open for my mum pouncing on us. You don’t get how bad it can be. See, when I say she’s a big bat, I mean she’s the biggest bat. And, uh, I might have gone topside without askin’ her for leave. Or writin’.”
“You ran away from home?!”
“Keep your voice down!” Arteria hissed. “Last thing I need is gossip spillin’ everywhere! I don’t even know how she found out I was here! I ain’t even gabbed my real title an’ I wear a disguise everywhere!”
“A disguise-- wait, you mean the sunglasses are supposed to be a disguise?”
“Well, duh,” Arteria scoffed. “Can’t tell at all what I really look like. You can barely even see me on account of how shady they make things!”
Dawn rubbed her snout. “That’s not how sunglasses work… But I bet either Princess Luna tipped her off about you or Princess Twilight got curious enough to ask about it herself. You’re the only batpony in school, so your mom probably put two and two together and figured out the only batpony outside of Thestralia is the only batpony missing from Thestralia.”
“Oath, when you lay it out like that it makes me feel like a bogan wonderin why there ain’t no tunnels going across a canyon,” Arteria groaned.
“You don’t think she’ll try to pull you out of school, will she?” Dawn asked.
“Fair right question,” Arteria sighed. “She won’t like that I ain’t gone an’ made the Principal treat me like royalty. Good thing Starlight ain’t a stallion, neither. Mum don’t like the notion of stallions workin’ instead of staying home an’ takin’ care of the nest. She’s a bit old-fashioned about that.”
“Old fashioned.” Dawn raised an eyebrow.
“Well, you know how it is,” Arteria scoffed. “Stallions are emotional, delicate, not really suited to be leaders. That sort of dinkum. If she thought a stallion was in charge of things she’d prolly flip a u-ey and do somethin’ dumb.”
“...How bad is ‘flippin a u-ey’?” Dawn asked, suddenly worried.
“Why?” Arteria asked, slowly.
“Oh honeycrust,” Arteria groaned.
“What’s wrong?” Sunburst asked. “Are the banners okay? I just sort of took an educated guess and went for dark red. I mean, Cranberry Day, right? So probably we should do something with cranberries.”
“That’s not the bogan in the well,” Arteria sighed. “What do you mean Principal Starlight is out for the week?!”
“Apparently something happened in the Crystal Empire and Princess Twilight asked her to take care of it personally,” Sunburst said. “I didn’t really get the details, but don’t worry! I’m on top of this. You kids don’t have anything to worry about.” He paused. “Um, and I apologize on behalf of the school for not using your title before, Duchess.”
Dawn turned slowly. “Duchess?!”
Arteria coughed, her cheeks red. “Can we put a fang in that an’ pretend it ain’t the aboleth in th’ room?”
“Isn’t Duchess like, one step down from Princess?” Dawn asked.
Arteria groaned. “That’s why I don’t gob none an try to drop th’ title like a drop-cloak spottin’ prey down below.”
“What’s a drop-cloak?” Sunburst whispered. Dawn shrugged.
“You uplanders ain’t got proper wildlife. They lurk on th’ ceilin’ and wait for somethin’ to walk under ‘em. Sorta like a trapper but on the reverse. Very dangerous critters. They bite onta you and wrap ya all up like a ponyrito until yer just bones.”
Dawn glanced up, just in case.
“Looks like I’m gonna have to mare down and take charge,” Arteria sighed. “So first stab in the dark we need is the giblets. Can’t have a Cranberry Day festival without somethin’ to gob on so the whole roost can shove their mouths full of sugar instead of their own hooves.”
“Well, I’ve already placed an order, so there should be cupcakes here by tomorrow,” Sunburst said. “You kids don’t have to worry. I’ve got everything perfectly under--”
“Oy! Don’t you even dare!” Arteria snapped, her wings raising up to make her look bigger, like she was trying to scare off a predator. “You know what kind of pookum that brings when a feckless stallion goes an’ says things can’t get worse or everything’s under control or some shockin’ deaf thing like that?”
“This isn’t a war. This is just a little party.”
“A little…?” Arteria huffed. “You aint even got an echo of what me mum is like. If things aren’t exactly perfect…” she shuddered.
“Well, how about we go down to the bakery to check on the order?” Dawn suggested. “It’s probably Sugarcube Corner, right?”
Sunburst nodded. “I gave the order to Pound Cake myself. It’s a little tight with the Summer Sun Celebration right around the corner, but he was able to fit us in.”
“Speaking of that, we can probably use my checklist for the Celebration to make sure everything important is done for your mother’s arrival.”
“Grand idea, Dawn!” Arteria said. “We’ll just pop in to make sure it’s all on the down low.”
“After we check on food, we can try to arrange some music. I doubt that’ll be hard,” Dawn said, looking over a piece of scrap paper she’d jotted some notes onto. “Most musicians have plenty of time on their hooves in the lead up to the Celebration, and the local ones aren’t going to go on tour when they could be playing here for Princess Twilight.”
Dawn looked up and realized she was speaking to thin air.
