My name is Nightshade, and this is my story, of how I lived my life up to the day I met the pony that would change my life for the better.
My name is Nightshade, and this is my story, of how I lived in the forest I called home, of how practically everyday was a struggle for me. After the tragic events of what befell my clan, Blackwood Forest became a dangerous place, for a young colt like me, you grow up quick and strong, or die. This is my story, of how I lived my life until the day I met that one pony who changed my life for the better. This is a prequel to A Hermit With A Heart
My life was perfect, I had everything I could need to be happy. My parents were the king and queen of our tribe, which meant I was the prince. We lived happy peaceful lives, we worshiped both the sun and the moon. The sun for bringing light and life to the world, the moon for bringing beauty and peaceful rest. Saying that my parents ruled over our tribe wouldn’t really be right, it was more like the tribe looked up to them. Our tribe consisted of three branches of our kind. There were those who were bound to the earth but had a talent for growing food and plants, there were those that could fly and manipulate the weather, and there were those that had the ability to use magic.
But there was one trait all our tribe shared, a different kind of magic, it was known as shadow magic, the ability to manipulate, control, and travel through shadows. Myself and my parents had all three traits of our tribe. The ones who wielded magic had two horns atop their heads that curved back a little. The flyers wings were similar to that of a dragon’s wings. Our home was a stone village rested in the heart of a deep dark and very large forest. We lived peaceful happy lives there and kept to ourselves in the forest, we never saw the need to venture outside when we had all we needed at our village.
One other feature about our home was the fact that it was the only place really to find a beautiful flower known as a lunar lilly, it was named such as it bloomed every night when the moon shone, the outside of the pedals were a deep purple, while the inside was pure white and let off a white glow similar to the moon whenever they opened. Our tribe was like a family to me, we all got along and knew one another, and cared for one another. The young helped the old and sick. Because of our peaceful ways, we didn’t know how to fight, we never had the need to, our forest was a peaceful beautiful place with its large thick trees and beautiful plant life. Our peaceful paradise was not to last however. Tragedy struck one night. After the sun had set and we were all getting ready to rest for the night, a cry rang out at the edge of the village. Flames were forming atop the roof of a home, the flames started to spread, then the attack came.
Creatures similar to us in form began to surround the village, some of them had wings too, but they were feathery, while some of them had horns, but they only had one straight horn atop their heads. They came out of nowhere and started attacking us, we had no hope to defend ourselves. Mother and father were afraid, father picked me up and placed me on his back, together, he and mother ran away as fast as they could to try and escape the flames that now consumed our once beautiful home. As we raced through the village, I chanced a look back only to see a tall slender figure hidden by the shadows, the only feature I could make out were its red red glowing eyes.
It saw us running and pointed an appendage at us, soon, some of the creatures began to chase after us. Mother and father did their best to try and out run them, we had managed to make it away from the village but we would be unable to out run all of them, I tried to suggest that we fly away but father said that we would be over taken by the flyers. It was looking hopeless, we were goners, the pony creatures would over take us soon. Without warning, my parents suddenly stopped, my father picked me up from his back and placed me in a hollow dead tree. He looked down to me with worry evident on his face. “Son, I want you to stay here and keep yourself hidden, no matter what you hear, DO NOT come out of this tree, understand?”
I was afraid, why was father leaving me in this tree. “Dad, what are you and mom going to do, please don’t leave me here.” I pleaded with them not to leave me.
“Son, we know your scared, but this is something we have to do, we’ll lead them away so you can be safe, once we lose them, we’ll come back for you. Please stay here and I promise we will see you again.” Mother tried to comfort me.
“Mom, please don’t leave me, I’m afraid.” My eyes were starting to water with fear.
Father spoke to me again. “We know your afraid, but right now, I need you to be brave, stay here and keep hidden. We will come back for you.”
“We love you son.” Mother said to me before they both turned and ran off, leaving me where they put me. I was terrified at this point, but I did as my parents instructed and stayed in the tree. Moments after they left, the ponies that were chasing us passed by, I pushed myself as far back into the tree as I could, ducked down and covered my mouth with my hooves. They passed by without noticing me as I watched their hooves gallop past. After a minute or two, I heard a terrible scream off in the distance, I recognized the scream. Fear welled up inside of me, I had to go see if my suspicions were correct. I crawled out of the tree and galloped as fast as I could to where I heard the scream come from. I soon came to the top of a hill, thanks to the moon still shining in the sky, I was able to see what was going on. At the foot of the hill, there was the group of ponies that were chasing us. They were gathered in a circle looking down at something. I froze in fear, thinking they would see me, I ducked behind a nearby tree at the top of the hill. I poked my head around and watched.
The ponies soon began to head up the hill where I was hidden. I quickly tried to hide myself in the shadow of the tree and kept my muzzle shut. Thankfully, they passed by, heading back in the direction of my home. Once gone, I came out from behind the tree and looked down to the base of the hill. I could make out two figures lying on the ground. My breath caught in my lungs as I feared the worst. I slid down the hill and came to a stop at the base.
I slowly made my way over to the figures, looked down and beheld what was before me. My worst fears were realized that night. My mother and father lay before me with blood coming from their nose and mouth, their horns were shattered and broken, their wings were torn up and rendered useless. Their legs were broken, their manes were a mess. My mother and father……..my parents…….lay dead before my eyes. My tears welled up, I tried to hold them back, but it was no use, I let out a hurt felt heart breaking wail at the sight as I flung my head up to the night sky and closed my eyes as my tears flooded out.
“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, MOTHER, FATHER, IT CAN’T BE, you can’t leave me, please!” I cried as I looked back down to them, I cradled my father’s head in my forelegs, trying desperately to wake him. “Please father, get up, you can’t be dead you can’t!” I placed his head and walked over to my mother’s body. “MOM, please wake up, you have to wake up, PLEASE! DON’T LEAVE ME!” It was futile, my mother and father were gone. All the ponies of my tribe had been slaughtered, in my remorse, I tucked myself in my mother’s lifeless hooves and just lay there next to her cold body in utter hopelessness. “Mother, father, what do I do now, I’m all alone.” I said to myself. I don’t know how long I stayed like that with my dead parents, minutes……..hours, I didn’t care, all I knew was that my tribe was now gone, my home was burned down, and my parents…….my caring wonderful parents……were now gone. I was all alone now with no one to take care of me, I was still just a colt at the time, how could I do this, how could I survive on my own.
My parents gave their life so I would live, I knew I had to at least try…….and that is what I was going to do. This is my tale of how I lived my life in the forest I called home, Blackwood Forest.
Five days had passed now since I lost everything dear to me. I went back to my village the next day to see the destruction those invaders rot. It was not a pleasant scene, every shadow walker I knew was dead, I searched throughout the village hoping to not find a dead familiar face, but it was to no avail, I ran away and didn’t look back. I did what I could to stay alive, feeding off the fruit that grew on some of the trees in the forest and eating the edible plants. Five days after that, I found myself sitting on a rock under a large leaf from a nearby bush.
It provided protection against the downpour that came from the sky. The day seemed to mirror my mood, dark and depressed. As if to celebrate its freedom and take its anger out on being controlled for so long, the sky let out a turrent of rain from the very thick dark clouds above. I sat there, sobbing, sniffling, and crying. After about an hour or so, I finally stop. “What’s the point of crying anymore, what’s the point of anything, I’ll never be happy again. I’m all alone now, I have to do what I can to survive, it’s what my mother and father would want. I can’t be sad anymore, no more feeling sorry for myself.” That’s when I got a thought. “What’s the point of feeling anything anymore, it’s not like there’s any pony around to care how I feel, I’ll just lock my emotions away and never have to worry about it again.”
I made a decision that I would lock away everything that had to do with emotion. I remember some mental training I received from one of my tribe mates, they were good at mental things, he was a magic wielder, he taught me some things about how to lock away your fear when you shouldn’t be afraid, it was only meant to be a temporary thing for one should never be without fear forever. But then, how could he foresee what I would end up going through. I decided to use that technique here and now to lock away all my emotions forever. I closed my mind and focused my thoughts, just like I was taught.
After a few moments of concentration, I felt that I had accomplished my goal. Little did I know that such an action would have a side effect. Emotions weren’t meant to be locked up forever. “Hello.”
“GAH!” I screamed in surprise at the sudden voice. I looked to my side with surprise, apparently I still had a ways to go to lock all my emotions up, but I felt I locked quite a bit of them, that would have to wait for now though. To my side, was a shadow of myself, it looked exactly like me, except it was all black and had red eyes. “Who……who are you?” I asked hesitantly.
“Well, I’m you….sort of.” It responded.
I cocked an eyebrow at the shadow of myself. “Sort of, what do you mean sort of, how can you be me, I’m me, what are you?” I asked, pointing my hoof at the apparition.
“Well, I’m not sure how to explain it other than to say that……I am a manifestation of your emotions, since you chose to lock them up, they have to come out somehow, so the magic in you created me.” It explained.
“That’s ridiculous, how do I know this isn’t some kind of trick from some creature that wants to eat me?” I asked, not believing a word of what my shadow double had said.
“What if I told you something that only you knew, something about yourself?”
I narrowed my eyes at the shadow. “All right, tell me something about myself that only I would know.” I said with suspicion clear in my voice.
The shadow put a hoof to its chin in thought. “I know what mom and dad called you when you were younger.”
I waved a hoof as I turned my head to the side. “Yeah right.” I turned back to the shadow. “All right then, what did mom and dad use to call me when I was younger?”
My doppleganger sneered. “They used to call you their little night bird.”
It was evident now that I still had a ways to go to lock up my emotions, as my face flushed red with embarrasement. “HEY, they…..they did not. You’re a fake!” I tried to lie.
I don’t know why, but the shadow then started to laugh. “HA ha ha ha, oh man, the look on your face.”
I was getting mad. “Knock it off you imposter, or I’ll……I’ll do…..something.” I desperately tried to think of something to follow through with my threat, but nothing came to mind.
My duplicate then composed itself and spoke. “I’m sorry, but how else was I going to prove to you that what I said was true?”
I gave a humph in disapproval. “Humph, fine, so you know that about me.” I said as I looked to it with a frown. “I guess you’re telling the truth, so what now, am I stuck with you or what?”
The shadow smiled. “Pretty much, at least until you decide that you do need emotions.”
I was not happy about that statement. “Well, I don’t need emotions anymore, there’s no need for them when your alone, and I don’t need you around either, so just disappear already, I don’t need you, I don’t need anyone.”
My double shook his head. “Sorry Nightshade, but you’re stuck with me. Like it or not, I’m like your imaginary friend now, only you can see and hear me.”
“Great.” I muttered under my breath before letting out a yawn, I was getting tired and it must be late, the rain was still coming down though, yet in my tired condition, it was almost soothing. I laid down, crossed my forelegs, and rested my head on them. “I don’t need anyone.” I said one final time before I fell asleep. Before I did, I felt something warm snuggle up beside me. I raised my head again and saw my shadow had laid down next to me, somehow it was able to give off warmth like he was alive.
As if to answer the question in my head, my double spoke. “It’s part of the magic that made me, you can feel me too, I can give you warmth like this so you won’t be too cold in this weather.”
I just ignored him then and rested my head back in its previous position with it facing away from my shadow. I didn’t want to admit it, but feeling warmth from another source provided some comfort for me as I let sleep take me. “Don’t worry mom, dad, I’ll survive on my own just fine, just like you wanted.” I said quietly to myself before blacking out from sleepiness.
***
I awoke the next day to the sound of birds chirping, the rain had stopped as the sun shone through the trees, I could see through the canopy that some of the clouds were still there, but were now white instead of grey. I decided today would be the day I got to the arduous task of burying my clan. I knew it would be hard, but it was something I had to do. I could remember where everyone lived, so I thought it also appropriate that I bury them in the ground under their houses. I yawned as I stretched my forelegs, followed by my hind legs, and gave my wings a good stretch.
I decided the first thing I needed to do was find breakfast, I then noticed that my shadow double was gone. “It must have been a dream.” I thought to myself. I shook the thought from my head and decided to let it go, if it was a dream, there was no need to dwell on it. I climbed down from the rock I was on and went about to locate the nearest fruit tree. It only took me a minute to find one. I craned my neck up and spotted the food I craved. A funny shaped fruit with two shades of green in the form of stripes, a forest pear. I figured I could easily fly up there and retrieve it, but I knew that since I was on my own now, I needed to start strengthening myself. So I decided to exercise my shadow magic first. I concentrated like my parents taught me and formed a black circle under me, I was straining at first as I groaned and flexed my shadow walker powers. “Come on, come on.” I egged myself on.
“That’s it, you almost got it.”
I suddenly lost my concentration and let out a surprised yelp and fell to my side. “AH!”
“Oops, um, sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you, I was just trying to give moral support.” My shadow had returned. To my dismay, what happened last night was not a dream.
“Oh great, it’s you, so you weren’t a dream after all.” I said as I rolled my eyes at it.
My shadow smiled as it responded. “Nope, I’m real all right.” His smile quickly disappeared in place of a straight face. “Well, sort of.”
An idea formed in my head. “All right then. If your real, then get that fruit for me.” I said with a sneer of my own.
My shadow then shook his head. “Sorry, but I can’t interact with anything but you, I’m not real, I really only exist as a manifestation of your emotions, remember?”
I frowned and narrowed my eyes. “Then what good are you, just leave me alone so I can eat.”
My shadow turned his head slightly and raised an eyebrow. “You sure you don’t want me to cheer you on?”
I turned my attention back to the tree and faced the trunk. “I don’t need cheering, I need food, so just leave me alone and let me do this in peace.” I faced my double again and gave a glare to get my point across.
My double closed his eyes as he spoke. “All right, but if you need me, you know I’ll always be there for you. You know where to find me.” With that, my double then just faded out.
“Whatever.” I said as I turned my attention back to my task at hoof. I focused my shadow magic and created the black circle again, straining like before. The form appeared under my hooves and I strained to shape it into a shadow tentacle to reach up and grab the fruit. “Come on, come on, almost got it.” I said to myself as I held my eyes closed in utter concentration. To my delight, a tentacle started to form, I chanced a peek with my left eye and saw a shadow tentacle reaching up in front of me. I closed my eye again, and kept it up. After a moment, I had to see how I was doing, so I opened my eyes while trying to keep my concentration up.
I saw the tentacle slowly reaching up the trunk of the tree and heading right for my goal. I couldn’t help but feel a little pride in myself that I was succeeding in my difficult task. The tentacle reached the fruit and I concentrated on what I wanted the thing to do. It wrapped around the fruit and I focused on pulling it down. The fruit was being stubborn as I strained even more to get the tentacle to pull it off. It took everything I had and finally managed to dislodge the fruit from the tree with the tentacle I made. It was a little easier to make the tentacle come down with the fruit in tow.
Once it reached me, I took hold of the fruit with my mouth and released my concentration. Once the shadow magic dissipated, I collapsed to the ground in exhaustion and the fruit fell out of my mouth, thankfully, it didn’t roll away. I managed to collect it in my right foreleg and brought it to my mouth. I managed to push myself up off the ground onto my haunches and held the fruit up. I took a bit with a satisfying crunch. After the exertion I put into obtaining it, it was the sweetest tasting fruit I ever ate. But I knew one wasn’t enough.
“Way to go Nightshade, you did it.”
My eye lids fell to a half lidded position as my smile turned to a frown, my mouth full with some of the fruit. “Ugh.” I quickly turned my head for a quick peek and saw my double there giving me a smile as if to congratulate me on my victory. I just ignored him and turned my attention back to my breakfast. After I finished with it, I went the easy route to get another piece and flew up to the branches.
After eating two more of the forest pears, I decided now was the time to start the task I set for myself, it wasn’t going to be pretty, but it was something I felt had to be done. I made my way back to the village with my shadow double next to me. I came to a stop at the edge of the village.
“Are you sure you want to do this, it’s a lot of work, especially for one so young.” My double asked with concerned eyes.
“Of course I’m sure, I can’t just leave them like this, they’re my family.” I said as I looked over the village, the bodies of my tribe lay scattered in disarray. I was starting to get a worried look as well as I looked over the grizzly scene. I audibly gulped and steeled myself as I narrowed my eyes. “All right, I can do this. I can do this.” I then turned to my double again. “I don’t suppose you’d be able to help?” I asked with my eyes narrowed.
“Sorry, but like I said, I am only able to interact with you, I can’t move or touch anything else.” He said with sympathetic eyes.
“Then I guess I’m on my own, like I knew I would be.” I said sourly. So I began with the closest body, it was not pretty like I thought, but I had to steel myself. I recognized who it was and realized I had to move the body to near the center of the village, that was where his home was. I saw one of his legs were broken in a few places with a bone sticking out. I did my best not to vomit at the sight, but I knew there was bound to be more gruesome things to see. I decided to exercise my regular magic this time and took hold of the body in my black aura as my horns lit up, I tried to drag it. I strained again like before, letting out grunts and groans as I managed to move the body a ways, I even tried using my wings for extra leverage.
After a few minutes of straining myself to move the body, I finally managed to get it to its destination. I then figured it would probably be best to move the bodies to their homes before I started digging the holes. I had a LOT of work to do. I figured I would save my parents for last since their bodies were outside the village.
Only half the day gone now, and I managed to move only a few of the bodies to their rightful resting places. I still had a few more to go, then I could start on the holes. And, as I thought, the deaths I saw that were inflicted on my tribe were more gruesome than the first one I saw, but I need not get into the horrors of it. I didn’t notice the position of the sun when it hung in the middle of the sky. My double emerged and spoke to me as I was busy trying to move another body to its rightful resting place. “Nightshade, don’t you think it’s time you took a break, it’s lunch time you know?” He informed me.
“I’m…..doing……just……fine.” I said between strains. “I……don’t need……a break.” I finally gave out on the body I was moving. I collapsed to the ground, that was when my stomach decided to disagree with me by letting out a rebellious rumble as if to tell me to eat something. I let out a defeated sigh. “*sigh* Fine, I’ll take a break.”
My double gave me a sympathetic smile.
Near the end of the day, I finally managed to move all the bodies to their homes, I was exhausted by then and knew I wouldn’t be able to dig the holes in my condition, plus, the sun was starting to set. With the first half of my task complete, I only had to get my parents bodies and move them to the castle at the other end of the village. I decided tomorrow was when I would retrieve their bodies and bring them to the castle, then I could start to make the holes. For now, I needed sleep. I decided to rest in the castle, I walked along the cobble stone road that lined my home up to my own place. I walked through the front doors that were now in shambles, one of them just hung on by a single hinge. I looked at it with sad eyes, I continued on into the castle where the throne room was.
From there, behind the thrones my parents used, and my own, was a large door that lead to my parents room, next to that was a smaller door that lead to my room. I walked up to the door and opened it up. It was still the way I left it. Everything was there, a few toys made of wood, a doll my mother made me that looked like a pony from old tales my father told me, a brave stallion who wasn’t afraid of anything and always did the right thing. It was resting on my bed, it was really more like a nest made of twigs and green leaves, my father used a spell on the thing so the leaves would stay green and comfortable longer than they normally would. The doll I owned was resting in my bed.
I walked up to my bed, picked up my doll with my left foreleg and looked at it with sad eyes. “Dad, mom.” I whispered to myself. I cradled the doll now and nuzzled it as a tear managed to escape. I opened my eyes in shock. I quickly pulled myself away from the doll. “NO!” I shouted. “I can’t afford to feel anymore, I have to be strong, I have to.” I threw the doll away to the wall opposite my bed. I huffed in anger as my nostrils flared. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath to calm myself. I then turned to my bed and crawled in to rest for the night. Tomorrow, I would bring my parents here and begin the task of burying my clan.
It’s been a month now since I buried my clan and parents, after doing so, I erected markers for each one of them, I did the best I could for them. As usual, I just lived my life alone, surviving however I could, it was pretty easy since all I had to do was make sure I got food and water when needed, but it was starting to get boring. I stayed in the village after I buried every pony and didn’t leave, but now, I was starting to consider venturing beyond the village just to find something to do so I wouldn’t be bored. It was still morning when I walked to the edge of the village and pondered on weather this was a good idea or not. I figured since I had nothing else to do, I might as well explore Blackwood forest and see what lies beyond my home. My shadow, however, decided to try and talk me out of it.
“Are you sure about this, there’s no telling what might be out there, no shadow walker has ever gone beyond the village, other than to gather fruit and water, and even then, they didn’t venture all that far since the stream is so close.”
I turned to my shadow and responded with a frown. “You got any other better ideas, it’s boring here just eating, drinking, and sleeping with nothing to do.”
“But it could be dangerous, who knows what’s out there.”
I faced forward and steeled myself. “I’m not afraid, I can handle myself just fine now.” I have been practicing my magic in the month, but it still wasn’t very strong. I took my first step and never stopped. My shadow had disappeared after my first step and started on what I hoped would be a new and exciting adventure for myself.
I walked for what seemed like hours. It wasn’t until I caught sight of some strange tracks, the likes of which I had never seen that I finally stopped to take a look at them. The tracks were big to say the least, they were in sets of two, as if made by some bi-pedal creature, the sides of each print curved in at the middle and had five protrusions at the front of them. I wasn’t sure what to make of them, but they were fresh. I decided to follow the tracks and see what sort of creature made them.
“This is a bad idea.” My shadow had reappeared beside me and warned me in a sing song voice.
“I already told you, I’m not afraid. Besides, I can always fly away from it if it’s dangerous.” I said to my shadow.
“Ok, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.” He said before fading out again. I just rolled my eyes at his warning, I then began to follow the new tracks.
After a few minutes, I managed to catch up to what made the tracks, it appeared to be looking for something as it looked behind bushes and trees, I kept myself hidden behind a bush as the creature had its back turned. I was right in my assumption that the thing was bi-pedal, it was standing on two legs, it had two other appendages that were similar to a monkeys hand that I had seen. This new being was large, had a big gut, and sickly green skin with warts on different parts of its body. It was wearing a loin cloth around its waist and was carrying a large wooden club in one of its hands. “Whoa.” I whispered to myself. “What is that thing?”
My shadow then appeared next to me to try and get me to leave. “Ok, you saw what made those tracks, now let’s get out of here before it sees you.”
“Are you kidding, I’ve got to get a closer look and see what it’s face looks like.” I said as I looked to my shadow.
“Are you CRAZY, what if it tries to eat you, you can’t go over there, there’s no telling what it might do to you.”
I was so foolish in my young age then. “I’m not afraid.” I then quietly came out of the bushes and snuck around to try and get in front of it without being spotted, taking cover behind other bushes and trees. As I was coming around to its side, I heard something.
“Well, well, well, what do we have here?” I turned around and there was another of the creatures standing before me and looking down at me. I gave out a yelp and tried to fly away, but the thing had a club too, it swung it at me and hit me on my side, sending me flying to the side and I slammed into a tree, hitting my other side.
I grunted in pain. “GAH!” The two creatures, along with a third that emerged closed in on me and cornered me against the tree, I managed to stand up, and took a kind of defensive stance. I tried to jump up and use my wings, but was only met with pain. “AH!” I flopped back to the ground, I looked over my right wing and found it was broken, rendered useless until it could heal.
The three creatures stood over me. The one that was looking in the bushes earlier spoke. “Well now, what do we have here, looks kinda scrawny don’t ya think?” It asked in a deep voice with a bit of a snarl. They had two sharp looking teeth sticking up out of their mouths.
One of the things on the first’s left spoke. “It sure does, might make a good snack though, heh heh.” It was then I decided to show I wasn’t afraid. “I….I’m not afraid of you, you best let me go or else.”
This seemed to surprise them as they gained shocked expressions on their faces. The middle one spoke again, I assumed that one must be the leader. “What do ya know, it can talk, first creature I saw that could talk back.”
The one on the leader’s right then spoke. “Maybe we should take it to the chief, not only can it talk, but we aint never seen nothin like this thing, Don’t ya think Oog.”
The leader gave a sinister smile to his friend. “Not a bad idea Bulk, hog tie him and let’s take him back to our village.”
The one identified as Bulk then took the rope that was hanging from a strap of some kind around his waist and moved towards me. “You better back off, I’m warning you.”
Bulk was not intimidated. “Save it runt, you aint goin nowhere.”
I then decided to try and use my shadow magic against them, I formed the shadow circle around me and formed the tentacle, I was straining though, but I had to try something to see if I could scare them off. “Hey, what’s it doin?” Asked the left one.
I then launched the tentacle at Bulk, but only succeeded in just causing a light tap, the tentacle just scrunched up on impact against Bulks belly. That bit of shadow magic exhausted me. “HAH, is that all you got, that didn’t even tickle.” Bulk stated, I was now too weak to try anything else. He reached down with one of his hands and picked me up, my whole body fit in his hand and just my head was poking out.
Bulk then gave me a little toss and grabbed me by my hind legs so I was now hanging upside down. “HEY, let me go you brute, I’m warning you.”
