Chapter 1

“Hoo.”

Twilight blinked her eyes and shook her head, stifling a yawn before giving Owlowiscious an appreciative smile. Her expression turned into a frown when she returned her attention to the piece of parchment on the desk in front of her. A large splotch of ink had stained the unfinished sentence she had been writing before dozing off. Even as she watched, another drop of ink hit the parchment, falling from the tip of the levitating quill poised above the paper.

Twilight yawned again, then gave a low groan as she lifted her gaze from her desk to look out the window of her bedroom. The sun had set a long while ago, and the moon had already circled around to the west side of the library. The dying candle on her desk provided a paltry amount of light compared to the waxing gibbous above.

Using her magic, she cleaned the tip of her quill, put it away, corked her inkwell, and folded up the piece of parchment before throwing it in the trash bin under the desk. She rose quietly from her seat and stretched her legs before casting out a cone of light from her horn. The light quickly sought out the door leading out into the main part of the library, which clicked open in response to her magic.

The wooden floor creaked softly beneath her hooves, and Twilight was soon looking out upon the reading room from the second story walkway above the stairs. The cone of light shining from her horn swept right, illuminating the corner of the ‘Happy birthday!’ banner that had been strung across the balustrade.

It took her only a moment to undo its fastenings, and she was in the process of folding the ungainly banner into a neat square when she heard somepony approaching the library from outside. When there came a gentle tapping on the front door a moment later, Twilight gave a sigh and put the folded banner down.

“About time.”

She trotted down the stairs quickly, using her magic to switch on the lights in the main reading room and to open the front door. She made it down the stairs and to the entrance just in time to greet a very tired-looking Rarity, carrying a sleeping Spike on her back.

Twilight gave her friend a warm smile, belying her own annoyance. “Hey. You okay? I didn't expect you back this late.”

“Err, no, I ‒” Rarity gave a long yawn and shook her head dully. “There was a... change of plans, it seems.” She looked back at Spike, arching her back in an invitation for Twilight to take the dragon. “But perhaps we should get the birthday boy to bed, hm?”

“Of course. His bed's all ready upstairs. I'll just be a minute.”

Rarity simply nodded, closing the door gently behind herself and watching the alicorn and the dragon levitating behind her disappear up the stairs. Once they were both gone, Rarity looked back at her own shoulder with a grimace, quickly finding the damp spot on her coat where Spike had been drooling in his sleep.

Whimpering a little as she went along, Rarity sifted through the patch of fur with her magic, applying a little heat in order to slowly dry herself. Once finished, her attention turned to her mane and tail, horrendously disheveled after what had been a very, very long day. She pulled at her hair carefully for a few moments, doing the best she could without a brush. Her hooves, alas, would have to wait until she was home and could draw a long, warm bath.

It wasn't long before Rarity heard movement from upstairs and Twilight returned, looking quite tired herself. “Thanks again for looking after Spike, Rarity. I'm sure he's had a wonderful night thanks to you.” Twilight reached the bottom of the stairs, and she rubbed at her neck uncertainly. “But, uh, what happened? Spike's bedtime was four hours ago. The Crusaders can't possibly have lasted this long.”

“Ah.” Rarity nodded her understanding. Weary of standing, she wandered into the main reading room to find a chair. Twilight followed after. “I too was under the impression that my sister and her friends would be joining us. Either they and Applejack got lost on their way to Canterlot, or Sweetie Belle is a fibbing little headache of a filly.”

Twilight blinked in surprise as they both sat down at a reading table. “You mean they never showed up?”

“I mean it was all a setup! I have spent an entire night in Canterlot being courted by a dragon half my size!” Rarity gave a melodramatic groan and let her head drop onto the table. “I don't know if I'm more embarrassed or angry,” she continued, her voice muffled by the table.

Twilight didn't respond at first, taking her time in processing the surprising revelation. After a few moments, however, she couldn't help but giggle. “You mean he got a date with you? For his birthday? That's kinda cute.”

Rarity turned her head slightly to glare at Twilight with narrowed eyes. “You knew about this!”

Twilight held up her hooves placatingly, trying ‒ and failing ‒ to suppress a smile. “No, no! Believe me, I'm gonna give him a stern talking to tomorrow for lying to us both. And roping the Crusaders into his plan.” Twilight lowered her hooves, giving up on holding back her smile. “But come on. As far as those four's schemes can go, you gotta admit that this was far from the worst thing that could have happened.”

Rarity lifted her head from the table so that she could give Twilight a look of the gravest severity. “Oh, you have no idea.”

“...And I swear, just as we passed across the halfway point between Canterlot and Ponyville, he throws up in the carriage! I was fortunate in avoiding it all, but he did irreparable damage to both the upholstery and the woodwork! The carriage drivers left me out there in the middle of nowhere, stuck with Spike who was barely conscious and with at least five miles of pitch-black mountain trails between myself and the barest hint of civilization!”

Spike sat with his back against the closed bedroom door, his claws digging into the sides of his skull. As Rarity's much too vivid recollection of the disastrous date continued, Spike's urge to bang his head against the door became almost unbearable.

A day at Canterlot's amusement park, dinner at the fanciest restaurant his savings could afford, an evening at the Canterlot cinema, and a carriage ride home overlooking a starlit Ponyville from atop the mountain. Somehow, he had ruined every single one of them, and from what he could hear, no one agreed with him more than Rarity. Even Twilight's cautious optimism had quickly been replaced by a stunned silence at what Rarity had been forced to suffer through.

Rarity was almost done with her recollection now, Spike realized with no small amount of dread. He didn't know if he could bear hearing what Twilight had to say about his behavior. Rarity would go back home any minute now, and Twilight would be up the stairs. She could either find him sitting by the door crying, or he could be in bed pretending to sleep, waiting for tomorrow's lecture. Neither of the prospects seemed appealing.

Through his tears, his eyes found the nearest window, the one he knew led straight out onto one of the library tree's branches. He wiped his eyes and stood, taking a moment to confirm that Rarity was still talking before moving. Jumping and scrambling up the wall, he just barely managed to reach the windowsill. With a deft swipe of his claws, he unlatched the window and clambered out into the night.

He closed the window after him as well as he could, then climbed down the thick branches of the library, using a nearby flowerbed to soften his fall when he dropped down onto the ground. He took a quick peek inside the library to make sure neither Twilight nor Rarity had seen him, and then ran off through the darkened streets of Ponyville.

Twilight could fly, teleport at will, and shoot search beams from her head, and any minute now, she would be finding Spike's bed empty. With that in mind, the little dragon kept running as fast as he could, with no other destination in mind than as far away from the library as possible. She would undoubtedly find him sooner or later, he knew, but hopefully she would be more worried than angry at that point.

The soft pitter patter of his feet against the cobblestone was the only sound that accompanied him for the first several minutes of his flight through Ponyville. It would still be several hours until dawn, and aside from the library far behind him, not a single light shone throughout the entire town.

Soon, the cobblestone streets gave way to dirt roads, and the almost oppressive silence was replaced by the rhythmic chirping of crickets and occasional hoot of nearby owls. When Spike finally stopped to catch his breath, he found himself standing outside the entrance to the Everfree Forest, not far from Fluttershy's cottage.

Fluttershy would rat him out as soon as Twilight came looking, Spike had little doubt. Even if she didn't, Angel definitely would. Zecora, on the other hand, would probably be able to provide both refuge and some sort of counsel. Braving the Everfree Forest in the dead of night, however, was risky business.

When Spike looked back over his shoulder at Ponyville, he discovered that the lights on the upper floor of the library had all been turned on. The dragon threw a few furtive glances around his surroundings, finding nothing but open fields between himself and Ponyville. A distinct magenta glow had appeared atop the balcony of the library, sharpening into a bright cone that swept left and right across town. When the source of light lifted high into the air, Spike saw no other option. With his mind made up, he headed into the Everfree Forest.

As twisted black trees and dense foliage slowly closed in all around the dragon, the sounds of crickets and owls faded in favor of more alien and unnerving noises. He walked slowly at first, watching his steps in the encroaching darkness, but he never lingered. Menacing clicking sounds, wet squelches, and frightening growls from just beyond the shadows surrounded him on all sides. Wherever he looked, he swore he could see glowing eyes following him through the woods.

It wasn't too long before the atmosphere got to him, and he quickened his pace. He jumped at the sound of something heavy thumping down onto the pathway behind him, and when the sound was followed by a series of rapid steps toward him, Spike broke into a run. The branches above reached down toward him as he ran, and he was forced to duck and weave while sprinting through the darkness.

When he passed a huge patch of poison joke, he knew he'd taken a wrong turn, but he had little time to consider where to go before an exposed root snagged his foot. Suddenly, he was tumbling down a steep incline through thorny undergrowth and knotted roots. A green, fetid pool broke his fall, and he scrambled on to dry land before anything within the waters could reach him.

The tumble down the hill had robbed Spike of his adrenaline, and the dip in the chilly pond had sapped his strength. It was as if his whole body suddenly remembered just how long his birthday had been, and that he should have been in bed more than four hours ago. It was all he could do to crawl along the ground away from the pool, and in the end, that too proved too exhausting. He slumped onto his side, trying to figure out where he had fallen and where the path was, but failing miserably. The forest seemed equally dense all around him, and no part of it looked the least bit disturbed.

Spike rolled onto his back and groaned. “Worst. Birthday. Ever.”

“Hello?”

Spike flinched at the unexpected voice. It wasn't anyone he recognized, but it sounded like a mare, somewhere deeper inside the forest. He rolled onto his stomach again in order to peer ahead into the darkness, and found a bright pink light shining through the dense foliage just in front of him.

Grunting with exertion, Spike picked himself off the ground and stumbled forwards. He pushed himself past a cluster of bushes and suddenly found himself standing within a sizeable clearing. The thick canopy above receded, lighting up the area with moonlight, and the ground was covered in lush green grass.

Sitting in the center of the clearing, surrounded by a small swarm of fireflies, sat a unicorn mare. Her coat was a light pink, almost luminous in the bright moonlight, while her lengthy mane and tail were of darker purple and magenta hues. Her cutie mark was a shiny red heart flanked by two smaller white hearts, and her horn was alight with the pink glow that had led Spike to the clearing in the first place.

The mare's eyes found Spike as soon as he entered the clearing, and she gave him a reassuring smile. “No need to be afraid. You're safe here.”

“Uh, thanks,” Spike murmured, trudging toward the mare uncertainly. “Who are you?”

“Heartsong.” There certainly was a certain melodiousness to the mare's voice, and there seemed to be a sparkle in her eyes that put Spike at ease despite the Everfree looming all around him. “Who are you?”

Spike hesitated only for a moment. “Spike.” The fireflies surrounding Heartsong dispersed as he approached. “Sorry.”

The mare giggled lightly. “You can sit down if you want.”

Spike sat.

“So, Spike, what's a tiny dragon like you doing in the Everfree Forest? Why are you here?”

Spike gulped at the mere thought of his date with Rarity. He scratched at the back of his head and looked at his feet. “Well...”

“Woes of the heart.” Spike flinched again as the mare suddenly pushed a hoof gently against his chest. He looked up at Heartsong, who gave him a small smile at his confusion. “It's a specialty of mine, dear.” Her hoof circled his heart once before pulling back, leaving a warm, fuzzy feeling in his chest.

