Cloaked in Comfort

by EpicGamer10075

Chapter 1: Blizzard of Emotions

Once more, a void was out to consume Oleander.

The one before was brief, but this one was eternal and all-consuming, not a moment spared from the agonizing white all around her, its freezing winds biting into her fur and tearing away her dwindling energy. She had long grown numb to the pain of this cold, and that made it yet more difficult to plod through the ever-deepening snow, which must’ve only been possible by Fred’s dark tendrils sinking into her legs and forcing them along, but she couldn’t be sure as she couldn’t even feel her legs.

She knew well this could’ve been avoided by waiting it out; both of them knew it was coming, after all, and Fred had insisted in a tone she’d rarely heard from him to stay put, but she pushed on regardless. She hardly wanted to stay longer near the Grove than was needed, and she had found herself in the depths of the Tundra before the blizzard even begun, and her usual spite and stubbornness kept her from simply teleporting until her horn was too frozen over to do so.

The frigid cold slowing her thoughts certainly didn’t help, either.

Oleander’s mind slowly fell back to that damned argument with those endlessly-damned fools, and the one she still couldn’t tell was a puppet master or a puppet herself.

“You could at least show some respect for the Ungulate that saved all of your useless lives,” She stated towards High Priestess Lovecraft, who was staring back as dispassionate as always behind her alter.

“Your existence is no boon to us, Tainted One,” The ‘Holy’ Unicorn spoke, her composed words echoing through the large and nearly desolate temple, “The Predators cannot penetrate this Sacred Grove, protected by the Holy magic we alone hold.”

Oleander scoffed at those words. “You alone, hm?” She bit back, the ‘above-thou’ tone she’s always had directed at her now coming from her. “Don’t you have any care for other Ungulates? Ones with their friends, family, and loved ones getting ripped to shreds by these same very Predators?”

“Our Order is not to interfere with other societies of Ungulates,” The High Priestess replied as calmly as possible through her composure, “We are to be sufficient on our own means, as are they.”

“So all nations ought to be only out for themselves, huh?” The other Unicorn retorted sarcastically, sneering at the ‘good’ Ungulate before her, “Surely you know what happens from that belief; even the pettiest of resource squabbles can turn into wars.”

Lovecraft closed her eyes and sighed. “Do not speak to me as if I am unaware of the connotations of our ideology.” Looking back, and nearly glaring at the cursed Unicorn multiple steps down from her, she scathingly stated, “Other Ungulates only fall prey to these wars by the dark impulses of fury and greed within them. We have purified ourselves of such emotions, and as thus, have no stake in the foolish battles those tempted by darkness are to fight.”

Oleander paused for a moment, examining the words. “No ‘stake’?” She muttered out, incredulous, “Do you really think being devoid of emotions makes you more deserving of life that everyone else? And—” She went on, not allowing the other Ungulate to reply, “Even then, that’s not a life anyone cares to live. You may have purged yourself of anger and lust, but you’re also incapable of feeling other emotions like, I don’t know, happiness!”

The Pure Unicorn’s eyes fell to the floor, and she slowly shook her head. “You do not understand... Being cursed by the Demon has rent purity from you, Oleander, and you cannot anymore comprehend our Sacred Duty.”

“Please,” Oleander scoffed once more, her deadpan gaze leveled at the so self-assured Ungulate, “I have no idea what ‘duty’ you could be serving by being so damned callous, but I still know that the Longmas also have a sense of duty, and for them, it both makes sense, to serve their nation with honour, and hasn’t rendered them emotionless and uncaring for others.

“I may have thought I was better than you before,” She went on, her tone growing composed and assured, “But now I know I am. I actually care for others,” She stated, glaring evenly at the other Unicorn, “I’ve fought tooth and nail to save them from unfair deaths,” She spat, stomping forward a few steps towards the High Priestess, “I’ve even tried to reason with you here, leaving the Demon—my friend—behind to not blind you with his presence,” She moved even closer, her booming steps echoing through the temple while Lovecraft watched on, “And yet you still sit here, claiming your ways are best.”