“Save it kid, you got nothin.” Bulk said as he began to wrap the rope around my forelegs, then proceeded to tie all four of my legs together. “There we go, you aint gettin away from us pipsqueak.”
Oog then spoke. “Come on, let’s get back, the chief will want to see this thing.” Bulk then just slung me over his back and just let me hang there by my legs upside down. I was very annoyed and frustrated that I was being handled as such, but I was also feeling a little afraid at the fact that I was just captured by some large creatures I had never seen before, but I didn’t show it, I kept my annoyed expression.
It was then that my shadow appeared and was flyin in front of me. “I told you this was a bad idea.”
I glared at my shadow. “shut up.” I said in a low tone so the creatures could not hear me.
After a few minutes of being carried, I decided to see if I could at least see if they could tell me what they were. “Hey tubbo, can you at least tell me what sort of creatures you are?”
“We’re trolls, haven’t you ever heard of trolls kid?” Bulk answered.
“No, I haven’t.”
Oog then spoke up. “And just what are you kid, I ain’t never seen nothin like you before.”
I figured there was no harm in answering. “I’m a shadow walker, so you better let me go, or I’ll unleash my shadow walker powers on you.”
This got all three of them laughing at me. “HA HA HA HA, what, you mean that black thing that tapped my gut, HAH, oh yeah kid, I’m real scared. HA HA HA.” Bulk stated. It was then I figured I wasn’t going to intimidate my way out of this, so I had to come up with another plan, they didn’t seem all that bright, so maybe I could outsmart them. I began to think of another way to escape.
A few more minutes went by and I had formed a plan that I hoped would work. I smiled at my brilliance. “Hey ugly, I need to go.”
Bulk responded. “Like I said shrimp, you aint goin nowhere, we’re taking you to our village to see the chief and that’s final.”
“No, I mean I need to GO, as go to the bathroom.” I emphasized go.
“Yeah right, nice try kid.” Bulk thought I was bluffing.
“Ok, then I guess you’d rather I go on your back like this?”
That got him, he stopped in his tracks, I heard him very clearly. “EEEEWWWW, NO WAY are you doing that on my back.”
“Well then, let me down and untie me so I can go, I promise I won’t run away.”
Bulk then brought me around and had me still hanging upside down in front of his face. “Look here runt, I’m not about to risk you running off and getting away, you’re the best catch we’ve had today, you are NOT getting away.”
It was then the third troll who had yet to be identified spoke up. “Just use the rope like a leash.”
Bulk lowered me a bit to look at the one that spoke. “Good idea Guts.” Bulk then lowered me to the ground and lay me on my side, he then proceeded to tie the other end of the rope around my neck before undoing the ropes around my legs. I then stood up and looked up at Bulk. “Go there.” He pointed to some nearby bushes.
I walked to the bushes and heard Bulk walking behind me. I stopped before going behind the bushes and looked back at him. “What, you gonna watch me? I can’t go with someone watching me.” Bulk glared at me, I glared back. “Turn around.”
Bulk let out a grumble as he turned his head around and let me take care of business. I walked behind the bushes out of sight of the trolls and began to try and chew off the leash I had around my neck. It took a minute before progress finally started to show. I then heard Bulk’s voice call out to me. “You almost done in there kid?”
I stopped chewing to answer. “Just about, just give me a minute. It’s not exactly easy for me to go when I know someone could walk in on me.”
“Just hurry up already.” He grumbled out. I went back to my chewing. After another minute, I finally chewed off the rope around my neck and was free. “HAH, finally, those trolls sure are dumb.” I said to myself, but then noticed a large shadow looming over me. I looked behind me and saw the three looking down at me with sinister smiles.
Oog spoke. “Dumb huh, nice try runt, let’s go.”
Once again, I found myself with my legs tied together and hanging upside down against a green back. I gave out a sigh as I hung there, sad my plan almost worked. As the trolls continued on, I realized I was being taken further away from my village, I was starting to worry, but I had to keep hope that I would find a way to escape and get back. After at least another hour, of walking, Oog spoke up. “Finally made it back.”
Bulk then brought be to his front, flipped me right side up in his hand and faced me forward so I could see the front of the village, there wasn’t much to see though, there was a wooden fence made of logs that were sharpened to a point at the top, they were being held together by rope, there was a large wooden gate to enter the place. “Take a good look runt, since the chief has a thing for unusual things, he may want to keep you as a pet, so this is going to be your new home.”
I glanced back at Bulk. “I am not a pet, and stop calling me runt, my name is Nightshade.”
“Whatever you say kid, whatever you say.” Bulk then hoisted me on his shoulder so I was now looking in the same direction he was and wasn’t upside down. He kept me on his right shoulder with his right hand. I had a good view of the place after passing through the wooden gates, there were huts that looked like they were made from animal skins and bone, while others were more like houses made of wood. Trolls were everywhere as we passed through the place. Some of them had sharp metal looking objects hanging from the same strap Bulk had. They were also wearing cloth on their upper and lower bodies. Some of them stopped what they were doing to stare at me as we passed by. I also noticed a few smaller looking trolls around the place as well, they must be young troll kids.
Soon we came to a large wooden structure with a chair made of the same material as the tents sitting in front of an open door and up a couple steps. On both sides of the steps, were two more trolls holding sticks with sharp metal points at the ends in their hands. There was a troll sitting on it wearing a hard brown object with white horns coming out of it. He was eating a big slab of cooked meat off a bone as he watched us approach. The sight of it made me cringe, I was beginning to fear for myself.
The three trolls stopped just before the stairs, Oog spoke first. "Chief, we we’re unsuccessful in our hunt, but we did find something interesting you may like.”
Bulk then stepped forward and picked me up by the rope again, letting me hang upside down. “We found this thing in the forest, we never seen nothin like it and thought you might be interested.”
The chief stopped chewing on the meat and looked down at the trolls, then to me. He then spoke. “You IDIOTS, I sent you out to find food and you bring back a thing that won’t even make a mouthful? I should have your heads for this.”
Oog then tried to defend himself. “But chief, this thing isn’t like anything we saw before, just look at it.” He said as he pointed both hands at me while keeping eye contact with the chief.
The chief got up off his throne and came down the steps, he stopped just in front of us and moved his head right up to me to get a good look. I decided to try and be brave. “What are you looking at ugly.” I said with narrowed eyebrows.
The chief recoiled back with a cocked eyebrow. “Well what do you know, talking food, HA, and it has a mouth on it.”
“You better let me go, or you’ll be sorry, there’s a whole tribe of my kind that will tear you apart if you don’t let me go.”
Guts then spoke up. “Yeah right, we found you alone kid, if there is more of you, I doubt you would have been left alone in a forest full of creatures that could turn you into a meal.” He then turned to the chief. “We found this thing on its own during our hunt, it says it’s a shadow walker.”
Bulk then spoke up. “Yeah, he has some weird power where he can summon a shadow and make some kinda tentacle thingy, but it wasn’t very impressive, he tried to hurt me with it and I didn’t feel a thing.”
The chief the used his free hand to rub at his chin in thought. “Hmm, interesting, all right, put him in a cage, he’ll make a fine pet.”
This got me riled up. “HEY, I am NOT a pet, let me go, I gotta get home!”
“And where is this home, huh little one, if there was more of you, then where are they, they would make fine meals for me as well, if there are more of you.” The chief asked. I couldn’t answer, I wasn’t really paying attention to where the Trolls were taking me, I was now lost and trapped being a pet to a monster I never heard of until today. The chief took me from Bulk, keeping me upside down. He carried me to a cage carved out of a large nearby rock and wooden bars off to the right side of the house. He carried me over to it, opened it up, undid my bonds and threw me in the cage and slammed it shut. “Welcome to your new home my new pet. HA HA HA HA HA!” He cackled as he walked away back to his throne.
The cell was rather roomy for me but it was still a cage. I lost my confident look as it shifted to one of despair, I had no idea what to do, my magic or shadow magic wouldn’t be strong enough to get me out of this, not to mention my wing was still broken. It wasn’t too bad but I wouldn’t be able to fly with it. I laid myself on the ground, crossed my forelegs and rested my head on them as I began to sob with my eyes turned to the back of my new home.
“Um, hello?” My head shot up at the new voice. I looked to the cell door and there, looking in at me, was a young troll, his voice certainly sounded young.
I quickly wiped away my tears as I looked at him. “What do you want?” I asked bitterly. “Hi there, I’m Og, what’s your name?” He asked almost cheerfully.
“Why should I tell you, I’m a pet now in case you didn’t hear all that.”
He seemed to look away sadly, then back to me with a straight face. “I know, I was behind my dad’s chair when he was talking with those three.”
I cocked an eyebrow at his statement. “Your dad……your dads the chief? Great, so I guess that means I’m your pet too doesn’t it?”
“Well, it doesn’t have to be. I mean, I’ve never seen something like you before, what are you, and what’s your name, you do have a name don’t you?”
I glared at Og. “Of course I have a name, it’s Nightshade, so you better remember it, and I’m called a shadow walker.”
Og cocked an eyebrow at my statement. “Nightshade, that’s a weird name.”
“I could say the same about yours.”
Og didn’t seem to like my statement as he seemed to glare at me. “Hey, my name is not weird, it is a perfectly respectable troll name, my dad gave it to me.”
“Whatever.” I said as I waved a dismissive hoof. “Look OG, I’m not exactly in the mood to talk right now, so why don’t you just leave me alone.”
Og then smirked. “Why don’t you tell me what kind of a name Nightshade is, it seems like a rather odd name to me.”
I glared back now. “THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH MY NAME, I took this name in honor of my mother and father!” I shouted. This caused Og to recoil.
Then he seemed to adopt a hint of wonder in his eye. “So there ARE more of you, where are they, what are they like, can I meet them, I promise I won’t eat them.”
I looked curiously at Og and his slew of questions. “Why would you want to meet my tribe?”
“Because I’ve never seen another species with the ability to talk, please say I might be able to meet them.”
“Well I’m sorry to disappoint you, but you won’t be able to meet them.” I said as I looked away.
This disappointed Og. “Awwe, why not?”
“Because, they…….they’re……..not around anymore.”
“But, you said there was a bunch of you that would come looking for you.” Og said with another cocked eyebrow.
“I was bluffing okay, my family is gone, is that what you want to hear? That I’m the last of my kind now and I’m all alone and on my own, is that it?!” I just released some pent up emotion and exploded at Og.
He recoiled a bit at my outburst. “I…..I’m sorry……I….didn’t know. I can’t imagine what that must be like, to be all alone like that. What happened to your tribe?”
I looked away again. “What does it matter, they’re gone and I’m alone, that’s all there is to it, so just go away and leave me alone.” I lay back down and retook the position I had before my visitor came along.
“Well, maybe you don’t have to be alone, my dad may care about me, but I don’t like when he’s mean to the others, he’s only nice to me because I’m his son. Maybe you and I could be friends, just think about it, ok, I gotta go anyway, I’ll come back later and see you, okay?” I didn’t answer. “All right then, take care Nightshade.” With that, Og left me to my misery, little did I know, he would be my first real friend since the tragedy that destroyed my world.
It’s been two days now since I was taken and made a pet for a troll chief, and my wing was still hurting, in fact, I think it was starting to hurt worse than it did before. In those two days, Og paid me regular visits and was the one that brought me my food. I wasn’t sure why he had such an interest in me, but at least he was someone to talk to, but even then I still wasn’t sure I could trust him.
It was late in the morning when I was testing my right wing again, stretching it out to try and work out the pain. I was sitting on my haunches in my cell with my left hoof near it as I stretched it. It was hurting. “AH, darn it, come on, get better already.” I complained. I stopped for a moment.
That was when my shadow came out. “Maybe you should tell the troll chief, or Og, I’m sure he would help, he seems nice enough.”
I looked to my shadow to respond. “I don’t need help, I’m sure after a while it will get better on its own, besides, why would those things care about me, I’m just a pet to them.”
“But it could be serious, it wouldn’t hurt to just ask for help with it.”
I continued with my stubbornness. “I don’t need help. Now leave me alone.” My shadow frowned and faded out. I wasn’t paying attention when I went back to testing my wing, Og had approached the cell door and watched me. I tried stretching it out again and sucked in air through my teeth in pain. “Ah, darn it.”
Og then made his presence known. “Nightshade, are you all right, what’s wrong with your wing?” He asked with genuine concern.
I faced him to answer. “Nothing, I’m fine.” He didn’t believe me. “it doesn’t look like your fine, come on Nightshade, what’s wrong, I want to help.”
I gave him a hard stare, contemplating on my next words, it was apparent he wasn’t going to let it go. I gave a sigh and answered. “My wing is hurting, on the day those three trolls found me, one of them struck me on my right side and hurt my wing, it’s still hurting.”
“Maybe I can help, let me take a look at it.”
I raised an eyebrow at him. “What can you do?”
He rubbed the back of his head with a nervous smile. “I…..I’ve been learning medicine from the troll shaman.”
I was confused by this word. “Shaman, what’s a shaman?”
“Someone who is good with medicine, it’s the shaman’s job to help trolls when they are hurt or sick, I’ve been learning from him, Grog, my dad, may not approve, but he lets me do it anyway. So come on over here and let me see if I can tell what the problem is.”
I rolled my eyes at him, but complied, I stood up and walked over to the cell door. The spaces between the bars were wide enough for me to stick my wing out, I turned my side and stuck my wing out, I winced in pain a little as I did. Og took hold of my wing and examined it closely as he held it.
“Gosh, it doesn’t look good, I think it’s broken. You need a splint to keep it in place so it can heal, all the moving you were doing wasn’t helping.” He said. “Just give me a minute and I’ll be right back.” Og turned to leave but was met with the site of his dad standing before him.
“Well, well, what are you up to son?” The chief asked, looking somewhat displeased.
Og gained a nervous smile. “Oh, uh, hey dad, what’s up?”
“Og, what are you doing with my pet?” The chief asked with his hands on his hips.
“Well dad, you see, its Nightshade, he….”
The chief cut him off. “Nightshade?” He asked with a cocked eyebrow.
“Yeah, the uh, shadow walker, him.” Og answered pointing to me as I watched the scene. “He’s hurt dad, his wing is broken and I was just going to get something to keep it in place so it could heal.”
“A broken wing huh, well in that case…….good, let it stay broken, that way, he can’t fly away, HA HA HA!”
Og was surprised at his dad. “But dad, it could be serious, think about it. His wound could get infected, and if it gets infected, he could get sick, and if he gets sick he could die, you don’t want him to die and lose what could possibly be the last of his kind, do you?” Og asked with a sly look and a smirk.
The chief then began to hum in thought. He took a few moments to think about what Og had said. After a while he finally spoke. “All right, fine, go and get something to fix his wing.” The chief then took on a serious look. “But if he tries to fly away when he’s better if he gets out of that cell, I’ll clip his wings permanently. Understand.”
Both Og and I gulped and nodded our heads together in understanding, Og then smiled, grateful he would be allowed to help me. “Thanks dad.” He then ran off to get what he needed.
The chief then got down on one knee and eyed me carefully. "Don’t think I won’t follow through with my threat little one, you are mine, and I intend to keep it that way.” He then gave a smile. “Hope you get better real soon, shadow walker.” He got back up and left.
Moments later, Og returned with some white strips of cloth in his arm and a metal key in his hand. “Ok, here we go, I got the key from my dad so I could get this on you properly.” He said with a smile. He unlocked the metal cell door and came in, closing it behind him. He walked up to me and kneeled down beside me so he could begin wrapping my wing up.
It was then I took in his features, he was wearing clothing like the other trolls on his upper and lower body, he had a few warts here and there, and as far as height, he stood just a little taller than me. While he began his work, I decided to ask him something. “Why do you care? Why are you helping me like this?”
He kept his eyes on my wing as he wrapped it. “Because, we’re friends aren’t we?”
I gave a stern look. “If we’re friends, then let me out of here so I can go home.”
I saw his expression drop upon my words. “I’m sorry Nightshade, but……I can’t, my dad would be furious at me. Besides, didn’t you say you’re the last of your kind or something, what kind of home is waiting for you if there’s no one there?”
“It’s still my home, it’s where I grew up, it’s where I had everything.”
His voice became soft. “And from what I can guess, it’s where you lost everything too, isn’t it?” My eyes fell to a sad look. He then looked me in the eye. “The way I see it, home is where you have someone who cares about you, someone who will be there for you. I know what it’s like to lose someone you care about Nightshade, I lost my mother a few years ago.” He then turned back to my wing. “She was great, she was nice, when she was around, my dad was nice too, but ever since we lost her, he just hasn’t been the same. He still cares about me, but he acts so grumpy and grouchy to the others.”
My expression hardened. “So, what does that have to do with me, you just lost your mother, I lost a whole family and tribe. You have no idea of the pain I went through, what I suffered through.”
“Your right, I don’t.” He stopped his work and examined the wrappings before continuing. “But I can probably guess, you feel sad, depressed, lonely, like you don’t have a friend in the world, right, well maybe I can be that friend.” He turned to me with a smile.
My expression softened a bit as I turned away. “I don’t need a friend, I don’t need anyone.”
He smirked at me. “Really, like you didn’t need anyone to help you with your wing?” I had no response for that, he was right, I didn’t know my wing was broken, nor would I have known how to fix it. I kept my eyes away from him. “Just think about what I said, please. Your wing should be fine now, just don’t move it for a few days and it will be fine.”
I didn’t answer, I heard him begin to leave, I heard the cell door open, it was then I found my voice. “Og, Wait.” I called to him as I looked at him, I saw him holding the door open and was just getting ready to leave.
He looked at me. “Yeah Nightshade?”
“Look, um, about my wing…….well…..thanks, I….appreciate it.”
Og gave me a warm smile. “You’re welcome Nightshade.” I didn’t smile back, Og closed the cell door behind him and locked it. He then just walked off and left me alone.
“Looks like you made a REAL friend Nightshade.” My shadow said.
“He’s not my friend, he won’t even help me get out of here and back home.” I said bitterly.
“Maybe, but he did help you with your wing. You got to give him credit for that.”
“I don’t have to give him credit for anything, sure I appreciate him helping me with my wing, but that’s it. I said it before and I’ll say it again, I don’t need anyone, I can take care of myself.” My shadow gave a sigh and disappeared. I took a good look at the bandages Og placed on me, he wrapped it around my wing and midsection in a way to make sure I could still move my good wing.
The rest of the day went on with nothing to do since I was stuck in a cell. Lunch time rolled around and Og came back with the key and a bowl of my lunch, lettuce, carrots, tomatoes, apple slices, and in one hand, a whole forest pear for dessert. “Hey Nightshade, I brought your lunch, and good news, I talked with my dad and said I could be your caretaker, I’ll be in charge of bringing your food and such.” He said as he opened the cell and entered, closing it behind him.
I gave him a straight face. “Isn’t that what you do every day already?” I deadpanned.
He chuckled a little. “Heh heh, yeah, well, now it’s official. I just bring your food and clean out your cell. Here you go.” Og placed the bowl down in front of me and set the pear next to the bowl. Og just sat there in front of me as I began to eat. The food they provided me was always fresh and tasty, at least I had that going for me as a pet. As Og sat there, he decided to interrupt my meal with a question. “So Nightshade, if you don’t mind me asking, why are your eyes so…..narrow, like their slitted?”
“My eyes?” I asked with a mouthful, I gulped down my morsel before answering. I felt pride in my tribe so why should I hide what we were capable of to anyone, I figured I might as well tell him. “Well, I remember my dad saying that it’s an adaptation. A shadow walker’s eyes are like this so we can see in the dark, we can see just fine at night almost as clear as day.” I then buried my muzzle back into the bowl.
“Gosh, that’s pretty neat, are there any other special things shadow walkers can do, what about that thing one of the trolls who brought you mentioned, they said you made some kind of tentacle thingy that tapped him in the gut.”
I looked up again at Og while chewing on some lettuce with a small piece sticking out of my mouth. I swallowed again before answering. “We shadow walkers have magic powers inside us, we are also able to control the shadows, we can manipulate and control them ,even travel through them.”
Og listened intently as I explained my tribes powers. “WOW, that is incredible. But if you can do all that, then why don’t you use those powers to escape?”
I stopped my eating, I looked up at him again with wide eyes. I then looked to the side in thought. I rubbed a hoof on the back of my head. “Well, I….I’m…not….exactly strong enough. I still have a long way to go before I can make full use of my shadow walker powers, I can barely even make a shadow tentacle.”
“Well….maybe I can help you get stronger, help you train or something.”
I glared at him. “YOU, how could you help me, you don’t know anything about magic, what could you possibly do to help me train in my abilities?”
His face fell at my question. “Oh yeah, good point.” His face then lit up, as if he just had an idea. “Hey, I know, I may not be able to help you train in magic, but I could probably help you train your body, you know, help you get stronger physically? What do ya say?”
“Yeah right, I doubt your dad would let that happen.” I waved a hoof at him as I looked to the side. I looked back to face him as his smile was still there.
“It couldn’t hurt to ask, I’m sure I could convince him somehow.” He then stood up and turned to leave. “I’ll go and ask him right now, you go ahead and finish eating, I’ll come back later and let you know what he said when I come to get the bowl.” He exited my cell and left. I was now able to continue my meal in peace, at least, until my shadow appeared again.
“Now he wants to help you get stronger? If that isn’t a friend, then I don’t know what is, come on Nightshade, admit it, this kid likes you and wants to be your friend.” He said to me.
I let out a sigh in defeat. “Fine, so he wants to be my friend, big deal, I don’t need a friend, but he’s just going to keep up with this stuff isn’t he. Fine, so I guess we’re friends then.”
My shadow double smiled at me. “I’m glad you finally came to your senses.”
“Whatever.” My shadow then disappeared again and left me alone.
Another hour went by before Og returned with a big smile on his face and a string of rope in his left arm with a loop at the end. “Nightshade, good news, my dad said it’s ok!” He exclaimed as he entered my cell.
I looked at him, surprise evident on my face. “WHAT, how did you manage to do that, how did you convince him?”
Og looked to the side as he gave a drawn out, “Weeeeellllll.”
-Og’s POV-
“Are you NUTS, ABSOLUTELY NOT!” My dad shouted at me.
“Please dad, he needs the exercise.” I pleaded with him.
“Forget it, I’m not about to risk it getting away.”
I gave my dad a stern look. “HIS name is Nightshade dad.”
Dad looked down at me with a glare. “I don’t care if his name is mud, he is MY pet now, and I am not about to let him get away.”
I gave dad my pleading look again. “But dad, he needs the exercise, if he just stays in that cell all day every day, his muscles will shrivel up, he’ll become fat, and soon he could even expire, you don’t want that, do you?”
My dad started growling. “GRRRRR, I hate that you’ve learned so much from that shaman, FINE, you can let him out to exercise, but on one condition.”
My face lit up with glee. “GREAT, thanks dad.”
He let out a defeated grumble.
-Nightshade’s POV-
“And that’s what happened.” Og said as he finished his story.
I gave him an unsure look. “Okay, but what was the one condition he made so you could let me out of my cell?”
“Um, he said that……I have to…..keep you on a rope so you can’t get away.”
My eyes shot open. “WHAT, HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO GET AWAY, my wing is busted remember, not only that, but there are so many of you trolls here, AND the village is surrounded by those wooden posts, there’s no way for me to escape if I wanted to, the only way out is for me to fly, and I can’t!”
Og gave me a sympathetic look. “I know you don’t like the idea of being on the other end of a rope, but I had to agree to it so I could let you out.”
“Forget it, I am NOT letting you put me on a leash.” I glared at Og.
“Please Nightshade, I know you don’t like being cooped up in here, and besides, you really do need the exercise, please.”
I couldn’t fight it, I was getting tired of being in that cell for days on end, and Og really was trying to help. I narrowed my eyes. I gave out a sigh. “Fine, put it on me.” I said with a monotone voice.
“I promise, you won’t regret it, you’ll feel good to finally get out of this cell.” Og approached me with rope in hand and slipped my new leash around my neck. “Come on, now I can show you around our village, I just know you’ll like it.”
He seemed very eager to show me around. “Whatever.” I said as Og led me out of the cell.
I had to admit it did feel good to get out of the cell for a while, the sun felt nice on my coat as it shined through the canopy of the trees, they weren’t as plentiful since I was in a village of trolls, but there were still a few scattered around. I walked next to Og as he held my leash in his right hand. He pointed to a building on the right where a troll was using a stick with something black and hard at the end of it to hit something metal, it let out a clang each time. “That’s Bog, the blacksmith, he makes the swords and stuff for us.”
I looked to Og with a raised eyebrow. “Swords?”
"Those sharp pointy metal things you see some of the trolls carrying around, and the long sticks with sharp metal points are called spears.”
“What are they for?” I asked with genuine interest.
