A Tale of Two Ponies

by Silicas

Chapter 17: Two Moves Behind

Chapter 17: Two Moves Behind

---

Twilight woke to the sound of hooves beating against her bedroom window. She glanced at her bedside hourglass. Four o’clock in the morning.

“Only asleep for two hours,” the mare muttered as she pushed the covers off her and padded over to the windowsill. She squinted as she looked through the window; it was still very dark outside.

“Rainbow?” she asked, tilting her head. “What do you need?”

The blue pegasus bumped up against the glass again, before turning her head and smashing the side of it into the closed pane. Her mouth moved noiselessly, saying something that Twilight could not hear.

“What?” Twilight yelled. “I can’t hear you, Dash.” The unicorn paused for a moment. “Oh. Right.”

She flicked open the latch on the window with a quick spell. “What do–?”

Rainbow Dash shot through the open window, plowing into Twilight and sending the pair into a heap on the floor.

“Sorry,” Dash said quickly, pushing herself off the prone unicorn and standing upright. Twilight only moaned.

“What do you need, Dash? Is something wrong?” Twilight stumbled to her hooves, using her bed as support as she lifted herself.

Dash walked in a small circle as she spoke, her wings still unfurled and twitching impatiently. “You’d better believe it. We can’t find Starshade anywhere. We’ve been looking for an hour.” The pegasus stopped directly in front of Twilight. “Fluttershy won’t say a thing. She’s practically a fountain right now. The only thing we got out of her was that Cobalt had left before she realized that Starshade was gone. We can’t find him either. Cobalt, I mean. Fluttershy said–”

Twilight plugged Rainbow Dash’s mouth with a hoof. “Wait. What are you trying to tell me? That Starshade is missing and Cobalt took him?” The unicorn was glaring at Rainbow Dash, her eyebrows hooked in a wide ‘V’.

Rainbow shook her head furiously from left to right. Slobber leaked out around Twilight’s hoof as the pegasus tried to answer. Angrily, Twilight yanked out her hoof and took a half step closer to Dash, stretching her forelegs and crushing the gasping flyer with her gaze.

“Whaddya do that for?” the pegasus huffed in between breaths. Dash took a small step backwards and glanced to both sides. “Why are you looking at me like that, Twilight?”

“Well?” Twilight said, matching Rainbow’s stride.

“I, uh, I wasn’t saying anything about your little coltfriend. But the fact is that Starshade’s missing, and so is he. That’s all I know.”

“What were you about to say about Fluttershy?” Twilight shot back.

“Only that she said it was her fault that Starshade ran away. Her words, not mine.”

Twilight visibly relaxed, tilting herself backwards slightly and letting Rainbow Dash rise back to her full height. “Okay,” she said, “that’s all I needed to know.”

“If you hadn’tve shoved your hoof into my mouth and been all crazy like that you would’ve gotten it faster,” Dash said bluntly.

Twilight looked to her side for a brief moment. “I– I’m sorry. I just needed to know. I couldn’t believe that Cobalt would’ve done something like that.” Twilight turned and walked towards the window. She turned her head and looked up to the night sky. “Does Luna know?”

Dash stepped alongside her. “That’s sorta why I came to get you, Twi. We need Spike to send off a letter.”

“Oh, right. He should be…” Twilight stopped mid-sentence as she turned around and saw Spike’s empty basket. “That’s weird. He was there when I went to sleep. There’s no way he left in the middle of the night.”

“You’re not telling me that Spike’s missing too, are you?” Dash said.

Twilight shook her head. “I don’t know. I guess I am.”

---

Spike opened his eyes and sat up, rubbing his head. He looked around, scanning the dark space around him. “What happened? Where am I? Argh. Why does my head hurt like this?”

“Oh, you’re up now,” a voice said beside him. It sounded like it had just been crying.

“Starshade, is that you?” Spike asked, reaching out a claw to feel for the colt.

“Yah,” Starshade said.

“Well I guess it’s good that you’re here with me. Do you have any idea what’s happening?” Spike asked.

“Yah.”

“And…?” Spike said, waving a claw in the darkness.

“We’ve been foalnapped by somepony who calls herself Trixie. We’re in a crate right now, and she’s taking us somewhere really quickly.”

Spike nodded in the darkness, pushing himself backwards and up against the wall of the crate as the floor bounced up and down irregularly beneath him.

“Is there anypony else in here?” the dragon asked after a moment.

“No,” Starshade said. “It’s just us.”

“Do you have any idea–?”

Starshade ruffled his wings. “I think so. I’m not really sure.”

“Well, anything’s better than nothing,” Spike said. “What do you think?”

“I think it’s because I’m Princess Luna’s foal.”

For a few seconds, Spike was silent. “What? There’s no way.”

“I overheard Fluttershy and Cobalt talking. I know what they said,” Starshade answered quietly. “It sort of explains everything too.”

The dragon sat silently again, his claws on his knees and his head loosely bobbing with the motion of the crate. After a minute or two, he looked up and said, “You know, I could light up this place with some fire for a few seconds, if that’d help.”

“Why not,” Starshade said flatly, scooting himself away from the dragon. “Go ahead.”