“Arteria?” She looked around and up and it wasn’t until she looked back that she saw Arteria was standing in the school’s doorway, shuffling her hooves pensively.
Dawn walked back over, putting the paper away.
“Are you okay?” Dawn asked. “This isn’t some kind of weird reverse vampire thing where I have to formally invite you outside, is it? Because if it is, I have some serious questions about how you got to the Castle of the Twin Sisters a few weeks ago.”
“...Can you keep a secret?” Arteria whispered.
“Better than most ponies,” Dawn said.
“I don’t like going out of doors,” Arteria hissed. She looked up. “It ain’t cracker. Look at that!”
“It’s the sky.”
“Exactly! No ceiling at all! Don’t matter how hard you listen, there ain’t no echo at all. It’s just a ‘orrible void of shockin’ nothin lurking way up on top. Last time I went out here Berlioz didn’t half had to carry me until we got to the forest where the trees were at least some kind of cover. It’s like any second I might just get sucked right up an’ never land anywhere at all!”
“You’re afraid of the outside?” Dawn blinked.
“I can’t even get one ear on why you ain’t shiverin’ in yer breeches about all this! You uplanders are so crazy you can’t begin to grok why it’s so shockin’ awful! Can’t even get a return on half the things I can see, like that rock over there.” Arteria pointed.
“...That’s Canterlot. It’s like twenty miles away.” Dawn could have been more exact, but this wasn’t the kind of conversation where she needed to be more accurate to more than an order of magnitude.
“Twenty miles?!”
“I know that sounds pretty far, but the mountain is so tall that we can see it way further than the normal distance to the horizon. If you wanted to calculate it, you can use the square root of the object’s height in feet and multiply by about one and a quarter--”
“Shock, Dawn! This ain’t about the shockin’ mathemagic you unicorns do! That’s even further than the whole length of Cranberry Canyon!”
“Is that good or bad?”
“It’s like bein’ blind,” Arteria whispered. “Can’t hear a shockin’ thing, and the things you do hear are from so blinkin’ long on that you ain’t sure about th’ direction. No proper tunnels or caverns to shape th’ sound at all, and things can sneak up on ya from anywhere.”
“I guess it’s like the opposite of claustrophobia,” Dawn muttered. “What can I do to help?”
“I just gotta mare down an’ do it,” Arteria said. “Can’t let me mum catch an earful of skinty gabs about her little spiderbite bein’ afraid of a big nothing. It’d be a stain on th’ noble bloodline of Black Bread Nelly.”
“Maybe…” Dawn thought. “How about I keep talking, and you focus on that instead of the quiet?”
“Yeah. Yeah, that might work,” Arteria nodded. “And we’ll just… walk close like, so I don’t get lost if I have to close my eyes to rest ‘em a bit. It’s too shockin’ bright out here.”
“Sure,” Dawn said, taking her hoof. “Don’t worry. We’ll get there.”
“So what was that about music?” Arteria asked.
“Well depending on what kind of music your mother and you like we’ve got a lot of options in town. I already interviewed a few of them to think about options. The town’s got everything from classically trained ponies to the latest in thaumosynthwavecore. That’s a new music genre that was invented when two local bands had a terrible cart accident and the band members that weren’t injured had to put together an act using a theremin, electric bass, two vocalists, and a drum set that was half acoustic and half electronic…”
Arteria nodded along, squeezing Dawn’s hoof for support and listening to every word she said to help drown out that terrible emptiness above.
“You’re shockin’ dreggin me keckmines!” Arteria spat, trying to get the taste off her tongue. “What the shockin shock did you do to these poor things?”
“It’s a normal recipe,” Pound Cake said, confused. He leaned in to sniff. “Yeah, it’s not even one of Aunt Pinkie’s weird one-offs. That’s just a normal carob and carrot cupcake.”
“Carob is normal?” Dawn asked.
“It’s hypoallergenic,” Pound shrugged. “When we have an order at the school we have to think about accommodating a lot of different creatures.”
“I ain’t servin’ this to me mum,” Arteria said. “She’d take me home just on principle if she thought I was eatin’ junk like this. Guess I’ll have t’ show you how it’s done.”
She hopped over the counter into the kitchen.
“Does she know how to cook?” Pound asked.
“Well, she’s been taking the basic classes with everypony at the school, but, um, maybe it would be a good idea if we supervise?”
“Oy! Where’re the onions?!” Arteria shouted from the back.
“A very good idea,” Pound agreed, letting Dawn back behind the counter so neither of them would be facing whatever was in the kitchen alone.
Arteria had, in a shockingly short time, found ingredients that Pound would have sworn weren’t in the kitchen before she started looking for them, which either meant she’d brought them with her or else she’d found one of Pinkie’s stashes.
“Don’t even got proper red mushie paste,” Arteria mumbled. “Think I can whip somethin’ up with all this.” She dumped mushrooms into a bubbling saucepot. “Ain’t had to make vegactite from scratch before.”
“Do I even want to know what that is?”
“Ah well it’s th’ ultimate health food is what it is!” Arteria said, dumping a whole bag of something into the pot.