“They’re weapons, we use them to hunt other animals to…..eat, um.” Og’s voice dropped on the last word. I looked at Og with a bit of contempt. “But, you don’t have to worry about becoming a meal, every troll here knows that you belong to my dad, so you don’t need to worry about that.”
“Great, that makes me feel so much better.” I said with thick sarcasm.
“Look, I’m sorry Nightshade, I didn’t mean anything by it, honest.” Og tried to apologize.
“Let’s just keep going.” I said with an annoyed tone.
“Right, come on, I want to introduce you to the shaman I mentioned.” We then continued our walk through the village.
Og soon led me to a tent, this one was made out of cloth instead of what the other tents I saw were made of. It was almost as wide as the wooden structures I’ve seen scattered around the village. Me and Og approached it and Og moved a flap to enter. “Leon, I came by for another visit, and I brought the friend I told you about.”
I spotted a troll near a small fire at the center of the tent we entered, there were animal skins lying on the ground on the other side of the fire, from what it looked like, I assumed that was this trolls bed. I took a look around and saw a few plants in pots on tables lining the sides and a few bottles as well. The troll stood up and turned around to face us. This one looked kind of old, he had white hair growing out of his chin. He smiled upon seeing us. “Ah, Og, how good of you to come by and visit me, I’m always glad to see you, and I see you brought someone with you.” He said as he focused his attention on me.
“Leon, this is Nightshade, the one I told you about.” Og introduced me. The old troll got down on one knee, leaned in close and rubbed a hand on his chin as he eyed me. “Hmmm, interesting, you are indeed something different, I can honestly say I have never seen anything like you before. So you’re the one I’ve been hearing about around the village.” Unlike the other trolls, this one had a pleasant elderly sounding voice. “Tell me little one, what is it you call yourself?”
“I’m a shadow walker, what’s it to ya gramps?” I asked bitterly, I wasn’t exactly in the best of moods.
Og turned to me with a shocked look. “Nightshade, that was rude.” He then turned back to Leon. “Sorry Leon, he isn’t exactly having a good day.”
“Try a good week, or a good life.” I added.
The elder troll backed off and sat down with his legs crossed. “Oh, do tell, what seems to be the trouble little one?”
“Well this for starters.” I said as I raised my left hoof and raised a part of the rope around my neck. “I’ve been made a pet to your chief, and he isn’t about to let me go home.”
“Really, and where is this home of yours?” The elder troll said.
“I’m not about to tell you, why should I?” I asked bitterly again.
Og looked down to me. “Nightshade, come on, I know your upset about your situation, but he’s just curious, he’s a nice troll, really.”
I looked to Og and turned my head away with a humpf. “I understand young one, you are upset because you have been made a prisoner, haven’t you? And you want to go home but can’t.”
I turned to face the troll Leon. “how’d you guess?”
Og grunted in annoyance and slapped his hand to his face.
Leon just laughed at the scene. “Heh heh heh, well I may be old, but I’m still smart. Now then, Og here told me that you may be the last of your kind, but from what you said, it is still up for debate, tell me, is it true, are you really the last of your kind?”
Og looked at me worriedly, I sat down on my haunches, there was something about this old troll that I felt I could open up to him. I thought it might feel good to finally tell someone of my plight. “Well, yeah it is, I’m the last shadow walker of my tribe, everyone else is gone.”
Leon gave me a sympathetic look. “Oh dear, I am so sorry to hear that, how did it happen, if you don’t mind me asking.”
I just couldn’t help myself, this troll seemed genuinely concerned for me, I really felt like I could open up to him, so I took a deep breath and let it out, then I began my story and told him how I lost my tribe. “Well, it’s like this….” As I recounted my tale to the two, they both listened intently, gaining shocked and horrified looks at my tale as I told how my clan was slaughtered. I even told them the part of how I buried every one by myself. I left out the part about how I had a kind of imaginary friend.
“And now, here I am, a pet for a troll chief. And that’s my story.” As I finished my tale, the two trolls were silent for a moment.
Leon was the one to break the silence. “My goodness, you poor thing, to have to go through so much and be left alone, and not to mention going through the task of burying everyone you cared about? That must have been very hard on you.” He said with a solemn voice.
Og then spoke. “Nightshade, I…..I had no idea how bad it was, I’m so sorry you had to go through that, isn’t there anything I can do to help…….well, besides letting you go, I wish I could, I really do, but my dad made it clear that there would be consequences if I did.”
I looked at Og with a frown. “It doesn’t matter anyway, I don’t know how to get back to my village from here anyway, I’m lost now.” I hung my head and closed my eyes. “How could my life get any worse.”
Og, turned his head to the side and looked down. He then looked back to me and spoke. “Nightshade, I’m sorry, but I need to get you back to the cell, dad said I could take you around only for like an hour or so, and time is almost up, we really need to go back, I’m sorry.”
I looked to Og. “Whatever, let’s just go.”
Og turned to Leon. “I’ll see you later Leon, take care ok.”
Leon waved a hand at us. “I hope the two of you come back to visit me again, see you later Og.”
Og lead me out of the tent, through the village and back to my cell. He walked me in, removed the rope around my neck and started back to the door. He stopped just as he was about to exit and turned to face me. “Nightshade, I really am sorry for your loss, if you ever need to talk to someone, I’ll always be available.”
I just looked at him, then back to the ground as I sat on my haunches, I heard the cell door creak closed. Og walked off and left me alone. “Come on Nightshade, you have to admit he really does care, surely you can see that, he wants to be your friend.”
I looked at my shadow and spoke. “I….guess you’re right, he has been rather helpful, I just wish he would let me out of here. But because of his dad, that’s impossible.”
“At least you have a new friend now, right, maybe even two, that old troll was rather nice.”
“I guess. I need a nap, I’m gonna try and sleep for a bit now.” I lay down and rested my head on my hooves as my shadow disappeared.
It’s been a little over two months now since I was allowed to first set hoof outside my cell, Og, at first, took me around the village to give me a tour so I could be familiar with the area, after that, it was really more of a way to get me out of the cell each day so I could stretch my legs, I was grateful for it, but I still disliked the idea of having to be led around on a leash. After two weeks of treating my wing, my bandages finally came off and I had full use of both my wings now. During these outings, Og took me to a secluded part of the village so he could help me get in some body building exercise to strengthen my body.
Because of my situation though, I had no idea what I could do to strengthen my magic or shadow abilities, so I was stuck with just building muscle. Og had me do what he called pushups, sit ups, and let me jog around in a circle for a bit to build up my stamina. All the while though, he kept me on a leash, he always felt bad for me because of it, but I knew why he did. If he let me off my leash, his dad would punish him severely. Over the two months, I was also starting to accept Og for a friend. He was the only one who seemed to care about me. It wasn’t until later I found out why he seemed so desperate before to have me for a friend, he didn’t have any.
He told me the other troll kids didn’t want to be his friend because they were afraid of his dad. I wasn’t sure what to make of it, so I just said nothing. It was another typical day and me and Og were in the same secluded spot, Og had one end of my leash tied around a wooden post and I galloped around in a circle while Og stood off to the side to root me on. “All right Nightshade, just three more laps and you can stop!” Og called out to me.
Once I finished my laps, I came to a stop. “Well…..how…..was…..that?” I panted out.
He walked up to the post and removed the rope from it. “You did good Nightshade, was it any easier today then before when you first started this?”
“A little……yeah.” I said as I panted, trying to catch my breath. Og had me run 20 laps and it made me exhausted, but it felt good to get out of my cell and work out like this, at least I didn’t feel cramped.
“That’s good, a few more days of this, then I’ll bump you up to 25 laps.” He said with a smile as he took my leash off the post.
“Oh come on, I can still barely do 20! You want to make me do 25 now?” I exclaimed.
“Hey, remember how you could barely do 10? Look at you now, your able to run 20 laps. Besides, this helps to build up stamina remember?”
“Yeah, I remember.” I said with a smile as Og came up beside me.
“Well now, what is going on here?” A deep voice asked as a shadow loomed over us. Me and Og looked up and saw chief Grog standing over us with a displeased look. We both gave an audible gulp as we looked up at Grog. Og spoke to his dad first. “Oh, uh, hey dad, what’s up?”
Grog had a very deep frown. “Son, you aren’t helping this thing get stronger so he could escape are you?” He asked suspiciously.
Og was sweating heavily. “Of-of course not, I was just letting him get in some exercise to keep him in shape is all, honest.”
Grog kept his frown. “You better not be lying to me son, I would hate to have to punish you, I am not about to let my pet escape.”
Og stood firmly before his dad. “Pet, dad, how exactly is Nightshade your pet, I’m the one that has been taking care of him, I clean up after him feed him, bath him, let him get in some exercise, all you do is just look at him and admire how different he is, if he is anyone’s pet, he is really more my pet then yours. So why do you even keep him around.” Og then looked up to his dad with a sympathetic eye. “Why not just let him go dad, he misses his home.”
Grog glared down at his son. “Listen carefully son, I am keeping him and there is nothing you can say to change my mind, he is too unusual to just let go, so keep your yap shut and just do as your told, UNDERSTAND!” Grog bellowed the last word.
Og nodded nervously and I was feeling rather scared now after that shout. “Yes father.” Og said in a low tone as he lowered his head. “Come on Nightshade, let’s get you back in your cell.” Og led me away and back to my cage. The cell door creaked open and Og led me back inside, I turned to face him as he took the rope off from around my neck. “I’m really sorry about all this Nightshade, I wish there was something I could do to help.”
I gave Og a smile as I tried to comfort him. “Hey, don’t worry about it, it’s not your fault I’m stuck here, besides, it isn’t all bad, at least I have a friend, a roof over my head, and three square meals a day.” I joked in an attempt to lift his spirits. I really didn’t like being stuck here, and Og knew it, but I also wasn’t sure how I felt about leaving my first and only friend behind if I should find a way out.
Og gave me a warm smile back, he turned to leave and made for the door. Before he did, he looked over his shoulder and spoke to me. “I know you don’t mean that, but thanks anyway.” He then left and closed the cell behind him.
Once he was gone, I allowed a frown on my face to form. “Guess you don’t have any ideas on getting out, do you?” My shadow asked after appearing.
I turned to him and answered. “Of course not, how am I supposed to escape? Sure I could fly out of here if I found a way out of this cell, which I can’t, but what about Og, he’s my friend, if I escape, Grog will think Og let me out and he’ll get punished. I can’t let that happen to him, he’s my only friend.”
My shadow gave me a sour face. “Hey!”
“My only REAL friend.” I amended my statement. This seemed to placate my double as he smiled again.
He then frowned immediately after. “So then, what are you going to do?”
I looked away and down to the ground. “What can I do, I have no way out of this cell, and the only way for me TO get out is on a leash held by my only friend, and I’m not about to try and convince him to let me escape just so he can get punished for letting me out. I’m stuck here.” I dropped to the floor and just lay there.
“Don’t worry Nightshade, I’m sure there’s some way for you to get out of here and back home.” My double tried to cheer me up.
I said nothing as I lay there, my shadow then disappeared and left me alone.
The rest of the day went on, lunch came around and Og brough me my food as usual. Mid-afternoon then rolled around and Og came back to take me around for my dose of exercise, we did pay visits to the troll shaman Leon and had friendly chats, he too soon became another friend, but not as good as how me and Og had become. Night soon fell as the moon shone brightly in the night sky, after Og brought me my dinner and I ate, I lay myself down to rest for the night.
I don’t know how long I was asleep, I heard a creaking that stirred me from my sleep, it was still dark out, I wasn’t sure how late it was, I turned my head to see the source of the sound. My eyes were half lidded as I gave out a yawn. My eyes widened a bit when I saw Og standing in front of my cell. “Og, what are you doing?”
Og put a finger to his lips. “SHH, keep it down.” He said in a hushed tone. He looked around nervously as he unlocked my cell door. “I’m getting you out of here, come on.”
I stood up and looked at him with surprise, then curiosity. “What, but why, what about your dad, won’t he punish you or something?”
Og gave me a smile. “Don’t worry about my dad, I can handle him.” His smile faded to a frown. “What I can’t handle is seeing you suffer like this anymore, now let’s go before someone wakes up and sees us.”
I narrowed my eyes. “But I can’t just leave you, there’s no telling what your dad will do if he finds out I escaped.”
“Nightshade, I can’t stand seeing you trapped here anymore, now come on, you’re getting out of here NOW.” He then grabbed my left hoof and dragged me out of my cell. “Go on, fly out of here and find your home, I’ll be fine, don’t worry.” He gave me a smile.
I couldn’t believe it. “Og, I…..I don’t know what to say, are you sure about this?”
“Of course I am, otherwise I wouldn’t be doing this, now get going, spread your wings and fly out of here.”
I smiled big at him. “Thanks Og, I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this.” I walked up to him and wrapped a leg around him, Og returned the hug.
“You’re welcome buddy, and hey, maybe we’ll see each other again someday.”
We broke our embrace, I looked at him one more time. “Count on it buddy.” I then turned flared out my wings and flew off into the night sky, leaving the troll village behind me, and my only true real friend.
I don’t know how long I flew, but I was still tired since it was still late at night, after a while when I felt I put a good amount of distance between myself and the troll village, I found a place to rest for the night, or so I thought, I was about to lay down up against a tree between some roots and a pile of leaves, when I heard a growl eminate from somewhere near-by. I frantically looked around to find the source of the growling and soon spotted a few sets of red glowing eyes coming from a nearby bush.
I looked on in horror as the growling grew greater, then a ghostly wolf emerged, followed by a few dozen others, a whole pack of ghostly white wolves surrounded me. I was terrified, until I remembered that I had wings, I could simply fly away from these things. I was still scared but I steeled myself. I looked at the dogs with confidence clear on my face. “Come and get me if you can you creeps.” I then sprang into the air and took off.
The ghost wolfs followed close behind me on the ground, they were running faster than I could fly, I was starting to get worried. What then made me worry more were the wolves climbing up into the trees and jumping from branch to branch and catching up to me. I looked to my left and saw a dog keeping up with me as it hopped across the branches, I looked to my other side and saw the same thing.
I was worried now, the dogs were keeping up with me easily as I flew through the trees. I tried swerving and weaving and making sharp turns, but nothing I did allowed me to lose my persuers, they were dogging me (Pardon the expression) every step of the way, or wing as the case may be.
I was starting to get tired too, I had never flown so much in all my life before and it was starting to show, I was panting as I started to slow down, one of the wolves that were following me among the branches saw this as an opportunity as it leapt at me and tackled me in mid-air. I fell to the ground and tumbled. I groaned as I pushed myself up. I looked around and found myself trapped by these ghostly wolves. After everything I had been through, everything I had suffered through, after all I had done to try and stay alive for my parents, it was all about to end as me being chow for these things.
One of the wolves leapt at me and I closed my eyes for the end………but it never came. After a minute, I opened my eyes and saw a bright light shining in from the left, the wolves were holding up their paws to try and shield their eyes from it, soon the light grew fiercer and they all just turned to vapor and blew away. I looked to where the source of the light was coming from and couldn’t believe my eyes. Standing before me was a large white glowing deer with big antlers. It slowly approached me as I started to feel exhausted, I tried to keep my eyes open, but with the threat of the wolves now gone, my body was telling me it was now safe to rest, not to mention this deer seemed to give off a comforting glow and aura, it wasn’t long before I lost consciousness and blacked out in a peaceful rest.
My eyes were met with the morning light as I opened them lazily, I closed again and gave out a yawn. I was lying on my belly when I awoke and sat up on my haunches with half lidded eyes. It took me a minute to soon realize that I was in my own nest, in my own room. My eyes shot open upon realizing where I was. I frantically looked around and began to wonder. “What, but, how did I get here, what happened?” It was then that my mind went back over the events of last night. “Let’s see, Og let me out, I flew off, was about to rest for the night, got chased by some weird ghost like wolves, then…….”
My mind reeled upon remembering the last bit. “That deer, that white glowing deer, it showed up, chased those wolves away and saved me, but what was it, did it bring me here, how?” I had so many questions fill my mind, I decided the best way to get answers was to get out of my nest and try to see if that deer was still around. I climbed out, but before leaving my room , I figured maybe my double could help me figure this out. “Hey, shadow me, come on out would ya?” I said as I looked up to my head.
My shadow emerged and looked at me curiously. “Sorry Nightshade, I’m afraid I won’t be any help here, I’m just as confused as you are. I don’t know what that white deer was either.”
I scowled at him. “A lot of help you are.” “Hey, it’s not my fault I don’t know what it is, you don’t know so I don’t know. Simple as that.” My shadow stated before disappearing.
I then made my way out of my room and into the castle throne room. I walked past the three thrones, came up around to the front of them at the base of a couple steps that led to them and looked down, I faced the stones I made for my parents and where I buried them. “Hey mom, hey dad, I’m all right now, sorry if I worried you, but something weird happened last night. I miss you both so much.” I let a tear run down my face.
I turned and made my way to the exit of the castle. Once out, I saw something I didn’t expect to see so soon, that same white glowing deer was standing just a few feet away from me, looking right at me. I was so surprised by this I didn’t know what to do. I just stared at it for a while before I heard a voice. “Well, don’t just stand there, don’t you know how to say hello?” I didn’t recognize the voice and it sounded like it was in my head, I was looking at the deer the whole time and it’s lips didn’t move once.
I stammered. “Uh…I….uh……you.”
The deer smiled and closed its eyes as its head lowered and bobbed up and down, I heard laghter in my head. “Hm hm hm hm.” It’s head stopped bobbing and looked back to me. “You sure are funny when your stunned.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, my shadow then appeared beside me. I quietly whispered to him. “Any ideas?”
“Like what, there’s a tall white glowing deer standing in front of you that saved you from a bunch of ghost wolves, what do you want to do?”
“How about a greeting, followed by introductions.” I heard the voice again, it must be the deer.
“Well, I guess that would be a start…..wait, WHAT!?” I asked in surprise. “You…….you heard me?”
“And your friend there.” He said, this confused me more.
“Friend, what do you mean?”
“I mean your black friend with the red eyes standing next to you.” He stated simply.
This sent my mind reeling. “You…..you can…..see him? But that’s impossible, only I can see and hear him.”
My shadow agreed. “Yeah, only he can see and hear me.”
The deer continued. “I am connecting directly to your mind to speak, thus I can see and hear your friend there.”
“So your reading my mind, no fair, that’s private stuff.” I complained.
The deer gave me a smile. “Don’t worry, I am not reading your mind, I am merely connecting to it so we can talk.”
“Ok, so like, why can’t you speak to us normally?” My shadow asked.
“I do not speak the same language as you, this way we can understand one another. I think introductions are in order, you may call me Bright Horn.”
I looked at the creature carefully before giving my name. “Well, my name is Nightshade. And, I guess, this is Nightshade too.” I said, feeling awkward having to introduce my imaginary friend for the first time.
“It is a pleasure to meet you Nightshade, and Nightshade.” He said with a chuckle on the second Nightshade.
“Um, I’m thinking this is going to be weird if I stick around so I’ll just be going, if you need me, you know where I’ll be.” With that, my shadow double vanished and was back in my mind.
I now was able to give my full attention to this mysterious deer named Bright Horn. “So, Bright Horn, you’re the one that saved me from those wolves right?”
He gave me a nod. “Yes I am.”
“Well, thank you for saving me, and helping me get back home.” I said as I looked at him.
“You’re welcome, but you should know that from now on, it will be dangerous to travel the forest at night, or on your own. Those things were called spirit wolves, they can’t be stopped, it is best you stay in your home.”
I glared at Bright Horn. “Hey, I can take care of myself, I don’t need you watching out for me.”
Bright Horn smirked. “Oh really, I suppose you had a way to get away from those wolves then when it seemed they had you cornered?”
He had me, I looked to the side to try and think of a comeback, but nothing came to mind, he was right. “Okay fine, you got me there, but where did they come from, I’ve never seen anything like them before, sure I had a few close calls with wolves when I went food gathering with some of my other tribe members, but we never saw anything like those before, and certainly nothing like you before, what are you?” My curiosity finally piqued.
“They are spirit wolves, drawn to an area that had a great tragedy occur in an area, they feed on the negative energies that linger on, they also have a craving for living things as well. I am a forest spirit, it is my job to make sure they don’t get out of hoof and keep them from causing too much trouble, and now, it is my job to keep the last shadow walker alive.”
“You know what I am, but how, and why is it your job to protect me now?”
Bright Horn gave me a serious look. “Because I did look into your mind a bit and saw what you and your tribe was like, AND because you are the last of your kind, I am making it my responsibility to keep you safe and alive. I am now your guardian.” Bright Horn smiled again.
I didn’t know what to make of all this, suddenly I had a guardian now, someone who was going to take care of me and look out for me. How was I going to handle this? Then I remembered Og, he had taken a chance at getting punished to help me, I just had to go back at some point and see how he was, I just hope my new guardian wasn’t about to give me trouble over it. For now, I would just live each day and see how things went.
For about two months now, Bright Horn, my self-appointed guardian, had also become my magic teacher, he began to teach me about my magic abilities, helped me learn what I could do and how to do it, unfortunately, he wasn’t knowledgeable on my shadow magic, but I controlled shadows the same way I did magic, so as I learned magic, I was able to learn more of my shadow walker powers. Or rather, I was getting better at controlling them, I remembered seeing what a shadow walker was capable of from watching my tribe when they were still around.
All Bright Horn could do was cheer me on as I figured out how to control the shadows, a basic ability from the shadow walker tribe was hiding and blending in with the shadows so as not to be seen, it was simple enough and I picked up on it fairly easily. I was able to meld myself into a shadow of any object that cast one, or sink into my own shadow and move across the ground, I also found it easier to form those shadow tentacles and make them do what I wanted. The whole time though, one thing still plagued my mind, the only real friend I made, the one I left behind in that troll village, Og. I just couldn’t stop thinking about him, was he ok, did his father figure out that he let me escape, how was he being punished? I had already told Bright Horn all about what happened between me and the trolls, and about how I wanted to go back and at least make sure Og was all right one day.
The day finally came when I had enough of waiting till I was strong enough to take on a troll. “I’ve had enough of waiting, I can’t just sit here anymore while my friend could possibly be suffering.” I said to Bright Horn as I paced back and forth in front of him.
“But Nightshade, you don’t know where the troll village is.” Bright Horn said to me.
I turned and looked at him with a scowl. “No, but you do, you found me out there near the village and was able to bring me back to my own village, so you can take me there.”
Bright Horn objected. “Forget it Nightshade, I’m not about to let you go back there and let yourself get caught just so you can try to save a friend and become a pet again, you are the last of your kind, you shouldn’t be a prisoner of a bunch of trolls.”
I protested more. “Og is my friend, he’s the only one out of that village that cared about me, other than that troll shaman, and I’m not about to just forget about him, if you won’t take me to the troll village, then I’ll just go find it on my own.”
Bright Horn Narrowed his eyes. “Nightshade, I can’t let you do that.”
“And are you going to stop me, I can just sneak out while you’re sleeping and head off to try and find the place, one way or another, I will find that place and find my friend.
It was then that my shadow double appeared and decided to throw in his opinion. “But Nightshade, what about those spirit wolves, you can’t out run those things, it’s too dangerous.”
I glared at my double. “You know as well as I do that Og could be in serious trouble and I am not about to give up on him, I don’t care how tough those trolls are, I just want to see if he’s ok, I’ll sneak in, look for him and talk with him, then sneak back out, they won’t even know I was there.”
“And what if he’s not ok, what will you do then, there’s no telling what Grog did or is doing to punish Og, if he is being punished.”
“Of course he’s being punished, we know how mean Grog is, he is most likely taking his anger of me getting away out on Og, we have to go there and see if he’s ok, and if need be, Rescue him.”
Bright Horn gave a sigh. “You’re really not going to let this go are you?”
I smiled at him. “Nope, besides, with my new ‘shadow sneak’ ability, those trolls won’t be able to hold me even if they see me.”
My double gave me a look. “You’re really going with that name for it?”
“Come on, even you have to admit it sounds cool.”
He smiled back at me. “OK, yeah it does.”
Bright Horn took a moment to think. After about a minute, he finally spoke up. “All right, I’ll take you to the troll village, but JUST to see how your friend Og is. I can’t follow you in if the place is as locked up as you say it is, so you have to PROMISE that you won’t make yourself known, not even to your friend, no matter what.” He emphasized.
I put my left hoof up to my barrel and promised. “I promise that I will not make myself known to any troll.” My shadow gave a disappointing shake while Bright Horn had his eyes on me. My shadow then faded out and me and Bright Horn began our preparations to make our way to the trolls.
Bright Horn and I walked for quite some time before arriving at the troll village, just like I remembered, it was surrounded by those, wooden posts with the sharp points at the top, there were two troll guards outside with spears guarding the gate. Me and Bright Horn were hiding Behind a large Bush a ways away, but we still spoke in a whisper. “All right Nightshade, here we are, now remember, just sneak in without being noticed, find your friend and make sure he’s ok, then sneak back out, no matter what you see, if he isn’t in a good condition, you are to come back here and we’ll head back to your home, understand?”