“Your... specialty?”

“I heal heartaches.” Heartsong explained. “There are those who have looked everywhere, but simply can't find their special somepony. There are those who have loved and lost. There are those who care for another pony with all their heart, only to find their love... unrequited. I travel the land, and lend them my guidance. Help them... sometimes with a spell or two.”

“Huh. You... cast love spells?”

Heartsong chuckled. “Tell me what troubles you. And I'll tell you what you need.”

Spike gulped again, fidgeting with his fingers for a while, not quite knowing where ‒ or whether he should ‒ begin.

Heartsong eased herself down onto her belly, resting her chin on her hooves. “There's a girl,” she ventured.

“Yeah...”

“Tell me about her.”

“She's... beautiful,” Spike sighed. “She has a coat white as the purest snow, and her mane is the prettiest thing I ever saw. She's the kindest, most generous pony you'll ever meet. She's smart and hardworking and she's... she's just perfect.”

“Buuut?”

“I love her. I fell in love with her the first time I saw her. But I don't know if it's... uh, re-... requited?” Heartsong nodded her understanding. “I mean, I told her... about how I feel... once,” Spike continued, and the mare adopted a surprised expression.

“Oh?”

“But she never let me finish... Just put a hoof to my lips and smiled. W-what does that mean?” Spike demanded somewhat hotly, frustrated by the memory. “Was she agreeing with me? Or rejecting me?”

“That is a pickle,” Heartsong agreed, looking thoughtful. “But that's not everything, is it?”

Spike shook his head, flushing with embarrassment as he recalled the disastrous date. “Today was my birthday. I'd told... her and my friend that I wanted to go celebrate it in Canterlot with three other friends, and I convinced her to kinda look after us while we were off celebrating. She's... a bit older than me, you see.”

“Aha.” Heartsong nodded again.

“Only, I'd arranged for my three other friends to never show up, so it was just the two of us.”

“Sneaky.”

“I had the whole day planned out. First, we went to the amusement park. You've been to that one, right? It's fun, but it's not over the top in any way. Just as tasteful and elegant as the rest of the city. Perfect for the two of us, and I'm pretty sure she was actually enjoying herself. When she wasn't worrying about where the rest of the guests had gone.”

Spike buried his face in his hands. “But I messed up. I ate way too many snacks while we were there. I had a horrible stomachache by the time we left. After the amusement park, we went to this fancy restaurant, but none of us enjoyed that. I couldn't eat a thing, and I must have embarrassed her in front of all the other ponies there. We were supposed to have gone to the movies after that, but by then I was just too sick. I threw up in the carriage on the way home, so she ended up having to walk me halfway down the mountain to Ponyville.

“She hates me now,” Spike despaired. “I heard her talking to my friend after we got home. ‘The worst night of her life’, she called it. I can never look her in the eyes again.” He wiped away the tears that had begun to well up in his eyes and looked up at Heartsong. “What do I do?”

“Hmm...” The unicorn's eyes turned skyward for a few moments as she thought the matter over, grimacing a bit for reasons Spike couldn't quite discern. “So your special somepony is ‒ what can I say ‒ a mare. Not exactly what you'd call a filly, right?” Spike nodded. “That's a pickle of a pickle,” Heartsong murmured.

“I hate to say this,” she continued, “But you're a kid. And she's a mare. A pretty mature mare, from what you've been telling me. No doubt she sees your love as nothing more than some kind of childish infatuation. Convincing her otherwise ‒” Heartsong gave him a reluctant shrug “‒ I just don't think it can be done.”

Spike's eyes widened. “What? But ‒”

“Not to say that it's hopeless,” She interjected quickly, holding up a hoof to silence him. “But there's no grand gesture or sneaky tricks you can pull off in these kinds of situations. There's nothing to it but waiting.”

Spike frowned. “Waiting? Why?”

“Adults can't be in love with children. It's weird,” Heartsong whispered to him, as if somepony might be listening in on their conversation. “You might not mind so much, but I doubt your lady friend is completely indifferent to public opinion, hm?” Spike nodded sullenly. “Well, there you have it. You'll have to grow up to get her.” Heartsong tapped him on the chest again, almost knocking him over. “And that is why she didn't let you finish when you confessed your feelings to her.”

Spike's eyes widened with the realization. “Oooh.”

“It's what I do,” Heartsong declared proudly, rising up into a seated position again while holding a hoof to her chest.

“So she loves me?”

“I can't make any guarantees, but there's a good chance she does. However...” Her hoof found Spike's chin, and tilted it up so that their eyes were locked. “Your heart is still in great peril. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you dragon guys age slower than ponies do. You've got years and years of waiting to do, every moment fraught with heartache. Unless you wanna risk pushing her away, you're gonna have to leave her alone until she's ready to reciprocate your feelings.”

“Wha-... But how do I leave her alone?” Spike asked the unicorn. “I really love her! What if she finds someone else while I'm waiting?”

Heartsong shook her head. “There's nothing you can do to sway another pony's heart, I'm afraid. You've got a tough situation on your hooves. You're gonna have to learn to let her go. You might just have to.”

“I won't.” Spike grasped the outstretched hoof at his chin with both his hands and lowered it, giving the mare the most determined look he could muster. “I can't let her go.”

For a moment, Heartsong simply stared at the dragon, eyes wide with surprise at his sudden conviction. Then she smiled, gently pulling her hoof free of his grasp. “She's a lucky one, I'll give her that.” She seemed lost in thought for another moment, and her warm smile slowly faded from her lips. “There is a spell,” she revealed reluctantly, giving the dragon an uncertain look. “I'm not sure you'd like it, and I've never even considered using it on a kid your age.”

“What is it?” Spike leaned forward eagerly, his gaze now drawn to the mare's horn.

“As I said, there's nothing to be done about your true love's heart, that's up to her.” Heartsong sighed. “But you can save your own heart from... breaking.”

It wasn't exactly the solution he had been hoping for, but Spike nodded all the same.

Heartsong chewed her lip for a moment before continuing. “I know a spell... that can draw out the heart of someone. Completely harmless procedure, I guarantee you. It'll take away all of your heartache. You'll no longer be obsessed with your mare, and you'll have no problem leaving her alone for as long as she needs.”

Spike frowned, and his hand moved instinctively to his chest. “Take my heart..?”

“I'll put it in a box,” Heartsong assured him quickly. “And give it back to you. Anytime you want your heart back, all you'll need to do is open that box. Even if you're miles and miles away, once that box pops open, your heart is back, just like that. Once you're old enough, you just open that box, and the love of your life should be all yours. Until then, no heartache, no awkwardness, and if the worst should come to pass and she finds someone else, you won't feel a thing.”

Spike's gaze dropped to ground as he considered the offer. “Isn't there some kind of... I don't know, drawback? I mean, don't I need my heart?”

“Life will seem a lot more dull,” Heartsong admitted. “You won't get sad or angry, but you won't feel as happy as you usually might. It's why I've never done it to a kid. I mean, sacrificing the happiness of your childhood so you can be with the one you love? It takes a lotta guts.

“But there's a sincerity to your love...” Heartsong observed, rubbing her chin thoughtfully. “A passion that just doesn't belong in a child's heart. It can't be easy. I can't tell you for sure if the payoff is gonna be worth the price, but tell you what: If you ever regret it, all you have to do is open that box, and everything goes back to normal.”

Spike nodded thoughtfully.

“And since it's your birthday, I'll even do it for free,” she chuckled, mussing the spines on his head.

The dragon gave a little smile. After a while of thinking, he finally nodded his head. “Alright. No harm in trying it out, right?”

“Doesn't hurt a bit,” Heartsong assured him, standing up. “Even so, you're a brave one.” She motioned for Spike to stand and cleared her throat. “Now, this is a really hard spell. Y'see, I can't draw out your heart as such myself. Only you can give it to someone you really care about.” Heartsong's horn erupted with a bright pink light, and glittering sparkles weaved through the air to encircle Spike. “Close your eyes.”

Spike felt a pleasant warmth spread throughout his body as the magic surrounded him, making him feel lightheaded and putting a smile on his lips. His eyelids grew heavy, and he did as Heartsong told him.

“Good,” Heartsong purred. “Now imagine her. Imagine she's standing here, instead of me.”

“Mhmm...”

“Can you hear her voice?” Rarity asked him.

Spike nodded wordlessly.

“Can you feel her?”

Spike reached out a hand and found her cheek, pressing gently against him.

“Open your eyes.”

He'd opened them before she'd even finished speaking, and he now found Rarity standing right in front of him. Her half-lidded gaze made him weak at the knees, and her hot breath washed over him like the sweetest perfume, slipping out between half-parted lips that beckoned him closer.

Their lips had met before Spike even realized he had leaned forwards, and immediately the warmth that had been caressing his scales all over plunged through his insides, silken fingers of heat flowing down his throat, filling his lungs, and spilling out into his veins. When they finally reached his heart, it felt as though the ground fell away beneath his feet, and everything beyond Rarity blurred away into darkness. Simultaneously, the light streaming from the unicorn's horn, sometimes light blue, other times pink, grew to a blinding crescendo, framing Rarity's face in a halo of purest light.

Something tugged at him uncomfortably somewhere deep within his chest, but at the same time, Rarity moved forwards, almost engulfing Spike's mouth within her own and making him forget everything outside the kiss.

An empty coldness started spreading from within his chest, but between Rarity's advances and the amazing warmth now traveling back up his throat, it was quickly forgotten. Rarity's eyes were glowing as brightly as her horn now, and both came alive with flickers of green fire sparking out in all directions. The warmth finally poured out of his mouth, and Rarity pulled back, releasing Spike from the intensity of the kiss. Her eyes had gone fully green by now, as had her horn, and held between her fangs was a bright, flaming heart.

His vision darkened just as those fires dwindled, and the last thing he saw before toppling over was a pair of black lips closing over a cold, green lump of crystal.

Chapter 2

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With a reluctant whimper, followed by a pair of decisive yips, Winona lifted her snout from the ground and sat, staring straight into the entrance to the Everfree Forest.

Applejack yawned loudly, giving the dog a scratch behind the ears before turning back to Twilight and Rarity. “Yup. That's probably where you'll find him. You'd think he'd know better than to head into the Everfree Forest in the middle of the night.” She stared into the forest for a few moments before she nodded back at Winona, who still hadn't moved a muscle. “It's as far as I can take Winona, though. Can't stand that forest anymore'n us.”

“You're a lifesaver, AJ,” Twilight thanked her, giving her a quick hug. “Take Winona home and get some sleep.”

“Ya'll don't need an extra pair of eyes?”

Twilight's eyes found the forest entrance, as if she could find the answer there. She wasn't a stranger to the unease roused by those foreboding woods, but tonight, it felt different. Worse.

“Twi?”

The alicorn blinked and her gaze shifted back to Applejack. She smiled and shook her head. “I'm sure we'll find him soon. Thanks again.”

“You're welcome, sugarcube.” Twilight wasn’t blind to her raised eyebrow, but for whatever reason, Applejack decided to let it go. She stepped aside and tipped her hat at Twilight as she headed off into the forest. “Good luck.”

Rarity gave Applejack a quick hug and a few words of thanks of her own before hurrying after Twilight, who had already entered the forest. The overhanging branches quickly filtered out the light of the predawn sky above, and soon the only source of illumination was Twilight's horn up ahead. Rarity lit up her own horn, but even in the short time it took her to cast a simple spell of illumination, Twilight had already outdistanced her by another ten feet.