“That was yeast,” Pound said. “You have absolutely no idea what you’re doing.”
“I jes said I’m makin’ vegactite! It’s a shockin’ essential in th’ kitchen.” She stirred the boiling pot. “It’s, uh, it’s sort of made of leftovers from makin’ mushroom ale an’ all sorts of healthy things fer vitamins. Like, uh…”
She held up a turnip.
“This… carrot?” she guessed.
Pound shook his head.
“Well, it’s still healthy,” Arteria said, tossing it in. “We just gotta boil this slop down to jam, and oingo boingo, bat’s yer uncle!”
“How long is that going to take?” Dawn asked, looking into the pot. It looked like mud, if she was being generous. She wondered if the otyugh in the sewers would be willing to eat it.
“About eight or twelve hours,” Arteria said.
“I can’t have that in the kitchen all day!” Pound groaned. “I’ve got to bake! And that smell is…” he shivered.
“No worries. I ain’t aiming to shoot right through. I’m gonna sit ‘ere and baby it like m’ own foal until it’s good and ready.” Arteria paused. “I just winked there in case you couldn’t tell with me sunnies.”
Pound gave Dawn a pleading look.
“We’ve got a lot of other things we need to take care of,” Dawn said. “I don’t think you can spend the time here, and Pound doesn’t know how to make it, um, properly, so we might just want to dump this out--”
“Far away from the store, please,” Pound said.
“--Dump it out into the river and figure out something else,” Dawn finished.
Arteria sighed. “Fair digs. Can’t spend all night on this when there’s hard yakka to flap on to. We’ll just have to speed things up, since me mum would dangle me by me ears if I didn’t have vegactite.”
“You can’t just speed up cooking something. Trust me. I learned that lesson the hard way in baking class-- why are you looking at me like that?”
“You’re gonna try to pass me on the right and claim you ain’t gone and found a spell that’d do exactly that?” Arteria asked.
“It’s not the kind of thing you can just…” Dawn sighed. “Okay. We might be able to speed it up a little if we can increase the boiling rate, but if you just turn up the heat, it’s going to burn, and a pressure cooker won’t release the steam.”
Pound sat down and extended his wings. “I could create a low-pressure zone over the pot. It would let it boil harder at a low temperature. But that air’s going to get saturated with steam pretty quickly. It’s sort of gradient thing. If we could make the air really dry, it’d come out even faster.”
“Maybe a drying spell?” Dawn suggested. “I have a lot of practice with how often Larrikin hangs out in my room without asking.”
“Alright. Let’s give it a go,” Arteria said, stepping back.
Pound started flapping slowly, and the steam rising out of the pot swirled in a vortex, drawn out faster and faster while the bubbling reached a fever pitch. Dawn cast her spell, pulling the steam out of the air as fast as she could.
The pot bubbled and actually jumped a little, the suction pulling it up. Dawn grabbed the handles, holding it down.
“Is it working?” Arteria asked.
“It’s doing something!” Dawn yelled.
“Just hold it for another minute,” Pound Cake said. “It shouldn’t take long to boil it down at this rate.” And then, he hoped, they could throw the whole pot into the Everfree. He’d never be able to cook caramels in it again.
The bubbling and steaming came to a slow stop, and the pot jumped a few more times like a thrashing animal caught in a trap before finally going still.
“It’s done,” Pound sighed, folding his wings.
Dawn was the first to look inside, and she looked mortified. “I’m sorry, Arteria. I think we messed something up really badly.”
Inside the pot was a layer of almost jet-black muck two inches deep and as thick as marmalade. All the vegetables and assorted things Arteria had thrown in had broken down into it, and there was absolutely nothing identifiable left.
“Hmmm…” Arteria rubbed her chin. Then she grabbed a few slices of bread from the counter.
“What are you doing?” Pound asked.
“Well we gotta test it, don’t we?” Arteria asked. “Here, toast these, would you? We’ll need a slab of butter too. Can’t do up a proper vegactite sammie without it!”
“You can’t be serious,” Pound said.
Dawn dutifully toasted the bread, and Arteria buttered each slice, then added a thin layer of the black mush from the pot.
“I’m not sure this is food,” Dawn said.
“Look, we’re all in this together,” Arteria said. “We’ll try it on three. One. Two… Three!”
Like three ponies going to the gallows, they raised the bread up and bit into it. Pound immediately spat it out, gagging.
Dawn managed to swallow and put the rest of her toast down, pushing it far away.
Arteria took a second bite, then a third, then finished her toast.
“Oh shockin’ oath that is blinkin’ amazing! It’s even better’n the real thing!”
“It’s supposed to taste like that?!” Pound gagged.
“Well a delicate little stallion like you prolly can’t handle it, but Dawn kept it down, eh?” She patted the unicorn on the back. “Good stuff. You should be able t’ make some swirly bread an’ filled steam buns like that, right?”
“I technically can,” Pound said. “I’m not sure it would be ethical.”
“Look, it’s for me mum. She’ll love it. Please?”