Finally, her steps stopped just before the stairs that went up the altar, and Oleander let out a heavy sigh and said with exasperation, “I’m done fighting you...” The subtle squint of the other Ungulate’s eyes was clear enough evidence that she hadn’t expected mercy. “You’ve already taken so much from me, and while I may so wish to rip you limb from limb... that won’t help any of us.”

The Dark Unicorn turned around to face away from her previous mentor, trotting back over towards the gaping maw of the temple, the massive double-doors she had thrown open still in that position. “No more of you, Lovecraft!” She shot back at the other Ungulate while not breaking stride, “You will never hold a strand of control over me ever again.”

Her words for a short while amidst the empty place, and she continued forward, eager to leave it all behind. However, the High Priestess suddenly spoke to her, “Very well.”

Oleander stopped in place as she heard those words of assent, of acquiescing to someone other than herself about an ideology not her own. Her neck craned around her let her eyes stare incredulously at the Pure Unicorn, whose expression was oddly... peaceful.

“Our Order is not to interfere with others,” Lovecraft elaborated in turn, her tone as sage as ever, but not quite as condescending as usual, “And despite our possible qualms about your dark nature and having abandoned us so, I shan’t give into temptation. You are no longer of our Order, Oleander, and you are free from both our rules and our safety. Do as you wish.”

When Oleander’s expression remained for a few more seconds, only changing with a suspicious squint of her eyes, the High Priestess stated, “Do not mistake my statement as simple mercy, Tainted One. You are and have been exiled from our Order for your betrayal of our tenants, but beyond our Sacred Grove, we have no jurisdiction. You will be at Fœnum’s mercy.”

Blinking multiple times, the shocked Unicorn then closed her eyes in contemplation. The High Priestess and her Order, while a place strictly upheld by ironclad rules, also held those rules firm for those outside of them. Perhaps they expected her suffer outside of the secluded safety of the Grove, but given her own experiences...

She opened her eyes and stared with determination into Lovecraft’s own. “I’ll take that chance.”

That was the end of their conversation, after which she had promptly left the Grove and then the Woodlands as a whole. It wasn’t long before she arrived in the Tundra, and the blizzard had begun.

The blizzard she was still within.

“Oh,” She rasped weakly, with her voice even further drowned out by the raging winds that must’ve gotten even stronger than when she started to lose herself in her thoughts.

Oleander could barely see a dozen steps before her amidst the whipping snowfall, her hoofsteps falling half the length of her leg into the endless white abyss below, and the horizon only broken up by the occasional pine tree, which itself looked little more than a spattering of green and brown under the constant buffeting of white. She couldn’t feel her hooves and legs sinking into the snow, and she couldn’t feel the freezing gales against her body, it all having gone so numb that she knew she wouldn’t be able to walk if not for Fred forcing his control over nearly her entire form and moving it for her.

All things considered, she was practically completely possessed by the Demon, and perhaps that would be for the best; this sensation of the cloying white all around her seeping into her mind and suffocating her thoughts wasn’t all that pleasant, and simply blacking out and leaving herself without a thought for some time would spare her some pain. It was certain to happen at some point soon, and perhaps... it would be best not to wake back up.

The High Priestess’s words still echoed in her head; her statements about Oleander’s emotional foolishness and the merciless world of Fœnum rung true, both having trapped her there at that very moment. The Dark Unicorn’s words in turn, were quite petty and stupid, with her final challenging statement as short-sighted and spitefully rebellious as she was when she first left the Grove.