Spike opened his mouth and let a small jet of green flame escape. For a moment, he saw the small blue colt’s outline huddled against the opposite corner of the crate. His bloodshot emerald eyes were wide, his wings folded tightly against his gently oscillating sides.

The baby dragon scanned the rest of the space. It was completely empty, aside from the two occupants.

Spike let the flame die, plunging them back into darkness. “So you don’t have any idea why I’m here, do you?”

“We could always just ask Trixie,” the little pegasus answered.

“Huh?” Spike said.

“Just bang on the crate. She’ll open it up.”

“Maybe in a bit,” Spike said, stifling a cough. “I think I burned up some of the air in here. My head hurts even worse now. And I’m going to need to wait for my eyes to adjust again, too. I didn’t think of that.”

“Mm,” Starshade said. “I’ll just be over here if you need me.”

---

Twilight Sparkle sunk down onto her belly and inched a hoof around the crying yellow mare beside her.

She paused for a moment, thinking of what she could say. “I’m sorry Fluttershy, for whatever it is, but we need to know what happened. Starshade and Cobalt are missing and we can’t find Spike.”

Fluttershy turned her head away from Twilight and tucked it beneath her right foreleg. “Of course they’re gone. I shouldn’t have said anything.” She dug her head deeper into her side, sniffling back a fresh wave of tears. “And now I’m never going to see any of them again.”

Twilight wrapped her forelegs around Fluttershy’s head and gently pulled it from her side. “Fluttershy, you didn’t hear me. Spike is missing. It’s the middle of the night, and he was there when I went to sleep. Something is happening. We need to know what you told Cobalt, and what Starshade heard. Please.”

Fluttershy turned her head and looked out the ground-floor window and up at the moon, it’s top edge just barely hidden by the windowsill in the cloudless night sky. Fluttershy sighed. “I’m so sorry, Princess. I– I don’t know why. I didn’t want him to be angry at me.”

The unicorn extended a hoof and patted Fluttershy on the side. “It’s okay. We will find Starshade, and Cobalt, and Spike. I promise. But the first thing I need to know is what you told them.”

Fluttershy turned her head back to Twilight, and tried to force a smile through the tears. “I know. I–” Fluttershy halted, but after a moment, drew a deep breath. Closing her eyes, she burst out, “Starshade is Princess Luna’s colt. That’s what I told Cobalt, that’s what Starshade heard.”

Twilight blinked. “Oh. It all makes sense. I know where Cobalt will be. I’ve got to go. I’ve got to go now. Rarity and Applejack are just outside, if you need somepony to talk to. I’ll be back with Cobalt as fast as I can.”

---

Trixie slowly opened the top of the crate. Shielding the small crack with a layer of energy, she looked inside.

“What do you want?” she snapped, squinting into the darkness.

Only a gasp, followed by several suppressed coughs answered her. After a moment, the small dragon inside said, “Well, the first thing I wanted was some fresh air to breathe. Seeing as I have that now, I was wondering if you could tell us what’s going on. Starshade here hasn’t been much of a help.”

From somewhere in the far corner of the box, the colt grunted. Trixie still could not tell exactly where he was.

Trixie pulled back her head and raised her chin. “The Great and Powerful Trixie, your illustrious captor, refuses to answer such a question.”

“Wow. I thought it was just a coincidence that you happened to be named Trixie, but you really are that silly showmare from all those months back. Guess that whole gig didn’t go too well for you. Had to turn foalnapper to keep food on the table?”

Trixie glared daggers into the box. “Trixie is just getting back on her hooves. Once Sanguine’s mission is done, I’ll be back on the road wowing audiences from Canterlot to Las Pegasus. And you’ll be dead, probably, once we’re done with you.”

“Sanguine?” the dragon said. “So you didn’t even come up with this? Well, that’s probably why you managed to capture a young foal and a sleeping dragon this time. I’d call that a relative success.”

“Trixie captured you from under the watch of Twilight Sparkle and Fluttershy, two of the Elements of Harmony. That is hardly an easy feat.”

“Twilight and Fluttershy were asleep, weren’t they?” Spike asked casually.

From the corner, the colt interjected, “Actually, Fluttershy was talking to Cobalt. She can barely even breathe around him. Would have been harder to fool her if she had been asleep.”

“Case and point,” Spike said, flicking a claw against the side of the crate. “Not exactly the crowning achievement of all ponykind.”

Trixie shoved her head further into the crate, her horn aglow with anger. “You’re lucky we need you alive, little dragon. You should see what we’re going to make you do when we get back. You’ll wish we didn’t.”

“And what is that?” Spike shot back, moving his head to within centimeters from the blue mare’s. “Another one of those plans Sanguine came up with?”

Trixie pulled her head back and closed her eyes. “No. Trixie thought of this one. We needed a way to make sure that Luna and Celestia could not be alerted quickly. That, and we need you to send the ransom letter. You’re going to make this all possible, Spike.”

The dragon sunk back against the crate, crossing his arms. “But you’ve forgotten one thing, Trixie.”

The mare raised an eyebrow. “And what is that?”