“I got it already, sheesh.” I then stepped back from the bush and focused on my shadow magic, I sunk into the ground of my own shadow and could now slink along unnoticed. Bright Horn kept his eyes on me the whole time I did this until I snaked my way slowly out of the bush and off to the right side of the troll guards. They kept their eyes forward as I snuck my way up to them and managed to get under the front gates.
I snaked my way to the first troll I knew I could count on to keep my presence a secret, Leon, the shaman troll, he and I had become friends during my time in the village thanks to Og, I figured I could find Og faster if Leon told me where he was, just in case he wasn’t where I figured he might be. I managed to sneak through the village unnoticed as I went from shadow to shadow, making my way to his tent. It didn’t take long, I reached the tent and saw Leon sitting in front of a little fire in the middle of the tent, I crept around to his left and made my presence known by speaking in a whisper, just in case. “Psst, Leon.”
I accidentally startled him. “WHA, HUH, who’s there, hello?” He jumped up and frantically looked around his tent for the source of my voice.
I was still hiding in a shadowy part of the tent, I emerged from my own and stepped forward into the light of the fire. “Leon, it’s me, Nightshade.” I said as I looked up at him.
The old troll gave me a surprised look. “Nightshade, is that you? What……what are you doing here, how did you get in?”
I smiled up at him. “Of course it’s me, how many shadow walkers do you know huh?” I asked jokingly. “I learned a new trick that let me get in here, I came by to see you, and ask if you knew where Og is, I don’t want to waste time looking for him in this place. Can you tell me where he is?”
Leon’s expression dropped. “Nightshade, it isn’t good, you shouldn’t have come back.”
My expression dropped then. “What, why not, aren’t you happy to see me?”
He gave me a sad smile. “I am, but I’m afraid you won’t like what you see if you go to Og, it’s best you leave or you’ll get caught again.” He frowned again.
I gave him a determined look. “Hey, I didn’t come all this way for nothing, where is he, is he ok? Come on Leon, you’ve got to tell me, I’m not leaving until I see Og.”
Leon sat back down. “All right, but you’re not going to like what you see. I should warn you that Og was indeed punished, in fact, he is still being punished, for your escape.”
I became worried at this statement. “Still, what do you mean still being punished?”
“Just what I said, Grog was furious at your escape, Og tried to lie and say he didn’t let you out, but Grog didn’t believe him, so now, Og is being punished for letting you escape, or so Grog says is what happened. Tell me Nightshade, DID Og help you escape?”
I looked down and to the side in sadness. “He…..he did, he let me out the night before the day I was gone, he snuck out in the middle of the night and let me out of the cell and told me to fly away, so…..I did.” I looked back at Leon. “And now he’s being punished for helping me? Well I won’t stand by, there must be something I can do.”
“And what, pray tell, can a little shadow walker like you do to help Og, you can’t fight chief Grog, or any of the trolls, your too little.”
I gave a stern look to Leon. “I’ll think of something.” Before Leon could respond, I sank back down into my shadow and zipped out, I decided that I couldn’t waste time and zipped around as fast as I could to try and find Og, the first place I thought to look would be his house. I ducked and hid in every shadow along the way to keep from being seen. It didn’t take long for me to find the place, and what I saw from my hiding spot in the shadow of a tree just a few feet away from the house was terrible. Og was tied up to a pole with his wrists bound and strung up with his back facing the pole, he looked beaten and bruised. He had marks all over his body as he hung there, he was on his knees with his eyes closed, there was swelling just above his right eye. I couldn’t believe what I saw. His head was just hanging there looking down at his own shadow. This gave me an idea on how I could talk to him without being noticed.
I carefully made my way over to him and blended myself into his shadow, he had his eyes closed so he didn’t notice me. I manipulated the shadow just enough so only my eyes could be seen by Og from his point of view. “Psst, Og.” I whispered.
His head shot up and his eyes shot open. “What, who’s there?” He asked as he looked around.
“Shhh, keep it down, or the others might hear you.”
Og looked down at his shadow and finally noticed my eyes. “Nightshade, is that you?” He whispered.
“Of course it’s me, who else do you now with my eyes.”
Og seemed surprised. “But, how are you doing that, what’s going on?”
I decided to try and keep my answer simple. “Let’s just say I learned a new trick, what happened to you Og, you look terrible.”
Og began to whisper with worry. “Nightshade, you shouldn’t be here, you got to get out of here before my dad finds out you’re here, if he catches you again,”
I cut him off. “He won’t be able to keep me prisoner anymore, thanks to this new trick I picked up, I can hide and slink in the shadows, I call it my ‘shadow sneak technique’, pretty cool huh……..never mind that, I got to get you out of here.”
“No Nightshade, you can’t, you have to leave, I’ll be fine.”
“You call this fine?! Og, look at you, your tied up, covered in bruises, with a swelled eye, you are not fine, this is all my fault.” I said sadly.
“This is not your fault Nightshade, I’m the one who let you out, it’s my fault for letting you out.”
“And I knew you would get punished for it and I left anyway when I should have stayed. I’m so sorry Og.”
Og tried to give me a comforting smile. “Like I said, it’s not your fault Nightshade, now get out of here before my dad finds you.”
I gave Og a stern look. “I am not leaving you like this, I have to do something.” I then emerged from Og’s shadow and made my way up to his bonds.
Og cried out in a hushed tone. “Nightshade, what are you doing, get out of here before someone sees you.” I grabbed the rope on Og’s wrist as I spoke through the rope. “I ot eving u Og.” I began to chew at the ropes in hopes of freeing him.
“Nightshade, what do you plan to do once I’m free huh, I can’t go with you, this is my home.”
I stopped my chewing to speak. “Your home? Didn’t you say a home is where someone cares about you, this place is not a home Og, your dad is hurting you for letting me escape, that doesn’t sound like he cares to me.”
“He’s just……well, look, the fact of the matter is he’s my dad, and this is my home, I can’t just leave.”
“Come on Og, we can look out for each other, I’ve been doing just fine on my own for a while, besides, I got a new friend that can help us, he’s,” But before I could finish, a lasso went over my head and around my neck, it tightened and made me rear up. “GAH!”
Og cried out if fear. “NIGHTSHADE!”
The rope started to pull me backwards, I was forced to turn around as I struggled against it, the troll that held the rope dragged me as I tried desperately to push away with my hooves. The troll stopped pulling and smiled at me. “Well lookey what we have here, the little shadow walker.” Chief Grog then emerged from behind the troll holding the rope.
“So, you came back did you, I figured you would, since you and my son are all buddy buddy, just how did you get in here without my guards knowing?”
I smirked at him. “Your guards are lousy, that’s how.”
Grog’s smile faded after that. “Still got that mouth on you I see, tell me, why did you come back? For Og, to make sure I wasn’t hurting him or something?”
I then glared at him. “How could you do this to your own son, you heartless monster?!” I declared.
Grog stepped closet to me and spoke. “Listen here little one, I am the chief, I have to maintain a look of control, if even one of these trolls step out of line, they need to know there are consequences, even if that someone is my own son.”
I then thought of something that might help Og’s situation, I gave a smirk to the troll chief. “Listen here booger brain,” The chief snarled at me for my insult, “Og didn’t let me escape, I got out on my own.”
“HA, yeah right, you really expect me to believe that?” The chief laughed.
I kept my smirk as I answered. “Of course, I managed to pick up a little trick while I was here, a dose of my shadow walker powers that helped me escape, Og didn’t let me out, I got out on my own.”
“Oh really, and tell me little shadow walker, what is this little trick you picked up that let you escape?”
“Keep your eye on me, now you see me.” I quickly sunk down into my shadow and the rope around my neck was left on the ground. “Now you don’t.” I then darted around quickly and circled the area as a demonstration, I could see the shocked and confused expression on the chief and the other troll that roped me. “HAH, you can’t get me now meat head.” I then circled around Og a couple times, stopped at his side, and emerged again. I smirked bigger at the chief as he looked on in more shock and confusion.
“Well chief, you can’t keep me locked up anymore, I can slip out of anything you put me in, so as you can see, you are punishing my friend for nothing, now I suggest you let him go and I’ll be on my merry way, OH, and one more thing, I’ll be stopping by every now and then to hang out with my friend.”
Grog’s expression was priceless, he gritted his teeth, his head seemed to be shaking with fury, then he let out a shout of anger. “GGGGRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH! YOU LITTLE PEST, HOW DARE YOU!” But then his mood seemed to shift quickly as he began to smirk. “hm hm hm, I think I know what to do now.” He chuckled in a way that made my smirk disappear and turn to a frown.
“What are you laughing at Grog, you can’t keep me a prisoner anymore, I can just slip out, remember, I just showed you what I can do so why are you so happy?”
“Because little one, if you want Og to be unharmed, then you have to agree to stay in this village as my pet, if you don’t, I will continue to make Og suffer like this.”
“WHAT, DAD HOW COULD YOU?!” I heard Og exclaim from behind me.
“QUIET OG, you have done enough, this isn’t about just keeping him as a pet anymore, this is about winning, and I intend to win.”
I couldn’t believe it. I glared at Grog. “You….You really are nothing but a monster, I can’t believe you would threaten your own son like that!”
“Well, little one, what’s it going to be, stay as my pet, or leave and let Og be punished like this?” Grog asked with his arms crossed and a sly look in his eyes.
“I….I….” I didn’t know what to do, I didn’t want to be trapped here again, but I couldn’t leave Og.
“Nightshade, just fly away, I’ll be fine. Don’t let Grog trap you like this.” Og said from behind me.
I looked back at Og. “I can’t just leave you like this, I left you before, I’m not about to do it again.”
“Nightshade.” Og said quietly.
I looked back at the chief. “Well little one, what’s it going to be?” He asked.
I hung my head and closed my eyes. What could I do? Could I really give up my freedom for the sake of my friend, or could I just leave him so I would be free myself? What could I do?
“I did that, I can’t believe I did that, how could I just leave like that?!”
“Nightshade, calm down, you did the smart thing.”
“The smart thing? THE SMART THING?! I turned my back on my only friend and just left him to be tormented more by his father, how could I do such a thing?!”
“Nightshade, if you hadn’t, you’d be stuck there again, you don’t want that do you, there was nothing you could do for him anyway.”
“But I……but he…..I…..*sigh* your right Bright Horn, but I just left him, and he was my friend, how am I ever going to make it up to him?”
“The best thing you can do now, is wait until your stronger, when you can actually fight. Your still young Nightshade, you have a long way to go before you can do anything against those trolls.”
“Don’t worry Og, I’ll come back for you someday.”
*****
That day still haunts me, ever since I first turned my back on my one true friend. But Bright Horn was right, there was nothing I could do for Og, I had to leave him, but that didn’t make it any easier. For fifteen years I was haunted by that decision I made, today was the day I was going to do what I could for him, there’s no telling what I would find should I go back to the troll village and try to save Og, if he even needed saving anymore, but I had to at least see him. Over the next fifteen years, I trained and worked hard on my abilities, both physical and magical, I managed to build up some muscle and I had grown in height, of course. I managed to discover other abilities as a shadow walker, I soon discovered how to teleport through the shadows.
I could teleport with my magic as well, but I figured that was for more of a defensive thing to avoid attacks and such. I could produce shields with both abilities as well. Bright Horn was an excellent magic teacher, and he did his best to help me discover my shadow walker magic as well. I felt I was now ready to take on those trolls and try to save my friend. “This is it, no turning back this time, I’m not leaving that village till I find Og and save him.” I said to myself.
“You’re sure about this now? No talking you out of it?” Bright Horn asked me.
I looked to him with determination in my eyes. “It’s been fifteen years now since I abandoned him, I’ve never been more sure of anything in my whole life, I’m going to save him.”
“All right then, let’s go.” Bright Horn followed behind, he was just coming along to make sure those ghost wolves kept at bay, I did manage to fight them off once before as part of my training, but still, they were relentless. I was actually able to buck them and toss them around like they were solid, but they still held a ghostly appearance to them.
We left my village and made our way through the forest. After a while of walking, I heard a low growl coming from a nearby bush, I knew right away what it was. “Looks like they’re back.” I said to Bright Horn. A spirit wolf jumped out from behind the bush the growl came from and it barked and growled at us. Soon, more came out and had us surrounded. “Looks like they set up an ambush for us, you want I should drive them away?” Bright Horn asked.
“No, this will be good practice, you just watch yourself, I’ll handle the ones that come after me.” I said with a smile, I knew I could handle them, and it was fun. Bright Horn gave me a nod, I saw him as he galloped off towards one group of the spirit wolves and jumped over them with ease, they kept their eyes on him as he lept over them and ran off, the ones Bright Horn jumped over gave chase and left me to deal with the ones that stayed. I looked over the remaining spirit wolves and saw there was atleast ten of them, easy.
“All right you ghostly hounds, round four, let’s see if you learned any new tricks.” One of them jumped at me from behind, I saw it coming and bucked out my hind legs, making contact with its chest. It was sent flying backwards and crashed into two of its pack mates. Another in front of me jumped at me and I smirked, I simply put up a black magic shield and the wolf smacked into it. I kept my smirk as I looked at the wolf plastered on my shield. “I learned a few new tricks, guess you haven’t.” The wolf slid down to the ground and lay on its belly, it got back up and shook its head, then growled at me.
It then let out a loud bark and all the wolves got in a stance that told me they were all going to try and pounce on me. Like that would work. They all leapt forward towards me as I kept up my smirk. I produced a shadow beneath me and made five tentacles rise up around me, I swirled them one way, then quickly spun and extended them out, smacking every wolf that jumped at me away. They were sent flying all over the place, I took notice that two of them slammed into a tree and disappeared into it. The other wolves landed hard on the ground and got back up, I then noticed something strange occur.
The trees that the wolves slammed into seemed to start growing bulges, they formed into a wolf head, then legs emerged, then a body, and the whole thing fell from the tree, free from it. The wooden wolf forms lay on the ground motionless, the other wolves looked on in curiosity as well. The forms moved, eyes opened, revealing a green glow. The two looked at themselves in confusion. They had wooden bodies and moss and leaves for eyebrows and a tail. The two new wooden wolves then looked at each other, then the other wolves. I didn’t like the looks of this.
One of the spirit wolves gave a confused look to one of the wooden wolves, then gave a nod to the head towards me. One of the new wood wolves then looked to me and snarled. It charged at me and jumped, I easily nocked it back with a shadow tentacle, causing it to shatter to pieces. The other wolves seemed worried, then the pieces began to glow green and float up, then they came back together and reformed the wooden wolf. It gave its body a few test motions and appeared unharmed.
I swear I saw a smirk appear on some of the wolves muzzles, the spirit wolves looked to each other, nodded, then started jumping at the trees, a moment later, they all emerged from them with wooden bodies, now I was surrounded by wooden wolves. “Ok, so now you have learned a new trick. Doesn’t matter, you’re still going down.” I declared. The wolves surrounded me again, I got in a low to the ground stance, ready for anything.
Two of them charged forward and I blasted them with magic bolts from my horns, they fell to pieces. Another lunged at me from the side, I quickly turned my hind hooves to it and bucked it, sending it flying backwards and causing it to crash into a tree, it shattered like the other two. By this time, the two I blasted had reformed and were glaring at me. as I was fixated on the two in surprise, another from my left jumped at me and managed to land on my back. “GAH!” I cried out in pain as it sunk it’s wooden teeth into my right shoulder. I fell down to the ground with the beast on me, I did my best to shake it off and used a teleport spell, I managed to teleporty myself out from under the wolf and the beast fell to the ground, I teleported myself out of the circle of the wolves.
They all turned to face me, I was ready to try and fight them off, but I was now wounded. I summoned my shadow tentacles around me and had them ready to fight them off. They all gathered together, eyeing me carefully. They all charged forth and I let loose with my tentacles. I shot them forward and formed them into a kind of drill as I swirled them around and shooting branches of the tentacles in all directions. I managed to pierce them all and flung them back. It wasn’t easy, that much effort was draining on me, especially with my wound. The wolves just reformed themselves and picked themselves back up.
Before they had wooden bodies, I was able to at least hurt them and that was enough to drive them away, but now, with these wooden bodies, it was like they didn’t feel pain at all. How could I drive them back if they didn’t feel pain now. I had recalled my tentacles and had them around me. I took a step back in fear, the wolves took a step forward, mimicking my movement, at this rate, there was no way I could hope to fight them off. Just then, from the back of the pack, there was an explosion of fire. I saw smoke rise up from the back of the pack and they all turned around to see what happened.
I tried to look over them and I saw Bright Horn with his horns glowing. I took the wolves confusion as an opportunity to make my way over to Bright Horn, I galloped to the pack and jumped over, using my wings to soar over them and get to Bright.
“Bright Horn, thank the stars you’re here.” I said as I came up next to him.
He looked at me and saw my wound. “Nightshade, are you all right?”
“I’ll be fine, it’s just a bite wound.”
“What are these things, what happened to the spirit wolves?”
“Those ARE the spirit wolves, I knocked two into a tree and they disappeared, only to re-emerg in those wooden bodies, then the rest of them followed up and got wooden bodies of their own.” I looked over to the pack and saw a pile of ash in front of one of one of the wolves. “Bright Horn, what did you do?”
“Fire spell, too advanced for you right now, I shot off a spout of fire and turned one of them to ash.” I saw as the other wolves looked at the ash pile expectantly, I assumed they were waiting for their friend to reform, but it didn’t happen. “Guess the only way to stop them now is with fire.” I said to Bright. “What do you mean?” He asked.
I managed to shatter them to pieces, but they just reform and come at me again, it seems like they don’t even feel pain anymore.”
“All right then, stand back Nightshade.” Bright Horn stepped forward, his antlers lit up with an orange glow. Streams of flame shot forth from his horns at the wolves, he managed to incinerate a few before the rest of the wolves got the idea that they wouldn’t last against fire, so they all turned tail and ran off. Once all the wolves were gone, Bright Horn then turned to me. “Nightshade, are you sure your all right, that bite looks serious.”
I brought up my left hoof to the wound. “I’ll be fine, it’s nothing.”
Bright Horn closed his eyes and shook his head. “Nightshade, you don’t have to be brave, here, let me help you with that.” He then came up to my side, lowered his head, and his antlers lit up again. I felt a warm soothing sensation envelope my wounded shoulder. The pain I felt slowly started to fade, I saw as the wound started to close up and heal. Once it was gone, Bright Horn lifted his head again and looked down at me. “There you go, better?”
“How did you-“ He cut me off.
“Healing spell, another advanced spell, too advanced for you as well for now.
“Thanks Bright Horn, now let’s get going, I have a friend to save.”
“Hold on there Nightshade, I don’t think we should, not after what just happened.”
“What, why not, I can handle those trolls.”
“I’m not saying you can’t, I’m saying that fight wore you out, you need rest so you will be at full strength in case you do need to fight. Come on, let’s head back.”
“*sigh* fine, but I am not waiting more than two days to save Og.” I was not happy about this, but Bright Horn was right again, as usual. I was tired now, and in no condition to fight. We headed back to my village to rest for the day.
*****
The next day came and me and Bright set off once again for the troll village, it was high time I did what I could to set things right between me and Og, I was ready to take on anything, even those wolves in their wooden bodies.
After a long while of walking, we arrived at the troll village and, just like last time, there were two troll guards in front of the gate, me and Bright Horn stayed hidden behind some bushes for now. “All right Nightshade, this is it, I can go in there with you and help if you want?”
“Thanks Bright, but I need to do this on my own, I got Og into the mess he was in, and I have to get him out, but thanks for the offer anyway.” I kept my eyes on the guards as I spoke. I emerged from the bushes and walked right up to the troll guards.
They looked down at me and pointed their spears at me. “HALT, who goes there?” One of them asked. I decided to see if I could get in the easy way.
“My name is Nightshade, I am here to see the chief of your village, I wish to speak with him.”
The two trolls eyed me carefully. “What business do you have with our chief?” the other guard asked.
“I wish to see him about his son, will you let me pass, or do I have to force my way in?”
The two trolls looked at each other, then burst out laughing. Obviously, they thought I didn’t stand a chance against them, I was much bigger now then how I was fifteen years ago, but they still towered over me. I glared at them. Then the guard on the left gained a shocked look, like he just remembered something important. He then turned to his fellow guard. “HEY, hold on a minute.” The other guard stopped laughing and looked to his partner.
“What?” He asked. The first guard then whispered into his ear. I couldn’t hear what they said, I just looked on curiously as they spoke in whispers. Once they were done, the second guard gave a nod. The second guard then spoke to me. “Come with me, the chief will want to see you.” I figured that meant the chief must still remember me and was expecting me to come back someday for Og.
The first guard gave a signal and the gate to the village opened up. The second guard then started to walk in and I followed. The village hadn’t changed much from what I saw, the same buildings and tents still stood where they were. I saw a few troll kids running around as well, playing. Something about this place seemed different, not structurally, but……..I don’t know, it just seemed……brighter.
All the trolls seemed to be a little happier than the last time I was here. It was strange to see it like this. After a while, the troll guard led me to the center of the village where the chief was. I heard some laughing as I approached. The guard that led me spoke. “Chief, you have a visitor.” The laughter died down and I heard another voice from in front of the guard, he was blocking my view at the time so I couldn’t see who was talking.
“Really, who?” That voice, that wasn’t chief Grog, I don’t know why, but it sounded familiar. The troll guard finally stepped to the side so I could see who was sitting where the chief sat. A large, hefty troll sat in the chief’s chair, he looked like a young adult troll, he was muscular but bulky looking, there were other’s around him, with smiles. The troll sitting in the chief’s chair looked down at me and seemed surprised. “Nightshade, is that you? I don’t believe it.”
I looked at the troll carefully, this was definitely not Grog, I don’t know who it was, but at the same time, I couldn’t help but get a sense of familiarity from him. “Do I….know you?” I asked.
He stood up from the chair and stepped down to meet me. “ guess you wouldn’t recognize me since it’s been fifteen years since we last saw one another…….after you left me.” he said that last one a bit sourly.
My eyes went wide as I soon realized who it was. “Og…..is that you? You….you’re so big.”
“I grew up, trolls don’t stay little kids forever you know.” He said sourly again.
I grew a smile upon seeing my friend alive and well. “OG, it is you, look at you, you’re so big, and looks like you put on quite a bit of muscle too.”
“Well, I have to be in shape if I’m the chief of this place, can’t let some other troll try and take away my leadership.”
“Chief, you’re the chief? But what about your dad, what happened to him, how did you get to be chief?”
“Simple, when I was able, I challenged him for right of leadership and beat him in a fight.”
I then remembered why I came here in the first place. I lowered my ears and head in sadness, my voice soft as I spoke. “Og, I am SO sorry for leaving you like I did, I don’t know why I did that, I never should have left you like I did, can you ever forgive me?” I looked back up to him, keeping my head low and my ears flat.
Og folded his arms in front of him and glared at me. “Nightshade, do you have any idea what I went through after you left me? My father beat me relentlessly every day, tortured me, humiliated me, all to get a point across that he was not to be turned on. I was an example for those that thought to go against him. Before he began the beatings after you left, he came up to me and whispered something that stung me to my soul. ‘You are not my son’. Those words haunted me every day that he beat me.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “Og, I’m so sorry, I never should have left.”
“No….you shouldn’t have……..BUT YOU DID, YOU LEFT ME THERE TO SUFFER AT THE HANDS OF MY CRUEL RELENTLESS EVIL FATHER! HOW COULD YOU DO THAT TO ME NIGHTSHADE, I THOUGHT WE WERE FRIENDS!” He screamed at me.
I recoiled at his shouting. “Og, I’m sorry, I know I shouldn’t have left you but I did, and that decision haunted me every day, but there was nothing I could do.”
“YOU COULD HAVE STAYED, YOU COULD HAVE STAYED HERE SO MY FATHERE WOULDN’T TORTURE ME LIKE HE DID!” He yelled again, causing me to cringe more.
“Og…….please, I didn’t mean to.”
“But you did, you left me and I suffered for it. You say your decision haunted you every day since you made it, well I suffered physically and mentally because of YOUR decision. You left me behind, you fled when I needed you most. As far as I’m concerned, our friendship ended the day you flew off and left me behind. From now on, we are NOT friends, I never want to see you again Nightshade, you and I are enemies now, if I ever see you again, I will not hesitate to waste you. Do I make myself clear?” Og snarled out.
At this point, tears were forming in my eyes. “Og, please, don’t do this, I’m sorry I left you, I really am but-“
He cut me off. “Sorry doesn’t change the past, sorry doesn’t undo all the physical and mental anguish I went through, now get out of here……NOW!” He said as he pointed a finger to the village gate.
I couldn’t take it, I glared at him. “Fine, if that’s how it is, then that’s how it’s going to be, we are no longer friends, good bye Og.” I turned and stormed off with tears in my eyes, the trolls just watched me walk by.
