The Devil's Details

by Carabas

Darkening Horizons

The next day had dawned. Skewbald had woken early, read in bed, and had not yet gone to the post office or sent off his letter. Something far more fun had come up.

In essence, the Proposition is such: Wherever the subject Object possesses such Properties as are known and understood within our Natural Philosophies, these same Properties may be Reassigned or Transposed by raw magical calculation and determination. When what we believe of our Arts and the concepts we hold aligns with the Arcane given Structure, we may impose such effects as hath been discussed, in a silk's Softness granted by Reassignment to a rock, that same rock's Weight Transposed with that Weight of a crimson feather, a lance's Edge layered 'pon the feather through Reassignment. To these, I would add a last; the Reassigning of Colour.

A red apple and a blank piece of paper sat side-by-side on the table in Skewbald's kitchen-cum-front room, drab in the early-morning light. He stood before the table, licked his lips with anticipation, and fixed the apple and paper with a particularly intense stare.

Let Colour then be our Property, the creation of which is known within the Philosophy of Opticks, on which subject I grant higher experience to my honoured friend Starswirl and his Treatises. Let a sphere of whitest quartz and our much-abused feather (the previously-applied Properties voided) be our Objects. Let us therefore Reassign.

Let nopony say Past Reflections On Fundamental Attribute-Manipulation Of Forms hadn't been an informative read if the theory was adequately understood. Amongst a collection of different papers by different ponies throughout history on the subject, most of which had been as dull as dishwater and mostly prattling on about the theory, one Red Hunter's The Malleability of the Properties of Objects had finally helped Skewbald hold the whole subject in his head.

True, it might have been written in Pre-Princess times and had the language to match, but least Red Hunter had had the decency to actually write up his experiments and calculations in detail.

Observe the twelfth figure, in which I hath presented the Arcane Summary of the feather's Colour with accompanying calculations, alongside suchlike details for the quartz. The mental exertions as described in detail in the Reassignment of Softness, wherein the Summaries are held in mind and applied to the appropriate Object, are of such an undemanding nature for the Property of Colour and the Objects concerned that an adequately-schooled unicorn foal could accomplish the task. Upon the release of magic, the expected effect indeed occurred; the quartz all but glowed with the overlay of red light, while the feather rested with its colour drained away. To Transpose would demand such exertions as explained in the Transposition of Weight, and would grant the feather the white hue of the quartz.

Skewbald concentrated, magic beginning to gather about his horn as he mentally composed the calculations to produce the Arcane Summary for the colour of the apple and paper, the natural mechanics and physical properties of both translated into a magical form. That was easy enough – it was a task he'd made himself rehearse often enough back in Canterlot. His mental effort expanded to the apple, and then the paper. Both shimmered amidst the pale green aura of his magic.

The magic built in his mind, to the point required for the physical world to actually sit up and take notice, and Skewbald's eyes reflexively slammed shut as he released it.

He slowly opened them again. The paper was a bright shade of apple-red. The apple was as black as the spaces between stars.

A laugh of satisfaction escaped Skewbald, and he fell back to sit on his haunches. "Who's a clever pony, who's a clever pony?" he murmured. "Who is? You is, Skewbald."

He casually reached out and pulled the apple closer to him, breakfast as a reward for a job well done of Reassigning. He'd eat half of it, and then he'd attempt Transposition.

It was far more advanced than rote spells and most routine tricks, and most of its intended effects could be replicated under such. It required breadth and depth of scientific knowledge so you would know what you were manipulating and so that you could produce the Summaries required. But it potentially let unicorns punch far above their magical weight by utilising pre-existing magic embedded in the world, and that was its main appeal for Skewbald.

He was about to take a bite of the apple when there came a ferocious knocking on the front door, followed by a mare's angry voice. "Open up!"

Skewbald paused, glanced around at the door, set the apple on his table, and slowly rose to his hooves. He didn't think he'd done anything to especially aggravate anypony since arriving in the town.

The knocking ceased for a second, and then resumed with even greater force. "For Pete's sake, OPEN UP!"

Skewbald, by turns annoyed and vaguely intrigued by what could be provoking this sort of thing, trotted towards the door and yanked it open. "Wha …"

A dun-coloured pegasus mare blazed, "FIX HIM!" and brandished a flapping duck at Skewbald. The duck quacked as if by way of frantic agreement.