The only difference now was how she had no more purpose; no Predators to slay, no Hold to seal, and no other Champions to fight. Truly, what could she do in this world, and why would she ever bother with it? Any of the blithe platitudes about finding happiness within one’s community would ring hollow for the Ungulate that had lived apart from them for nearly a decade and a half, and no job within could ever be properly suited to her skill set; she was stupid and rebellious, after all, and trained in dark magics rather than any traditional task like cooking or drawing.

There was hardly a doubt in her mind that living with other Ungulates would take quite a lot of adjusting, and there would be many problems caused in the meantime, problems that the Ungulates already living there wouldn’t have to deal with without her. Really, the world of Fœnum was better off without her, as her life’s purpose of sealing the Hold was already complete.

Unfortunately, she remembered after a moment the one creature that may still want her around, as they kept pushing her through the blizzard in spite of no pact holding them together with her any longer. Fred would likely not appreciate her dying so anticlimactically, and keep her alive with whatever dark magics he could muster—not to imply it would be of any trouble to him, of course; he had already revived her multiple times in the past with no ill effect.

Oh, and there were her fellow Champions that she had grown to become friends with, who would all likely mourn her in their ways... Tianhuo’s funeral pyre and stoic gaze, Arizona fighting through her denial, Velvet’s sharp shouting about how disappointed she would be, Pom bawling her eyes out with her puppies, and Paprika... doing whatever Paprika would do.

And... of course, Cashmere.

Oleander knew well of that Reindeer’s infatuation with her, even after only having spoken a scant few times, as Velvet and Fred were all too eager to tease her about it. However, it was always confusing as to why she was so infatuated with an Ungulate that was so stupid and eager to throw her life away...

It really ought to be best that she fall into this endless white sea that suffocated her so, her thoughts slowing into a muddled crawl with any remaining ability to sense the outside world fading. For only a short time she beheld no connection to the world around her, unfeeling, unseeing, unhearing, but still forced thoughts through her frozen mind; why, after all of this time, after everything she did with the other Champions, was she still so stupid?

And then, finally, there was naught but void.

“Hfff...” Fred sighed as he dropped Oleander’s body just beyond the gates to Reine, “I never thought keeping a mortal alive could be so exhausting.” The dark tendrils of his form pulled back out of the flesh and muscle of the
literally frosted-over Unicorn, retreating back into the Unicornomicon so that its cover could close back up.

Behind him, the blizzard had died down somewhat, the lesser snowfall now allowing for a decent amount of visibility, where multiple buildings could be seen just inside the city, and as for one of them...

BAM! “OLEANDER!?”

The door to the building was blasted open, Velvet rushing out towards the fallen Unicorn and the Demon by her side.

“Velvet,” He greeted her somewhat grimly, but only getting a glance from her, as her focus was far more taken with the Ungulate at death’s door.

“Vhy vere you out in zis blizzard, you idiot!?” She couldn’t help but shout hysterically, grasping at the body that was even colder than her own icy hooves. “How are you not even dead yet!?”

Fred cleared his non-existent throat, drawing the Reindeer’s attention back to him for a few more moments, where she then sighed in realization and begrudging acceptance. “Ve must get her inzide now!” She shouted out to the Demon, who just nodded and unfurled the cover of his tome once more, reaching out with a massive dark claw and grabbing Oleander’s form, and with Velvet frantically leading her, they both entered into the much warmer building where they could finally rest.

Comments

[Polak23]

You’re one of the few authors that actually could get me into the story. I wish you good luck writing and I’m looking for the next chapter!

[Darwey47]

It has always been a pain seing all the tfh stories on this site die and end up incomplete (at least all the non-crossover ones)

But I really hope that this story is finished

Cause right now it really good, like really really good

[EpicGamer10075]

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There aren’t many TFH stories at all, and while there are some more at Ao3 (link to them here), I can’t find anything about just a nice, clean ship that’s actually done well.
I’m trying to fix that, and I’m doing pretty well so far. I’ve already got the next chapter written, and am still pretty determined to see this through.
Thank you for the encouraging words!

11847684
And thank you too!