“Fine,” Pound sighed. “I’ll… figure something out.”
“Cracker! What’s next on the list, Dawn?”
“Music, I think? Let me just, um, give him my notes. Why don’t you wait out front and I’ll catch up?”
“Sure. You gonna eat that?” She pointed to Dawn’s toast.
“It’s all yours,” Dawn said, passing it over. Arteria happily bit into it and walked out of the kitchen.
Pound watched her go, then looked at Dawn. “I can’t serve that to ponies!” he hissed.
“Look, just make a few things with it, then put the rest in a jar or something else for her,” Dawn whispered. “Make the rest of the cupcakes the regular way.”
Pound nodded glumly.
“I’ll get her out of here before she thinks of other ways to help,” Dawn promised.
“Okay, let’s hear what you got,” Arteria said.
“I think you’ll like this,” Neon Lights said. “Okay everypony, from the top! One, two…”
The band lurched into action. Regardless of what genre they claimed to play -- which varied depending on the day and which member of the band one decided to ask -- they were essentially a jazz band operating on the very edge of the esoteric edge. They were clearly very professional about the whole operation, too. Every time one of them hit a sour note, they glared at somepony else as if it was their fault.
“You were deffo not tellin a furphy on this,” Arteria sighed. “It’s like somepony found the loose bits of two bands in th’ trash and bodged them into an act.”
The two vocalists were nice enough to take turns, which was good because one was trying to growl like they were summoning electric demons with the assistance of the theremin and the other was belting out lyrics about being in love.
“They’re very popular,” Dawn said.
“With who?” Arteria asked.
Dawn tried to come up with an answer to that while the bassist did his level best to play well, though he sped through the easiest parts and had to slow down for the more difficult passages, meaning he was never quite on beat with the drums, which the theremin player was trying to manage with a forehoof and bass pedal while also waving his other forehoof in the air to produce droning tones from the rest of his equipment.
“I mean they’re not bad,” Dawn said.
Arteria was about to say something, so Dawn quickly revised her statement.
“Individually,” Dawn corrected.
Arteria scrunched up her nose, her ears twitching. She nodded. “Bit iffy havin’ em all in the same place. You sure they’re all playin’ the same song?”
It was a good question, because they didn’t all quite manage to finish at the same time, the bass player trailing off into an awkward solo before just stopping.
“So what do you think?” Neon Lights asked.
“What’d you say th’ name of this…” Arteria gestured at the four ponies. “Band? Is band deffo the word we’re using? Okay. What’s the name of this band, then?”
“Captain Neon and His Magic Band!” Neon Lights said.
“I thought we were going with Pecan Sandies?” asked the stallion on drums and theremin.
“No, we’re not using that, Riff. I told you, we need to really play on the fact we’re like nothing else,” Neon retorted. “Also we need to tell people we’re a band.”
Arteria nodded. “I get the echo on why you’d have a header on that. Jes one minute, no worries.” She pulled Dawn aside, then a little more aside when the band started tuning their instruments. Or playing another song. It was hard to tell.
“I admit they’re not the best,” Dawn whispered.
“You’re gonna have to speak up a bit on account of how my ears are ringin’. What’s the polite way t’ tell them to flap off?”
“Well, before you do that, you should know one very important thing,” Dawn said.
“What’s that?”
“They’re the only ones who showed up when we offered the job.”
“...What?”
“It turns out quite a few local bands have decided to take the summer to go on tour and only come back for the Summer Sun Celebration, which means just about every pony who knows how to hold an instrument correctly isn’t here. They’ll be here in a few days, sure, but not tomorrow.”
“You mean to tell me in this town, where you promised there were dozens of musicians…”
“This is all we have right now because of the short notice,” Dawn sighed.
“Well buck me dead,” Arteria groaned.
“It’s better than nothing, right?” Dawn smiled bravely. “I mean, no matter how picky your mother might be about music or anything, they’re a local band and they’re enthusiastic. Let’s just try to be polite and nice because otherwise we’re going to have hope Ibis and Phantasma have hidden musical talents that they’ll discover in the next day.”
Arteria sighed and swept back her white mane. She turned to the band. “How many songs do you blokes know?”
Neon Lights looked at the other band members. “We’ve never really managed to play the same once twice.”
“Well it’ll be original, then. Welcome aboard.”
“So that’s food and entertainment,” Arteria said. “What’s left?”
“Cider,” Dawn said.
“Cider?” Arteria repeated. “What’s that?”
“You’ve never had cider?” Dawn smiled. “It’s unfiltered apple juice. The Apple family has a secret recipe and the best apples in Equestria, according to Princess Twilight.”
“Yeah but… aren’t we gone pretty far bush? I can barely see th’ town from here!” She squeezed Dawn’s hoof tighter and looked firmly down at the ground so she wouldn’t see the sky.
“I’m not an expert but I’m pretty sure you need a lot of space for an apple orchard,” Dawn said. “We’re almost there. You’ll be okay.”
“I know. I’m almost used to it,” Arteria said. “Thank you for gettin’ me through this mess. I couldn’t have even flapped my way free of the doorway without you.”