Skewbald's cogitation decelerated, stopped altogether, and then slowly gathered speed again as he found himself saying, "You'll want a vet for that, good day, ma'am," and started to close the door.

"No! He's not a duck!" The mare wedged a hoof in the door and threw it open again.

Skewbald took several cautious steps back even as he looked over the duck. It was certainly duck-like in appearance, moving the way a terrified duck could be expected to, and producing appropriately alarmed duckish sounds.

"Empirical observation and inductive reasoning aren't on your side in this, and I'll have to ask you to -"

"Bolt. Bolt. Relax."

This new voice came from another mare, another dun-coloured pegasus coming up from behind the first. She seemed to be the older of them – Skewbald guessed they might be siblings. She placed a calming hoof upon Bolt's shoulder. "I think the guy needs to be given some sort of explanation first."

"Yes, do," replied Skewbald, stopping as his rear collided with the table. He steadied himself with a flush of irritation and fixed the mares and duck with a look of deliberately detached appraisal.

"Sorry to burst in on you like this," said the older pegasus, while Bolt simmered with agitation. "Are you the student from Canterlot, from the School for Gifted Unicorns? We'd heard from a friend working in the town hall that you'd arrived yesterday."

It was hard to maintain gravitas in the face of a panicking duck, but Skewbald gave it his best effort. "Yes. Skewbald Doul. And you are?"

"We're the Thunder siblings. I'm Head, this is my sister, Bolt. And this," said Head, indicating the duck, "This is our brother, Clap."

Skewbald looked again at the duck, at the sisters, at the nearest wall, back at the duck, and then at the sisters.

It was far too early in the morning. "Could I indulge in a smart remark about the family resemblance?"

"Shut up," replied Bolt. "He's been transformed."

That … added some amount of sense to the situation. Skewbald peered closer at the duck. "How?"

"You think we'd know? It happened while we were out on weather patrol for all this stupid freak weather. One minute, little brother moving to help disperse a cumulus congestus; the next, duck!"

"I saw him moving around the cloud," interjected Head. "He called out, just to let us know he'd found a potential weak spot in the cloud, and then there was a flash of white light. We thought it might have been lightning, and rushed to see if he was alright. We found him like this." She looked at Skewbald pleadingly. "I know there are specialised wards in hospitals that can reverse this sort of thing, but the nearest one's fifty miles away in Las Pegasus. If you know how to help him … we'd owe you one. Please."

Skewbald took a deep breath.

He had an idea about how to go about reversing the change, which was almost certainly some weird result of an eruption of wild magic, somehow. He'd never heard of such occurring mid-air before. But he was half-tempted to claim ignorance and tell the Thunder siblings to get out. Bolt's yelling had set him on edge, and he wanted to get back on with his own work.

But this could be fun as well. In fact, he was certain he knew how to go about reversing the change – and seeing it done successfully would be satisfying for its own sake. There was even the possibility that assisting other ponies like this could assist him with Celestia's assignment, that it could unlock the magic of friendship or make Celestia just appear outright and congratulate him on a job well done.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Skewbald looked at the duck. "Bring him here. I'll see what I can do."

"Thank you," said Head with all apparent gratitude, and nodded at Bolt. Bolt released the duck, which flapped out of her grasp only to be snatched a second later in a firm aura of Skewbald's magic. It flapped and quacked with panic as Skewbald pulled it closer for inspection.

"Don't hurt him!" snapped Bolt, starting forwards.

"Do you see me telling you how to do your job?" replied Skewbald, extending part of the aura to poke at her snout and stop her in her tracks. He willed arcane perception throughout the aura's field to get a better sense of the duck's dimensions and current properties, each bit of information flowing into his head in pure number form and being neatly stowed away for reference. The numbers were in flux over the short time intervals that he took them, subtly but surely changing in different directions – by microscopic amounts, certainly, but changing all the same.

This was exactly what he'd expect from the effect of a transformative bolt of wild magic. The form imposed was strongly held, but the magic wouldn't last forever, and it was already diminishing. Give it about a century and it would bleed off naturally, gradually restoring the subject to their proper form and consigning them to decades of both a form and a mind somewhere between duck and pony. Give it to a unicorn who knew how to bleed it off safely, and it could be reversed in an instant.

Skewbald closed his eyes, composed himself, and then slammed an arcane needle into the wild magic permeating the duck.

