Book 1 - The Behemoth came to Canterlot

by Equimorto

Crumbling Fronts

"I have found it a simple, truthful fact of life, that experienced opulence most often clouds the minds of those not born in it, and rarely does it not break them." Stella did not wait for Trixie to finish preparing. She was on her, horn against horn, having teleported there. Her spears still at her sides pressed and ground against an invisible barrier Trixie had put up. The impact was forceful enough to undo the tornado below Trixie's platform, and shatter that same platform, leaving Trixie held in the air by her own magic alone. For once it was the alicorn who was calm, and the unicorn gritting her teeth. But it only lasted a moment, enough for Trixie to finish charging up what she'd been preparing.

Stella once more teleported, to Trixie's side and below her and a short distance away, as a pillar of red light rose from the unicorn's horn. Then Stella lunged towards Trixie again, still thrusting with her spears, still they met the invisible bubble of Trixie's shield. But the spell Trixie had cast did not dissolve as a simple blast would have. It lingered, it solidified, and finally it shattered.

A shower of red shards came pouring down around Trixie like a hurricane. From all directions fragments of crystallised magic the size of leaves danced around her with frightening speed, threatening to shred through anything that might be in their path. Stella was forced to retreat and dodge once again, and further to keep moving as the shards followed her downwards towards the ground.

But they could not follow her and threaten her as tightly and consistently there. In their natural movement downwards, though focused on her, they still spread out, and more so the further down they went. As the gaps between one shard and the other widened, Stella found space between them to pass, and no longer needing to outrun the crystals she focused instead on dodging them. Some scraped her skin and scratched her wings, but none hit her, and soon she was flying skywards once again, towards the unicorn floating in the air.

As the swirling tempest of shards around Trixie cleared, Stella propelled her spears to the unicorn once more. One more time, they came in contact with Trixie's shield, and hung vibrating in the air with their tips against it. Then Stella gave a twist of her neck. The spears turned and rotated around each other, and in a moment forced open a breach in Trixie's barrier.

The alicorn was quick. Her horn was through the opening between the moment Trixie saw it and the one she thought to react, and a blast followed too soon for the unicorn to avoid. It pierced her shoulder, and her screaming was avoided at the cost of the blood her teeth drew from her lip. But her horn lit again, and at her command the shards she had scattered became magic once more, and a red rain of bullets poured skywards.

Comments

[Speckle]

Trixie!