“Hey, you’re my friend.” Dawn squeezed Arteria’s hoof back. “I know this whole thing with your mother is really hard for you. Family can be tough, and this got dropped on you out of nowhere.”
“I knew she’d catch up to me at some point,” Arteria muttered. “I thought it would take longer.”
“Why did you leave?” Dawn asked. “It’s okay if you don’t want to tell me! I just, you know. I’m curious. It’s a mystery hanging right over the head of one of my friends and it’s been nagging at me for hours to try and get answers.”
“Hah, yeah, Phantasma says you’re like a black spiderwolf. Once you got your fangs in something you never let go of it until it stops strugglin’ and gives up.” Arteria laughed. “I can’t really keep things a secret none with me mum on the way so I guess it won’t be too dezzo to flap above the trouble and put in me own shout.”
Dawn relaxed. “Thank you. I just want to know what we’re dealing with.”
“Yeah,” Arteria agreed, leading her over to a tree so she could sit with something overhead. “So you’ve lived in Canterlot, yeah? You must have a solid bite on what th’ nobility is like, yeah?”
Dawn sat next to her. “It’s a mixed bag. Most of them are just like any other pony, but… there are the rules.”
“Yeah. Crack on. The rules. I had to act like somethin’ I wasn’t. Like playin’ a part in a drama yer whole life. No real breaks, just constantly memorizin’ scripts an’ sayin the right words to everypony.” She shook her head. “Ain’t no way to live. I saw how it drained at me mum.”
“It’s sort of true everywhere, isn’t it?” Dawn asked. “Like when you’re a student you have to act like a good student.”
“Tell that dinkum to Larrikin an’ see if that web can catch a moth.”
“You know what I mean. I’m not nobility. But when I was in Canterlot I still had to play by the same rules, but it was even worse for me because I wasn’t their equal.”
“What are you gabbin about? You’re Princess Twilight’s personal student!”
“And I’m not part of some lineage of heroes or business ponies or even civil servants,” Dawn said. “I can’t trace my line back ten generations to somepony who once had the grand honor of doing Princess Celestia’s laundry.” She smirked. “Or for that matter, to a pony who bravely held back a horde of evil derggo.”
“But that stuff isn’t important! I want ponies to like me for bein’ me, not fer something some blinkin hero did centuries ago! That’s askin’ me t’ be a shockin’ museum exhibit fer them to gawk at.”
“I was always sort of jealous,” Dawn admitted. “They’re born having all these connections and opportunities.”
“You’ve got ‘em too, though. And you did it with your own hooves. It’s easier for them, but I think when you do somethin’ for yourself, that makes it better. Makes it yours.”
“That’s one way to put it,” Dawn agreed. “There’s a lot of luck involved too. If Princess Twilight hadn’t noticed me I’d probably still be waiting for permission to look into the Canterlot archives.”
“Luck’s how I got here, too.” Arteria glanced up and shuddered. “So, you caught on that Thestralia ain’t exactly a short hop from th’ ground floor, yeah? It ain’t easy to get there or leave. See, between Cranberry Canyon an’ the surface is about a blinkin bazillion miles of tunnels. Worse’n that, it’s basically a shockin’ desert. There ain’t a lot of water or food.”
“But I saw a whole lake when I went down with Berlioz,” Dawn said.
“Yeah. Always too much or too little, huh? It’s hard findin’ a cave what isn’t totally under th’ sea or dry as a bone. Anyplace a bat can find land and water? That’s a place worth callin’ home. It’s why we spend so shockin’ much time on the up-side of a room, yeah? It’s th’ only place a bat can stand sometimes.”
“That… makes a lot of sense.”
Arteria sighed. “After Princess Luna came back, we started hearin’ about it. In dreams first, then she did us the real solid. She opened up the way back t’ the surface and ended the long walk in the dark.”
“That’s when she got some batpony guards, right?”
“Yeah. They’re a bit of a legend now themselves.” Arteria grinned. “Shouts came back they braved th’ wild and untamed surface, met strange ponies, all sorts of tales, yeah? I heard all about that sittin’ in the palace an’ all the other bats would natter about was how they were great. Not their ancestors or mum, them.”
“So you left?”
“Well they proved th’ way was safe enough, right? Ain’t too much bookum to think I could do it too. Bit of a rough outing, nearly died a few times, but me mum was tryin’ to open the way anyhow. Clear signs an’ wide tunnels and all that.”
“You almost died?”
“Eh, it’s not th’ excitin’ kind of way of kickin’ the bucket. Weren’t even no hook-birds. Just a fair amount of goin’ hungry an’ eatin’ strange things. Gonna give you a good survival tip, yeah? Don’t ever eat nothin’ that glows an sings to you.”
“You know, I bet that cider is going to be a lot tastier than glowing singing… stuff.”
“If it’s somethin’ you like, I know I will too,” Arteria said. She put a hoof on Dawn’s shoulder.
Dawn smiled and looked up at her, suddenly very excited. “Oh! Does that mean you’re open to some book recommendations?”