Magic began almost instantly to blaze off, which Skewbald was prepared for and caught in a transformative effect of his own. It was turned into bright but harmless light, radiating out from the duck and Skewbald's aura of magic in all directions. He squinted and edged his eyes open – the sisters could barely be seen, holding their hooves over their eyes, while the duck was a half-glimpsed, twisting, growing silhouette in the air before Skewbald, producing alarmed noises that couldn't even remotely be described as natural.

The magic outflow grew suddenly, alarmingly so, and Skewbald struggled to not lose control. If he did, the currently-releasing magic would become wild in its own turn. That would be unpleasant for everypony, especially himself, and release Clap in his current half-duck, half-pony form. With a great and frantic exertion, he kept a lid on the magic, making sure it continued to be converted into light.

But it continued to build, continued to exert greater and ever-greater pressure on his ability to keep on processing it all, and soon the pricklings of fatigue began to build within his horn – a gentle sensation that would soon burn -

And then, with one great rush that almost stole Skewbald's hooves out from under him, it was done. He leaned sharply forwards as he gasped for breath, while the form of an exceedingly surprised dun-coloured pegasus stallion collapsed to the floor in front of him.

"Clap!" cried Bolt, diving forwards. "Are you alright? Don't you dare frighten us like that again! Don't you dare, you complete and utter - "

"What?" said Clap, his eyes alighting on every part of the scene around him with no little alarm and confusion. "What – what just happened? Everything went – was I knocked out? Where am I? I don't – what?"

Head looked down at Clap, pure relief breaking like a sunburst across her features, before she looked back up at Skewbald. "Thank you! Thank you from all of us, once the other two have their act together. We had no idea whether he was in danger or - "

"Don't mention it," said Skewbald, in a voice that was part growl. The prickling heat in his horn had become compounded with a fatigue-induced headache, and futilely shaking his head back and forth wasn't doing anything to help it. He'd have to rest before attempting any more magic for today, and he would be hesitant to attempt Transposition at all for the rest of today even after doing so.

It could also be assumed from the lack of the manifestation of a beaming Sun-Princess or any sudden rush of goodwill on his part towards the pegasi that no breakthrough in the magic of friendship had been achieved either. This hadn't been nearly as satisfactory an exercise as hoped for.

Thunder Head regarded him as he tried to shake the ache out of his skull, and then looked past him to the table at his back.

"Out of interest," she said, "Why is there an apple-shaped void sitting on your table?"

"Magic reasons," replied Skewbald. "Now kindly get out, all of you."

---

"Doth thou comprehend?"

The orange-coated filly that stood before Luna in the midst of the dreamscape scuffed one hoof awkwardly across the ground. "I ... guess so?" Her Manehattan twang was mockingly echoed by the various spectral figures that were now fainter than when Luna had first entered the dream

"When assailed by thine tormentors ... "

"I ... 'return their torment in equal measure, grant wound for wound, and let myself not be belittled with impunity'?"

"Good now, good." Luna permitted a gentle smile pass across her face, before poorly-concealed uncertainty that matched the filly's own replaced it. "Such sentiments still match the current cultural ethos, do they not?"

"Not really." The filly flicked a strand of red mane out of her face nervously, apparently considering the best way to inform a princess that they were mistaken. "Everypony I've spoken to talks more about not falling to the bully's level. Should ... should I have been ignoring them?"

Luna stood still for a moment before speaking. "Perhaps we had better start from the beginning again. In sooth, I would not have thou embarking upon an entirely inappropriate course of action because of mine ad - "

"Princess Luna?" The reverberating voice that suddenly issued from all around, that of a stallion, came as if from underwater. Luna started, then sighed. The filly tilted her head, apparently deaf to it. "Princess Luna? An urgent matter requires your attention."

"We'll discuss this anon," said Luna quickly as she quickly pieced together the magic to propel her consciousness out of the dreamrealm. "Mine services are suddenly required elsewhere. I now wish to counsel caution about the whole 'granting wounds for wounds' matter until I can better acquaint myself with modern mores."

"Wait, hang on - !" started the filly a second too late. The dreamrealm was already melting away around Luna, giving way to the figure of a concerned-looking pegasus Dayguard at the edge of her bed. The morning sun poked in at the edges of the bedchamber's windows.

"Princess Luna? Are you well?" The Dayguard's voice grated on her nerves.