I made my way through the gate and it closed behind me. I made my way back to Bright Horn with tears and an angry look. Bright Horn saw me and spoke. “Nightshade, what happened, where’s Og?”
“Just go away Bright Horn, I don’t need you anymore.” I said to him as I continued to walk, keeping my eyes forward.
Bright Horn trotted along next to me. “Nightshade, what happened in there, is Og ok?”
I stopped in my tracks, I looked up at Bright and glared at him. “Og is not my friend anymore, I don’t need friends, and I don’t need you, so GET LOST AND LEAVE ME ALONE, I NEVER WANT TO SEE YOU AGAIN!” I yelled at Bright Horn, I then turned and continued on my way. It would be a long time before I saw Bright horn again, even longer for my heart to heal from the pain I just went through that helped me decide once and for all that I didn’t need friends. I finally experienced the pain I needed to to shut my heart away for good, at least I thought it would be for good, but the key that would unlock it again wouldn’t come for another 1,895 years.
“16….*BOOM*. What does it look like I’m doing. 17….*BOOM*….18….*BOOM*, I’m trying to get in some exercise with my magic. 19….*BOOM*” It’s been 20 years now since I lost my only true friend and my magic teacher, I was currently lifting a large boulder as a form of exercise to try and strengthen my magic. The forest echoed with the sound of the boulder landing hard on the ground after I lifted it up with my magic.
“Do you really think lifting that boulder up will make your magic stronger?”
“22….*BOOM*, you got any better ideas, cause I’d like to hear them. 23….*BOOM*….24….*BOOM*.” Over the years, I tried to find other ways to strengthen my magic, but I didn’t know how, I figured lifting heavy objects was the best way, like how you build up muscle. I figured that because lifting the heaviest object I could find was a strain and was very similar to when I lifted something myself. So I figured that lifting heavy boulders would be the best way to do it. It was morning when I started lifting a boulder and had already had my breakfast. “48….*BOOM*….49….*BOOM*….50….*BOOM*, huh….huh….there….fifty lifts….not bad if I do say so myself.” I kept a straight face as I complimented myself. I had given up on showing emotions twenty years ago when my only friend turned me away.
I had taken to exploring the forest a bit more each day but never strayed too far away from my home village. I was also able to fend off those……timberwolves, as I called them, from me with some of my magic and shadow powers. The day went on and nothing new happened, I never found anything of interest lately. Around mid-day, while I was flying about in a section of the forest where I had accidentaly stumbled on an area with quicksand, I heard the sound of someone struggling. It sounded close, curiosity got the better of me and I veered in the direction of the sounds.
What I came to see was something I never thought I would see. Og…..before my eyes…..stuck in quicksand waist deep, he had a club in his left hand. I perched on a nearby tree and looked down at the scene, he was looking down at the quicksand squirming around to try and free himself. “Oh this is too rich.” I said to myself.
“Don’t you think you should help him?” My shadow had appeared next to me.
“What for, he’s not my friend, why should I help him?”
“Maybe you can use this opportunity to patch things up, you know, try to be friends again?”
I looked to my shadow. “Fat chance, you remember what Og said the last time we met, we are no longer friends, instead, we’re enemies, so why should I stick my neck out for someone who wants to chop it off. I’m just going to sit here and watch him squirm.”
My shadow gave me a saddened look. “Nightshade, you can’t mean that, you may be enemies, but can you really just stand there and watch him sink into the quicksand, think about all the times he helped you.”
“You’re not going to let this go are you? You’re just going to pester me until I help him aren’t you?” My shadow gave a smile. “Fine, I’ll help him, but first, I wanna have a little fun.” I then turned my attention back to Og. “HEY BLUBBER GUTS, UP HERE!”
Og looked up at me and snarled. “NIGHTSHADE, I should have known, YOU set this up didn’t you, I’m gonna kill you for this!”
“Oh please, I knew you were stupid, but come on, ME, set up a quicksand trap, HAH, you’re more dense than I thought. In case you hadn’t noticed, this whole area of the forest has quicksand pits.”
“Nightshade, that isn’t going to help patch things up.” I ignored my shadow.
“If you didn’t set me up for this then why are you here?” He asked me.
“Coincedence, I was flying around, exploring the forest, when I heard your pathetic attempts of struggling to get out of the quick sand, so out of sheer curiosity, I came to see what was making the sound, and lo and behold, I find you in this mess. So out of the goodness of my heart, I figured I could help you get out of this.”
Og pointed his club at me. “Forget it Nightshade, I don’t need your help, I can get out of this just fine on my own, you’ll see!”
“If you say so.” I then leaned my side up against the tree on the branch I was on and just watched as Og sank a little more.
“Nightshade, do something, he’s going to sink in.” My shadow said with worry.
“Didn’t you hear him, he said he doesn’t need help, he can get out of it on his own.”
“Nightshade, you can’t just stand there and let him die, DO SOMETHING!”
I looked at my shadow and rolled my eyes. “*sigh* Fine, I’ll help. Hey Og, just stop squirming or you’ll sink faster!” Satisfied, my shadow then disappeared.
Og looked back up to me. “I DON’T NEED YOUR HELP, now get lost!”
I just shook my head. I flew down and got behind him, placing myself at the edge of the quicksand pit. “Just hold on, I’ll get you out.”
Og looked at me over his shoulder. “I don’t need your help, how many times do I gotta say it before you get it through your thick skull.”
I ignored him as I looked around for an idea on how to haul Og out of the sand. I saw a large, thick branch overhead that looked very sturdy, it was then I got an idea. I formed two shadow tentacles at my side from the ground and reached them up and over the branch, then brought them down and wrapped them around Og’s arms. “HEY, what are you doing, I said I DON’T NEED YOUR HELP!”
“Would you just be quiet already, you’re never going to get out of this on your own, so just shut up and let me help.” Once my tentacles had a good grip, I lifted with all my strength, I strained and grunted as I lifted, Og slowly began to lift up out of the sand. I stepped backwards for more leverage and lifted og out, I then managed to swing him to the edge of the quicksand pit and set him on solid ground, his entire lower half was now covered in the mucky sand.
I dismissed my shadow tentacles, Og turned around to face me and looked down at me with a snarl. “You…..you.” His gaze softened a bit. “Thanks, I guess.” He actually thanked me, perhaps we could get to be friends again. “But don’t think this changes anything, I still want you dead for what you did to me, but since you did just save me, I’ll let you go this time, but the next time we meet, I won’t be so nice.” Or not. Og then just walked off to wherever.
“Nice to see you too.” I said to myself.
“Weird, I wonder what he was doing out here by himself?”
“Who cares, he’s gone now, and besides, I doubt he would have told us anyway.”
“Well, you may not be friends again, but at least you’re on the right track of patching things up.”
“Give it a rest, we are never going to be friends again, he hates my guts and I hate his, I only saved him because you weren’t going to let it go, so keep your ideas of friendship to yourself.” I then took to the air and continued my exploration. I traveled around the forest throughout the day and soon it started to get dark.
I wanted to look around some more but it was going to be hard to see anything, even with my night vision, so I resolved to head back the way I came. But before I did, a strange glow caught my eye. I looked to my left and saw a group of plants glowing softly, I stopped in my tracks and swooped down for a closer look. “What in the name of the moon?” It was a few flowers and plants, nothing special about them, but as I looked beyond them, I saw more plants glowing, I grew very curious about this and began to follow the trail of glowing plants. As I headed further and further, I noticed the glowing plants got brighter and brighter, eventually I came to a group of bushes that were glowing very brightly, I pushed passed them and saw an amazing sight, it was a lake letting off a bright white glow.
The water itself was glowing white, I stepped closer to the edge to get a better look and saw I could see clear to the bottom of the lake and see all the fish and water creatures swimming around. I couldn’t believe it. “Whoa, this is incredible. Wait, this can’t be…….can it?” it was then I remembered something, something my parents told me about, a glowing lake that glowed like the moon in the with water so clear, it looked like the fish were flying. I remember them saying that one day they would take me to the lake so I could see it for myself, and here it was before me. I remember what my parents called it. “Moon Lake, I don’t believe it, it looks even more beautiful than my parents said.” I looked to my left and noticed the water fall, even the water fall itself was glowing, so apparently, the glowing water had a source. I grew very curious as to what could make the water glow like this.
I looked back down at the water, then at the glowing plants surrounding it, it was then I figured the water must be making the plants glow. I then got a though, I figured if the water made the plants glow, what would happen if I drank it? I lowered my head to the water and dipped my muzzle in, I took a long sip, lifted my head up and gulped down the water. It tasted fresh and cool, it was very good. I then looked over myself for a second and saw that I started to glow the same color as my coat, I was literally glowing. I couldn’t believe it, I just had to find the source of this water.
Before I took off though, I noticed a white glow moving around from behind a few bushes on the other side of the lake. I paused and watched, wanting to see what it could be. Bright Horn emerged from the bushes and walked up to the edge of the water, lowered his head and took a drink. “Bright Horn?” I said quietly to myself.
Bright Horn lifted his head and noticed me looking at him. “Nightshade?” I heard in my head.
“Bright Horn, what are you doing here?!” I called out, it was kind of far from one side of the lake to the other.
“Hold on, I’ll come over to you.” To my surprise, Bright Horn started walking on the water and made his way toward me. Once he got right in front of me, he spoke again. “Hey Nightshade, how you been.” He asked nicely.
“Just fine, thanks for asking.” I kept a straight face.
“Nightshade, what happened between you and Og that got you so upset?”
“That is none of your buiseness, I’ll thank you to stay out of it, what are you doing here?”
“I always come here at this time for a drink. The water here is the best.”
“Is this water what makes you glow?”
“No, my glow is all me, it’s part of being a spirit. Nightshade, I’m worried about you, you may not wanted to admit it, but we were friends too.”
“No, you were a glorified body guard and magic teacher, that is all. Your job was just to make sure I would be safe, and take care of me until I could take care of myself, well now I can, and have been since that day I told you to leave me alone. I’ve been doing just fine on my own and I will continue to do so.”
“Nightshade.” He said sympathetically.
“Save it Bright Horn, I don’t need you, I don’t need friends. Now if you’ll excuse me, I would like to see where the source of this glowing water is coming from.” I looked to the water fall, spread my wings and took to the air. I flew over the cliff and followed the river the water fall came from. As expected, all the plant life along the river had a luminescent glow. I looked on in wonder at all the glowing plants as I followed the stream.
It must have been two hours that passed by the time I came to the source of the glowing water, the river I followed just led me to another lake where the water came up out of the ground. “Well that’s disappointing, I was hoping for something more impressive. But what is in the ground that’s making the water glow?” All that traveling and it just led me to a disappointing dead end to a mystery I wanted to solve. I was too exhausted from flying now to head back home so I decided to sleep here for the night, I found a comfortable spot up in a tree on a large branch and closed my eyes.
Morning came, I awoke and stretched out a bit. “By the stars, trees do not make a good bed.” I said, I was feeling a little sore from sleeping in the tree. I found some fruit on a nearby tree and ate up before heading back to home. I followed the stream back to the lake and headed back to my village.
It took a while since it was a long flight but I made it. However, I was not greeted with a pleasant sight. Standing right in the middle of my home was a large yellow scaly beast with orange spines, a dragon. “Hmmm, this will make a fine place to make a home for myself.” Said the dragon.
I wasn’t about to let a dragon take over my village. I glared at the beast as I drew closer to it. “HEY, SCALE HEAD, WHAT DO YOU THINK YOUR DOING?” I yelled at him.
The dragon turned around and looked down at me. “Beat it small fry, I found this place first.”
“FAT CHANCE, this is my home lizard lips, you need to beat it! I’ve been living here for years.”
“Not anymore small fry, I’m making this place my home now.” He said with a smirk.
“You think that just because your bigger than me you can come here and take it over? Forget it, you want a place to live, find somewhere else, this is my home, and I’m not about to give it up to an over grown gecko like you!”
The dragon snarled at me for my insult. “You little pest! I’ll fry you for that!” He then shot out a burst of flame at me. I managed to put up a magic shield around myself to protect me.
I was able to hold off the flames. After a moment, the dragon ceased it’s flames and I heard it chuckling, apparently he thought he fried me. I lowered my shield and found myself in the cover of the smoke from the flames. I decided to use this to my advantage, I used my shadow sneak technique and sunk into my shadow, I quickly made my way behind the dragon and re-emerged. I decided to form my shadow tentacles around my neck, I produced four of them and merged them to two sharp shadow blades. I flew up and readied my left blade for a strike. I swung hard against the dragons back and managed to leave a large cut. The dragon cried out in pain. “GAH! WHAT?” He then turned around and saw me hovering there in front of him. “YOU LITTLE INSECT!” He then took a swipe at me with his left claw, I managed to dodge it by quickly dropping down, but I failed to see his right claw coming at me.
He struck me hard and sent me flying backwards, causing me to crash into one of the stone homes and making it shatter and fall apart. I groaned as I pulled myself out of the rubble. I was hurt, but not bad enough to stop fighting. I had to make this dragon pay for invading my home. I shook off any remaing rubble, reformed my shadow blades and took to the air again.
The dragon breathed out a stream of fire at me, I was forced to take evasive action as I flew to the right and dodged the flame, the dragon didn’t let up, he followed me with his stream of fire. He quit then yelled out. “HOLD STILL YOU LITTLE WORM!” The dragon the continued with his flames.
I took shelter behind one of the stone houses. The dragon concentrated his flame on the building I was hiding behind. He stopped again. “Come on out you coward, face your death!” I used my shadow sneak technique again and made my way next to the dragon’s right foot. I raised both my shadow blades and struck them down right on the dragon’s foot. He howled out in pain and stumbled back. “OOOOOWWWW!” He fell backwards and crushed a few more stone houses.
“NO!” I cried out. I didn’t like that this fight may very well destroy my home, I had to try and chase that dragon off…..or kill it, either way, I had to end this fast before more of my home was destroyed. I took to the air and flew straight for the dragon as he got up. He saw me coming and shot a fireball at me. I ducked down and avoided it, he fired another one and I went up, he fired again and this time I produced a shadow shield shaped like a cone, I plowed through it and went straight for the dragon’s heart. The dragon was stunned that I plowed through his fireball and struck him right in the chest, I went straight through him with as much force as I could muster.
The dragon fell back on his back…..dead. I had succeeded in ending the fight, but now I had the problem of moving a massive dragon out of my home. I figured I could at least see if I could lift him up. I focused my magic and my black aura surrounded the body of the dragon. I strained and grunted with all my might, I managed to lift the dragon up with a great deal of effort. I slowly moved the dragon out of my village and set it just outside my village for now. I panted heavily once my magic grasp was released.
I sat on my haunches and breathed heavily, trying to catch my breath. “Nightshade, are you all right?” My shadow asked upon his appearance.
I looked at him with tired eyes. “I’m fine, I just need a minute to rest.”
“You sure, you did take a heavy hit from that dragon.”
“Does it matter, it’s not like there’s anything you can do to help me anyway, you’re nothing more than a nuisance to me. So why don’t you just disappear permanently and leave me alone, I don’t need you.”
My shadow looked at me sympathetically. “I know your just saying that cause your upset that dragon destroyed some of your home. I’m not going anywhere Nightshade, like I said when we first met, you’re stuck with me.”
“Fine, whatever.” Once I caught my breath, I got up and headed back to the village. I was very unhappy about what I saw, so many of the houses were wrecked, left as a pile of rubble, only a few of the houses were left standing, and even they had a few holes in the walls and roofs. It was too hard to look at for me, it just didn’t look the same. “No, the village, it’s completely ruined.” I said.
“Well….not completely, some of the houses are still standing….sort of, and look, the castle survived.”
I glared at my shadow, I looked back over the village, seeing it in such a state was too much. My home…..my beautiful home….was now in shambles, I just couldn’t bear to see it like this. “I…..I can’t stay here. This is just too much.” I just turned and slowly walked away. “Where am I going to stay now?”
Many years have passed now since I lost my home. It still stands, but is in shambles now, and I can’t bear to see it like that. I still go there though, to visit my parents graves. The forest itself became my home, every tree, every branch, every lake is my territory. I have grown in strength, both physical and magical. I have mastered my magic and shadow powers, so I am fully capable of defending myself from any threat. However, there was one thing I didn’t count on, but I’ll get to that later.
Ever since Og’s passing many years ago, my relations with the trolls didn’t improve. I could care less about those brutes, all I cared about was following my parents wish and live on, but every day that passed, it seemed harder and harder a little at a time to continue with that wish. How could I possibly go on when I’m the last of my kind. I just did the best I could to ignore those thoughts and lived my life in the forest. But one day, something new came to the forest, something that would give me a step in the direction to improve my living situation a little.
During my walk through the forest, I came across something I never thought I would see. A pony, one of those……..THINGS, that attacked my home so many years ago. It had a single horn on its head, had a green coat with a blue mane and tail and a strange mark on its flank. I had no idea what that mark was, but it looked like a gold colored circle on a brown stick. It was also wearing a blue cloak with the hood down. This…..pony…..was levitating a book in front of him.
“Fascinating, this forest is so huge, and the plant life is so odd. Princess Celestia will be most pleased with my work here. I just know if I study all the plants here, a cure for many ailments can be found.” The unicorn said. At the time, I was keeping myself hidden in a nearby tree as I watched him closely. I wanted so desperately to swoop down there and stomp on his skull, but at the same time, I was afraid. Looking at that pony’s face sent me back to that horrible night when I lost everything.
Besides, if I killed him, others may wonder about his disappearance and they would come looking for him. The last thing I wanted was more of those blasted creatures roaming around in MY forest, so I kept my distance. “Fascinating, these insectivorous plants seem more cognative than some of the ones in Equestria.” He said as he wrote down something in his book. “This forest is just too fascinating, I must set up a place to live here, there is just too much to examine in one trip. I’ll have to set up a place I can live while I study this place.”
I did not like the sound of that. Was this pony really going to start living here? Is he just a scout to take over this forest? I didn’t know what to do. “Nightshade, It’s…..it’s.”
“I know, I know what it is, but what am I supposed to do, If I kill him, others may come looking for him.” I said to my shadow in a whisper.
“KILL HIM, Nightshade, this could be your chance to make peace with them.”
I glared at my shadow. “Make peace with them………MAKE PEACE WITH THEM!?” I shouted in a whisper. Quickly realizing I didn’t want to draw attention to myself from that pony, I went back to whispering. “Have you forgotten what they did to me, they took everything away from me, my home, my family….” I looked away from my shadow and down to the ground. “….my parents.” I looked back at my shadow. “How could I possibly make peace with them after what they did to me?”
“Well, that was a long time ago, maybe things have changed since then, you could at least talk to him and see what he knows about that incident.”
My glare hardened. “I am not about to consort with one of those wretched monsters, I would rather have a thousand scorpions eat me alive then talk with those things.” I then turned around and flew off. “I am going to have to keep a close eye on him though. I have to know what he’s doing here.” I said to myself.
*****
A few weeks passed. Over the time, a few more of those ponies showed up with all kinds of things, things I couldn’t really describe at the time. Ponies with wings, ponies with horns, and ponies with neither. They all set up all this stuff and started building a house on a cliff near the edge of the forest. They eve laid down these long metal tubes that went from the house to a lake nearby. After their work was done, the first pony I saw stayed behind while the others left. I figured that meant there were others who knew he was here, which meant I couldn’t kill him at all. In fact, if I didn’t want more of those showing up, I had to make sure nothing would happen to this pony. Like it or not, I would have to act as a silent body guard for this pony. I growled at the realization as I eyed the pony standing in front of his new house.
A few more weeks passed as the pony gathered plants and took them to his home, so far, nothing serious happened, until one day. I was out flying around as usual, making my way to that ponies house to see when he would emerge and venture out to the forest. I arrived at the house just in time to see him exit and head down the path along the side of the cliff going from his house to the forest. I followed silently, making sure he didn’t see me. I wanted to go down there so bad and tear him apart, but I knew I couldn’t, I had to make sure he would survive so others wouldn’t come.
The first threat that emerged he seemed completely oblivious to was a large snake slithering up behind him. I quickly flew down and grabbed the snake in my magic aura, I then gave it a toss and sent it flying over the canopy. The fool continued on with his observations of the plants. “Most fascinating, this one seems to exhibit intellect.” He said as he examined a snake vine. I knew he would be all right as long as he didn’t make any sudden movements. Thankfully, he moved on to something else without incident.
Soon after, another threat emerged. This one, the pony became very aware of. A low growl came from a bush near him as I watched from a branch overhead. The pony grew fearful. “Oh my, I don’t like the sound of that.” He slowly turned his head to the direction of the growling. A timberwolf then jumped out at him. “AAHHH, what in the name of Celestia IS that!?” He cried. Then a whole pack of them came out in front of him. He slowly started to back up. One of the wolves followed.
The pony lost it and ran for it, the timberwolves gave chase. This was my chance to save his sorry flank. As much as I wanted to let those timberwolves tear into him, I had to save him. So while he ran, I placed myself in front of the pack and halted their chase. “Hello bark brains, remember me?” I looked over the pack and saw at least five of them. This was going to be easy. One lunged for me, I quickly jumped up with my wings and crashed down on it with full force, shattering it to pieces. Two more came at me, I formed my shadow tentacles from the ground and grabbed them in mid-jump, I gave them a hard toss to the rest of the pack and caused them to shatter.
They soon reformed and growled at me. “Round two, fine by me.” the whole pack was now in front of me. They all charged at me, I put up a shadow wall before they got close and they slammed into it. They fell to the ground, I picked the whole pack up in my aura and tossed them far away. “And don’t let me catch you around here again!” I yelled at them. I then turned around and flew off to find that pony to make sure he was ok. After a while of flying, I caught up to him as he was sitting on a rock, breathing heavily.
“Sweet Celestia, what were those things, I’m going to have to be more careful around here, but how did I lose them? I was sure they were right on my tail.” I was once again watching from a tree looking down on him. “I’d better send a report about those things to the princess.” I was starting to grow curious about who this princess Celestia was, I figured I could find out more if I kept an eye on this pony, maybe even sneak into his house and look around.
I followed him back to his house and used my shadow sneak ability to hide in his shadow when he went back inside. I followed him as he went to a cage set up in the room with a pigeon in it. “Hello Alexander, did you miss me? I had a close call.” He spoke to the bird. He went over to a desk and sat on his flank. I took this opportunity to look at the inside of his house, I slunk away from him and stuck to the shadows as best I could so as not to be seen.
“My dearest princess Celestia, I am reporting to you on my findings of the forest you asked me to investigate, this forest may be more dangerous than the Everfree, I had a close call with wolves made of wood. It was very strange, their entire body was made of wood with green glowing eyes and leaves and moss on them. They chased me down, but I somehow lost them. There are, however, very interesting plants here, unlike anything in Equestria. I will continue my investigation of this place for you and send regular reports when I find something new.”
I heard him say as he wrote down something. He then got up and had a parchment in his magical grasp as he went over to the bird. “Ok Alexander, I need you to deliver a letter for me, are you ready?” The bird responded with a coo. “All right then, I know you can do it.” He then opened the cage and took the bird out. He then attached the parchment to the bird’s leg and went to another room, I followed him through a pair of double doors, he went to the left and through a glass door onto a stone balcony. He then let the bird fly off. I also noticed the room was full of books. There were shelves of books lining each of the walls of the room. There was a large bed there too and a fireplace.
I explored more of the house afterwards in secret out of curiosity, there was a smaller glass house attached to the big one where the entrance was to the right of the front doors, the glass house was full of plants, the plants in there were ones that were found in the forest, they were all on white tables lining the walls. After a good look around there, I snuck my way to a room with a white floor that had a large black metal object with pieces of wood in it, I snuck to another door that led downstairs into a room that had stone walls, a large wooden table on it and wooden bowls. I also noticed two large metal tanks in the basement with those large metal tubes.
I figured I’d seen enough, so I snuck back upstairs, went to the front doors, and snuck under them to leave. I got out of my shadow and flew off into the forest. I stayed close to the house though, in case that pony decided to explore the forest more for today.
The days went on as I continued to act as this pony’s silent guardian. It pained me to do so, but I had to, otherwise, others would come and I could be found out. I continued to protect him in secret from the timberwolves, snakes, poisonous plants, and other dangers of the forest. The pony was growing suspicious of how he had managed to get by without at least a scratch, but he was too interested in his work. I was still clueless as to why he wanted to learn what he was about this forest.
One day, while I was out, in the forest making my way to the pony’s house, I heard a scream. “AAAAHHHH!” I quickly veered toward the direction of the scream, knowing it had to be that stupid pony I was watching. I managed to find him, but he was in a bad situation. The trolls found him and were carrying him in the same way I was carried when I was first captured by them.