“Twilight will be looking for me. She’s much better at magic than you; she’ll find us.”

Trixie scoffed. “How? It’s not like she can just trot over to the Canterlot Archives and grab a scrying spell. She may be a special pony, she may even be able to get access to spells like that, but she won’t be able to do it fast enough. Now, do you have anything else you want to ask the Great and Powerful Trixie?”

Spike looked to the side at Starshade. The colt shrugged in response and turned his eyes back to the crate wall.

“Eh, I’ve got nothin’,” Spike said, duplicating Starshade’s shrug. “Just remember to open up that lid every once in a while so we can breathe. Okay?”

“Trixie hates you,” Trixie said as she withdrew her head and let the lid drop, plunging the dragon and the foal back into darkness.

---

Twilight Sparkle poked her head out of the thick underbrush of the Everfree forest and scanned the clearing. It was early morning now, and the first rays of the dawn were just beginning to clear the dark overhead canopy. The mare shivered slightly as she walked into the grassy space. Dew sprinkled the ground and soaked her legs as she moved throughout the crumbling ruins, searching for some sign of Cobalt Rooks. She knew he would be here.

The mare rounded a corner and, spotting a burned-out campfire, trotted up to it. It looked like it had been there quite some time. Bits of white ash floated in the small puddles of condensation that surrounded a single large and blackened log. Twilight idly dug a hoof into the soft pile, turning hooffulls of burnt material in small circles as she looked up and scanned the ruins.

She jumped slightly as a stallion’s voice spoke from behind her. “I don’t know if you’re looking for me, but I doubt somehow that you’ll find what you’re looking for in the ashes of a dead fire.”

Twilight spun her head around and looked back to Tantalus. As she met his gaze, she saw that he was smiling, his head cocked slightly to the side. His eyelids, however, were drooping and he was breathing heavily.

“Didn’t sleep well?” she asked, turning her body around completely to face him.

“Didn’t sleep at all,” he said, gesturing a hoof to a flattened patch of grass beside the wall behind him. “I guess news like this tends to do that to you.”

Twilight lay down on the ground, tucking her forehooves underneath her body. “So you are Tantalus Starshade, then, aren’t you?”

Tantalus followed her motion. Sighing as he lowered himself, he said, “Yes.”

“You are Starshade’s sire.”

The stallion looked at the ground. “I suppose so. I just can’t believe…” Tantalus trailed off, his eyes locked on the beams of daylight rapidly approaching their spot beside the fire. “… I wonder what she knows,” he finished, looking back to Twilight.

“Luna?” she asked.

“Her too, but I meant Celestia.”

Twilight looked to the side, studying a patch of ground. “I don’t know.”

The two were silent as they watched the advancing streaks of brightness illuminate the grass around them and continue onwards.

Twilight looked back to him and said, “So, I take it you don’t know anything that has happened yet, then.”

“What do you mean?” he asked, raising and eyebrow and cocking his head even further to the right.

“Starshade and Spike are missing. They vanished sometime late last night, right after Starshade overheard your conversation with Fluttershy. I wouldn’t be too worried if Starshade had just simply galloped off to collect his mind, but we searched everywhere – even with magic – and the fact that Spike is missing to makes me think that something is going on. That’s why I needed to find you.”

Tantalus pushed himself up and rose to his hooves. “Well, then, let’s get moving. We don’t have any time to waste. We need to get back to the library.”

Twilight followed him. As they trotted to the edge of the clearing, she asked, “Why the library? That was the first place I searched for Spike.”

Pushing aside the foliage blocking their path, the stallion explained, “I need some components for a spell. It’s an old one, one that many ponies today probably don’t remember. Nightmare Moon and I used it to track Celestia. I think we can use it to find Starshade.”

“A scrying spell?” Twilight said slowly. “Those are forbidden.”

“Never stopped me before,” the stallion said with a grin. “This particular one is special, too. All we need is a part of Starshade. A hair, or a hoofclipping. Or, alternatively, we can use the blood of a close relative. We used Luna’s to track Celestia. If I am truly Starshade’s father, then we can use mine to find him.”

“Not only a scrying spell, but blood magic?” Twilight shook her mane. “I really don’t think I can let you do this.”

Tantalus chuckled as he pulled aside a branch and allowed Twilight to pass him. “Blood magic? Don’t foal yourself. That’s not blood magic. I know what you need to do blood magic, and a few drops as a focus is not blood magic.”

“You’ve done blood magic?” she asked, more curiously than concernedly.

“Of course. Luna had to become Nightmare Moon somehow.” The stallion shuddered. “I’ve made many mistakes in my past, Twilight. I’m just hoping that Starshade won’t be one of them.” He looked ahead down the overgrown trail through the forest. “Come on, we need to move faster.”

Comments

[Nexodas]

Finally. Glad to see Tantalus starting to show the sort of arcane talents he had in the prologue.

Not too often you see Trixie as a villain in fanfiction, but I don't mind. I'm just happy that this updated. I suppose we must be nearing some sort of climax at this point, and I look forward to seeing how things develop from here.

Until next time!

[See ScriptScrolls]

black magic ftw!

[Jesman101]

Dis gon b gud