"It has been but an hour since we lowered the moon. We desired rest and the chance to better a foal's life-course, and quite possibly failed to achieve the latter. Kindly explain your purpose."

"Princess Celestia's summoned the privy council for an emergency meeting, Your Grace," said the Dayguard. "She bids the other Princesses attend as well. She emphasised that it was quite urgent."

Luna closed her eyes briefly and let various rote tricks flow across her, smoothing her coat and straightening the stars in her mane. When she felt civilised enough to venture outwards, she extricated herself from the covers and stepped down. "My commendations for your swift service, then, and my apologies for my surly manner, good guardspony. Return to my sister and inform her that I am on my way."

The Dayguard nodded and left. In her privacy, Luna shrugged herself into her crown, shoes, and ornamental peytral one by one. Diminished as her magic was in the daytime, it was still an effort - always an effort - to curtail it to the point where it could accomplish such small and precise tasks. Alicorn magic was suited for larger things, but she made the effort.

Eventually victorious and fully clad for the day, she breathed out, murmured, "Ever onwards," to herself, and ventured to Celestia's meeting.

She crossed paths with Princess Cadance partway into the maze of twisty little passages that filled the lower palace, attended by her own guards. The smaller alicorn, not yet grown into her full size and power in spite of the passage of years (Luna intended someday to fully appraise herself on what exactly had happened to the Crystal Empire) brightened when she saw Luna.

"Auntie," said Cadance, trotting up to Luna and nuzzling her briefly, a gesture which Luna returned. There was no blood-relation between them, Luna was certain of that, but the affectionate honorific had stuck even before Cadance's rise to alicornhood. "Do you know why the council's been summoned?"

"I fear not," replied Luna. She and Cadance fell into stride as they continued towards the meeting chambers. "She has the habit of divulging in full only when the news is good or of no great importance. Holding silence until others arrive compels us to attend."

"It's serious, then?" said Cadance. The pale marble corridors they travelled through straightened; the sound of their hoofsteps echoed ahead of them. Luna cast her attention to an insignificant-seeming side-corridor a short-distance ahead.

"If not, I shall be very put out with her. But it is likely so." They detoured down the short side-corridor, and Luna reached out with her magic to open the plain wooden door at the end of it.

Almost immediately, ranks of gleaming lance tips descended to face them from the room beyond. "Halt, and identify yourselves," came a stallion's voice.

Luna sighed. "An invading horde. Surrender your treasures and we shall leave ye unmaimed."

"Stand easy, guard," came the same stallion's voice. The Princesses stepped into the small room, seemingly filled entirely with rows of lance-wielding Dayguard. The captain, a white-coated unicorn in purple officer's armour, stood before the door at the room's back. He nodded to Luna and Cadance in turn. "Princesses Luna and Cadance. Princess Celestia and the rest of the privy council wait in the chamber for your arrival."

"My thanks, Captain Armour. Who amongst the council wait within?" Luna had noticed the way he and Cadance had looked at one another, and made a note to herself to follow this with interest.

Shining Armour paused in thought. "Princess Celestia herself. Ministers Elusive, Cold Spell, Royal Purple, and Grimoire. High General Hobby. Prince Blueblood."

Luna considered it an odd collection of councillors, and struggled to guess at what the Intelligence, Weather, Diplomatic, and Magic Ministers could collaborate on with the Guard's High General and Prince Blueblood (she understood the latter's title was purely aristocratic and not the result of an alicorn-minting spree by Celestia, and that his presence owed more to loopholes of hereditary than actual expertise)

"Very good," she said to the captain. "Grant us entry, then."

Shining Armour nodded and stood aside, opening the door with his magic as he did so. Luna stepped in, Cadance on her heels, and as they entered, the door was shut behind them.

The privy council's chamber was a high-ceilinged room, as old as the original foundations of the palace itself, lit from all sides by suspended magical lights in hovering glass spheres. A semicircular oak table sat in the middle, the flat length of it facing the far wall, on which was raised a great and flat plane of stone.

The councillors around the curved side of the table looked up and greeted Luna quietly as she entered. She recognised them from left to right: Weather Minister Cold Spell, a bright and cheerful-looking periwinkle-coated pegasus mare; Magic Minister Grimoire, an ageing and indigo-coated unicorn stallion who carried himself with dignity; Diplomatic Minister Royal Purple, an earth pony stallion who seemed to be engaged with some kind of quiet dignity competition with Grimoire; Intelligence Minister Elusive, an indeterminate mare hidden under a outsized cloak; High General Hobby, a pegasus mare clad in dull red armour; and Prince Blueblood, who was making a valiant effort to look as though he knew what he was doing here.