I followed silently, I couldn’t let that pony know about me, so I had to wait for the opportune moment to strike so he wouldn’t know who saved him. I heard him trying to talk with the trolls. “Please kind sir, I’m sure we’re both reasonable creatures, perhaps we could work out a deal, you let me go, and I could…..um……give you something. I have some very valuable items I’m sure you’d like.”
“Fat chance, your what we want, the chief is gonna be pleased that we found something like this.” The Troll carrying the pony said. I followed them up to the troll village where I stopped and watched them go in. I was unable to find an opportunity to save him in secret during the trek here.
I was furious now, these trolls have caused me enough problems in the past, the last thing I needed was them making a meal of a creature that could draw unwanted attention with its disappearance. I had to act directly now. I trotted up to the two troll guards and spoke. “HEY, FATSOS, let me in, I want a word with your chief!”
The two trolls eyed me carfully. Then burst out laughing. “BA HAHAHAHA, yeah right, and who are you to demand that, HA HA HA HA!”
“Hey, do ya think the chief would want this as a side dish for that other thing the hunters caught?” the other troll guard asked.
I glared at them. “Listen you two, I am in NO mood to be messed with, let me in or else!”
“Sorry squirt, but you ain’t getting in.” The first guard said, he then raised his spear and charged at me. I stood my ground as he came at me. I charged my horns with my magic and fired a black bolt at him. I left a big hole right in the center of his chest as he fell over dead. The remaining guard looked at his fallen comrade in fear, then at me. “Well, don’t just stand there, open the gate and let me in.” I said to the guard. He simply nodded and opened the gate for me. I strolled in and made my way through the camp. As I did, the other troll guards inside kept trying to stop me, but I just kept tossing them aside with my magic or blasting them back without killing them. They soon realized I was too much for them and left me alone.
By then, I was now standing in front of the chief. “What is the meaning of this, how dare you come in here and attack my guards, who are you anyway?!” The chief asked angrily.
“My name is Nightshade, and your hunters took something they shouldn’t have, a pony, similar to me in shape, but has one horn. He has a green coat and a blue mane and tail. I demand you let him go this instant!”
“And why should I, my hunters found him fair and square, he’ll make a nice snack.”
“Because I said so, that’s why.” I gave a snort through my nose.
The chief then eyed me curiously. “Hold on, do I know you?”
“Doubt it, I’ve never seen your ugly face before.” The chief glared at me for my insult.
“Now I know who you are, there has been a story going around this village for years about some creature that could manipulate shadows, he was a friend to an old chief once but betrayed him and ran off.”
I slowly looked away. Then glared back at the chief. “That’s old news, something that happened years ago, now are you going to let that pony go, or do I have to beat you into the ground.”
“Why do you want him free so bad, is he a friend of yours?”
“No, I just can’t afford to have him dying on me, don’t make me say it again, LET….HIM….GO!”
The chief smirked. “Tell you what, if you can beat me in a fight, I’ll let him go, if you lose, then you can become dessert.”
I gave another snort through my nose. “Fine, you’re on.”
The chief stood up from his chair and picked up a club that was leaning against it. He came down the steppes and looked down at me. “You’re gonna regret this small fry.” He then raised his club high over his head with both hands and brought it down with all his might. I quickly formed two shadow tentacles and crossed them over my head. The club came down on them and I grunted a little from the strain.
I could see the determination in the chiefs eyes. I quickly forced my tentacles up which caused the chief to raise his club involuntarily. He was wide open, so I quickly launched myself forward and slammed into his gut, sending him flying backwards into a crowd of trolls that were watching.
I flew over to him and landed on his stomach, I walked up to his head and looked him in the eye. “Care to try that again, I’m tougher than I look.”
“So, that doesn’t mean you can’t be beat.” The chief quickly moved his right hand and grabbed me. I was surprised by this and started to struggle to get out. “HAH, not so tough now, are you?” The Chief asked smugly. He got up and picked up his club in his other hand. I then stopped my struggling and smirked at him. “What are you smiling at?”
I then focused my magic in my horns and disappeared from his grasp, I teleported myself to the roof of the chief's hut. “HEY WART FACE, YOU LOOKING FOR SOMETHING!” I called down to him.
He turned around and looked up at me, he snarled. “GET DOWN HERE YOU LITTLE PEST!”
“You asked for it!” I jumped in the air, formed my four shadow tentacles around my neck, and had the points connect in front of me. I dove at the chief while the shadow cone I made spun. The chief raised his club in defense, I plowed right through it and shattered it, however, it threw my aim off and I only managed to graze his right shoulder. I did leave a good size gash though.
“GAH!” The chief cried out as he dropped to one knee and held his left hand over his wound.
“You ready to give up yet?” I asked
He glared at me over his shoulder. “Not a chance.” He stood back up and another troll came up to him and gave him a large sword that he had to hold with two hands. He took a stance with the sword pointing up at an angle. “I’m gonna make you regret coming in here.”
“Bring it on bubble gut.”
The troll chief raised his sword as he gave a battle cry and charged at me. “RRRRAAAAAAHHHHHH!” He swung down, I dodged left, he raised his sword to try and get my head, I ducked, he swung down again, I dodged right, I flew up and gave an uppercut to his jaw with my left hoof. The chief stumbled back a bit. He looked at me with one eye as I gave a glare. “YAAAAAHHHH!” He charged at me again, he swung his sword from left to right, I flew up to dodge, the chief swung from right to left, I flew down, he swung down again, I dodged right and quickly turned around and bucked him in his chest with all my might.
The buck caused him great pain as he fell to his knees, clutching his stomach. I took the opportunity to go for a finishing blow. I flew up and came down hard with my left hind leg for a kick to the face. I sent him flying backwards into a weapon rack set up in front of the hut. The rack shattered and the chief had spears and swords laying on him. He groaned as his eyes spun around in his head. “OOooooohhhhh.” He then fell unconscious.
“Looks like I win.” I then looked around at the surrounding trolls. “Well, I won, so one of you better go get that pony and let him go, or do I have to get rough with the rest of you!” I heard the trolls chatter in agreement. One of them stepped forward and headed for the chief’s hut.
Before he got to it, I had to say something. “HOLD IT!” The troll stopped in his tracks and turned to face me. “Wait for me to get on the roof, then go in and get him. And whatever you do, DON’T say a word to him about me. Just take him to the gate and let him go, I’ll be watching you. If you even think of trying anything, I’ll take your head, GOT IT!” The troll gave an audible gulp and nodded. “Good.” He then went inside and I flew up to the roof. I watched as the troll carried the pony out of the hut.
“Um, excuse me, but where are you taking me?” The pony asked.
“Today’s your lucky day fella, you get to leave.” The troll told the pony.
“Really, but…..well, thank you.”
“Just keep your mouth shut.”
I followed silently as the troll carried the pony through the village and to the gate. The gate opened and the troll just tossed the pony out, then went back in with the gate closing behind him. The pony landed flat on his stomach. “Goodness, that was rude, still, I suppose I should be grateful they let me go. But why, I was sure they were going to cook me up. And what happened to their leader, I saw him unconscious in that heap. Maybe somepony IS watching out for me.” I just watched as the pony walked away from the troll village, I kept following him for a while until he stopped. “Oh dear, I just realized something, I have no idea where I am now, how will I ever get back to my house?”
I facehoofed. It was then my shadow appeared next to me. “Well Nightshade, it looks like you WILL have to make you presence known, you’ll have to lead him back to his house.” I groaned as I realized this.
Letting this pony know I was around was the very thing I was trying to avoid. But now I had to, so I could lead him back. “I just know this is going to come back and bite me in the flank.”
I glided down and landed right in front of the pony. He gave out a yelp and fell to the ground, covering his head with his hooves. “GAH!”
“For the love of…….GET UP, you stupid pony.” I was really annoyed with this one.
He raised a hoof and peeked out from under his forelegs. “Who…..who are you, you don’t want to eat me too do you?” He asked in fear.
I gave a sigh. “*Sigh* Look here, if you want to get back to your place, then follow me.”
He then removed both hooves from his head and looked at me curiously. “You…..you’re going to lead me back, but why, who are you?”
“Does it matter, all you need to know is that I’m here to lead you back to your place, so I suggest you get up and follow me.”
He then stood up. “Now hold on, I am very grateful for your assistance, but I simply must know who you are. Please kind sir, I must know who my helper is.”
I gave a snort of frustration. “If you must know, my name is Nightshade, now get moving, I’ve very little patience.”
He gave me a smile. “Thank you Nightshade, I am Keen Eye, a pleasure to meet you. Tell me, do you live here?”
We began walking as I answered. “Every rock, every tree, every branch and plant, every inch of this forest is my home, I know this place so well, I could navigate it with my eyes closed. So yes, I live here.”
“Fascinating. And are there others like you?”
I hung my head. “There used to be.” I said quietly.
“I’m….sorry, what happened…..wait, something about you seems familiar.”
I froze in my tracks. My head shot up at his words. I quickly turned around and faced him. “What do you mean there’s something familiar about me?......did you see others like me?” I asked, hope was evident in my voice, could it be that there were survivors of the horrid event that took everything away from me that I missed, I was sure I saw all my family dead.
“Um, no.”
My eyes fell to half lidded. “Wait, how could you not know whether there were others like me or not?”
He gave me a confused look. “I’m afraid I don’t know what you mean, how COULD I know. I’ve never seen anything like you before.”
I glared at him. “Because, it was YOUR kind that destroyed my world, it was YOUR kind that killed my family and took everything away from me.” I said as I started stomping toward him, he started backing up with fear on his face.
“I….I….I’m afraid I don’t know what you’r talking about…..please calm down.”
“Don’t know what I’m talking about…..DON’T KNOW WHAT I’M TALKING ABOUT?! HOW COULD THE EXTERMINATION OF AN ENTIRE RACE GO FORGOTTEN SO EASILY, MY ENTIRE WORLD WAS DESTROYED BY YOU CREATURES AND YOU HAVE THE NERVE TO TELL MY YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I’M TALKING ABOUT!?”
“P-p-p-please…..I-I swear I don’t know…….WAIT, I-I-I just remembered something……y-y-you w-wouldn’t happen to be a shadow walker, would you?”
I got in his face and spoke through my teeth. “How do you know that?”
“I-I do have something that tells of a clan of creatures called shadow walkers.”
I backed up and looked down at him through narrowed eyes. “Show me.”
“Of-of course, come, let us make haste to my place and I will show you.”
After a long arduous walk, we made it to Keen Eye’s house. He went up to the door first and opened it for me. “Welcome to my humble abode, where I live while I’m studying this forest.”
“I don’t care about that, just show me this book you mentioned.”
“Yes, of course, right this way.” He led me to the room with the walls of books. “Before I show you, I would like to ask something.”
“What?”
“Do you know how your kind first came to being, I do have a book that seems to tell of the origins of the shadow walker.”
“All I care about is this book you mentioned. Now show it to me.”
“Very well.” He then walked up to a shelf on the far right wall, pulled on a book, and the shelf came forward a bit, then moved to the side. A small alcove was reveled with a black book on a stand. “Here we are. Take a look.”
I walked forward and levitated the book out of the alcove, I held it in front of me and began to read. I couldn’t believe it, this book told of the tragedy I had gone through, it had no mention of me, but it spoke of how my whole tribe was wiped out by some beast king. Once I was done, I quickly turned around and faced Keen Eye. “Where did you get this?”
“It was a gift, from a friend of mine.”
“WHO….WROTE……THIS?!”
Keen Eye was cringing. “St-Starswirl the Bearded, he said I could have it as a gift for my hard work and studies.”
“Where is he, where can I find this Starswirl the bearded.”
“Now hold on, if you go after him, you should know that he is VERY talented with magic, he is very powerful, he even managed to create spells that could manipulated time, or send one through time.”
That caught my attention. “Are you saying that this…..Starswirl the Bearded could travel through time?”
“Um……yes?”
Another spark of hope emerged in me. But I kept my feelings in check. “Where can I find him?”
“Now see here, you may have helped me get back home, but with this attitude of yours, I’m not sure I should tell you, what do you plan to do if you should find him?”
I glared at Keen Eye. “Listen here you one horned freak, I have been keeping your sorry flank safe this whole time you’ve been here, I fought off those timberwolves, kept you safe from snakes, kept poisonous plants back, AAAAND, I’m the whole reason you’re not a trolls main course. So you owe me a lot. Now tell me…..WHERE IS HE?!”
“Y-You, YOU’VE been keeping me safe this whole time…..but why?”
“Because I figure if anything were to happen to you, others would come looking for you, and the last thing I want is more of your kind in MY forest. Now are you going to tell me where I can find Starswirl or not?”
“A-A-All right, I’ll tell you, he is princess Celestia’s personal advisor, he lives at Canterlot castle, the capitol of Equestria. Just south of here.”
“Listen you little waste of space, it took all my energy not to rip into you myself after what your kind did to my kind, so I suggest you stay here while I’m gone so you don’t get yourself killed. Stay out of my forest and don’t leave this house…do I make myself clear?” He nodded. “Good, I don’t know how long I’ll be gone, so just stay put.” I then left and made my way out of the house. I took to the air and headed south for this Canterlot place.
In the few months that that unicorn, Keen Eye showed up, I’ve been doing everything I could to keep him safe just so others like him wouldn’t come snooping around in my forest. I had to get directly involved and let him know about my presence after I saved him from the trolls and lead him back to his house. After I did, I found out he had a book that told of my tribes extermination. When I questioned Keen Eye about it, he said another unicorn by the name of Starswirl the Bearded gave it to him. Once I got the information as to where I could find this unicorn, I took off and left my forest, something I never thought I would do.
I went ahead and ‘borrowed’ Keen Eye’s cloak in case I ran into other ponies I didn’t want to meet. I kept away from the towns and villages on my way to this Canterlot castle place. It was easy enough to spot, it was resting on the side of a mountain. I flew on up to it in the night and used my shadow powers to keep hidden from other ponies. During my trek, I was feeling very afraid at the time, but I had to do this, this could be my chance to restore what I lost with the help of this unicorn who can supposedly travel through time.
I managed to make it to the castle gates where there were more of those ponies in armor with spears in their hoofs guarding the place. I snuck past them easy with my shadow sneak ability. I made my way under the front doors and into the castle, it was then that I realized something. “Um, Nightshade, do you even know WHERE this unicorn is?”
I kept my voice low as I was hiding in the shadow of a large potted plant. “Of course I do, he’s…….somewhere in this castle.”
“But where in this castle, you should have asked Keen Eye where he is.”
“Do you want me to get caught, just keep quiet and don’t talk to me so I can focus.” My shadow disappeared. Suddenly, I heard hoofsteps approaching. I stayed in the shadow of the plant as two guards walked by.
“So where you headed?” One asked.
“I got guard duty for the princesses advisor.”
“You mean Starswirl?”
“Yep.” This was my chance to find him, I snuck from the shadow of the plant and hid in the shadow of the guard. “Weirdest thing, he asked for me specifically, his place is at the end of my patrol coming through this area.”
“That is odd, any idea why he asked for you specifically?”
“No, but he kinda creeps me out a bit, all those spells he came up with, all that time he spends working on them. If you ask me, he really needs to get out more.”
“Tell me about it. I’ll see you later, good luck with your post tonight.”
“Thanks, see ya later.” The two guards then parted ways. I stuck with the guard going to Starswirl as he made his way through the castle. Finally, he came to a room with a large door. He was about to knock on it when the door opened.
A unicorn with a brown coat, a long white beard and wearing a pointed blue hat and cape with stars and crescent moons on them poked his head out. “Yes, what is it?” He asked.
The guard was stunned for a moment. “Oh, um, I’m the guard you asked for, I’m here to take the shift of guarding your room for the night sir.”
I took this chance and snuck from the guard’s shadow and into the room. “I appreciate you coming down here, but I changed my mind, I won’t be needing a guard tonight, thank you though.”
“But sir, it is protacol to have a guard stationed outside the rooms of all important ponies at the castle.”
“I understand that and I am sorry for troubling you, but that won’t be necessary, good night.” He then closed the door on the guard. I took a good look around the room, there we’re scrolls and books scattered all over the place, I saw a fire burning in a stone alcove that provided some light for the room, I was hiding in the shadow of a desk on the opposite wall of the fire. There was a black metal pot being suspended over the fire as well.
The unicorn, Starswirl, walked away from the door and stopped at the center of the room. “You can come out now shadow walker.”
I was stunned, did he know I was here, how could he know, there was no way he could know I was hiding in his room. I stayed where I was for a moment, not sure what to make of what I heard.
“Come now, no need to be afraid, you don’t need to hide under my desk.” He said as he looked right at where I was hiding. He did know I was here, he knew exactly where I was.
I wasn’t sure what to do, I was afraid and angry at the same time at this pony. I chose to go with anger and pushed my fear down inside. I slowly slunk out from under the desk and emerged from the shadow. I glared at this unicorn looking at me with a smile. “How did you know where I was, and how do you know WHAT I am?”
“It’s really simple my boy, I foresaw your coming, I knew you would come looking for me once you found out about that book I gave Keen Eye.”
“I’m not in the mood for games old timer.”
“ME old, HA, if I’m not mistaken, you’re practically a thousand years old yourself are you not?”
I took a few steps forward. “If you knew I was coming, then you know why I’m here, I want answers unicorn.”
“And answers you shall receive.”
“Tell me, is it REALLY true you can travel through time, or was it just some lucky coincidence that you knew about my kind and expected one to come to you?”
“Yes, it is true, I am capable of time travel.”
“Then you should also know what else I want.”
“You wish me to send you back in time to save your clan from the horrible disaster that befell it, effectively wiping them out and leaving you as the sole shadow walker.”
“Exactly, so get to it, I want my family back that your kind stole from me.”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that.”
I glared intensely at him. “I’m warning you, you do not want me angry, now SEND ME BACK SO I CAN SAVE MY CLAN!”
I saw his horn light up, my whole body froze, I was completely paralyzed, the only thing I could move was my mouth. “What, what is this………I can’t move, what did you do to me old one?!”
He smirked at me. “Paralyzing spell, you will be unable to move until I undo the spell.”
“Then you’d better undo it or I’m going to tear you limb from limb and feed you to the timberwolves in my forest.”
“And just how do you plan on doing that when you can’t move, even your magic and shadow magic is useless right now.”
I was starting to get scared again, this unicorn had me at his mercy, I couldn’t move, I couldn’t use my powers, I couldn’t do anything, and it was all because of this unicorn who is part of a race that destroyed my world. “You……..you better let me go…or I’ll-“ He cut me off.
“You’ll what, use your shadow powers on me, I don’t think so. Just relax, I’m not going to kill you.”
“Yeah right, you planned this didn’t you, using that unicorn as bait to lure me here to finish what your ancestors started?” I was actually starting to accept the fact this could be the end for me. I may actually get to be reunited with my family in the afterlife. “Well, what are you waiting for, just get it over with then.”
“Nightshade, I’m not going to kill you, I just want to talk. I find your kind very fascinating, the only creatures capable of manipulating the shadows and doing incredible things. Such a race should never have been killed off.”
“Then……why won’t you let me save my family?”
“Nightshade, I’m sorry, but your family can’t be saved, I could send you back, but do you really expect to fight off all those ponies on your own? You won’t be able to save all of them. Plus, there would be too many for you to fight. There is nothing you can do for them Nightshade.” He looked at me with such sympathy. “I’m sorry, I truly am, but you just have to face facts, your family is gone, and there is nothing you can do.” He then released his spell on me and I was able to move again.
His words stung. “You…you’re lying, there has to be something I can do. I can’t just give up, not after everything I’ve been through.”
“There is nothing, not a thing that you can do. I’m sorry.”
I returned my glare at him but spoke low. “Then tell me unicorn, what is the point of me going on if my family is dead, what point is there when I’m the last of my kind with no hope of restoring them? WHAT, TELL ME!”
“Hope.”
“……Hope? What do you mean, you just told me I can’t bring my family back, where is the hope in that? This is a sick game you’re playing.”
“Hear me out, there is no hope of restoring your old clan, but there is hope of bringing the shadow walkers back to this world.”
“What are you talking about, how is there hope of bringing them back, you said my family can’t be brought back.”
“True, but you can make a new one.”
My anger was returning, I was getting tired of this unicorn beating around the bush. “Listen old one, I’m getting tired of this, either you start making sense, or I start hurting you.”
“What I mean is simply this, one day, you will meet someone that will change your life for the better, she will be the key to bringing the shadow walkers back to this world. You just have to have faith and continue living your life.”
“I’m still not getting it beardo, who is this someone that I’m supposed to meet?”
“All I can tell you is that she will be the key to unlocking your heart again so you can be happy again. That is all I can say, if I reveal too much, then it may not happen.”
“Then why are you telling me all this now?”
“Because you needed to hear it. That is all I have to say on the matter.”
“So that’s it, I’m going to meet someone that will unlock my heart and make me happy and help me bring back the shadow walkers? Do you have any idea how ridiculous that sounds?”
“If you don’t want to believe me, that is your choice, I said what I felt you needed to hear. It’s up to you to believe it or not.”
“And give me one good reason why I shouldn’t kill you for wasting my time?”
“Because one, there is a part of you that want’s to believe me. And two, killing me won’t do anything, it would just be a waste of your time. So if there is nothing else, why not go on back to the forest, there will be a nice new home waiting for you. Pity about Keen Eye, I wish he had listened to me when I told him not to go to your forest, but then, we wouldn’t be having this conversation now would we?”
I cocked an eyebrow at him. “You are a strange one, but……I suppose you are right, killing you would be a waste of my time, I’ve wasted enough time here already anyway. You just watch yourself and stay away from my forest, and if you tell any of your kind about me, I will hunt you down.”
“No need to worry about that, your visit will be our little secret, as is Keen Eye’s whereabouts, he took a job to study a dangerous forest, thus Celestia decreed that if anything did happen to him, nothing would be done about it, they know he’s there, but they also know the forest is dangerous, if they don’t hear from him, they will assume he fell prey to the dangers of the forest.”
“Are you saying I can just go ahead and kill him?” I looked at him confused.
“I’m saying you won’t have to do anything to him upon your return to your forest, now go on, off with you, I’ve said all I needed to say, you best be off now.”
I just gave him a look, sunk into the shadows, and slunk away. I made my way out of the castle, out of the city, found an area with no ponies around and flew off back to my forest.
During my flight back, I ended up having a conversation with my shadow. “That was weird, what do you think he meant by all that?”
“I don’t know, and I don’t care, he’s just some crazy old unicorn, this was a complete waste of my time.”
“But what if it’s all true, what if you ARE destined to meet someone that could change your life for the better and make you happy again?”
“HMPF, Yeah right, that unicorn was just spouting a bunch of nonsense.”
“And what about all that stuff about restoring the shadow walkers, don’t tell me you’re not at least a little hopeful about that.”
“I gave up hope a long time ago.”
“Then why did you come see him?”
“……” I had no comeback, the whole reason I went to him was because I DID hope, I hoped there was a chance to get my family back, a chance to restore my clan, but now I see that wasn’t what happened. Instead, I was told that I would meet someone that would make me happy again, I didn’t believe it though. Yet……still.
It was early morning when I got back to Keen Eye’s house, I just landed in front of the door and barged in. “Keen Eye, you here!? You better not have gone out into the forest!” I received no response. “Great, I bet he went out into the forest for this research he was doing.” So I turned around and headed out to look for him. I searched and searched for a few hours and saw no trace of him, until I came to the part of the forest with quicksand pits. I found his book lying on the ground in front of a pit.
“That moron, I told him to stay put, why didn’t he listen.” It didn’t take a geneous to figure out what happened. Keen Eye fell into a quick sand pit and drowned. He was now gone. “That stupid unicorn, now others are going to come looking for him. If any of those ponies find me…..”
“But Nightshade, didn’t Starswirl say that if anything happened to Keen Eye, this ruler of theirs wouldn’t do anything about it, they would just assume he died from the dangers of the forest?”
“Hmmm, I guess, and he did say there would be a new home waiting for me when I got back to the forest.”
“You think he meant that big house Keen Eye lived in?”
“What else could it be, might as well, bet it’s better than sleeping in trees anyway.” So I resolved to at least give the house a try for myself and see what it would be like living there. Did this mean Starswirl is right, that I truly would meet someone that would change my life for the better and help me restore the shadow walkers to the world? Only time would tell me that.
The years just rolled by as time went on, I read every single book in that library that I now called my own, I learned about how to utilize the plants in the greenhouse to make healing potions and salves, my powers only grew as time went on as well. I had lost track of time in my solitude, the days just seemed to mesh together. The words that unicorn I met said stuck with me though, I’m not sure why. Hope, that one word stuck with me, hope that I would one day find a mare that would end my loneliness, free my emotions and help me rebuild what I lost. I wanted to forget it, I didn’t see how such a thing could happen, but it still stuck with me no matter what. Eventually, I managed to just lock it away in my mind, it was still there, just not as prominent as it used to be. I still paid regular visits to my parents grave and my clans home on a weekly basis, I have been since the incident with the dragon.
