Chapter 39: Light and Dark
Awareness slowly returned to Foxfire. The throbbing in her head seemed to beat in time with the throbbing of her heart; and she realized that she was looking down at the gibbering mess that was Ash Heart.
What in the names of the Goddess is going on? Foxfire asked out loud, stopping in surprise as she realized that she couldn’t hear her own words. She also had no memory of beating Ash Heart and doing… whatever it was she'd done to him.
Another surprise greeted her as she felt her head move all on its own to look up the street and see her family a few blocks away, running in almost slow motion towards her. Her body then pirouetted to look down Brightly’s main street toward the school, where the distinctive plumage of Medevac was coming towards her.
“Hello Foxfire,” the Umbral said, greeting the unicorn with her own voice.
Oh, Goddess. HOW? begged Foxfire, realizing that somehow the Umbral had returned and was now in control of their shared body. Foxfire was a prisoner in her own mind.
“To be sure, when last we parted I thought it was my end,” the Umbral stated calmly. “The end of magic in Brightly should have been the end of my spirit as it lost its coherency and dissolved back into the aether.”
Damn right it should have been, Foxfire growled, trying and failing again to move any part of her body.
“Neither of us reckoned with just how powerful you are… with just how much you limit yourself,” the Umbral replied happily. “Your innate magic sustained me just enough to prevent the final dissolution, but not enough for me to think, act, or to be aware. In your terms, I fell into a permanent coma.”
Why couldn’t you have just stayed there? Foxfire asked. I was happy! I had my family, friends, even students.
“Blame Ash Heart,” the Umbral replied with a shrug. “In his attempt to make sure that you were fully under his thrall he poured enormous amounts of magic directly into me, thinking he was overwhelming some final mental defence of yours. And, in a way I suppose he was right.”
So now what? Foxfire demanded, throwing every ounce of her will at moving any part of her body. Her left forehoof trembled briefly, but otherwise the Umbral seemed to be in complete control.
“As you feared, your body is now simply a mount for my spirit to ride in. A vessel that will become feared on two worlds as mistress of both Earth and Equestria!” crowed the spirit.
Getting a little ahead of yourself, aren’t you? Foxfire asked snarkily. You’ve only seen a taste of what Earth’s military can do, and there’s no portal back to Equestria.
“No portal, yet,” replied the Umbral smoothly. “Ash Heart was an arrogant, misogynistic manipulator who was far too enamored of his own abilities to ever achieve any kind of lasting victory, but he was right about the link between Sweetie Belle’s diamonds and Equestria. While finding all the gems that Celestia sent to Leung would be enough to guide a portal there, they are so old and weak it would take finding all of them to succeed. From your memories I know that at least two or three of the gems are beyond retrieval.”
“But Sweetie Belle’s diamonds have only been away from Equestria for a few months,” continued the creature. “The link between them and their homeworld is fresh and strong. Sufficient energy of the correct type directed through them would easily open up a portal to Equestria.”
I’ll fight you! Foxfire declared, again throwing her willpower into gaining back control of her body. Night and day, I’ll fight you. You’ll never know a second’s peace because the moment you relax, the moment you let your guard down even for an instant, I’ll take my body back and wreck everything you’ve done with it.
As if to underscore Foxfire’s words, the unicorn managed to make her left foreleg take a small half-step.
“You are strong, and powerful, and vital. Which is why I would expect you to fight my control just as any strong-willed creature would, and why your body is worthy of holding my spirit. However, there is something I need to make clear to you, my host,” cautioned the Umbral, as it reasserted its control over the errant hoof.
Go ahead, threaten me, Foxfire shot back, marshaling her will for another assault. There’s nothing you can say that will make me stop trying to take my body back!
“And if you succeed, if you win, if you manage to slip the reins so to speak… you will never hear my voice in your mind again,” stated the Umbral.
GOOD! mentally shouted Foxfire, preparing her strike.
“Aye, you will never hear my mind in your voice again, but I promise you that one day you will hear it… coming from your foal,” the Umbral added, the words freezing Foxfire in place.
You BASTARD! roared Foxfire. You wouldn’t dare!
“On the contrary, it would be very easy. A foal in the womb is a blank slate for a creature like myself, with no developed personality to oppose me. Slipping into its mind would be as easy as putting on a new sweater,” the Umbral replied calmly. “Plus, your child will be heir to both your mystical strength and to Iron Heart’s physical prowess and skill with artifacts. A child of destiny and a fitting host for myself.”