“Twilight?”

Instead of responding, the alicorn broke into a gallop, spreading her wings and beating them furiously to help speed her along. Rarity tried following suit, but between her already heavy exhaustion and the uncertain footing, she was quickly losing ground.

“Spiiiike!” Twilight called out desperately, throwing her head around in search of any sign of the dragon. Seeing the tears on her face, Rarity joined in as well, calling out to Spike at the top of her lungs.

As they continued to delve deeper into the cursed forest, Rarity felt the fear begin to gnaw at her as well. He had been gone for so long. Too long. She and Twilight had already been searching for two hours, ringing doorbells and combing through the streets and fields of Ponyville. They had assumed ‒ or hoped ‒ that Spike had enough sense to avoid this place. Even in daytime, the Everfree Forest was no place for a young dragon like Spike. Especially not in state she suspected he was in.

Rarity grimaced as she continued her increasingly reckless pursuit of Twilight. There could be little doubt as to why he had run off. For the hundredth time that night, she cursed herself for having spoken so freely of their night. He had been in the room right above her! What could she possibly have been thinking?

A fuzzy, lavender wall broke her chain of thought, and she and Twilight went tumbling across the dirt path, both crying out in alarm. They went down in a heap off the side of the road, and Rarity found her legs submerged in a sludge that she in the darkness of the Everfree could only hope was mud. Twilight was the first to recover, and quickly disentangled herself from the downed unicorn.

“Sorry, Rarity.” She nodded toward the split in the path she had stopped by before Rarity had crashed into her. “I'm gonna check by Zecora's real quick. You continue down here and look, alright? I'll catch up.”

“Right...” Rarity groaned, slipping on the mud as she tried to stand. Twilight used her magic to lift her off the ground and deposit her on the pathway, brushing off the worst of the dirt and grime stuck to her coat in the process. They both exchanged a nod before Twilight vanished in a burst of light.

Rarity gave a heavy sigh, then turned back the direction she had been going before, continuing down the pathway at a swift canter. Her horn lit up again, and a cone of light shot out ahead of her, helping to light her path and keep an eye on any tracks or signs left by Spike.

Something rustled suddenly in the branches just above her, and in the split second she lifted her gaze, a gnarled root snared her hoof, sending her tumbling over forwards. With a dazed groan, Rarity lifted her head up from the ground and spat out a mouthful of dirt, then shrieked with frustration.

“Evil, evil forest!”

She was debating whether or not just to collapse on the ground then and there, when she spotted something in the bushes ahead of her. With some difficulty, she lit up her horn once again, focusing the light ahead of her. What had caught her eye turned out to be the lighter shade of wood exposed by a series of broken branches, forming an almost unnoticeable path off the main road.

She stood up and approached the bushes, pushing them aside to reveal a steep incline full of recently disturbed thorny undergrowth. Her eyes lit up, and she turned back toward where she'd come from.

“Twilight! I think I found him!”

Only a few seconds passed before the alicorn popped into existence beside her. “Where!?”

Rarity motioned down the incline with a hoof, and Twilight's horn lit up almost immediately. After a few moments, the thorned branches ahead of them rustled to life, curling back and forming a straight path toward the bottom of the incline. Twilight led the way down, and Rarity followed after, both of them picking their way carefully down the treacherous terrain.

“All these rocks and thorns,” Twilight muttered worriedly. The light shining from her horn reached down the length of the pathway, illuminating a sizeable pond below. Its water was an unhealthy, almost fluorescent shade of green, and an unpleasant, sulfurous odor rose from its surface.

Panic gripped Rarity when she realized that the path Spike had carved through the underbrush led straight into the water. It was evident she wasn't the only one who noticed it: Twilight's searchlight brightened and widened suddenly, before flicking about the pond erratically. A wet trail soon caught the light, leading off through the grass and mud to the left.

“Oh thank goodness,” Rarity breathed out in relief. The two ponies reached the pond and circled around it, carefully tracking the imprints Spike had left in the soggy ground, first by his whole body, then by his feet. Twilight's magic parted a cluster of bushes ahead of them, and suddenly the light of the rising sun was shining brightly in their eyes.

“Spike!” Twilight cried out, and she was gone in an instant.

Rarity blinked her eyes against the sunlight, and discovered that they had stepped into a clearing, quite sizeable by Everfree standards. In its center sat Twilight, her wings wrapped protectively around the dragon she cradled in her lap.

The whole forest seemed to have gone quiet around them, lending an ominous tranquility to their surroundings. Still squinting against the bright sunlight, Rarity stepped closer. Spike's eyes were closed, and he hadn't responded at all to being picked up by Twilight, so it was with no small amount of trepidation that Rarity approached the pair. The alicorn hugged the dragon close to her chest, shaking all over, but when she lifted her head, Rarity found her smiling through her tears.

“He's breathing,” she managed, struggling to speak. “He-he's okay...”

Rarity sat down in front of Twilight, letting out a breath she didn't know she had been holding. Only now did she notice how much she had been shaking herself, and she pulled Twilight into a tight embrace, with the dragon resting between them.

Twilight gave a shaky yawn. “Let's... go home.”

Rarity only faintly registered the sound of Twilight's horn firing up. Spike's breathing and her own furiously beating heart was all she really seemed to hear. Their surroundings faded into brilliant light for half a second, before they were replaced with the interior of Twilight's bedroom.

Both ponies rose to their hooves slowly, smiling fondly down at the dragon. He murmured faintly in his sleep, stirring slightly as if he were about to wake up. Before long, Rarity's smile faltered, and she looked up at Twilight.

“I should go... The poor dear needs his rest more than anything else right now. And a bath.”

“Don't we all?” Twilight chuckled, yawning again. “Thanks, Rarity. I owe you big time for everything you've done tonight.”

“Nonsense” ‒ Rarity waved a hoof in dismissal and turned to leave ‒ “What are friends for?”

“I'll be sure to let him know just how worried you were,” Twilight called out after her as she reached the door. “Knowing just how much you really care about him is sure to cheer him up.”

Rarity frowned a bit at the door before turning her head back to smile at Twilight. She wasn't quite sure what to answer, so she simply nodded her head before leaving the bedroom.

Twilight woke up in the middle of the afternoon, feeling even more tired than she had going to bed. With a great yawn, she snuggled further under her covers, still half asleep. It wouldn’t have taken her long to drift back to sleep, but she was afforded only a few seconds of peace. Her ears twitched at somepony knocking at the front door of the library, and she realized what had woken her up in the first place.

With a groan and another yawn, she rolled out of bed, using her magic to disentangle her wings from her duvet. Her gaze moved to Spike's bed as she shuffled towards the door, but she found it empty. She had little time to worry, though, before she heard the main door opening downstairs and Applejack's familiar drawl.

“Oh hiya there, Spike! Ah see ya made it back just fine!”

Twilight stepped outside her bedroom just in time to see Spike and Applejack standing in the doorway, the dragon nodding mutely at the pony. Applejack's gaze met Twilight's for a second before she returned her attention to Spike.

“Ya look just plum tuckered out, though!” She lowered her head so that she was at eye level with Spike. “You feelin' alright?”

Spike nodded again. “Uh-huh...” His left hand, resting on the doorknob, slipped down lazily, leaving his arm dangling at his side almost lifelessly. He turned back toward the back of the library just as Twilight arrived at the door, allowing her a quick glimpse of his drooping eyelids before he left.

“He looks like a zombie,” Applejack remarked quietly, so that Spike wouldn't hear.

Twilight nodded her agreement, giving the dragon a worried look. He was practically dragging himself across the floor, toward the stack of books he had likely been working on shelving before Applejack’s arrival had interrupted him.

“So what was he doin' in the Everfree Forest?”

“I'm still not sure. Rarity and I found him passed out in a clearing pretty deep inside. I took him straight home, gave him a bath, and put him to bed. He could barely utter a coherent sentence the whole time.” Twilight yawned again. “And I just got up. Haven't had a chance to speak with him, actually.”

“Ah see. Didn't mean tah wake you up, Twi, Ah just figured Ah'd make sure he was alright.”

Twilight chuckled. “Fair’s fair. I woke you up at four in the morning. Thanks for checking in.”

Applejack smiled as she stepped away from the door and toward the cart of apples parked outside the library. She nodded toward Spike, standing with his back to the two ponies. “Ah'll let ya get to it! See ya around!”

Twilight waved the earth pony goodbye, chuckling quietly to herself when she saw a miserable-looking Applebloom sitting in the back of the cart. She remembered Applejack being less than pleased when she and Rarity had told her about the Crusaders' little deception yesterday. She certainly wouldn't envy Sweetie Belle once Rarity got her hooves on the little filly.

She closed the door and turned back to Spike, who was balancing precariously atop a ladder while struggling with a stack of almost a dozen books. Twilight moved toward the dragon with a heavy sigh and lit up her horn, relieving him of his burden and sorting the books herself.

“You know the rule, Spike. Ten books per trip up the ladder at most, and then minus one per shelf off the floor. If not for your sake, then at least for the books'.”

Spike regarded her with his half-lidded eyes, blinking a few times before opening them up a little wider. “Sorry,” he murmured. His attention turned to the ladder, and he climbed down to get the next stack of books.

Twilight regarded her assistant quietly as he wordlessly walked past her to the nearest reading table, picked up a stack of exactly six books, and returned to the ladder, scaling it to the top shelf.

“I know what you're doing,” Twilight told him, taking a few steps toward the ladder.

“What?” Spike finished the shelving, and he returned to the table to retrieve another seven books. Twilight stepped to the side to allow Spike to reposition the ladder.

“No matter how many chores you do today, we're gonna have to talk about last night sooner or later.”

Spike hefted the stack of books onto his right arm with a grunt of effort, using his left to shelve them. “Okay.”

Twilight opened her mouth to start lecturing him, but then gave a concerned pout. “Are you... feeling okay? You seem pretty... distant.”

“I'm fine.”

Twilight frowned. Lighting up her horn, she yanked the dragon off the ladder as he put away the last book. She held him up in front of herself and touched her hoof against his forehead. “You feel a little cold. Maybe you picked something up in the Everfree Forest.”

The two vanished in a blink of light and reappeared in the bathroom. In a few short seconds, she summoned a stool and placed it in front of her, floated Spike onto it, pulled out a thermometer from the cabinet, and popped it into his mouth.

“You fell into that green, awful-smelling pool, didn't you?” Twilight said, phrasing it more as a statement than an actual question. A clipboard and a quill popped into existence in front of her, ready for her notes. Spike nodded dully, bouncing the thermometer up and down idly with his lower lip. “Alright. So, apathy, mental fatigue, and perhaps physical fatigue. Feelings of dizzyness?”

Spike shook his head.

“Nausea? Rashes? Any kind of pains?”

Another shake of the head.

“Elevated heartbeat, coughing, sneezing, anything at all?”

“There's nothing wrong with me, Twilight,” Spike mumbled through the thermometer, moving to get off the chair before being stopped by Twilight.

“That's the first time you've gone beyond two syllables today.” Twilight took a few moments to scribble down her notes so far, then pulled the thermometer out of Spike's mouth. “Look at this. Two degrees below your usual temperature. I'll need a sample.”