Thanks to the books, I also learned about certain plants that only grew in a forest called the Everfree forest in the country called Equestria, I visited that forest once in a while to find the plants there as well. Luckily, it wasn’t near any pony settlements so I didn’t have to worry too much about any of them wandering into the forest while I was there. In a forest where the only life are plants, animals, a few trolls, and myself, nothing much happened. The rest of the years that went by were uneventful and quiet…..I liked it like that. But today, something did happen. I was out in the forest looking for plants to use for potions. This became my hobby in my solitude. While I was out and about, I had ventured a little further into the forest then I usually do, I was looking for a rare plant that grew in that part of the forest.
As I was looking, I heard a rustle off behind a few bushes. I was wearing the blue cloak at the time with my hood up, I had taken to wearing it every time I went out. I made my way to the bushes and saw something I never thought I would see again, it was a pony. A Pegasus mare with a yellow coat, two shades of grey in her mane and tail, and she was wearing a tan shirt with a pith helmet. The mark on her flank was like a compass. I couldn’t believe it. My anger and fear flared up, but I kept my composure. The mare had gotten herself tangled in some vines, she struggled to get out. “Gh, stupid vines, let GO!”
Little did she know, she got caught by snake vines, vines with a mind, and they weren’t about to let her go while she struggled. “Hmpf, what’s a pony doing here?” I asked myself.
My shadow appeared next to me. “Don’t you think you should help her?”
“Again with this, look, I don’t like those ponies, all right, they took everything away from me, how many times do I have to say it. She can just hang there till the timberwolves come for all I care.”
“But Nightshade, this could be the mare Starswirl was talking about.”
“I don’t CARE ABOUT THAT!” I accidentally shouted.
“Who’s there, hello, I could really use some help here.” The mare asked.
I rolled my eyes under my hood, I might as well let her know I’m here. I emerged from the bushes and spoke to her. “What are you doing here pony?” I spat the last word out.
She didn’t seem to notice as she answered. “Look, can you help me out here please?”
“Why should I, I don’t know you.”
“Oh come on, help a fellow pony out.”
I said nothing to that comment. “Like I said, why should I help you? You’re trespassing in my forest.”
She looked at me with confusion. “Your forest?”
“Yes, my forest.”
“How is this your forest?”
I sighed in annoyance. “*Sigh* I live here, I know every inch of this forest, hence, this is my forest, and your trespassing, so why should I help you?”
She gave me a pout. “Are you really going to leave a helpless mare in this mess all by her lonesome?”
“Come on Nightshade, what harm could it do?”
I snorted. I turned to walk away, as I did, I heard the mare speak and she seemed to panic a little. “WAIT, look, if you help me out, I’ll…..share the treasure with you.”
I looked at her from over my shoulder. “Treasure, what treasure?”
“I’m an explorer, I found clues that point to a lost civilization where there’s supposed to be a magical artifact. If we get it, we could get some serious bits for it.”
I turned back to face her. I figured this lost civilization she was talking about was my village. “What do you know about this lost civilization, do you know what the inhabitants were called?”
“If you get me down, I’ll tell you all I know.”
“Fine, I’ll help you, but you better not waste my time.”
“Thanks, now get me out of here please.”
“Just stop struggling.”
“What?”
“I said, stop struggling, the more you move around, the more they’ll hold onto you and eventually start crushing you.”
“What kind of vines are these?!” She asked in a panic.
“Snake vines, now stop…..struggling. They’ll let you go once you do.”
The mare finally ceased her moving. After a moment, the vines suddenly let her go and she just dropped to the ground. “OOF! Ow.” She looked up at me with a smile. “Thanks.” She raised her hoof, I assume she was expecting me to help her up……..I didn’t. She got the message and stood up on her own. “Ok then, well, thanks for helping me out of that.”
“I helped you, now you tell me what you know about this civilization.”
“Right, anyway, supposedly, many many years ago, there were these ponies that lived in a stone made city, they worshiped gods and held ceremonies to celebrate the good fortunes they believe the gods gave them.” Upon hearing this, I knew it wasn’t my clan, we didn’t worship gods, and we didn’t hold ceremonies. “Supposedly, the gods gave the ponies a magical artifact that would grant them whatever they wanted, their heart’s desire.”
This got my attention. “Their heart’s desire? You mean this artifact could grant wishes?”
“I know, it sounds crazy right, but if I can get it and bring it back to Equestria, every pony could enjoy looking at a piece of legend.”
I cocked an eyebrow under my hood. “Don’t you think it would be dangerous to bring something like that to other ponies?”
“What do you mean?”
“Think about it, what if some evil pony got their hooves on it, they could end up ruling everything.”
She laughed at me. “HA HA, yeah right, it doesn’t really grant wishes, it’s just a piece of old history that was left behind a long time ago, something like that is very valuable. I just want to get it so others can enjoy seeing something that was a part of a long forgotten race of ponies.”
“Then it seems your wasting my time, have fun with the trolls, I’m out of here.”
I was about to leave, but she called out to me. “WAIT, I could really use your help with this.” I just looked at her. “Look, I don’t know my way around this forest, it’s hard for me to find the place from the air because of the canopy of the trees are so thick, and I can’t navigate this forest from ground level, if you know this forest, then I could really use your help. Come on, we could have the adventure of a lifetime.”
“I’m not interested in adventure.”
“Well, I could pay you for your troubles, this thing is sure to earn us a lot of bits.”
“I’m not interested in money either, everything I need is right here.”
“Oh come on, what will it take to get you to help me out, I could really use it.”
“Nothing you have to offer me.”
“Surely there must be something.”
“There isn’t, now if you’ll excuse me, I have some things to take care of.”
“WAIT!”
“What now!” I yelled in annoyance.
“What if I said I lied about the artifact not being magical.”
This mare was starting to get on my nerves. “Then you were a fool for lying to me.”
“I’m sorry all right, but I could really use your help.”
I glared at her. “You better be straight with me pony, cause I’m getting very tired of this, can this thing grant wishes or not?”
She sighed in defeat. “Fine, I’ll be straight with you. To be honest, I’m not sure. There is a chance it could do what the legends say, but I don’t believe that stuff.”
A chance, a chance to grant one’s heat’s desire, could this mare really be the one Starswirl said I would meet, could this mare really be the one who could help me restore my family? I didn’t want to, but something in me told me to at least see if this could be real, I mean…….we’re talking about a chance to restore all I lost. I spoke so she knew I meant business. “This better be for real, or I’ll toss your sorry flank to the trolls and let them turn you into a snack.”
She raised an eyebrow at me. “What’s a troll?”
“You don’t want know, so this better not be a wild goose chase, or you will find out. Now, where is this place supposed to be, because I don’t recall seeing any civilization around here.”
She reached into a pocket on her shirt with a hoof and pulled out a small book. She looked through it. “Let’s see, according to what I’ve managed to gather we’re supposed to head through the heart of the forest and go north from there. I think the heart of it is west from here.”
I didn’t like the sound of that, the heart of the forest was where my home was, where my family and clan was buried. I tried to ask if there might be another way. “Why don’t we just head North West and save on time?”
She shook her head. “Because we don’t know how far up this place could be, we could end up passing by the way we’re supposed to go straight up or something.”
“Fine, to the heart of the forest then, just follow me and stay close. It’s a long way there so by the time we get there, it will be night fall.”
“Great, thanks for the help.”
“Whatever.”
“Since we’re buddies now, we should introduce ourselves, I’m Daring Do, explorer extrordinair, what’s your name?”
“We’re not buddies, let’s just go.” I started walking.
“Hey, wait up!” She started flying next to me lazily as I walked. “So why live in a forest anyway?”
“It’s the perfect place to find solitude so I’m not pestered by unwanted guests.” I opted to walk because I didn’t want to expose my wings to her.
“Why would you want to live alone, that sounds dull. No pony to talk to, no one to share a laugh with, it must be boring.”
“I get by just fine.”
I saw her cock an eyebrow at me. “So what’s your name again, I didn’t catch it?”
“I didn’t throw it, can you just stop talking while we go?”
She stopped flying and landed, she stood there while I kept walking a bit. “What’s your problem?”
I stopped in my tracks and looked back at her. “My problem is that there’s an annoying pony asking me annoying questions, and I would like to get this little trip over with as soon as possible.” I started walking again. I heard her start as well.
We managed to make the trek through the forest without incident, and thankfully, she got the hint I wasn’t much for talking. The sun was starting to set as we drew close to my old home. She stopped when she noticed the dragon bones that were once a dragon who wanted to make my village his home. “WHOA, what happened here?”
“Does it matter, it’s the remains of a dragon.”
“But look at its ribs. It looks like something just plowed right through it.”
“It doesn’t matter, its DEAD, let’s just head into the village and set up camp for the night.”
“Right….wait….village, what village?” I kept walking, she followed. Once we entered she was a little amazed at the sight. “No way, did we find the place already? AWESOME!”
“Save your excitement, this village has been here for centuries, there no treasure to be found here so don’t bother asking.”
She looked at me with a bit of surprise. “You know about this place? You just gotta tell me what you know!” She asked with excitement.
I was surprised she didn’t know anything about this, I thought what happened between my clan and the ponies would be history. “Don’t you know about it already?”
“How could I, I’ve never heard of a place like this in a forest.”
I wasn’t very happy about that, I couldn’t believe these ponies. An army of them shows up out of nowhere, wipes out my entire clan, disappears, and the descendants don’t even know about it? My clan was just wiped out and forgotten, then again, why should I care if these ponies knew about what their ancestors did. “Never mind then, let’s just get some wood together for a fire.”
“Ok, but you just gotta tell me about this place afterwards.” We both went off to gather wood as the sun was setting. We got the wood piled up at the center of my village and sat around the fire. It provided a warm glow once the sun was gone. “Well, there we go, a nice warm fire, now come on, you gotta at least tell me your name, I’ve got to call you something.”
“If you must know, it’s Nightshade.”
She smiled at me. “Nice name.” The moon soon rose up and over us, it was a half-moon tonight, the lunar lilys bloomed and started glowing around us. I just looked around at them, then back to the fire, Daring just looked in awe at them. “Whoa, that is beautiful, what are these, I’ve never seen flowers like these before.”
“They’re called lunar lilies, they only bloom at night when the moon is out, and they only grow here in this part of the forest.”
She looked back at me with a smile. “How come?”
“That is all I know about them, I don’t know why they only grow here, they just do.”
“Speaking of which, you still need to tell me what this place is, where did it come from, who lived here?”
I could tell she wasn’t going to leave me alone until I told her. “Why do you care so much, it should just be an old ancient stone city falling apart to you, why do you care what it used to be?”
“Because, I like learning about historical things, this place must have been something when it wasn’t falling apart like this.”
Those words seemed to get to me, she seemed to see it as more than just crumbling ruins. I thought for a moment as to whether or not I should tell her, I figured there wasn’t really any harm. “Let me ask you something. Have you ever heard of a race called the shadow walkers?”
“No, who were they, are they the ones that lived here?”
“Yes, they were a race of peaceful creatures that could manipulate the shadows and travel through them. They lived in this place in peace and happiness.”
She looked at me with a sad expression. “What happened to them?”
“They were wiped out nearly seventeen hundred years ago.”
“Wiped out, that’s terrible, how did it happen?”
“Does it matter, it’s ancient history, something that happened a long time ago, it doesn’t matter what happened.”
“It does to me, it sounded like what happened to them was unfair, why did a race of peaceful ponies get wiped out, something like that should never have happened.”
I looked to her with a bit of surprise. She actually thought what happened to my clan was wrong. Was I wrong about my assumption of these ponies? I pushed that thought away. “Since you’re so interested, I’ll tell you, it was your ancestors that did it.”
“What, my ancestors, what do you mean?”
“I mean pony kind, it was an army of ponies that did it. They came in the night and slaughtered every last one of them.”
“Whoa, I…I had no idea. That’s terrible, why did they do that?”
“I don’t know why, all I know is they did, and destroyed so many innocent lives.”
I saw her look away with a frown. Was she actually about to cry? I couldn’t believe it, this pony was actually sad about what happened. She looked back up to me. “How do you know all this, no pony has ever heard of something like that happening, so how do you know?”
“How I know doesn’t matter, I just know.”
“You had to have learned it somewhere, how can you know about something that no other pony knows about? Especially when you’re living alone and isolated from others. Come on Nightshade, you can tell me.”
“It doesn’t matter. I know and that’s all there is to it.” I was starting to get annoyed with her persistence.
“Come on, please Nightshade, you can tell me, if it’s a secret how you found out, I won’t tell any pony, please.”
I snapped. I glared at her from under my hood. “BECAUSE I WAS THERE ALL RIGHT?!” She recoiled at my shout. I softened my voice as I spoke. “I was there when it happened, I saw the whole thing.”
“But….but you said that happened seventeen hundred years ago, how could you have been there?” She was looking both shocked and confused at my words.
“Can we just get some sleep? I’m tired.” I said with annoyance.
“Nightshade, you seemed very adamant about not helping me until I brought up the fact that what we’re going after could grant wishes, nothing else swayed you, what is it you’re hoping to wish for?”
“Good night pony.” I said in a way to try and let her know I wasn’t wanting to talk anymore as I lay down with my side facing her and my head away from the fire.
“You said you were there, but that should be impossible, and if you were there, why, how?” She stopped a moment. “Are you…..are you one of the shadow walkers?”
I sighed, she figured it out, she was a smart one, I’ll give her that. I lifted my head and looked at her. “Not one of, last of, my clan was wiped out by your kind and I was the only survivor, that’s why I live here in this forest, these ruins used to be my home.”
She looked at me with sad eyes again. “Nightshade, I…I’m so sorry…I had no idea.”
“You’re sorry? Why are you sorry, since when do ponies show compassion, none of you showed compassion as your kind tore through my home and slaughtered my clan, killing the young and old alike.”
“Nightshade, I had nothing to do with it.”
“No, but your kind did, they killed my family and left me alone, I’m alive because my parents sacrificed themselves for my sake.”
“But…how are you still alive if that happened so many years ago? As far as I know, only alicorns are immortal. Are you an alicorn?”
“Alicorns are ponies, I’m no pony, I’m a shadow walker, though I suppose I am the equivalent of an alicorn, I have magic and wings like them, but I’m much different from them.”
“Like how?”
I walked up to her, I lowered my hood so she could see my face, my horns were now visible and my slitted eyes shone in the light of the fire. I then spread out my wings from under my cloak. She looked at me surprised. “Whoa….I……um.” She was speechless.
“If you think I’m going to let you finish what your ancestors started, you better think again, your just one pony against an angry shadow walker with magic and shadows at his disposal.” I then formed four shadow tentacles around me to show her I meant business.
She looked scared then. “WAIT, Nightshade, I swear, I didn’t know anything about all that, I’m not here to kill you, I didn’t even know about what you were till you showed me. I’m truly sorry about what happened to you and your clan! No pony should have to go through what you did.”
I dismissed my shadow tentacles. “If you’re truly sorry, then you’ll help me get this artifact. If it can do what you say, then I can use it to get my family back and restore my clan. Once I do, then you can just take off and leave. Understand me.”
She gave me a determined look and a smile. “Nightshade, I swear I will do whatever it takes to help you get it.”
I tucked my wings back down and went back to my spot. I kept my head facing forward as I spoke. “If you try anything suspicious, I will kill you.”
“I understand Nightshade, and I promise I won’t, I will help in any way I can.”
“So how far is it to this temple again?” I asked the Pegasus adventurer calling herself Daring Do.
“I don’t know, I just know we need to head north from the center of this forest.”
It was late in the morning as we made our trek through the forest, after revealing my wings, we took to flying through it to make better time. I rolled my eyes at Daring’s response to my question. “Well sorry to burst your bubble about this, but I don’t recall ever even seeing a temple of some kind around here, are you sure your right about this?”
“Hey, you’re talking to Equestria’s number one adventurer here, if I say that a temple is somewhere around here, then there is a temple around here.”
I veered down and came in for a landing on the ground. Daring followed and landed next to me with a quizzical look. “I warned you before that you better not try anything funny. If I find out that this is some sort of trick, I will kill you, in case you forgot, I don’t like you ponies.”
Daring gave me a worried look, it soon faded and she just looked at me. “Nightshade, I promised I would help you and I meant it, this isn’t a trick. Maybe the temple is in a part of the forest you haven’t been to yet.”
I looked away from her and just started walking, she followed. “I suppose that is possible, there are distant parts of this forest even I haven’t ventured to because it was so far away from where I made a home for myself.” As we walked a little further, I heard a rustle in a nearby bush.
“What was that, did you hear something?” Daring asked from behind me.
I turned to face her. “Stay close to me if you want to stay alive.” Daring came right up to my side and looked around with narrowed eyes. A pack of timberwolves emerged from the surrounding bushes, it looked like there was at least twelve of them. I sneered at them. “Haven’t you bark heads learned your lesson yet, how many times do I have to beat you before you learn that you can’t beat me?”
Daring looked at me with a raised eyebrow. “You know what these are?”
I answered with annoyance clear in my voice. “I live here remember, I know everything about this place.”
She turned to face the pack that had us surrounded. “So what are they?”
“Timberwolves, pretty much immortal, they shatter easily, but can reform in seconds.” After my explanation, one lunged for Daring. She managed to buck it quickly and knocked it back and into two other wolves. The three shattered to twigs and reassembled in seconds. I was a little impressed that she showed little fear at these things and was able to strike like she did.
“So then how do we beat them?” A pair of timberwolves lunged at me, I quickly formed a shadow circle under me, moved it forward and created a pair of spikes that shot up quickly, piercing the wolves in mid-air, then I made more spines quickly shoot out from the first, breaking the wolves into pieces.
I decided to make quick work of them, I focused my magic and my horns lit up with my black aura, I formed a large ball of fire above my head. Daring watched in awe as I did this. The timberwolves seemed to cringe at the sight of fire. I fired a fireball at a group in front of me, a few jumped out of the way but I managed to hit one and turned it into a pile of ash.
The timberwolves nearby looked at the space that held their pack mate with fear, they turned to me as I formed another fireball. They got the message as all the surrounding timberwolves cringed. They dispersed and ran off. With that minor annoyance out of the way, I dismissed the fireball I formed and continued walking. “Let’s go, that little encounter wasted our time.”
Daring trotted up to my side. “Nightshade that was awesome, how did you do that?”
I just rolled my eyes. “Magic, it was a fire spell. I thought you ponies had magic?”
“Well, we do…..I just never seen a spell like that before.”
“Let’s just keep moving.” I took to the air with Daring following.
We flew for hours till we finally reached an area of the forest I was not familiar with, the trees seemed the same but it just didn’t feel familiar. We finally stopped to rest for lunch in a small clearing. Daring took the initiative in getting food by collecting a few fruits from the nearby trees. She tossed a pear to me and I caught it. “Here ya go, eat up.”
I held the fruit in my hoof as I took a bit out while sitting on my haunches. I decided to try and converse with this mare. “So, you didn’t seem all that afraid of those timberwolves we ran into earlier.”
She just waved a hoof at me. “Nah, I’ve faced worse believe me.”
I kept a straight face as I responded. “Well, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, there are worse things out there than those timberwolves.”
“You mean like these trolls you mentioned?”
“Pretty much, they’re only slightly more dangerous because of their size and strength, and because they’re a little smarter. Not too much smarter though, pretty much dumb as mud as far as I’m concerned.”
She gigled at my quip. “He ha, that’s pretty funny.” I just looked at her oddly. “I think I like you Nightshade.”
This surprised me a little. I just narrowed my eyes. “Well don’t get any funny ideas, I still don’t like you. I’m just putting up with you because of this thing that can give me back my family.”
She smirked at me. “I figured as much. Come on, let’s get going.” We continued on our way.
It was another few hours later till we finally reached a large clearing where the ruins of a stone city rested. I was frozen in place as I looked over it, it reminded me of my home village, only there was no tree coverage over the place, and in the back was a large stone structure with a flat roof and stone carvings of animal heads surrounding it. Daring Do smiled as she looked it over. “HA HA, we found it, this is it Night shade, I told you there was a temple here.”
I finally shook myself out of my daze to respond. “Ok so you were right, big deal, consider yourself lucky so far.”
She turned and faced me with another quizzical look. “Why?”
“One less reason for me to kill you.” I responded simply.
“Are you ever going to stop with the death threats?”
“Are you ever going to stop being a pony? Let’s go, the sooner we get this artifact of yours, the sooner I can get my family back and you can be on your merry way.”
“Aren’t you the charmer?” I heard her say under her breath.
As we, made our way through the city, we saw many skeletons of ponies scattered about, some were whole while others were just skuls or ribs or legs, it was rather ugly, but it didn’t bother me.
Daring seemed a little disgusted by this. “Eh, Nightshade, aren’t you bothered by all this? I’ve seen bones before, but not so many in one place.”
“This is nothing to me, I’ve seen worse than this……MUCH worse.”
“Really, like what?”
I stopped and turned my head to face her. “Let me put it this way, have you ever seen your entire clan slaughtered by an army of angry ponies, only to have to bury them all yourself and see the carnage that was brought upon them close up?” She looked horrified by this as she shook her head. “I was just a young colt when it happened, and I buried my entire clan on my own. So yeah, I’ve seen worse than this.” I turned my head forward again. “Come one, we’re wasting time.” I heard as she slowly started to follow.
We made it through to the other side of the city and up to the entrance of the temple. Daring came up to my side as I was about to step through, but she stopped me with a hoof to my chest. “Hold on Nightshade, you can’t just go barging into an ancient temple.”
I turned to her. “Why not? Let’s just go in there and grab the thing.”
“You see those holes in the floor?” She pointed a hoof to the floor of the hallway into the temple. “And the ones in the walls.” She also gestured to the walls.
I looked along the floor and saw a series of holes in the floor like she said, then to the walls and saw a series of holes in the walls as well. I turned back to her. “What about them?”
She rolled her eyes at me. She then picked up a rock and tossed it into the hallway. As soon as the rock was in, darts started shooting out of the holes in the walls at high speeds. The rock landed on a tile with a hole and a sharp metal spike shot up from the floor. “Booby traps, I’ve encountered plenty of them in my line of work. That is why you don’t just go barging in a temple like this. Now we need to find out what the trigger is and find a way to disable it.”
As she thought, I came up with a quick solution, I formed my shadow under both of us and sucked us in using my shadow sneak ability. Daring gave out a shriek of surprise when she felt herself sink quickly. “WHOA!” I zipped us across the floor with ease slinking between the holes in the floor and got us through.
Once safely on the other side of the hall and past the spikes and darts, I had us re-emerge from my shadow. Daring looked at me with a smile. “Or we could just do that. Nice work Nightshade, wish I had you with me all the time when I go exploring, you make getting past booby traps easy.”
“Don’t get used to it, this is a one-time thing.” I was about to take a step when she stopped me again.
“Hold it!” She put a hoof to my barrel again.
“What now?” I asked in annoyance. She simply pointed down at the floor and I saw a hint of a glimmer, I leaned down closer for a better look and saw a wire. I looked back up to her with a glare. “It’s just a piece of string.” I deadpanned. She smirked then pointed a hoof to the left of me, revealing three long slots in the side of the wall just in front of me. I looked back down at the wire and stepped on it. Three large axes came flying out of the slots and imbedding themselves in the wall across from the slots.
I looked back at Daring who was wearing a smug look. I just narrowed my eyes again. “So how many of these booby traps are there in this place?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“I thought you were an expert here?”
“I am, it’s just the number of booby traps and what kinds vary from temple to temple.”
I looked straight ahead again. “Great. Well miss expert, go ahead and take the lead then.” She happily did so. After passing the axes, Daring found an unlit torch and took it out of the brace that was holding it.
She turned to me. “Say Nightshade, would you mind lighting this, we’re going to need it, it’ll get dark in there.” I figured I could tell her I could provide light with an illumination spell, but then this torch would let me save up my magic in case it was needed. So I lit up my horns and used my magic to light the torch in Daring’s hoof. She gave me a smile. “Thanks. Come on, let’s go.” She then continued to lead the way.
We soon came to a large open chamber with a section off to the left was raised and had steps leading up to a stone table. There were old looking pots lying around, some were still standing while others were shattered and broken. “Wow, look at this place. This must be the main chamber of the temple.”
We walked in a little further. “So is the artifact in here or what?”
“I don’t think so, something as important as that would have its own chamber and will be well protected.”
“So how do we find it then.”
“There must be a clue on the walls, look at these inscriptions.” She went over to the wall on the right and lifted the torch for me to get a better look. I could see funny writings on the wall accompanied by pictures of other ponies. I couldn’t make out what the words said. “Nightshade, see if you can find a clue in these, there should be a picture of these ponies looking like their worshipping something.”
“You do know I can’t read this right?”
“I can, but you don’t have to, just find a picture of what I described.”
“Fine.”