Behind the flat side stood Celestia, and she nodded to Luna and Cadance as they circled the table to stand at each side of her.

"Well," started Celestia, "Since we have the entire current privy council at hand, I see no reason to delay any further. Cold Spell, if you could begin with the report you gave me?"

Cold Spell nodded, cleared her throat, and said, "There's a storm inbound for Equestria. A wyld storm, coming from the north, and expected to discharge within our borders."

There were some intakes of breath from the council, and some confused mutters. Luna thought an exceedingly foul word to herself before Royal Purple spoke up. "I'm aware of the general principles of a wyld storm – it's natural severe weather that's managed to get itself infused with wild magic along its path, isn't it?"

"Correct," said Cold Spell. "It's a moving storm system that's soaked up a great deal of wild magic in its starting location. It's pushed by streams in the atmosphere, the Great South Stream in this case, continues to soak up wild magic, and discharges all of its energy and magic once it reaches a certain critical level. This isn't a good thing if you're where it discharges. Which we are. Princess, if you could - ?"

Celestia closed her eyes as magic pulsed around her horn, and the great stone plane at her back suddenly lit up with a brightly-glowing golden map of the continent.

Luna peered at it. There was the familiar wedge-shape of the continent running from south-west to north-east, with Equestria comfortably sprawling across the south-west and the lands north of that. The Greycairns started just within Equestria and bisected the continent into the inhospitable north and settled south, with all the nations south of the Greycairns picked out in glowing borders – neighbouring Asinia, Ovarn, mountainous Capra, Bovaland, and finally distant Corva occupying the far north-east.

On the map, there was another curving line, glowing red. It came from across the sea and off the map's top edge, from the terrible and eternally-frozen Far North. It passed into the continent at the eastern edge of Corva, shifted its course westwards to pass through Corva and clip the edge of Bovaland, and terminated in a flashing little circle in the Greycairns just north of Capra. A dotted line passed out of it, indicating an expected route that exited the Greycairns, just missing Asinia as it did so, and which came to an abrupt stop just in the middle of Equestria.

Hobby cleared her own throat. "What effect will it have when it makes a stop here? I'm guessing a huge amount of wild magic ruining everyone's day."

"In essence," said Grimoire, his voice a melodious and commanding baritone. "Warped natural workings, random transformation, destruction of towns, ponies, environments – envisage when Discord held sway, without any remote sense of fun behind it all. I may exaggerate – has a strength category been determined yet?"

"The Weather Office is inclined to call it a Category Four, more than sufficient to cause widespread devastation if left unchecked." Cold Spell paused in thought. "It could be a borderline Five, we're not sure yet."

"Oh, almost certainly a Five," said Blueblood suddenly. "That sort of track length would be positively abnormal on anything less, if I recall correctly. I don't suppose you've managed to determine mean precipitation levels where the storm's already hit? They can be inversely proportional to the strength of it, as a rough measure – the magic can retain a lot of the moisture, it's a funny process... "

He stopped as the silence from the rest of the table began to sink in.

"I, ah, studied this. I have a doctorate in meteorology, and my thesis was on magically-altered weather systems such as wyld storms."

The silence continued.

"...It doesn't come up much in conversations – when is it expected to arrive?" said Blueblood hastily.

"Thirty six hours," replied Cold Spell. "More or less by about an hour."

"That's accursedly close-at-hoof," said Royal Purple. "Surely it's still got half the continent to travel?"

"The Great South Stream's driving it on, and it's not unknown for effects within wyld storms to give them unnatural speed."

"Reports from Bovaland about the storm came earlier, and sightings from the borders of Capra shortly after," said Elusive for the first time. "It's moving quickly. There have already been reports from Weather Patrol leaders about freak wild magic incidents across Equestria. I understand such storms push a vanguard ahead of them through the weather currents – we're already seeing their effects."

"Correct," said Cold Spell. "I will point out with all due long-suffering patience that those are my office's reports."

"I'm the Intelligence Minister. Every report is eventually my report."