“You do know you don't have a medical license, right?” Spike remarked when Twilight pulled out a syringe from the cabinet. His tone was as flat as ever, though, and he didn't seem at all worried, making no move to escape.

“That may be ‒ hold out your arm ‒” Twilight encased the syringe within a pressurized force field and heated it up immensely. Spike stretched out his right arm reluctantly, and Twilight summoned an intense flame that blowtorched the pit of his elbow for a few seconds before dissipating. “‒ But I'm one of the few ponies in the world who has ever studied a blood sample from a dragon, let alone yours. Besides, we both know nopony around here knows the first thing about your physiology.”

“Zecora does.”

“I'm pretty sure Zecora doesn't have a medical license either,” Twilight rebuffed him. “And I doubt she has much experience with a microscope.”

She dispelled the makeshift magical autoclave that had been holding the syringe, and, after checking it carefully, brought its tip against the crook of the dragon's elbow.

“Ow,” Spike murmured, staring blankly at the syringe filling with his blood.

It was quickly replaced by a wad of cotton, and Twilight turned away from the dragon, smiling triumphantly at the sample in her grip. “Now, refrain from stretching out your arm, Spike ‒”

“I know.”

“‒ And get some rest. It's the best advice I can give you until I find out what's wrong. Spit.”

A test tube popped into existence in front of Spike, who dutifully complied.

“There's nothing wrong,” he sighed again, wiping his mouth and getting off the stool.

“Denial.” The quill next to Twilight's head made a few scribbles on the clipboard, just before the alicorn and all her equipment vanished in a flash.

Spike sat down at the foot of the stairs in the main reading room, taking a short break in order to appreciate his work. He had put away every single book in the entire building, he'd dusted every shelf, and he'd swept the floor. He gave a little smile. He usually did that after finishing his chores. Kinda strange in retrospect.

Using the broom still clutched in his hands, Spike hoisted himself up to his feet and looked around the room blankly. There was something he was forgetting. He was almost sure of it.

He made a few popping sounds as he dragged the broom around the room and went around the tables, looking underneath each of them. The popping sounds grew louder as his gaze swept across the shelves all around him, and before long, he remembered. “Bo-... bo-... Box. Box.”

Some kind of box. An important box.

A very important box.

Maybe not all that important, but definitely something he should be looking for. Maybe.

The door to the cellar swung open suddenly, and Twilight stepped into the library. She blinked her eyes in the sunlight and looked around the room with some confusion before her gaze settled on Spike.

“I told you to get some sleep.”

Spike shrugged. “Couldn't.”

Twilight rubbed at her temple with her forehoof and sighed. “Okay. Well, thanks for cleaning up the library.”

“Did you find anything?”

Twilight gave an even more exasperated sigh. “No, I did not.”

Spike nodded his head dully. “Hm.”

Twilight groaned. “What's with the attitude!?”

“Whuh?”

“That! The monosyllabic replies! The monotonous voice! That spaced-out look in your eyes! The way you drag yourself along the floor like a zombie! You should be making some snarky comment about me wasting two and a half hours studying some stupid blood sample, but all you can do is grunt!”

Spike shrugged.

“The only reaction I've seen from you today was when I pointed a syringe at you, but even then you didn't even flinch! If you're not tired and you're not sick, then what's up?”

Spike hesitated for a moment, then shrugged a third time. “Have you... seen my box?”

Twilight stared at him incredulously for a long moment before bringing a hoof to her forehead and groaning. “No..? Urgh, what box? What does this have to do with anything?”

“I... need it.”

“For what?” Twilight griped, trying and failing to make any sense of what her assistant was saying.

Spike shrugged again.

“No more shrugging! For the love of..!” Twilight stomped her hoof against the floor and took a deep breath to calm herself. “What... is this box? When and where did you get it?”

Spike seemed to space out again. It was as if he either hadn't heard her, or had fallen into some sort of trance. Even so, he was looking right at her with that blank expression.

“Spike. I said when and where did you... Are you just... not shrugging?”

Spike nodded, and Twilight gave him an acidic glare. The normal Spike would have flinched away from such a scowl. The dragon in front of her, however, simply blinked his eyes slowly.

“Did you get it... yesterday?” Twilight tried, succeeding in getting a hesitant nod out of Spike. “Alright. That's a start. None of your birthday presents were boxes. Did you get it in Canterlot?”

Spike stared blankly ahead for a moment. “I... can't remember.”

“You didn't come home with one. Rarity didn't mention anything like that... and she was... very thorough.” Twilight raised an eyebrow at Spike. “Did you find it in the Everfree Forest?”

Spike scratched his head. “I dunno.”

Twilight's eyes narrowed, and she approached Spike. “Something happened in the Everfree Forest, Spike. What? You overheard Rarity and me talking about you, and you got upset. And you ran off. Why would you go into the Everfree Forest?”

Spike let the broom in his hand drop to the floor with a clatter, and he sat down on the floor in front of her and shrugged. “I was... just... running. I ended up outside the forest. You... searching the library. Needed to hide, so I went in. I got... scared, and I started running. And then... I... uh... I don't ‒”

“You fell,” Twilight helped him. “Down a hill and into a nasty pond. Remember the smell of rotten eggs? The color green?” Spike nodded dully. “You crawled out and walked into a clearing. It would have been lighter suddenly. Maybe you saw the moon?” Twilight put a hoof on his shoulder. “What happened in the clearing?”

“I can't... I met a... I don't know.” Spike shook his head, giving the tiniest hint of a frown.

He backed away slightly, and Twilight realized she had been leaning forwards, standing just inches from Spike. She drew back with a sigh, figuring his recollection had hit a dead end. “We're going to Zecora's.”

“But you said ‒”

“Shush.”

“...And the last thing he remembers is walking into some clearing deeper inside the forest,” Twilight finished, wrinkling her nose as Zecora uncorked a particularly noxious vial. “I think he met… something in there.”

The zebra emptied the vial's contents into the cauldron that stood in the center of her small hut. She was apparently having a very busy day, judging by the sheer volume of the potion she was mixing. Dozens of flasks and containers had been brought in from outside, taking up every single square inch of table space in the house and littering the floor. Some containers had even been strung up in the ceiling, forcing Twilight to duck her head and tuck in her wings.

The windows had all been shuttered, and while Zecora had welcomed them warmly, she had urged them to close the door quickly behind them. Twilight's entire explanation of Spike's situation had taken place in almost complete darkness while Zecora worked, but now a faint red glow emerged from her cauldron, painting the zebra's visage a sinister shade.

All around them, strange wooden masks faded into view, staring down upon the hut's three occupants. Some had lips carved in bizarre smiles, while most others bore much grimmer expressions.

Counterpointing both the unnerving decor and the eerie lighting, however, was Zecora's warm, familiar smile, hovering above the giant cauldron as the zebra sniffed at her concoction. Apparently satisfied, she ducked behind the cauldron for a moment and reappeared a moment later with a large, cast-iron lid gripped between her teeth. She dropped it onto the cauldron with a great thud, leaving Twilight marveling at the strength of the zebra's jaw.

With the potion no longer exposed, Zecora picked her way across the floor and opened up her windows to let in the sunlight. “Come, and sit down,” the zebra finally said, using her snout to clear off some space on a nearby table. “And let's have a look around.”

Spike wandered over to the zebra, dragging his feet across the floor in a straight line. His movements were so careless that only Twilight's magic kept him from knocking over any of the flasks between him and Zecora. Once there, he clambered clumsily up onto the table, and Zecora set to work.

She stared deep into his eyes, tapped at his knees and elbows with a wooden ladle, pressed a hoof firmly against his brow, and examined his mouth thoroughly. She put an ear to his chest, nudged at his spines, and stomped a hoof against the tip of his tail, making the flasks all over the table clatter, but eliciting not a single reaction from Spike.

She drew back and rubbed at her chin for a moment, then turned to Twilight. The alicorn opened her mouth to ask what was wrong, but the zebra went around to her side without a word. Then, quick as a snake, she nipped at her wing and plucked a small lavender feather.

“Ow! What was that for!?” Twilight demanded, but Zecora offered no reply.

In the blink of an eye, she was back in front of Spike, the feather held gingerly between her teeth. She leaned in close to the dragon and brushed at his nostrils with the tip of the feather, making him wrinkle his nose reflexively. She kept at it, pulling away when Spike flared his nostrils and tilted his head back slowly. With a mighty sneeze, Spike sent himself flying off the table, along with two empty clay containers.

Twilight caught all three with her magic and looked to Zecora, who now regarded Spike with wide eyes.

“What is it?” she asked the zebra, suddenly afraid to know the answer. She deposited the dragon on the floor and returned the clay pots to the table.

Zecora crouched down level with Spike's head, examining his face closely. “No spark, no smoke, no dragon's fire...” She rose again and gave Twilight a grave look. “I am afraid Spike's condition is quite dire.”

Twilight gulped. “What's wrong?”

“Your friend was waylaid by a thief's guile,” Zecora muttered in response, wandering off to the nearest bookshelf. “Clever disguise hiding intentions most vile.”

She picked out a large black book and put it on the table where Spike had been sitting. Twilight approached her as Zecora flipped through the book with a practiced hoof. Manticores and cockatrices, hydras and chimeras, dragons and minotaurs. Apparitions of all shapes and sizes caught Twilight's eyes for the briefest of moments as she watched the zebra search the comprehensive bestiary. Before long, she came to a halt and Twilight's heart sank at the sight of the image displayed on the page.

“Perhaps you are familiar with this thing?” Zecora suggested, noting Twilight's expression. “Have you ever met with the changeling?”

Twilight nodded her head, gaze hardening at the detailed drawing on the page. “What did they do to Spike?”

“A rare theft for any changeling, worthy of the title Queen or King,” Zecora explained in her usual roundabout way. “One has practiced an old, dark art. One has stolen dear Spike's heart.”

Chapter 3

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“I need your help.”

Four simple words. One syllable each. Yet every one of her friends had dropped everything they had been doing when they heard her say them. All it had taken were those four words, and one look at Twilight and Spike.

It would never cease to amaze her, Twilight decided, looking out upon the endless wastes of desert that the train was currently blazing through. The true power of friendship would always leave as profound an impact on her as it had today.

She was seated near the window in the back of the carriage, nearly empty save for herself and her friends. Applejack, Rarity, and Rainbow Dash were seated in the three seats around her, while Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy, and Spike sat across the aisle from them.

Despite everything Zecora had told her about Spike's condition, the dragon, at least for now, wore a dim smile, twitching ever so slightly at Pinkie Pie's jokes and antics. It was as if, somehow, she was making him forget that he lacked all foundation for emotion.

Remembering Zecora's warnings, however, Twilight found it hard to smile herself. She looked out the window again, seeing the first hints of civilization up ahead. It wouldn't be long before they were in Dodge Junction.

“We should go over our plans again,” she said, interrupting a lighthearted argument between Applejack and Rainbow Dash. Rarity, who had been staring wistfully at Spike, turned her attention to Twilight, and the alicorn noticed Fluttershy's ears swivel subtly in her direction, indicating that she too was listening.

“We've gone over it already, sugarcube,” Applejack responded with a smile. “Ah think we can all remember.”