“Wait, let’s find a torch for you.” She stopped me before I could take a step.
“I don’t need one, I have night vision. I can see just fine in the dark.”
“Oh, ok then.” She went right while I went left.
I scanned the carvings and saw images of the ponies with what looked like crops, another of them wearing funny looking clothes and seemed to be dancing around a fire, another where……..no…….it can’t be. I froze as my eyes came to rest on a depiction of a horrible looking beast with red eyes and sharp fangs looking right at me. An image flashed in my mind of the night my parents carried me away from our burning home, I chanced a look back and saw a horrid beast with red eyes and his sharp teeth glinted in the light of the fire. I was afraid, truly afraid for the first time in a long time. I was sweating as a look of horror was plastered on my face.
I fell back on my haunches. “No, no it can’t be, It just can’t.” I said quietly to myself. I was shaking.
I heard Daring call out to me. “Nightshade, did you find anything yet?” I didn’t respond. She called again. “Nightshade?” My eyes were locked on to the red eyes looking at me, glaring at me like the beast would jump out from the wall at me and try to gobble me up. I think I heard Daring gallop over to me, for soon I felt a hoof touch my shoulder. “Nightshade, what is it, what’s wrong?”
The sudden contact made me jump, I quickly looked to my side with a raised hoof and saw a worried expression plastered on Daring’s face. She asked again. “Nightshade, what is it?”
I recomposed myself as I responded. “It’s……It’s nothing, I’m fine.”
“Are you sure, you looked terrified there for a moment.”
I responded to affirm my previous statement. “I said I’m fine.”
She looked to the wall and raised her torch. “What is that?” She asked as she looked at the beast on the wall, now that I had gotten over my fear I got a better look at it. The figure in the picture did indeed seem to match the monster I saw that horrible night. But it was in more detail in this image. It looked to be a mix up of all kinds of animals.
I answered Daring’s question. “A monster.”
She began to read the inscriptions that were with the image. “We have learned of a terrible monster we have come to call the beast king, for he is made of many different parts of animals. This monster currently rules over a neighboring country and uses his powers to bring misery to all those under his rule. The beast king is a creature of power and chaos that is said to be unstoppable. Our sage has foreseen that the beast king will come for us for our sage knows how he can be defeated. A power will rise that will imprison him in stone, but will not truly rid the world of his evil. Only a creature of the shadows has the power to truly slay this monster. It is said that one will rise from the darkness of a dark and dangerous forest and stand against the beast king and rid the world of his tyranny once and for all.”
I just cocked an eyebrow when Daring finished. “A creature of shadows?” I looked to Daring. “Any idea what they’re talking about?”
“I have no idea, but this creature of the shadows must be you. Does that monster look familiar to you?”
I looked back at the image. “How could I forget, those red eyes are forever burned into my skull, they haunt my darkest nightmares. I will never forget that look he gave me the night me and my parents fled. So he’s known as the beast king?”
“That’s what the ponies here called him.”
I glared at the image. “Well I’m through being afraid, if this thing is still alive somewhere, he better hope he doesn’t meet me, because if we do meet….”
I charged up my shadow magic and formed a large shadow ball over head. “Nightshade, DON’T!”
I fired it right at the image of the beast king and destroyed the image of him, resulting in dust and rocks flying across the chamber. Daring just sat there in shock, she dropped the torch and just looked at the massive hole in the wall I made. I turned to her. “HEY, snap out of it and let’s go, we gotta find something remember?”
She stuttered. “Y….Y…..You didn’t just do that…..tell me you didn’t just do that.”
“What’s the big deal, it’s just a wall.”
She turned to me and glared. “Just a wall? Just a wall? That was ancient literature, thousands of years old, and you just blew it up!”
“So?”
“SO? Do you have any idea how big a find this is? This is ancient history.”
“Exactly, ancient history, as in stuff that happened a long time ago and doesn’t matter anymore.”
“We could have learned something from this! There might have been a clue to tell us where the artifact is!”
“The only thing I saw was images of ponies growing crops and having fun, I didn’t see anything on there that looked important.”
“But we still could have learned from it, we’re talking about long forgotten history!”
I glared back at her and pressed my nose to hers. “The only thing I care about is getting this artifact, getting out of here, and getting my family back, nothing else matters. If you can’t understand that, then I’m going to find this thing on my own, now you either help me find it like you promised or GET LOST!”
Daring backed off and took a deep breath. “*Sigh* Fine, I promised I’d help you and I meant it, I’m not about to go back on my word, just try not to destroy anything else in here please.”
I just snorted in response. She picked up the torch she dropped and we continued to scour the carvings and writing for clues as to where the artifact would be. After a while of searching, I heard Daring call over to me. “Nightshade, over here, I think I found something!”
I rushed over to her and came up next to her. “What is it?”
“Look.” I looked to the wall and saw an image of the ponies gathered around an idol that looked like a carving of a pony with wings and a horn. “The artifact is a statue of an alicorn, a creature with wings and a horn, like princess Celestia.”
I recalled hearing that name before from that unicorn scientist that came to my forest many years ago and died from quicksand. “Does it tell us where it is?”
“It says here, the item in question is called the alicorn heart. It has the power to grant a wish any pure heart desires.”
I raised an eyebrow at that. “Pure heart? What does that mean?”
“I don’t know, let’s see, the alicorn heart is a sacred object granted to us ages ago by the gods, Only one who is pure of heart can make a wish and have it be granted. The alicorn heart resides within the chamber in the very back of the temple.”
“Well what are we waiting for, let’s go.”
“Wait, there’s more.”
“So, we know where it is, let’s just go and grab it and get the buck out of here.”
“But it says that it’s heavily guarded, only one who is strong of will and heart will be allowed to reach it.”
“It probably just means there’s more of those booby traps, let’s go already.” I started walking off to another door at the other end of the room to find this alicorn heart. I heard Daring start to gallop to catch up. This alicorn heart better give me what I want. And as for this beast king…..I swear by the stars if I ever get the chance, I will kill him.
Thanks to my abilities, me and Daring Do managed to easily make it through a few other booby traps that were laid out before us. Pitfalls that lead to spikes, swinging blades, and even a large boulder that came tumbling at us. I was able to easily blast it to pebbles. The next room we came too had some treasures in it such as gold and jewelry. Daring looked at the room in awe as the light from her torch reflected of the treasures. “Wow, look at all these riches.”
I could care less. “Tch, it’s just a bunch of glittery junk.”
Daring just looked at me. “It may be junk to you, but this stuff is priceless to me and to some friends of mine in the museum business, I’m going to have to inform them of this place so we can come back and get this stuff.”
“Hmpf, greedy ponies.” I said under my breath. I started walking further towards the center of the room. “Let’s just go, we’re wasting time, any idea if were any closer to our goal?” Before Daring could answer, I stopped in my tracks as I heard a hissing noise. “What the?” I looked down at the floor and saw some things slithering around.
Daring was standing in the same spot and used her torch to look at what I was seeing. I looked back at her and saw a look of fear plastered on her face. “Snakes, why did it have to be snakes. I HATE snakes.” She backed up a little.
I just rolled my eyes. I wasn’t afraid, I dealt with snakes before so this was no big deal for me. I looked back at her and called out to her. “Why don’t you just fly over them? You do have wings you know.” I asked annoyed. She didn’t respond. I narrowed my eyes as I sighed out. “*Sigh* Am I going to have to carry you across?”
I saw her finally look up at me and shook her head. “No, I…I can do this. No problem, no problem at all.”
I spread out my wings and took to the air. “Then come on, let’s get through this already.”
She nodded, she spread her wings and slowly began to fly over the floor as she kept her eyes on the hordes of snakes slithering about along the ground. “I really hate snakes.”
She came up next to me in the air. “What’s the big deal, they’re just snakes.” I asked.
“The bid deal is that those snakes are poisonous, one bite could kill you.” She answered as she looked at me. “I’m surprised they didn’t bit you.”
“I’m familiar with this type of snake, as long as you don’t agitate them, they won’t bother you, plus, in this kind of environment, they’re rather docile. The chances of them biting are very slim.”
She cocked an eyebrow at me. “Do you know a lot about snakes?”
I deadpanned with my answer. “I live in a forest, a naturel home to snakes, of course I know about them.”
“Oh, right.” She gave a sheepish smile. We finally made it to the other side of the room and went through the door there to another long hallway.
“*Sigh* I’m getting really sick of this place, how much longer till we reach this Alicorn Heart?”
“The chamber containing it should be at the end of this hallway.”
“And let me guess, there’s more booby traps here?”
“Probably.”
“Let’s just take my shortcut and get through this.” I used my shadow abilities and did my shadow sneak power to zip us through the hall to quickly get through and avoid any traps. At the end of the hall way was what appeared to be a stone door.
Daring raised the torch to get a good look at it. At the center was a depiction of the idol we were looking for. It was accompanied by two large figures on each side. These creatures were something I had never seen before, they had hooves but stood on their hind legs, their top halves had appendages with long thin extentions. The heads looked like that of a bulls head with a ring hanging from the nose. Each held what looked like large clubs in their appendages. Daring began reading an inscription on the door. “The alicorn heart is guarded by the spirits of courage and purity, only those deemed worthy by these spirits will even be allowed to approach the alicorn heart.”
“So does that mean the alicorn heart is behind this door?”
Daring didn’t seem sure as she kept her eyes on the door. “I think so, but I wonder what it means by guarded by the spirits of purity and courage?”
“Who cares, just move aside and I’ll blast it open.”
Daring quickly looked at me. “Nightshade, NO, don’t blow it up, I’ll find a way to open it, just….just give me a minute.”
I conceded. “*Sigh* Fine, but hurry up, in case you hadn’t noticed, I’m getting tired of this place and I want this all to be over as soon as possible.”
Daring scanned the door for a minute or so, all the while I grew more impatient, we were so close to something that could possibly give me back my family. “Strange, these depictions guarding the alicorn heart look like minataurs.” Daring mused as she went over the door. Daring finally found what she was looking for, she pressed a hoof on a marking under the depiction of the alicorn heart and the door slid down. “There, see, no problem, I told you I’d open it.” She said with a smile.
“What do you want, a prize?” I took the lead as we passed through the door. As soon as we passed through, a series of torches on the walls of the room we came to lit up on their own, the room was massive, way bigger than the other rooms we found. With a series of pillars on the sides. It had to be at least 50 ft. high and 30 ft. across. Me and Daring could easily fly around in this room, it was very long too.
Daring was impressed yet again as her eyes widened. Even I was a little impressed by this. “Wooow, in all my adventuring, I’ve never come across a chamber this massive before. The ponies that made this really went all out.”
My eyes fell upon what was at the other end of the room, a large door with two massive statues of those minataurs from the door. The clubs they were holding were long and had eight sides with studs lining the sides. “I’m guessing the heart is behind that door there then. Come on, let’s go get it and get out of here.” I was about to fly to the door but daring stopped me.
“Nightshade, wait!”
I turned back and faced her with a snarl. “This had better be important, I am really close to getting my family back here.”
“Nightshade, don’t you remember what I read on the door back there, about how the alicorn heart is guarded by the spirits of courage and purity?”
I dropped my snarl as I responded. “It’s just some stupid story meant to scare off raiders, now come on!” I turned back around and took to the air, Daring dropped her torch since it was no longer needed and flew after me.
We were just a few feet away from the door now, me and Daring landed, I looked up at the statues for a moment, then back at the door. I took one step towards the door and I noticed a flash come from the statues, I looked up just in time to see their eyes flicker to life and glow white. To my surprise, and Daring’s, they started to move. They took a step forward from where they were standing and raised the clubs they were holding. “NIGHTSHADE, LOOK OUT!” Daring called as one of the minataurs brought their club down. We both flew up and away just in time. “I told you we should have been careful!” Daring said with narrowed eyes.
“Fine, so you were right about these things!” I called as we reached the first door we came to, we landed. “You just find a safe place to hide while I deal with these things. I’ve dealt with worse before.” Before she could say anything else, I took off and flew right at the two stone minataurs. I formed four shadow tentacles around my neck and prepared to attack.
I flew as fast as I could at the left statue and tried to topple it by slamming all four of my hooves against its chest. I didn’t even cause it to move back a little. These things were going to be a little more difficult than I thought. I quickly flew back off it and the other swung its club downward. I flew to the side to dodge. I formed my two tentacle blades and saw the other swing its club horizontally at me, I flew up to avoid it and flew at the club when the first statue had it as far to the side as it could get. I raised one of my blades up and brought it down on the club. To my surprise, I only managed to chip it. “What the heavens?” The second statue managed to grab me in my confusion. It brought me up to its head and looked at me. I glared back at it.
“WHY ARE YOU HERE SHADOW WALKER?” The statue actually spoke, I was a little surprised by this, as well as the fact these things knew what I was, but I kept my glare.
“I’m here to get my family back, so you better let me go and let me through that door or I’ll turn you into rubble!”
“YOUR FAMILY IS GONE, NOT EVEN THE ALICORN HEART CAN UNDO DEATH!” The second spoke.
“Like I’m supposed to believe that? I’m not about give up on my family, now LET…..ME…..GO!” I used all my strength to push the statue’s hand open and free myself. I flew back a ways and summoned as much magical power above my head as I could. The two statues started walking towards me as I hovered in the center of the room gathering my power for one massive attack. They were just about to reach out for me when I unleashed all my power on them in one massive magical orb. “EAT THIS! RAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!” I flung my magic orb at them and it struck the two at the same time on their sides, causing a massive magical explosion.
The result was a huge cloud of dust and rubble that caused me to go flying back from the force of the explosion. All I remembered after that was a bit of pain and coughing as I slowly opened my eyes. I heard a voice calling to me, it was faint. “Nightshade, Nightshade, can you hear me?”
I saw a yellow blur standing over me, the figure slowly came into focus and found it was Daring Do looking at me with worry. “Ugh, my head.” I groaned as I sat up on my haunches. I put a hoof to my head as I closed my eyes.
“Oh, thank Celestia your all right.” She expressed. I opened my eyes and saw here begin to narrow hers. “What were you thinking using so much power like that, you could have brought the entire temple down on our heads!”
“Hey, at least those statues are history right?” I looked back to where the statues were and saw that I had managed to destroy them. They lay in pieces and one of the heads was still whole but no light was in the eyes.
I turned back to daring who still looked angry. “That’s beside the point, you could have killed yourself unleashing a power like that so close up.”
“You were………worried about me?” I was confused by this, she was actually concerned for me despite my numerous death threats and attitude.
“Of course I was you idiot, you may not want to admit it, buy you’ve been a big help to me in this adventure, and after everything we’ve been through, I’d like to think of you as my friend.”
I looked to the side for a moment. “I don’t need friends Daring, you can think what you want, but once this adventure is over, I want you gone. I’m just after this thing to get my family back, not to make friends.”
I could hear hurt in Daring’s words when she spoke next. “Nightshade, why won’t you let any pony close, why are you so against having friends?”
I looked back at her. “If I am to make friends, it will be with my own kind, NOT with ponies. But since I’m the only one of my kind, I guess I won’t be making any friends, so just drop the whole friendship thing and lets go.” I got up and started walking through the rubble I created to the door. I heard Daring follow behind slowly. I wasted no time and used my magic to blast the door open. Daring didn’t stop me this time.
We walked through as the dust cleared and into a smaller chamber. In the center of the room on a pedestal sat the idol we had been searching for, the alicorn heart. We finally found it, after so much annoying traps and having to deal with giant magical statues, we finally found the one thing that could bring me back my family and undo the terrible tragedy that befell me so many years ago.
I was about to take a step but then looked to Daring. “Any traps in here, or are we clear?” I asked.
“Just to be safe, let’s fly across so we don’t accidentally trigger any pressure plates.”
We both spread our wings and flew over the floor to the pedestal. I was the first one to it as I landed. I eyed it carefully. “This is it, this little statue has the power to bring back my tribe.” I slowly reached a hoof out to pick it up. Daring’s hoof then stopped me.
“Nightshade.”
I clenched my eyes and did my best to hold back my anger, I spoke through my teeth. “What is it THIS time Daring?”
“Nightshade, I’m sorry, but taking the alicorn heart might trigger another trap.”
I turned to face her. “Then I’ll just teleport us out of here before the trap goes off.”
“You can do that?” She asked with a bit of surprise.
“Yes, are you really that surprised after you saw me blow up those two statues? I can teleport us out of here using my shadow flight spell. It’s one of my abilities with the shadows.”
“Ok, be ready to activate it right away then.” She released my hoof.
I looked back at the idol and reached for it, I picked it up and brought it close to me. As I held it, the entire temple seemed to start shaking
“Nightshade, do it now!” I wasted no time, I activated my shadow flight ability and we both vanished in the shadow I created. I teleported us just outside the temple and saw the whole thing shaking. Daring looked worried at this. “Oh no, don’t tell me the whole place is going to collapse.” To her dismay, that is exactly what happened. The whole temple just crumbled and fell apart. “NOOOOOOOO, all that history, lost forever! Ho, this is so unfair.” The sun was still out at the time we ported out of the temple.
“Pft, whatever.” I reactivated my shadow flight and teleported us to my village.
Once there, I held the idol in front of me and just looked at it. Daring came up to my side and put a hoof on my shoulder. “Well Nightshade, this is it, you’ll finally get your family back.” She said with a smile.
I looked at her from the corner of my eye. I looked back at the alicorn heart and lowered it a bit as I looked down. “Listen Daring, I…….well…..*Sigh*…..thanks.”
Daring’s smile faded. “For what?”
“For helping me get this, I can finally see my parents again and get my clan back.”
I looked back to her to see her smiling. “You’re welcome Nightshade, now go on and make your wish.”
I looked back at the idol in my hooves, I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “I wish for my clan and family back.” I opened my eyes. The idol let out a brilliant flash that blinded me for a moment. I was able to see again after a second and the idol was now glowing white, it started floating up out of my hooves. I simply watched as I kept my eyes on it as it floated up. Daring was watching it the whole time too.
The eyes of the alicorn heart started to glow as well. Soon, faint images started flickering around us, what I saw took my breath away. It was as if time itself was being reversed. The buildings around me and Daring started coming back together, I looked behind me to see my stone castle come back together as well. Within moments, the entire village was back to its former glory.
It didn’t stop there. At first, shadows were seen running around, shadows that looked all too familiar as they became clearer. My family, my clan, was now before my eyes. They were just going about their business as if nothing had ever happened. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.
“Nightshade, is this…..?” Daring couldn’t finish her question.
“Yes, it is, this is my clan, my home, it’s……it’s all back. I can’t believe it.” I single tear ran down my face, I ignored it.
“Nightshade.” An all too familiar voice called out to me from behind. Me and Daring turned around.
What I saw was too much, a few more tears escaped as a smile was threatening to come out. There…….standing before me just in front of the castle……..were my mother and father, looking right at me with smiles. “Mother, Father, is it really you?”
My father spoke. “Yes son, it is.”
My mother spoke. “It’s good to see you again son.”
I took a couple cautious steps forward, not sure if what I was seeing was true. “Mom, dad.” I couldn’t contain myself, tears started pouring from my eyes as I galloped to my parents. “Mom, dad!” I lunged forth to wrap them in a hug………….but I ended up passing right through them and landing on the stone on my stomach. I was very surprised by this. I got up and looked back at them. “What, wh-what’s going on, what happened?”
My parents turned around and faced me. My mother spoke first. “My son, we’re sorry, but we are not actually back, your wish only granted us the ability to speak with you for a time.”
I became confused and worried by this. “What, no, I-I made a wish on that idol, you’re supposed to be alive……I made a wish…..YOUR SUPPOSED TO BE ALIVE!” I screamed out. I ran up to them again to try and hug them, only to pass through them again and landed on my stomach again. I got up and walked up to them.
I waved my hoof through them, they were indeed not really here. My mother spoke. “I’m sorry son, but we are not alive.”
My father spoke. “Son, no amount of magic can undo death, the alicorn heart you got was only able to grant you the time to speak with us as spirits.”
“But……but.” New tears started forming. “NO, it can’t be, you have to be alive.”
My father tried to calm me down. “Nightshade, please try to understand, our time is over, but we are concerned for you.”
My mother continued. “Nightshade, even though we are no longer with you in body, we have always been with you in spirit, all of us have.” My mother gestured around me as I saw my entire clan surround me with smiles on their faces. “We cannot bare to see you so miserable, we want you to be happy.”
My father continued from there. “Please son, you can’t possibly be happy with being alone like this.”
I looked to my parents. “But I’m doing what you wanted, I’m staying alive like you told me to that night I lost you.”
My mother took a few steps towards me and looked me in the eyes. “My boy, we wanted you to live yes, but not like this. Please son, you need friends.”
I narrowed my eyes at her. “Friends, with who, there’s no one left for me to be friends with.”
“What about her?” My mother asked gesturing to Daring Do. “We have seen how she was so willing to help you get this far.”
“But she’s a pony, the kind that stole you all away from me so long ago, how could I possibly be friends with them?” I asked with a bit of anger. “They’re the whole reason I’m alone in this forest.”
“No my son.” My father spoke up. “You are the reason your alone, you refuse to accept friendship when it is offered. You need to leave this place and find some friends.”
“But…..I…..I can’t……I……..” My parents form started to flicker. “NO, you can’t be leaving now!”
My mother spoke. “I’m sorry my son, but it seems our time is up.” I noticed that my clan was starting to fade away again and the village was slowly reverting back to its ruined state.
“NO, you can’t leave me again, PLEASE!” I pleaded desperately.
“No matter what happens son, we will always love you.” My father said.
“Please son, find happiness, we will always be with you, and we will always be watching over you. Goodbye my son.” My parents started fading.
“NO, YOU CAN’T LEAVE ME AGAIN, PLEASE DON’T GO!” Tears were streaming down my face as my parents and clan finally faded out of existence once again. “No……..no……please, not again.” I just sat there and cried in silence. My emotions betrayed me. I had allowed myself to believe in a false hope, only for me to be hurt again.
I heard Daring walk up to me and put a hoof on my shoulder. “Nightshade…..you gonna be okay?” she asked, genuinely concerned.
I didn’t look at her as I responded. “Get away from me.” I spoke low. Thoughts of how my family was taken away had resurfaced after my family faded from my sight again.
Daring removed her hoof from my shoulder. “Nightshade?”
I turned and glared at her with tears in my eyes. “I said get away from me.” I saw her holding the alicorn heart in her hooves.
“Nightshade, I….”
I didn’t give her the chance to finish her sentence. “GET AWAY FROM ME, YOU PONIES TOOK MY FAMILY AWAY FROM ME, THEN YOU COME ALONG WITH A PROMISE TO BRING THEM BACK ONLY FOR IT TO BE AN EMPTY ONE!”
I saw fear in her eyes as she looked at me. “Nightshade, I’m sorry, I didn’t know how it would all work! You have to believe me!”
I was so enraged, I formed a massive shadow circle around me and numerous tentacles formed from it. “GET OUT OF HERE, I NEVER WANT TO SEE YOU AGAIN!”
“But Nightshade….”
“GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!”
Her fear seemed to fade. She just slowly turned away and started flying off. I saw her look at me with a single tear in her eye. I could swear I saw her mouth the words ‘I’m sorry’ as she flew away. I kept my glare as she flew off. Once she broke through the canopy, I let loose with the loudest scream of anger and pain I could.
“RRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!” My cry shook the whole area as I let it out. A few more tears escaped. Once I finished with my shout, I fell to the ground and the shadow and tentacles faded out. I took a minute to breath in and went through my mental exercise to lock up my emotions, I never wanted to feel that again. Once I did, an old familiar figure appeared.
“Nightshade, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry it wasn’t real, but Daring could have been a real friend.”
I narrowed my eyes at my double. “I don’t need friends, I don’t need anyone, I’m just fine on my own. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m exhausted and would like to go to bed now.” My double faded and I used my shadow flight to teleport back to my house. I was once again alone, and I couldn’t care less……at least, that’s what I kept telling myself.
0 Years, 0 days:
Over the next few years, I had noticed that a small town started forming near the edge of the forest I visited once in a while, the one called the Everfree forest. Those ponies had built a village there. I never thought that those ponies would ever come into the forest, but I still wore my cloak whenever I went through the forest to collect plants for my new hobby, potion making.
I was doing my usual round in the forest one day collecting plants. By sheer luck, I happened upon a rare flower called an iron root flower, it was pink with large petals. I could tell just by looking at it just how healthy it was, I knew that, even with all my magic, it would be difficult to pull out, it’s roots were a little mystical on their own to keep the flower planted. I eyed it, contemplating on whether I wanted it or not. Given the rarity of the flower and what I could make with it, I decided to try and uproot it. I focused my magic and my black aura enveloped the flower, I tugged and tugged with all my might to try and uproot it.
Through all my struggles, I failed to notice something coming up to me. I heard a voice that sounded like a mare’s voice and it startled me. “Um, Excuse me sir, do you need any help?”