“Don’t push it.”
“What’s taking her so long?” Larrikin groaned.
“She has to get ready,” Phantasma said. “It takes a while for a mare to get ready for a big event.”
“You didn’t take long,” Larrikin pointed out.
“I’m not a Duchess trying to impress her mother,” Phantasma said. “I don’t know if I could manage that kind of pressure. What do you think she’s going to be like? We don’t even know her name!”
“Huh. Maybe it’s secretly going to be Princess Luna!”
Phantasma sighed. “Larrikin, how could she be Princess Luna’s daughter? Princess Luna was imprisoned on the moon for a thousand years--”
“And came back before you were born,” Larrikin pointed out. “Do you know for sure that she didn’t decide to retire to live with the batponies?”
“Me mum ain’t Princess Luna,” Arteria said, before she’d even finished opening the door. “I could hear you two gabbin from th’ other room an if me mum were here she’d be able to hang an ear on you from two streets away.”
“Oh wow,” Phantasma breathed. “You look…”
“Beautiful!” Larrikin supplied.
Arteria’s sunglasses were nowhere to be seen, and there must have been a mixed martial arts tournament in town because somepony had wrestled her into a dress and made her tap out on trying to escape it. The affair was complicated, multilayered, with loose black lace like ornate fishnets as an underlayer, a corset and gorget made of stiff latex fitted around her chest and neck like ebony armor given shape and texture by seams outlined in crimson thread. Puffy sleeves and a skirt that didn’t quite reach the floor, both in wine-red, left her shoulders and wings exposed.
Maybe even more surprising than the fact that she was wearing it at all was that Arteria looked completely at ease in the outfit. Even the touches of ruby and obsidian didn’t seem out of place, and her mane was actually styled and held in place by an ornate silver maneclip.
“Ain’t been stuffed into one of these in a while,” Arteria sighed. “Think I remembered where all the hooks an’ buttons go.”
“You look good enough to eat,” Larrikin assured her. This would be more reassuring if it had come from somepony with a more discerning diet, since Larrikin was known to eat anything vaguely organic put in front of her.
“Arteria!” Dawn yelled down the stairs to the dorm. “Your mom is about to get here! At least, I assume it’s your mom. There’s sort of a minor stampede in town. Apparently nopony thought about telling us how she’d actually arrive!”
Arteria groaned and flew up the stairs after Dawn. Most of the students in the school had come to watch, lining the hallways in exactly the kind of public display Arteria didn’t ever want to deal with.
“How devo is it?” Arteria asked.
“Well, uh. There aren’t any major structure fires, so call it a five out of ten.” Dawn replied, leading Arteria to the front doors. “Are you sure you can handle this?”
The gawking students had mostly been kept back by velvet ropes that would, in theory, lead guests to the decorated ballroom. Sunburst waved to Arteria and pointed to where she should stand, like she didn’t already have it burned into her memory.
Arteria took a deep breath. “As long as everypony else can remember their lines for the next five minutes,” she said.
“It’ll be okay. Ibis is on the job, and she never forgets anything.”
“Blinkin well makes me want to throw the opposite an’ forget this whole thing,” Arteria muttered.
Berlioz opened the doors, and the thing which had been causing so much chaos in Ponyville approached in much the way a siege engine does, driving ponies before it while protecting its contents. It also, more specifically, moved like a carriage drawn by the largest spider Dawn had ever seen, easily the size of Princess Twilight.
Arteria’s pet spider crawled over her shoulder from where it had been hiding among the folds of her dress to look, waving one foreleg to the approaching arachnid.
The spider was almost silent as it moved, despite its size, the sound of its passage like wind blowing over grassy field. It turned to face the carriage doors with the school’s entrance, finally coming to a halt and waving back to Arteria’s pet.
The carriage itself was made of a wood dark enough that it couldn’t have been entirely natural. Some unicorn had taken a look at ebony and mahogany and decided he wanted something darker than black and somehow gotten it.
Two batpony guards wearing the armor of Luna’s Night watch landed to either side of the door. One opened it, and the other offered a hoof to the pony inside.
Ibis cleared her throat and picked up the scroll she’d prepared. Not that she needed a scroll, but she had argued that it felt more natural and was a useful prop.
“Announcing the arrival of High Duchess Arteria Ulna Daikon, Lord Protector of Cranberry Canyon!” Ibis declared.
She stepped out of the shadows. She was taller and more pale than her daughter, but with the same stark white mane. Unlike the elaborate dress Carpals was wearing, Ulna was wearing a black suit and long, high-collared coat. All of it was, of course, stark black, too dark to do more than suggest at elaborate details that couldn’t be seen but only felt. A single red ruby hung at her neck, the only spot of color in her outfit.
“Welcome to Princess Twilight Sparkle’s School of Friendship,” Sunburst said. “I’m sorry she was unable to greet you herself.”