“No harm in reiteration,” Twilight insisted, sensing that the train was already slowing. “We'll be in Dodge Junction any minute now. Spike, Rainbow, and I will get off here while the rest of you keep going to Baltimare. Once you get there, you find a ship to take you to The Changeling Kingdom.”

She pushed a piece of parchment across the table between her and Applejack. “Use my signature if you need it. After Rainbow Dash and I have shopped for supplies, we'll head south through the badlands and travel down Tangled Pass through The Dragon Territories. According to Zecora, changelings are fairly weak flyers, meaning our thief will have trouble going over the mountains. To get back to the hive, Tangled Pass should be the quickest route. If we hurry, we might be able to overcome the changeling's headstart and catch up to it.”

“But you still don't know how to get Spike's heart back, do you?” Rarity pressed of her, to which Twilight had to shake her head.

“I'll have to hope I can figure out how to do the transfer once I subdue the thief. If not, I'll have to take it and Spike back to Zecora and hope any of her ideas work.”

“I wish we hadn't given away our Elements of Harmony,” Rainbow Dash grumbled, fidgeting in her seat as she took a quick look outside. “I bet they could do it.”

“The Tree of Harmony should be plan C,” Twilight agreed. “If I can't do the transfer myself, I'll send Rainbow Dash to meet you girls at the changeling border so you can be back before too long.”

“Hold on,” Applejack broke in. “Then what'll you be doing?”

“Plan B. Taking Spike to Zecora. If that doesn't work, we won't have to spend a week ‒”

“How're ya gonna carry Spike and a changeling like that halfway across Equestria?” Applejack interrupted her again. “Ain't it got Spike's heart? That makes it a whole lot stronger than normal, right?”

“We'll figure something out,” Twilight assured her. “Maybe we can enlist the help of the dragons if we need it.” She threw a worried look at Spike, still caught up in Pinkie Pie’s antics. “In any case, we have to prioritize speed above all else. We don't have a lot of time.” Her gaze lingered on Spike a little while longer before she cleared her throat and returned her attention to the three ponies around her. “Now, while we travel through The Dragon Territories, the group going by sea will land in Gray Bay. You'll travel west through the neutral territory between dragons and changelings until you reach the southern exit of Tangled Pass. If the group going by land fails to catch the thief, the group going by sea will have to intercept it.”

“And we'll have to catch them then, won't we?” Rarity murmured uncertainly, looking at Spike again.

Twilight nodded. “If the thief passes into The Changeling Kingdom... we've failed. According to their laws, the changeling won't be a thief, and if I sanction an attack on it, it'll lead to an international crisis. If the thief gets across the border, I'll have to treat with Queen Chrysalis to get the heart back.”

Rarity nodded her understanding. “So in other words... We really have to catch the thief.”

The others nodded their heads in unison.

A momentary shudder shook the train, and soon the sound of screeching brakes filled the carriage. A family near the front of the carriage were out of their seats already, getting their bags in order while chattering excitedly about their vacation. Outside the carriage, the outer settlements of Dodge Junction were whizzing by, growing within moments from sparse, ramshackle sheds that shivered in the wake of the pounding steam engine to sizeable family homes and shops, elaborate in their woodwork and painted in dusty pastels.

Twilight took a deep breath to steady herself. She would have preferred to go over the plan at least once more. She was sure a lot of details still needed to be worked out, and she kept having that nagging feeling of having forgotten something important.

In just a few moments, she would have to hand off control of half the situation, with no way of contacting her friends. Not until both groups had traveled several hundred miles through lands populated by two of the most inhospitable species in the world. Applejack was one of the most level-headed ponies she knew, though, and Rarity had an even higher sense of organization and detail than she did herself. She’d just have to trust them to play their parts.

“This is it, girls,” she told her friends, levitating her and Rainbow Dash's saddlebags off the luggage rack above them. “It'll be at least two or three days before we see each other again.”

“And at least one of us'll be totin' a hogtied changeling next time we meet,” Applejack responded with an air of confidence.

“I don't know...” Rainbow Dash snickered. “I don't think the two of us brought any rope. How're me and Twilight s'posed to hogtie the thief when we catch her?”

“We should get rope...” Twilight murmured to herself, adding it to her mental checklist.

Meanwhile, a mischievous smile played across the earth pony's features, and she narrowed her eyes at the pegasus beside her. “Sounds like a bet to me.”

“Sounds like a free... hundred bits to me.” Rainbow Dash retorted.

“Oh, ho, ho, someone's feelin' mighty generous!”

Twilight and Rarity, the latter rising from her seat to let the former out onto the aisle, both rolled their eyes as the ponies in front of them spit in their hooves and bumped them. Rainbow Dash picked up her saddlebags with her teeth and lifted off her seat to land beside Twilight, flipping the bags onto her back with a flick of her head before fitting the straps with her hooves.

The train had slowed to a gentle roll by now, and the train station started sliding by at a slow crawl outside as Spike joined Twilight and Rainbow Dash. The alicorn turned back to face her four remaining friends in their seats, and she smiled. “Once again, I really appreciate you all coming with me today. This is likely one of the most dangerous missions we've undertaken without the princesses' support, but you all dropped everything in your hooves to come help me and Spike.”

“Whaddya mean without a princess' support?” Rainbow Dash cackled, elbowing Twilight in the side. “We got one right here!”

“Yep,” Applejack agreed, wearing an equally playful smile. “Horns, wings, sendin' us on a dangerous mission without a day's warnin'... Why, you're the spittin' image of Celestia already!”

Twilight couldn't help but blush at the well-meaning jape, but gave a dry laugh in response. “Very funny.”

The train finally ground to a halt, and a great hiss of steam from outside made the ponies wince.

“Alright, see you in a few days, girls,” Twilight told the four remaining ponies. “Hopefully, we'll meet down by the border with a hale and healthy Spike in tow!” She grabbed the dragon with her magic and planted him firmly on her back.

“And a sorry-looking changeling!” Rainbow Dash declared with a confident smirk.

“If you don't, we will!” Pinkie Pie added jovially.

“Darn tootin'!”

“Good luck to the three of you,” Rarity told them, taking a step forward to give Twilight a hug. “Hopefully, you won't be needing us at all.” She moved another step past Twilight to give the dragon on her back a tight hug.

Twilight gave the unicorn a smile. “We'll fix him, Rarity. I promise.”

“Better get going,” Rainbow Dash urged Twilight, giving her another nudge.

Twilight murmured her agreement, saying a last goodbye to her four friends before she followed the pegasus out of the carriage and onto the platform. Together, they waved the others off as the train slowly set into motion again and carried off into the east.

Despite their own carriage having been so empty, the platform was now full of new arrivals, milling about almost aimlessly in search of wherever they were going or shouting their greetings at family or friends welcoming them to the town. Others, like Twilight and Rainbow Dash, found themselves standing idly about on the platform, deciding their first course of action in this new locale.

Rainbow Dash stretched out her wings after the long train ride, flapping them a few times before looking to Twilight. “So, what do we need before we go?”

“Water, mainly. There'll be several streams along Tangled Pass, but we've got a lot of miles of desert and badlands between there and here. And rope. Other than that, we're already set.”

Rainbow Dash nodded. “Still got a few hours of daylight. If we hurry, we can make it to the badlands before dark.”

“If not further,” Twilight agreed, heading off the platform. “Can you carry the water? You being the strongest flier of the two of us, and with me carrying Spike...”

“No problem,” the pegasus assured her, trotting up alongside her. “Anything heavy you got, you just hoof it on to me.”

“Do you think we can catch it?”

Rainbow Dash's cocky smile faltered only for a moment. “Yeah! I mean, you found out about all this just a few hours ago, but we're already halfway out of Equestria!”

“The thief still has more than half a day on us.”

“Not a lot of trains running in the middle of the night,” Rainbow Dash countered. “She's probably still in the badlands somewhere right now.”

“If it took the route we think it did.” Twilight sighed and shook her head. “There's so much uncertainty to all this. I wish we could contact Celestia.”

“Not much chance of that without dragon fire.”

“Celestia would know how to handle this. She'd be able to send out a much larger search party than just the six of us. Why don't I have any royal guards!?”

Rainbow Dash chuckled. “Maybe they'll be included with your royal palace.”

“Maybe we should've sent Fluttershy up to the Crystal Empire to tell the other princesses what's going on.”

“The interception group wouldn't have a pegasus if we'd done it like that. They'd have a tough time catching a changeling.”

“Fluttershy's not that strong of a flier,” Twilight argued halfheartedly, knowing that it was already much too late to change her plans. “And she's clearly not comfortable with the destination. Barely said a word the entire trip.”

“But she came. Same as all of us. And when it really matters, she's really not that bad of a flier. She'll catch that changeling if she has to.”

Twilight nodded her head. “You're right. Sorry. It's just...” She looked back at Spike sitting on her back, his eyes empty of their usual spark and his expression void of any emotion. “He's fading. Fast.”

“Well... then let's get those supplies and get going,” Rainbow Dash suggested. “I'll find water, you find rope. Shouldn't be hard to find in a town like this.”

A gentle bump, probably no more than a pebble on the tracks, sent a light shudder through the carriage. The two-beat thump echoed backwards into the distance as the wagons behind Rarity each in turn rattled past the bump, and she opened her eyes sluggishly, giving a petite yawn.

Her head was slumped against the window, smudged from the fog of her own breath. She blinked, and her gaze rose to meet the coming dusk on the eastern horizon straight ahead of the train. The indigo sky was striated with fluffy clouds far above, painted pink by the sunset behind her, which likewise streaked her more earthbound surroundings in long, stark shadows.

The landscape beyond the train tracks had changed dramatically since they had left Dodge Junction. The desert hadn't gone on for all that long after they had set off, but now the train was bustling through woods as thick as the Everfree Forest. Great pines and oaks and birches passed by in a bewildering blur. Shadows and golden sunlight danced among each other across a shifting canvas of greens, whites, and browns, and Rarity lost herself in the lustrous dance for a few moments.

After a while, her attention returned to the inside of the carriage. Not many passengers had boarded the train back in Dodge, and the few that had were all remarkably quiet: either asleep, reading, or staring out at the trees. Fluttershy lay curled up asleep to her left, tucked into a tight ball of fur that somehow didn't intrude the slightest on Rarity's own seat. Pinkie Pie, who should have been seated across from Fluttershy, was nowhere to be seen, leaving only Applejack, sitting across from Rarity.

The earth pony was awake, and had been so for some time, it seemed.

“What is it?” Rarity murmured quietly, noticing the other pony looking at her.

“Nuthin'.” Applejack's gaze shifted to the sunset behind Rarity. Her stetson was tipped over forwards to shield her eyes from the brightness of it, but even so she had to squint as flickers of sunlight passed through the trees and played across her face.

Rarity lifted her head from the window and straightened in her seat, giving another yawn. “We must be getting close.”

Applejack gave a short nod. “Forest oughtta be thinnin' out any second now.”

As if on cue, the forest on the left side of the train fell away suddenly, revealing a broad river some distance off, running alongside the railroad. This would be the river feeding into Horseshoe Bay, Rarity knew, where the city of Baltimare lay.

“We should think about what we're gonna do once we get there,” Applejack suggested, looking out at the river.

“I will take Fluttershy and find the remaining supplies we need. You take Pinkie ‒ Where is Pinkie?”