No… whispered Foxfire, realizing how right Luna had been to worry. Please. Don’t. I’ll… I’ll behave. Just, don’t take my child.
“That is our bargain then. Your willing service as my mount, in exchange for your child being born unaffected by my power and in control of its own mind,” said the Umbral, and Foxfire felt the jaws of the creature’s trap close around her, sealing her fate.
Agreed, Foxfire replied, seeing no way out.
“Agreed what?” asked the Umbral. The players were all almost in place now. This was endgame.
Agreed… Master, was Foxfire’s dejected reply, accepting her defeat. The Umbral had won and both of them knew it. The unicorn’s only hope was that one of the preparations her and her friends had made would be enough to take her down before she did too much harm.
With both Ash Heart and the windigo defeated, their remaining winter soldiers abruptly stopped moving, and as their icy mobile prisons shattered they revealed several hundred very confused residents of the Northwest Territories who had no idea where they were or how they had gotten to British Columbia.
Polaris’ radio began to come alive with calls as both citizens and soldiers began to ask questions, check in with each other, and generally ask for some direction as to what to do next.
“All stations, this is Recon,” called the pegasus, swooping in to make a smooth transition from flight to cantering along with the rest heading down Brightly’s main street. “Hold what you’ve got. Take any wounded to the clinic, refugees to the Rec Center. When I know more I’ll pass it along. Recon out.”
“Thou art a fine leader, even though you seek to reject the mantle of command,” Rios noted, his speech slipping into an archaic mode as his body seemed to shimmer with a dark blue outline and phantom wings that faded in and out of visibility.
“Rios, what the hell man?” Polaris asked, as he moved up alongside his comrade in arms.
“Luna,” Rios growled, in his normal voice. “Damn mare must have been sneaking bits of herself into me during our sessions. She’s popping in and out of my mind like a damn yoyo. Stop sticking your nose into my brain!”
T’is needful, my soldier, whispered a voice in Rios’ head. But I agree that this is a violation of your trust. When next we meet in the flesh you may claim from me such forfeit as you deem necessary for redress of this wrong.
An image flashed in the soldier’s mind of him astride a saddled, dark blue alicorn, the reins to her bridle held confidently in his hands as he put the mare through her paces. “If you’re riding me, I’m riding you!”
Very well, sighed Luna. You may have me as such for a day.
“A month,” countered Rios, aloud.
A week, responded the alicorn.
“Two weeks,” Rios shot back, while everyone stopped and stared as they tried to figure out what was being said from only one side of the conversation.
Done, agreed Luna. Carry on as you would normally. I will speak and use my magic through you as needed, but you are in control of our physical actions.
“Right, none of you could hear that,” Rios said, taking in the confused looks of those around him. “Apparently Luna’s riding along in my head so I just cut a deal with her for payment.”
“But she wouldn’t be doing that unless… “ Shield Maiden began, still weak from what the windigo had done to her, but being carried along on Iron Hoof’s back. “Oh no.”
“Yeah,” replied Iron Heart grimly, and as three lengths of burning bronze took station alongside their wielders, the rest of the ponies present realized that the true battle lay ahead of them.
Medevac however, was the first to arrive at the sight of Ash Heart’s defeat, being significantly closer to the scene than the rest. The pony sworn to the preservation of life was wholly focused on the downed stallion as she glided in and immediately began checking Ash Heart’s condition via the gliding touch of her diagnostic feathers.
“Foxfire, what did you do to him?” the medical pony asked, over her shoulder. “It’s like most of his nerves have… forgotten how to send signals down to the rest of his body.”
“Though one of your duties will be to ensure he lives, do not concern yourself overly about him,” Nytefyre replied, shaping a bit of conjured silver in her magic. “Rather, concern yourself over your failure to greet your Queen properly.”
“Jean, this is no time for jokes. I need to know what…” began Medevac, her voice trailing off as she turned and her eyes took in the crown and torc below the ethereal, incandescent purple of Nytefyre’s mane and tail. The mare’s wings flared out as she realized what had become of her friend. “Oh shit.”
“You will not attempt to run,” Nytefyre quietly commanded, with a sure and confident voice. “I can seize your mind before you are more than a hoofwidth above the ground.”
“Then why haven’t you?” the medical pony asked, trying to remember if she had packed a certain syringe among her supplies today.
“Because my host begged me to allow her friends and family their free will,” answered Nytefyre, adding a last personal touch to the piece of jewellery she was crafting. “I agreed to it, and so long as you reasonably obey my orders and do not fight against me I will honour that request. Now, will you bow willingly and be a member of my court, or must I take your mind from you and have you serve as a mindless drone?”