“Yes, I’ve been told about the event,” Unla said. She was the kind of pony who should have had a voice like an iron glove wrapped around velvet. She actually spoke quite quietly, though nopony had to strain to hear her because something in the weight of it silenced conversations and distractions. “I am told that several artifacts have gone missing.”
“It’s nothing to worry about,” Sunburst assured her. “I promise everything will be fine.”
“Is that so?” Ulna asked. “I will remember to hold you to that.”
Her eyes slid off him and Sunburst slumped like a pony who’d had a knife to his throat until that moment.
“Mum,” Arteria said.
“Duchess Arteria Carpals Daikon,” Ulna said, stepping up to her. She looked down at her daughter silently for a long moment.
Arteria started to sweat.
“You have made friends,” Ulna said. It wasn’t a question.
Arteria nodded anyway.
“When you left without giving warning I was concerned you would do something foalish,” Ulna said. “There are a very many foalish things one can do between here and the safety of our home.”
“I made it fine on my own,” Arteria said.
“Yes. And I won’t taint your achievement by implying I had something to do with it, or that I was helping you from afar.” She paused. “I’m sure you’re doing quite well.”
“I am.” Arteria mumbled.
Ulna very carefully didn’t say she doubted that. She didn’t make even a single sound of doubt. She just left the space open there for it and allowed others to fill it for her with the echoes.
“How about we go to the ballroom?” Sunburst suggested. “We’ve got food, a live band, and cider!”
Ulna’s gaze slid away from her daughter. “Very well. I am curious as to how you uplanders live.”
She walked off, her hooves barely seeming to touch the ground. It looked less like Sunburst was leading her to the ballroom and more like he was being slowly chased and trying to make small talk with the predator at his back.
“She’s… something,” Dawn said, once they’d gotten enough distance to start to feel safe.
Arteria sighed, her wings slumping. “Thank th’ stone, she’s in a good mood today. I was worried Sunburst’d be bleedin’ out with how uppity an’ improper he’s bein.”
“Improper?” Dawn tried to think of even one thing he’d done wrong.
“He spoke to her without being addressed first,” Dawn explained. “Mum must like him!”
“...And since it was savory I decided the best thing to do was put it in a steamed bun,” Pound explained.
The High Duchess squeezed the soft, springy bun, allowing a bit of the dark paste inside to burble out. She licked it delicately.
“A fair attempt,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting you to try and recreate any Thestralian food.”
“It was Arteria’s idea,” Pound Cake said. “She even, um, helped in the kitchen!” He smiled. Ulna didn’t.
“I am sure it was a learning experience for everyone involved,” Ulna said. She put the bun down. “I take it the others are more typical of your skill.”
Pound smiled, trying very hard to not sweat. “I like to think… I always do my best. A chef shouldn’t excuse mistakes on his ingredients.”
Ulna paused and raised an eyebrow, nodding in approval before walking away, keeping a healthy distance from the band, who were currently working their way through what might have been the Equestrian national anthem. Or they might have still been tuning their instruments, but if so they were doing a poor job of it since none of them were in the same key.
“Perhaps you could introduce me to your friends?” Unla suggested, turning her head just enough to let her daughter know she was being addressed.
Arteria looked at Dawn.
“I’m Luster Dawn,” she said, stepping forward. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“I’m sure I can hardly compare to your Princess Twilight,” Ulna said. “It must be rather exhausting, keeping your place as her personal student.”
“What do you mean?”
“There are ponies that would do anything to have such proximity to power. Access to power, to bask in it and believe you influence the course of history, is almost as intoxicating as the power itself.”
“I never really thought of it that way,” Dawn said. “I just enjoy learning things and digging up the truth.”
“You’re in a good place to do so. Just be aware of the power you have. It’s fine to decide not to use a sword, but if you hold one and you’re unaware of it, you can easily hurt another without even knowing.”
“I’ll, um… I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Let me go next!” Larrikin said, bumping their way into the group. They offered a hoof, taking Ulna’s and shaking it. The guards appeared seemingly out of nowhere, and Ulna had to wave them off before they skewered the kelpie. “I didn’t even know Arteria had a mom!”
Ulna looked at her hoof in quiet horror.
“What is she?” Ulna whispered, looking back at Arteria.
“I’m a kelpie,” Larrikin supplied. “Do you think you could ask your daughter to make more of that brown stuff? It’s amazing! I ate like whole jar before I thought about putting it on bread.”
“I’ll have some shipped from Thestralia. I’m sure my daughter would appreciate having a taste of home as well,” Ulna said. “Now, I need to go speak to…” she paused.
“The sphinx,” Arteria pointed. “Her name’s Ibis.”
“Ah yes. Excuse me.”
Ulna let go of Larrikin’s hoof and stepped away, trotting up to Ibis to speak with her.
“I think I flustered her,” Larrikin said. “Does that mean I’m gonna be your new dad?”
Arteria rubbed her snout. “I hope not. I’ve got enough of those already.”
“Huh?”
“Mom’s got six husbands.”
Larrikin rubbed their chin. “They must be really good at cuddling.”
“Yeah. She’s always doggin’ me t’ get married.” Arteria scoffed.