Applejack shrugged and leaned back against her seat. “Went off in search of snacks or sumthin' a little while ago.”

“Ah.” Rarity's stomach rumbled at the thought. She had barely gotten out of bed when Twilight had come knocking, and as a result, her afternoon breakfast had been a hurried, meager affair. And although she had packed enough food to last her for days in the borderlands, she had somehow forgotten lunch for the train ride.

“Maybe we should get a bite o' dinner first?”

Rarity nodded. “Indeed. As I was saying, once we've eaten, you take Pinkie Pie to the docks and try to procure a ship. And a crew.”

Applejack couldn't help but smile. “You'd trust me and Pinkie to find you a ship to take you to Gray Bay?”

“More than I'd trust you to remember all the supplies we still need,” Rarity rebuked her. “I am more than willing to forego luxury if it means arriving at the border posthaste.”

“Ain't gonna be a lotta ships leavin' port at sundown,” the earth pony observed. “We'd have more luck in the mornin'.”

“Take a look anyway. We have no idea how far that changeling has gotten with Spike's heart.”

“You can't get through Tangled Pass faster'n you can sail past The Dragon Territories.”

“Well, let's hope the thief doesn't know that.”

“If it knows, it knows askin' for a boat ride to The Changeling Kingdom is a surefire way o' gettin' caught.” Applejack tipped her hat back off her brow, catching the unicorn's eyes. “Rarity, we'll get there before that thief does, sure as sugar. Whether we leave today or tomorrow, it don't matter none.”

“Still...” Rarity sighed and looked out the window, hoping that Baltimare would hover into view soon. “The sooner the better. I refuse to be part of the group that let... Spike...” She found her voice faltering just thinking of it, and she gave another sigh.

The door to the carriage behind Rarity clicked open, and Pinkie Pie came bustling through. She plopped down on her seat next to Applejack and dumped four cupcakes and a bag of tiny pretzels on the table. “Dig in!” she greeted her friends none too quietly, breaking the somber silence that had been filling the wagon since Rarity had woken up. Fluttershy's eyes blinked open, and she slowly uncoiled, stretching her back before sitting up.

“The conductor said we'd be there in just a few minutes, so you'd better hurry!” Pinkie Pie grabbed a pink cupcake off the table, downing it in two gulps before pouring a small pile of pretzels onto her hoof and devouring those as well.

Each with their own words of thanks, the three other ponies took a cupcake, eating theirs at a more measured pace. Rarity's gaze quickly drifted outside again while she nibbled at her treat. She looked south, past the forest, vast and impenetrable, and past the mountains, their snow-capped peaks shimmering in the sunset. Twilight, Rainbow Dash and Spike would be there by now, far beyond her reach within the badlands.

The train passed across another bump in the tracks. The repeated, two-beat thump that ran through each carriage sent a shiver down her spine, making her ribs feel suddenly... tighter. Without removing her gaze from the faraway mountain tops, Rarity touched a hoof to her chest thoughtfully, frowning lightly in confusion.

Applying one of her more powerful spells, the dozen small rocks Twilight had collected from the surrounding area transformed into a pile of dry twigs and branches. With the diagrams she had memorized in preparation for the trip clearly in mind, she rearranged the wood into the optimal tipi campfire build. Satisfied with her work, she lit a spark within the center of the mass of dry wood. Within moments, the two ponies and dragon had a lively campfire going.

“Aaand done!” Twilight looked to her left to see Rainbow Dash stepping away from the tent she'd just pitched, a proud smile on her face.

Twilight shook her head. “Uh, not quite. Where's the tarp?”

Rainbow Dash gave the tent, then Twilight, a puzzled look. “Tarp?”

“You know, to keep the tent dry if it rains.”

“Oh yeah. Don't need it.”

“What do you mean!? It's an integral part of the tent!”

Rainbow Dash flapped her wings. “Pegasi don't worry too much about rain, y'know?”

“Well, I grew up with tarps, so I ‒”

“You grew up with tarps?” Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow. “You don’t strike me as the camping type.”

Twilight pressed her lips together in frustration for a moment before sighing. “Alright, fine. I can count my camping trips on one hoof. But you can't be on the lookout for bad weather all night. If something comes along while we're sleeping ‒”

“We're in the badlands!” Rainbow Dash argued. “It never rains! Besides, it's not exactly easy setting it up without magic.”

Twilight sighed again and rolled her eyes. “Well, where did you put it? I'll set it up.”

Rainbow Dash shook her head stubbornly. “Don't need it.”

“I'm not gonna sleep in an unfinished tent!”

“It's finished, 'cause it's not gonna rain!” Rainbow Dash insisted with exasperation. “Look!” She pointed a hoof back the way they'd come. Beyond the dull, brown wastes and the reddish mountain range separating the badlands from Equestria, Twilight saw numerous fluffy clouds in hues of pink and crimson, catching the last light of the sun below the horizon.

Try as she might, however, every cloud she could see was floating in the skies of Equestria, just beyond the dead landscape. It was as if a great, invisible wall separated the badlands from the rest of the world. A wall to ward off all life and keep only death. She'd felt it the moment they entered the great valley. The verdant greenery of Equestria had died away beneath them so suddenly as they flew, and she had felt a subtle, yet great weight settle upon her wings. The air here was dry. Of water, of life, and of magic.

“Things work differently around here,” Twilight admitted, seating herself near the fire. “Almost like the Everfree Forest.”

Rainbow Dash nodded her agreement. “'Cept instead of dangerously alive, this place is just... dead. And brown. And flat. I wonder if we'd be able to see the changeling from here if it were lighter.”

“I hope not. It'd be able to see us. Maybe a fire was a bad idea.”

“Naw. Gets too cold around here. Besides...” Rainbow Dash dipped her head into the saddlebags lying beside her and retrieved three small plastic bags. “How're we gonna make s'mores without a campfire?”

This time it was Twilight's turn to raise an eyebrow. “You're packing for a trip that's gonna take you through the badlands, The Dragon Territories, and The Graylands, and you decide to bring marshmallows?”

“Have you tasted s'mores?”

“Of course I ‒ Wait...” Twilight put a hoof to her chin in thought. “I may have forgotten the 'eating' part, but I've definitely made them once.”

The pegasus held a hoof against her mouth and snickered, then burst with laughter. “Once? You gotta be kidding me! Do you ever regret wasting your childhood reading books all day?”

Twilight stuck her tongue out at Rainbow Dash. “Every minute I spent reading books has been a minute well spent. It's thanks to all my hard work and reading that I'm a princess now.”

“A princess who's never had s'mores,” the pegasus muttered, fishing a marshmallow out of one of the bags. She looked around the area for a stick, marshmallow held between her hooves. It was only after remembering they were camping in a barren wasteland that Rainbow Dash noticed Twilight's smirk.

“Thanks to reading, I found these sticks in a wasteland without vegetation.” Twilight took one of the smoldering pieces of kindling from the campfire and waved it in front of the pegasus. Rainbow Dash made a grab for it, but Twilight returned it to the fire. “Thanks to reading, I could use it as kindling for our fire.” She grabbed a marshmallow from Rainbow Dash's bag. “And thanks to reading, I don't even need a fire!” She put a hoof to her temple and squinted at the floating marshmallow for added effect. “I can roast it with my mind.”

Rainbow Dash chuckled at Twilight's antics and rolled her eyes. “Just gimme a stick, egghead.”

“You can have a stick when the tent is finished.”

With a groan, Rainbow Dash turned away from Twilight. “Hey, Spike.”

Twilight's gaze followed the pegasus', and she found the dragon standing some distance away, staring at nothing in particular. He stood with his back to them, Twilight noted, facing almost directly south. She couldn't help but wonder what he was looking at, what he was thinking. Could he sense his own heart out there? Drawn to it like the needle of a compass?

Upon being addressed by Rainbow Dash, however, Spike turned to face the two ponies and approached sluggishly, wordlessly.

“Be a pal and grab me a stick,” the pegasus told him, gesturing at the fire. “Grab me two and I'll make you a s'more.”

“No thanks.”

Spike picked out a thin stick near the fringe of the fire, broke off the burnt, smoldering end of it and handed it to Rainbow Dash. While it was still pointed at her, she skewered her marshmallow on its tip before accepting it with a word of thanks.

Spike was about to turn away from the two ponies again when Twilight grabbed him with her magic, leaning back slightly to deposit him in her lap. She wrapped her forehooves around him in a full-body hug and cradled the top of his head against the nook of her chin, giving him an affectionate squeeze.

“You're getting colder.” She took the marshmallow she'd been roasting with her magic and popped it into Spike's mouth.

“Moodier too,” Rainbow Dash noted, staring intently at her marshmallow poised above the flames. “He seemed a lot more cheerful with Pinkie Pie.”

“Zecora said there was a hole in Spike's being, where his heart used to be,” Twilight tried to explain, hoping that she had understood the zebra's rhymes correctly. “The thief didn't use any force to steal the heart, so they didn’t damage anything: The hole left by the heart should have the same shape and size, almost like a mold. For now, Spike's body still believes he has a heart. But it's a vacuum that'll be filled out eventually. With what, I don't know, but unless we find that changeling, it won't be a heart.”

Her forehoof touched against his chest. His physical heart was still there, of course, but its beats were feeble, slow.

“The hole is like an echo of his heart. It will reflect the emotions of those around him for now, but he can't truly feel those emotions. The empty space inside him will lose shape ‒ is losing shape ‒ as it shrinks. I can only hope it'll simply weaken his emotional responses, but it might distort them too.” Twilight blinked, feeling tears welling up in her eyes. “In a few days, he'll be like a stranger. The emotions tying together his memories will have dissolved, his behavior will be erratic and irrational. And when the hole of his heart has shrunk away to nothing, when its last echo has faded away...” Twilight hugged the dragon even tighter, and she felt his own tears dampen the fur on her forelegs. “So will Spike,” she whispered, almost inaudibly.

For a good while, the only sound in the camp was the crackling of the fire. The sky was darkening rapidly now, and night was settling on the badlands even quicker, casting shadows that crept closer and closer to the light of the fire. Rainbow Dash sat staring at her marshmallow, now tanning steadily, while Twilight sat with Spike, her gaze empty and unseeing as she simply felt the frail beating of his heart.

“You didn't tell us it was... this bad,” Rainbow Dash finally ventured.

Twilight's eyes focused again, quickly adjusting to the light of the fire. She saw the marshmallow drooping from Rainbow Dash's stick, its crisp underside darkening. “I gave you the end result.”

The pegasus' lips curled in distaste. “But everything in between,” she muttered. “That's almost worse.” The marshmallow dropped off the tip of the stick and into the embers of the fire, melting away into black sludge within moments. “With all your talk of speed, part of me was wondering why you wanted to drag him along with the two of us.”

“He's always been a pillar,” Twilight responded, still staring listlessly into the fire. “I need to be here for him now. Besides, it beats the alternative.”

“Ah.” Rainbow Dash nodded her head in understanding. “You didn't keep his condition from us, did you? You just kept it from Rarity.”

Twilight nodded.

Rainbow Dash gave a sigh, laced with both melancholy and bitterness. “Y'know... Maybe she should know.”