“My Queen,” Medevac responded, dropping into the graceful, wings forward bow Nytefyre had taught her in the past back when the Umbral had tried the path of slow subversion of the town to its will. “How may I serve—”
In mid-sentence Medevac transformed her bow into a sudden lunge forward, her left wing flashing toward Nytefyre’s neck with a quick injection syringe loaded with a cocktail of powerful sedatives and psychotropics guaranteed to put any pony down and keep them either unconscious or confused for hours. Fast as Medevac was though, Nytefyre’s mind was even faster, locking the pegasus in place with a minor use of her magic.
“I knew you had that, just as I know all of your plans to stop me,” Nytefyre said with a small smile, and Foxfire’s heart sank as she heard the words.
The unicorn tilted Medevac’s chin up so that she could place a small silver choker around the pony’s throat. A small dark purple flame emblem flared into being along the silver circle, burning away Medevac’s ability to resist any command she was given. “Now, let’s try this again. Medevac, drop the syringe and crush it underhoof.”
The now enthralled pony dropped the metal and plastic of the syringe to the pavement before smashing it to bits with a couple of quick stomps. Order complete, the obedient drone came to attention before the Queen of Brightly and the Lands Beyond.
“Now, let’s start over,” Nytefyre said, taking a quick moment to ensure that the enchantment on the choker was doing its job properly. “Greet your Queen properly.”
Again red and white wings swept forward, their tips touching the ground alongside the forehead of the obedient pegasus, and this time the bow was reverentially held until the pony’s queen commanded her again.
“Rise, and stand behind me to my left, as a good retainer should,” Nytefyre ordered, her face confident and regal, as the large group of ponies from the far end of town closed within a hundred meters. “We shall greet my children and my consort together.”
Nytefyre spent the next minute crafting more conjured chokers with her magic, setting them into a neat stack on Medevac’s back. The Queen of Brightly looked up just as the assembled group of ponies that had successfully defeated the windigo drew close to her. The white mare raised a single eyebrow in recognition of the blades and guns leveled in her direction.
“I assume this means you are aware of whom you face, and that any attempt at subterfuge would be a wasted effort?” the unicorn asked, taking in the faces of the group one by one.
“If you have truly fallen to darkness Foxfire, then it is the duty of those who walk in the light to oppose you,” Father Addison stated, the glow from the cross at his breast gleaming golden.
“She has not fallen to darkness, but rather been overtaken by a different kind of light,” was Nytefyre’s response.
“Jean?” Iron Heart asked, stepping forward, the Seed of Justice at his side. “Are you in there? Please, don’t make us do this.”
“Do what, my consort? Attack me? Strike down the pony you love, the mother of your foal? Would you really do that?” Nytefyre asked with a laugh. “Kill a pony who has killed no one? Where is the justice in that?”
“We won’t kill you, but we’ll do what we need to to keep our children safe,” Iron Heart stated, some of the power of his weapon adding steel to his words.
“I will make all of you this offer once, in Foxfire’s name: Do not fight against me, give me reasonable obedience. In return you shall retain your free will and be honored members of my court,” the sorcerous mare said to the group, readying her magic for the likely outcome. “What say you?”
“Get bent,” was Rios’ response, as he pulled the trigger of his riot gun.
The last thing that Rios expected to happen was for the barrel of his weapon to catastrophically fail, sending him flying backwards and making every pony except Nytefyre and Medevac to reflexively duck and cover. Taking advantage of the diversion, the Queen of Brightly used her magic to launch a volley of chokers at the ponies confronting her.
Dark flames briefly flared at the throats of Father Addison, his wife Natasha, Polaris, and Darrell Montcalm as enspelled necklaces attached themselves to their targets, burning away the free will of those four. Silver also flew towards Iron Hoof, Iron Heart, and Shield Maiden, only to be intercepted by gleaming lengths of sun-bright bronze.
“To me, my ponies,” commanded Nytefyre, and as the others watched in horror some of their best friends joined their enemy.
“How the hell did she do that?” Rios asked with a groan, getting back to his hooves and assessing the damage.
“I crimped the barrel of your weapon halfway down its length,” Nytefyre replied, using her magic to nudge her new retainers into formation. “Which is what I will do to anyone foolish enough to threaten me with a gun.”
“You can’t do that to all the guns,” Rios shot back, feeling Luna riding along the back of his mind, lending extra strength to his limbs. “And even if you can, you can’t stop tanks, and jets, and missiles.”