“Huh. Maybe she’ll tell you to marry me,” Larrikin said. “I’ve never even worn a fancy dress before.”
Dawn laughed nervously and leaned in. “I’m sure that’s not really why she’s here,” Dawn whispered.
“...I’m gonna make sure,” Arteria said, moving with some unseemly haste over to her mother. From the look on Ibis’s face, she was waiting to see if Ulna was going to be able to solve a particularly difficult riddle.
“A neolithid,” Ulna said. “The number of limbs they have changes over time.”
“...Really?” Ibis asked, looking defeated.
“It could also be a metaphor for age and growth, but I dislike metaphors.”
“Mum, can we talk?” Arteria asked, quietly.
“Of course,” Ulna said. She said it very mildly, as befitted somepony who was getting exactly what they wanted. “Why don’t we sit over there where we can have some privacy?”
She motioned to a few unused chairs off to the side, sitting in one of them with demure grace. Arteria plopped down in hers and folded her forehooves.
“Why did you even come here, mum?” Arteria asked, as blunt as a brick to the head.
Ulna sat back, raising her hoof. One of the batpony guards deposited a glass of cider in it, and she sipped at it before answering, making Arteria wait for a reply.
“You’re my daughter. I wanted to see you.”
“You never do anything just on a whim.”
“True.” Ulna held her hoof out again, and the glass was taken from her. “Some rather disturbing rumors made their way to my orbit and I needed to make sure you were safe.” She sighed and her expression softened, just a little. “I worry. But now I see that there’s no way I can simply ask you to leave.”
“Because I have a lot of good friends an’ I’m me own pony an’ need to make me own mistakes, even if they’re right blinkin stupid?” Arteria asked, her usual slang slipping back in before she could stop herself. She coughed. “Um, I mean, that is--”
“No,” Ulna said. “Because you’re a natural leader, when you choose to be one. A substitute baker. A substitute band. Improvised decor. Cider good enough to make ponies forgive a few of the rougher edges of the rest.”
“It was all Dawn’s idea,” Arteria said. “She had this big list and we just sort of went down it. I ain’t gonna steal credit from her. Mostly all I did was worry and fret.”
“Surrounding yourself with useful ponies is the most important trait a leader can have. Just try not to worry so much about putting your hoof into things, dear. That vegactite was terrible. You should have let the baker use their best judgment.”
“I’ll… remember that,” Arteria mumbled.
“Good. You’ll need to be a leader for the other bats in town.”
Arteria froze. “What other bats? This isn’t some shockin’ scheme to marry me off, is it? Because I swear--”
Ulna held up a hoof. “I met with the Equestrian nobility before I came here because I was finalizing settlement papers. We now own a section of the cave system under the town. The first settlers will be here shortly.”
“Wot?”
“Officially, as the only Thestralian nobility in city limits, you will be in charge of them. In practice, you’ll just want to welcome them and help them get around town for a few days. The Mayor will be handling the actual paperwork and duties.”
“I can’t do that!”
“Of course you can,” Ulna smiled. “Just don’t do it alone. Ask your friends for help. I like them.”
“...You do?”
“They’re not using you for your position. And they’re good enough friends that they’re not stumbling all over themselves agreeing with you.”
Ulna reached over and touched Arteria’s hoof.
“I want you to be the best pony you can be. Even if it’s not the same type of pony I am. I wouldn’t mind letters now and then, either. I’m told your friend writes to Princess Twilight. You could do the same for your mother.”
Arteria sighed. “Okay.”
“And you can always come home. Even just to visit. Bring your friends. They’re…” Ulna looked back. “I think that damp pony is eating a whole raw onion.”
“She does that, yeah,” Arteria agreed.
“Shockin’ weirdo upland horses,” Ulna muttered, her tightly controlled accent slipping.
Arteria giggled, smirking.
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I've hit the point where I can parse Arteria's dialogue without any trouble. How worried should I be for my continued health? I've heard becoming an Australian is terminal.
9995732
You should ask MrNumbers about that.
Awww, Ulna was much nicer than I expected, how sweet
Uh, I believe you used the name "Carpal" before it was said to be Arteria's middle name? Other name? ???
Also I'm very amused at how you tied Thestral history to Australians.
Wrong name, I think?
That accent really grows on you...
So, it's technically possible, but not ethically possible while keeping it ethnically passable?
I have to say I like Arteria's mom.
I've found a few errors/mistakes.
I think the second one should be Arteria instead of Dawn and further the opposite of claustrophobia is agoraphobia and that seems like something Luster Dawn would know.
On a different note I would like to taste those carrot and carobe cupcakes Pound Cake made since I like both carobe and carrots.
Because really, Thestralian nobility would still be nobility, but it is glorious nobility descended from bushwhackers and an environment where they cannot easily forget those roots. I would certainly love if our own medieval age nobility had turned out that way.
Again, fucking brilliant naming. XD
I'm dying. :D
...Arteria Ulna Daikon?
Really impressed that you were able to make her serious and even severe without lapsing into the evil overlord parent cliche.