Chapter 4

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The ponies' stay in Baltimare had been a short affair, even more so than Rarity could have hoped. After traveling the streets of the port city for just a little while, she and Fluttershy had had the good fortune of stumbling upon a small shop that sold just about everything their four-pony group would need for their voyage and subsequent journey. Pinkie Pie had somehow managed to track them down just as they left the shop, and together, the three ponies had made their way to the docks, where the two earth ponies presented them with a ship and crew.

The vessel was every bit as practical and lacking in luxury as Rarity would have expected of Applejack. The S.S. Sunrise was a moderately sized, wooden steamship, built for trade and not for passengers. Its hull had once been a painted picture of the sky, Rarity believed, but years of harsh winds and salt had worn away those colors until the hull was nothing more than gray splotches and exposed wood. The front half of a rearing alicorn adorned the front of the ship, bearing a fading resemblance to Princess Celestia.

Rarity had little trouble imagining how her two friends had persuaded the captain sailing that floating tribute to Celestia. No doubt a signature from the newest princess of Equestria carried quite a bit of weight with a pony like that.

If she tried, Rarity could certainly appreciate the rustic charms the exterior of the ship had to offer, but the interior was a different story altogether. The captain had been able to spare only a single cabin for the four ponies. One cramped cabin with only two beds. Worst of all, every cabin and corridor on the ship meant for personnel was absolutely horrid to even look at. Tight, confined spaces, bright lights that hurt her eyes, and every surface painted in a sterile, soul-draining white.

It would most certainly not be a luxurious voyage, but it was at the very least relatively clean, and financially, Applejack had certainly made a bargain of the voyage. More importantly, the ship had already been fully loaded by the time they had negotiated passage aboard it, ready to sail south for Zebrica within the hour.

It was in a good mood and with high hopes that the quartet of friends had waved Baltimare goodbye, but as the following day progressed, the initial excitement had slowly passed, replaced with a growing trepidation as they steadily approached Gray Bay.

Rarity stood brooding by the starboard side of the ship, amid the spray of sea and the many massive wooden crates strapped securely to the deck. Pegasus sailors bustled about her both back and forth, on deck and above head, filling the air with shouted commands, crude jokes, and raucous laughter.

She stood on her hind legs, leaning against the stout, wooden gunwale that surrounded the deck on all sides, built just low enough to afford her an unobstructed view of the ocean. Her forehooves beat idly against the top of the gunwale, matching the rhythm of waves breaking against the ship's hull. She gazed out upon waters stained black by the night above, but even in darkness, she could make out the distant mountain ranges in the west, belonging to the dragons.

“Whatcha doin'?”

Rarity almost jumped at the sudden appearance of Pinkie Pie beside her. The pink pony rose to her hind legs like Rarity and gave the unicorn a smile as she leaned against the gunwale.

“Oh, you know. Getting some fresh air, enjoying some open space. Trying not to think of what the salt in the air will do to my mane.” She gave a weak laugh. “What about you? I've barely seen you all day.”

“It's Saltbeard's birthday tomorrow,” Pinkie Pie whispered. “I've been making all the arrangements with the crew today!”

Rarity nodded. “Saltbeard. That's the captain, isn't it?”

“Pepperbeard's the captain,” Pinkie Pie corrected her. “Saltbeard's the cook! I've been cooking and baking for him all day without him noticing, and they're gonna make him captain for a day tomorrow!”

“Aha. Well, that sounds just delightful. I'm sure he'll appreciate it, Pinkie Pie.”

The earth pony nodded her agreement, beaming all the while. “Where's Fluttershy and Applejack?”

“The waters have been rather... unruly today. I'm afraid it hasn’t been agreeing with either of them. I tried convincing them that it's better up here, but Fluttershy ‒ being Fluttershy ‒ is terrified of all the sailors. And Applejack simply didn't believe me.”

“I love it!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed, arching her back in tandem with the ship's rocking. “It's been like a rollercoaster all day!”

“Yes, I can't imagine why someone would dislike that,” Rarity remarked. She gave an almost involuntary shudder at the thought.

“What?”

“Nothing. Just having some flashbacks to the day before yesterday,” Rarity explained with a half-smile. “Spike didn't fare much better than Applejack or Fluttershy under these circumstances.”

“Really?” Pinkie Pie sounded surprised, and she put a hoof to her chin in thought. “I would've thought he had a stronger stomach... Did he really end up..?”

Rarity nodded her head stiffly. “Yes. Yes... It certainly made an awful evening worse.” She looked out upon the barely visible mountains in the night, wondering where Twilight and the others were now. “If only I had known how much he agreed with me.”

“You have to appreciate the effort, though. Right?” Pinkie Pie remarked with a smile.

“I can,” Rarity assured her. “Misguided as it was, nopony can deny the effort he put into that... date.”

Pinkie Pie nodded, following Rarity's gaze out across the ocean. For a brief moment, the silhouette of the mountains became surprisingly clear as a flash of lightning erupted from somewhere among the peaks. A massive thunderhead had gathered within the dragon territories, stretching back north as far as either of the ponies could see. Another dull flash from farther inland shone through the dark cloud cover before the rumbling thunder from the first bolt of lightning reached the seabound ponies' ears. Most of the sailors paid it no mind, but Rarity did catch a few of them giving the distant storm a worried glance.

“What does 'misguided' mean?” Pinkie Pie asked her after a short period of silence had passed between the two.

Rarity’s gaze fell to her hooves, and she gave a quiet chuckle. “I've seen the question on your lips ever since we set off. I'd thought Applejack would have been the one to ask.”

“Why's that?”

Rarity shook her head. “I don't know. I haven't exactly been straightforward in my dealings with Spike, have I? I thought perhaps the Element of Honesty would be the first to object to that. I've seen it in her eyes often enough. I've seen it in Twilight's eyes as well. Perhaps anypony would object to it.”

“Wut's that you've seen in mah eyes?” The two mares looked back to see Applejack approaching, a green tinge to her face and a distinct wobble in her step. She stood up against the gunwale next to Rarity, giving a faint groan before looking at the unicorn.

Rarity frowned at the interruption. It was one thing talking to Pinkie about all this. She had figured it would either all go over her head, or she'd be her usual understanding and encouraging self. Applejack was a different matter.

Rarity sighed. “You wonder if I care about Spike.” She returned her gaze to the black waves rocking the ship, listening to the repeating ebb and flow of the ocean. A light drizzle had seized the ship, but she welcomed it, feeling the rain wash away the salt gnawing at her skin and hair. She waited for some sort of answer from Applejack or Pinkie Pie, but when it never came, she continued. “I never deny him his affections. I would be lying if I said I did not enjoy them. But they do leave a bad taste in my mouth. He needs something in return; everyone does, but I don't think I can give it to him.”

“I don't think it's that hard to give,” Pinkie Pie offered. “Most of the time, it happens all on its own.”

“And if it doesn't?”

“Then ya own up to it,” Applejack murmured. “Fer pony's sake, Rarity, you sound like a grade school filly. It ain't the end of the world.”

Pinkie Pie giggled and nodded. “You shouldn't be so afraid.” She pushed herself off the gunwale with her forehooves and went around Rarity and Applejack toward the back of the ship. “It's just a hop, skip, and a jump!”

The pink pony bounced down the deck of the ship, off on whatever business she had with the ship's crew. Rarity remained where she was, wondering what kind of authority Pinkie Pie was on love. A hop, skip, and jump indeed. No one seemed to realize just how intimidating Spike's dedication could be.

“We're too different,” she whispered, mostly to herself. “And he's so young. I may be past my school years, but he certainly isn't. I could break his heart.”

Applejack gave her a long, hard look. “Ya kinda already did, sugarcube. That's why we're out here sailin' into one of the most dangerous places in the world.”

“I have done everything in my power not to break his heart,” Rarity protested weakly, convincing neither herself nor Applejack.

“Not everythin'.”

Rarity's face flushed with anger and her gaze rose to meet Applejack's. “What, then? Because Spike loves me, I'm obligated to love him back? No matter my own feelings?”

Applejack shrugged. “Can't say nuthin' 'bout yer feelin's on the matter, but Ah reckon ya could at least give it a shot.”

“A shot? Try him out, see if he suits me?” Rarity shook her head. “He deserves more than that.”

“Then what does the poor guy deserve, Rarity?”

“If I knew, we wouldn't be in this mess, would we?” Rarity sighed. “He needs someone else. Someone his own age. Preferably a dragon. Someone who can make him forget all about me.”

“Rarity... Spike ain't really a dragon. Not in the ways that really count. He's lived his entire life in Ponyville and Canterlot. There ain't gonna be no dragoness to sweep him off his feet. He ain't just gonna forget about you.”

Rarity hated Applejack's honesty sometimes. And her insight.

“Ah know it's great havin' someone like Spike around, thinkin' the highest heavens of ya and seein' ya as nothin' less than perfect,” Applejack continued. “Ah know you don't wanna change that, but that's makin' it less about him and more about you. And that just ain't fair.”

“He gave away his heart thinking he couldn't be with me,” Rarity whispered, looking in the direction of the mountains, hidden behind thick curtains of rain. “But even then, he still had a little hope. Him and me... it's not impossible, Applejack. Maybe someday when he's older. Maybe if I were younger... But what happens to him if I take away that hope for good?”

“What happens if ya don't?” Applejack countered. “Two nights ago, he gave away his heart. Ya think his heartache's gonna be over once we get it back? If ya don't do somethin', this is gonna happen again.”

Rarity shook her head. “I can't. Not now.”

Applejack scowled. “You'n'me, we ain't gettin' no sleep 'cause o' this darned boat rockin' about.” She pointed a hoof at the mountains furthest north. “But Twilight, she ain't sleepin’ 'cause she's busy watchin' her oldest, best friend in the world dyin'. Don't come tellin' me ya won't do everythin' in yer power to make sure that never happens again!”

The words struck her almost like a physical blow, and Rarity quickly decided she had had enough of yielding any further to Applejack's criticisms. “This is not my fault!” A flash of lightning briefly illuminated the heated fires in both ponies' eyes, and a crack of thunder punctuated Rarity's backlash. By now, what had once been a light drizzle had transformed into a torrential downpour. “A changeling did this, not I! If anyone but that changeling is to blame, it is Spike!” She brushed her soaked mane out of her eyes. “I mean, who gives away their heart to a complete stranger!?”

“Well, gee, don't ya think it mighta disguised itself?” Applejack shot back. “Ah don't care if ya reject him or accept him, but if ya'd at least done either, he wouldn'ta ended up givin' his heart away to a fake you! At least the darned changeling could decide what ta do with it!”

“Oh! You mean drain him dry of emotion and leave him for dead in the Everfree!? I don't know why that didn't occur to me! Maybe I just care about him a little more than ‒”

“Ladies! Get the heck down!”

Both ponies' attention left each other briefly as they both looked toward the pegasus stallion further updeck bellowing at them. Any words he had beyond his initial warning, however, were lost to a loud roar from offship, quickly growing in volume. Their gazes followed the sound and turned west toward the mountains, only to find a colossal wave rushing toward the ship, its crest reaching just a few feet over the deck.

The two mares had just enough time to throw themselves to the deck and brace before the wooden gunwale they'd been standing against shattered under the impact of the massive wave. The sound itself was deafening, and Rarity's head was ringing as she scrabbled for purchase, fighting both the undertow of the wave pulling her backwards and the mighty heave of the ship, recoiling from the powerful blow the sea had struck it.