"Is this purely natural?" asked Luna, sending a brief glance Celestia's way, which was answered with a nigh-imperceptible nod of acknowledgement. She turned to the rest of the privy council. "Such storms have been prepared and released as weapons before."

Elusive shook her head. "It's almost certainly natural. Agents of mine sighted it moving into Bovaland from Corva, so Bovaland could have had no hoof in this. The Bullwalda seems to have been caught off-guard by it as much as we have. As for Corva, a new Cormaer has emerged." To the side, Royal Purple choked with annoyance at his planned contributions being stolen. "I suspect I'll be calling for a meeting of this council alongside General Hobby on that matter in due course. But they don't presently have the capacity, infrastructure, or unity amongst their magic-users to create something like this."

"Foreign threats or otherwise aside, what's to be done?" asked Royal Purple. "Have we some means of nullifying wild magic en-mass across Equestria? Grimoire?"

"We have the nullifiers in every town and city," said Celestia then, with grim satisfaction.

Grimoire chuckled. "I'd forgotten about that system. A relic from my predecessor. Holding onto it for a rainy day, indeed."

"Equestria was last hit by a wyld storm of this magnitude fifty years ago. We had more forewarning then," said Celestia. "A nullifier was a device that could earth the wild magic in the sky for miles around, enough to take it from the skies above a settlement and focus all the magic onto the device itself. When the magic was contained, the storms could then be safely dealt with by weather teams. Equestria pulled through intact then, and holding onto the devices in every town where they'd been used seemed wise."

"Well, that's something of a relief. Do they require any especial training to be used?" said Royal Purple.

"Nothing beyond what any unicorn with above average magical control and a minimum of strength can achieve," said Grimoire. "There should be one of those in every settlement, I should think."

"Nearly all. Some settlements are dominated by some tribes. And some newer ones have no nullifier." Celestia stood upright to her full height. "To that end, I will receive records indicating those settlements that have been established after the time of the last storm. Either myself or Luna will be able to see them protected."

"All of them at once, Your Highness?" said Hobby sceptically.

"All of them. If the storm strikes during day, I can move wherever the sun shines in an instant. Luna may do the same after nightfall."

"A sensible approach. I propose that the other of us attends to Cloudsdale. I believe it remains the largest purely pegasi settlement, and will require protection absent a unicorn resident," said Luna.

"Cadance," said Celestia, turning to the smaller alicorn. "Canterlot is the largest city in Equestria. I would place its nullifier under your care come tomorrow."

"Consider it done, Auntie," replied Cadance. "What about the other towns and cities in Equestria?"

"For the rest of today, the word shall be put out that a wyld storm is inbound," said Celestia. "All towns shall unearth their nullifiers, place them atop high ground, and see that a competent unicorn helms each one; with all resident ponies safe indoors and isolated homesteads evacuated. See that notice and instructions are given to all local authorities, Royal Purple. Cold Spell, see that weather teams are grounded and kept on stand-by, to begin an immediate clear-up after the magic from the storm is contained. General Hobby, begin a partial Guard mobilisation to assist in the repair of whatever infrastructure will be damaged. If we work swiftly and see that all are informed, not a single pony shall have to suffer come tomorrow."

She rapped a hoof on the table. "Any further information or suggestions, councillors?"

Heads shook around the table.

"Meeting adjourned, then. Let us avert mischief and see Equestria endure."

Comments

[krakenlakka]

I didn't catch any spelling mistakes in this one. You did have a slip of human phrase in the meeting

close-at-hand

. While not fitting with the all pony meeting, it does flow better with the mood of the circumstances. I don't know if you want to change that or not.

[Csquared08]

Luna sighed. "An invading horde. Surrender your treasures and we shall leave ye unmaimed."

HAHAHA! Yeeeeeeeeeees

(Royal Purple choked with annoyance at his planned contributions being stolen.)

I have no idea why there are parentheses there. The sentence was perfectly fine as a sentence in the middle of the dialogue.

[Lurks-no-More]

Well that explains why Blueblood was there!

All in all, this is shaping to be an interesting read.

[CrystalWaters]

"When assailed by thine tormentors ... "

"I ... 'return their torment in equal measure, grant wound for wound, and let myself not be belittled with impunity'?"

Oh this is just delicious.

Also, yay Skewbald!
Even though he might not have the greatest attitude he certainly has a bit of fortitude and talent.