“Perhaps, perhaps not. But with the tree’s magic empowering me and Foxfire’s body freed of her absurd self-restrictions I’m nearly as strong as an alicorn,” replied Nytefyre, standing tall and confident before them all. Regal and in control of the situation. “I could probably move the moon if I put my mind to it.”
She might indeed be able to do it, Luna whispered to Rios. Before my sister and I ascended, groups of unicorns would move both sun and moon.
“Mom?” Shield Maiden asked, stepping hesitantly forward to stand between the two groups. “Are you still my mom?”
“Your mother is still a part of this body, child. Her consciousness is separate and aware of what is going on around us,” Nytefyre answered, smiling down at the young pony. “Promise to be good and I’ll let you talk to her from time to time.”
“Don’t listen to her!” Iron Hoof hissed. “That’s just the Umbra thing talking. It lies all the time.”
“It costs me little to grant those that Foxfire cares for some clemency,” stated the unicorn, tilting her horn in acknowledgement of her own point. “Obeying me is obeying her and I will never command you to act against your natures, so long as you do not attempt to betray me or attempt overthrow my rule we should get along well.”
“Let me talk to her,” Shield Maiden begged, stepping a little closer. “If you’re my Mom too, or part my Mom or… I. I just want to talk to her.”
“Rowan?” came from Nytefyre’s mouth, and though it was the same voice, the inflections in it warmed Shield Maiden’s heart. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I wasn’t stronger. But it was a choice between giving it my body or the baby’s. Do what you think is right.”
“Oh Honey… “ Iron Heart sighed, realizing the terrible choice his wife had made.
“Arn… it wants to be Light Yagami,” Foxfire blurted out with fearful speed. “You need to be—”
“And that will be enough of that,” Nytefyre interjected crossly, re-assuming full control over her body before turning her attention back to Shield Maiden. “What will it be, young unicorn? Stand at my side and you can both be with your mother and learn sorcery from a being who is quite literally made of magic or you can oppose me, as the men of this group seem bound to do.”
“Light… Light Yagami,” muttered Iron Heart, trying to place the reference. He knew from the name it had to be something from an anime, but he had watched dozens with his new wife, and not all of them had been engaging. “I know that name.”
“O-okay,” Shield Maiden hesitatingly said, moving up next to Nytefyre, who gave her newest apprentice a comforting nuzzle.
“Oh shit,” Iron Heart blurted out, his eyes going wide as he finally made the connection. “Death Note. She wants to be a god.”
“Goddess,” corrected Nytefyre, placing a small tiara on Shield Maiden’s head, who flinched briefly at the contact of cold metal on her brow but was seemingly unaffected otherwise. “And this young pony will act as my conscience, so that I can be a benevolent deity.”
“Rowey? You can’t… you couldn’t!” Iron Hoof demanded of his adopted sister.
“It’s my Mom,” Shield Maiden stated, tears in her eyes as she lifted her blade into an approximation of a guard position. “If there’s even a chance I can get her out of there, I’ve got to take it.”
“Looks like it’s just the three of us, kid,” Rios replied, drawing a combat knife from his gear. “Time for guts and cold steel.”
“Shield us, daughter,” Nytefyre commanded, and in response the young unicorn brought into being a defensive barrier. As the Queen of Brightly looked over at her foes, she smiled and sighing slightly said, “You are outnumbered, and none of you possess the magic to either dispel my daughter’s shield or protect yourselves against my magic. Will you lay down your weapons or will—”
A beam of brilliant cyan launched out from Rios’s forehead, punching through Shield Maiden’s barrier as if it were no stronger than a soap bubble and breaking it apart with a sound like shattering glass.
“I know that magic!” hissed Nytefyre, confidence and poise supplanted in an instant by raging fury.
“Avaunt, fiend,” Rios bellowed, but it was Luna’s voice that echoed out and not that of the American soldier.
“Charge!” yelled Iron Heart, dashing forward as the fight began in earnest.
“Gotta get there, gotta get there,” Seeker panted, as her hooves finally touched pavement. The youngest of the Furred Five had heard the radio chatter and knew that her family was in desperate need of her help. Urgency lent endurance to young legs as she broke into a full gallop, the shining bronze of the returned gift to a magic tree flying along at her side.
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Nytefyre is a truly malevolent being.
But in her malevolence and desire for power, she has created a whole host of enemies who will stop at anything to take her down.
Welp, here's hoping they manage to stop Nytefyre.
Out of the frying pan and into the Fyre?
Man, Nytefyre is a great villain.
Credits roll
Why can't that bloody umbral just die!