Someone grabbed hold of her and shouted, but she couldn't focus hard enough to tell if it were Applejack or the sailor. Before she knew it, another concussive impact shook the ship, and the frothing ocean sent her careening across the deck and slammed her into a wooden crate.

“Looks like the storm's headed east now,” Rainbow Dash observed. “Shouldn't bother us tomorrow.”

She headed back into the small cavern she and Twilight had chosen as their shelter for the night, not much larger than the reading room of the library. The cavern was situated almost half a hundred feet above Tangled Pass, overlooking both the pathway and the vast mountain range in the distance, separating the trio from the sea to the east. Twilight could still hear the pitter patter of rain against rock all around her, but the veritable waterfall running past the entrance to the cavern had slowed to a gentler dripping, so she supposed Rainbow Dash was right.

The alicorn, seated at the fire she had built near the back of the cave, nodded her head. “Good. It's slowed us down enough as it is.”

Rainbow Dash shook her head and smiled at Twilight as she headed back inside. “First off, we're inside The Dragon Territories already. You teleporting us through the badlands put us way ahead of schedule. Second, this storm's gonna slow that changeling down as much as us. Trust me, we'll find her tomorrow.”

Twilight nodded again as Rainbow Dash sat down next to her by the fire. Without really thinking about it, both their gazes fell on Spike, sleeping beside Twilight. “It's not necessarily a she, you know,” Twilight pointed out. “It could have been any kind of changeling that did this.”

“I guess...” Rainbow Dash frowned and shook her head. “Just figured anything acting like Rarity would have to be a girl.” She hesitated for a moment before raising an eyebrow at Twilight. “But... any changeling? Really? You make it sound so easy, yet this almost never happens, right?”

Twilight's eyes remained fixed on Spike. He had grown paler.

“Spike's a bit of a special case. His draconic heritage yet complete lack of a dragon's psychology... It gives him all the outward appearances of a child. And in many ways, he is a child. He can be naive at times, his interests might seem a bit immature, and he possesses a sincerity you never see in adults. Most adults, anyway.”

“Pinkie Pie doesn't count,” Rainbow Dash told her, and they both grinned.

“It's easy to forget he's only a few years younger than you or me,” Twilight continued, her smile faltering. His breathing was so slow. “He may be a child by dragon standards, but he's something else entirely by pony standards, standards he's been raised with. He's more experienced than any foal, not at all shallow like so many children can be. Someone who can love truly and selflessly, and is trusting enough to give away his most important possession. He's the perfect kind of prey for a changeling.”

“Not exactly perfect,” Rainbow Dash argued, giving Twilight a nod. “Any thief who's got a princess of Equestria chasing after them messed up bad.”

“Yeah. I guess.” Twilight brushed a hoof lightly against the side of Spike's head. His usual hot temperature had fallen drastically since the theft, to the point where he now felt colder than her own hoof.

Noticing him shivering beneath her touch, she gently nudged him closer to the fire and herself. A partial silence settled between the two ponies while Twilight fussed over Spike, the only sounds the spatter, splash, and trickle of the ceaseless rain outside the cave and the occasional crackle of firewood from within. Rainbow Dash seemed content to simply watch as Twilight slowly rearranged the fire to almost encircle the dragon, giving him a bed of embers to rest on and warm his chilled scales. He'd be covered in soot in the morning, and so would she once she set off with him on her back, but at this point it was barely a concern.

“Twilight.” She looked up at Rainbow Dash, who was giving her a tired smile. “I'm sure he'll be fine. Maybe you should get some rest yourself. You've pushed yourself pretty far today. Gonna need your strength for tomorrow, right?”

Twilight couldn't help but yawn in response and gave a grudging nod. “Let's hope so.”

Using her magic, she retrieved her and Rainbow Dash's sleeping bags from the saddlebags in the back of the cave, dumping the latter in front of the pegasus while wrapping herself up in her own. She scooted back from the fire and rolled over so that she was facing the back of the cave rather than the bright flames.

“You sure he's good like that?”

Twilight rolled back over to look at both the pegasus and the slumbering dragon. “The fire? We used to have a fireplace back in Canterlot. He'd do this all the time during winters. And we've both seen him bellyflop straight onto molten lava.”

Rainbow Dash chuckled. “Oh yeah. Good point. Well, guess I'll see you both tomorrow. G'night.”

“Sweet dreams.”

Rainbow Dash rolled over like Twilight had done just moments earlier, and the alicorn was about to do the same when she noticed Spike stirring. She watched him toss and turn, wondering if she'd overdone it with the fire. After a minute or so, the dragon seemed to calm down, curling up on top of the embers with his back to Twilight.

Even surrounded by fire and burning coals, however, she could see him shivering badly. Twilight frowned. She couldn't even treat his symptoms, it seemed. Of course, Spike's chill was caused by powers beyond her control, so she supposed it only made sense that she lacked the means to heat him up again. At least until they found the changeling.

Minutes ticked by slowly as she watched her friend shaking, his occasional twitches kicking up small gouts of smoke and sparks around him. Rainbow Dash was already snoring like thunder, but for every moment Twilight watched Spike suffer, sleep seemed further and further out of reach.

Vexing what-ifs and troubling could-have-beens cycled through her mind in an endless drone, chasing away any hope of restful slumber. She wondered what Celestia knew about heart thefts. She wondered what she would have done had Twilight simply gone to her from the very start. She wondered what her reaction would be... should she fail. Why hadn't she sent another citizen of Ponyville up to The Crystal Empire in her place? What else had she forgotten? What if the thief had taken another route into The Changeling Kingdom?

Her aimless train of thought was broken when she noticed Spike lifting his head suddenly. Twilight wondered whether she'd been dozing off or if she'd been too engrossed with her own nagging thoughts, for it seemed quite a while had gone by without her realizing it. The fire had been reduced to smoldering embers, and the rain outside had lessened noticeably.

Her curiosity only grew when Spike rose to his feet, stumbling out of the embers and turning to face the cavern entrance. When Spike started shuffling toward the entrance, Twilight found herself compelled to intervene. Rather than simply grabbing him with her magic, however, she got up out of her sleeping bag and trotted after him.

“Spike?”

The dragon stopped just a few feet from the entrance, just as Twilight caught up to him, but he offered no reaction to his name being called. His eyes were half open, she noted, so it seemed unlikely that he was sleepwalking. In fact, he seemed more awake than he'd been all day. Rather than his usual trance-like state, he appeared somewhat lucid, staring at something dead ahead of him.

Twilight followed his gaze. Although the rain had waned since they had arrived, it still formed a thick blanket, veiling most everything beyond the cave from sight. Coupled with the darkness of the dead of night, Twilight found it difficult to make out anything but rain.

Spike, however, continued looking, and so Twilight did the same, letting her eyes adjust. Eventually, she could faintly make out the ridge of the steep cliffside opposite the path they'd been following all day. Spike's gaze seemed fixed on a particular protrusion in the cliffside; one that arched out over the pathway and jutted up far enough for it to almost be on the same level as the cavern.

Twilight gave a faint gasp when she noticed an equine figure standing atop the jutting cliff, and the figure seemed to shift in response to the noise. Wings ‒ much too large to belong to a changeling, but definitely not the feathered wings of a pegasus ‒ unfurled menacingly, and the creature fell into a defensive crouch, as if ready to pounce.

Unwilling to take any chances, Twilight's horn lit up as she threw a defensive barrier across the cavern entrance. Simultaneously, the creature's forehead became wreathed in an all too familiar green glow, revealing a pair of green, slitted eyes and a fanged snarl. The creature's coat was black and shiny, and the wings ‒ draconic in nature, Twilight realized as they caught the light ‒ had the same translucent cerulean hue as a changeling's.

The changeling's horn dimmed for a second, gathering energy before launching a bright bolt of energy straight at the pair. Twilight ducked instinctively, and she felt the back of her mane get singed as the changeling's spell shattered her barrier, flying straight over her head and exploding against the roof of the cave behind her. The shockwave put out the fire in the middle of the cavern and scattered its embers everywhere, causing Rainbow Dash to cry out in panic.

The changeling followed up with another three bolts, but Twilight was better prepared this time. She amped up the magic feeding into her horn and swiftly deflected the three blasts, countering with a bolt of lightning thrice the power of the changeling's. The resulting explosion threw up a thick cloud of debris around the changeling, but Twilight saw the green bubble pop up around it moments before impact.

When the faint green light within the cloud grew brighter suddenly, Twilight grabbed Spike and leapt back into the cave, avoiding a beam of energy that cut several inches into the rock it passed across.

“What the hay!?” Twilight looked over to see Rainbow Dash finish fighting her way out of her sleeping bag, looking around the cavern in bewilderment. “What's attacking us!?”

“You thought I wouldn't see two ponies flying around in broad daylight?” the changeling outside jeered, answering Rainbow Dash's question before Twilight could. “Think you can sneak up on a changeling?” His voice ‒ for the changeling was definitely male, Twilight decided ‒ had the distinct layered, unnatural tone to it as Queen Chrysalis'. She could swear she heard a little of Spike's voice mingled with the changeling's taunts.

“Is that the thief?”

Twilight motioned for Rainbow Dash to stay back, then crept back toward the front of the cave until she had the changeling in sight. The dust had settled around him, and without the glare of the fire behind her, Twilight found it easier to make out her adversary.

Chrysalis resembled an alicorn most of all, likely due to the hearts she had stolen from various pony races throughout her lifetime. That much seemed obvious just from looking at what Spike's heart thief had transformed into. Although it was hard to tell due to the distance and darkness cloaking him, it seemed the changeling had grown to almost double his regular size, and instead of the usual imitated equine tail, he sported a black, tapered tail, with a dark cerulean tuft along its tip. His hooves were misshapen, sprouting ferocious-looking claws, and his snout had grown into a half equine, half reptilian monstrosity.

An elongated and curved cerulean crystal protruded from the top of the changeling's skull like a second horn. Twilight had a feeling just by looking at it that this was what had become of the stolen heart. Like Chrysalis, the changeling before her lacked the solid blue eyes of his brethren. His eyes were bright emerald instead, much too similar to Spike's. And they were looking directly at her.

Twilight stood up and took a step toward the changeling. “You took something that belongs to us,” she declared, lighting up her horn again. “You're going to give it back!”

“Give it back to the husk? Oh, but that would be such a waste.” The thief beat his wings and set into the air, bringing himself level with Twilight. “Let me show you what I can do with it!”

The crystal atop the changeling's head flashed green momentarily before the glow transferred to his horn. Fire gathered at its tip, condensing into a steadily growing sphere that hummed with power.

Twilight threw a bolt of lightning at the hovering changeling in an effort to break his focus, but a simple force field appeared about him just in time, deflecting the spell.

The changeling became lost in a blinding blaze of his own magic, lighting up almost everything within and beyond the cavern. The light collapsed in on itself, and a white hot ball of fire whistled through the air straight at the cave.

Twilight teleported backwards into the cavern, grabbed both Spike and Rainbow Dash, and teleported all three of them back behind the changeling, on top of the cliff overlooking the Tangled Pass pathway. Behind them, the cavern was annihilated by a massive explosion, visible for several miles and audible for many more. A thunderous boom echoed out across the mountains, and even the changeling, cackling madly all the while, flinched at the magnitude of destruction, enough to leave a giant crater in the mountainside.

“Keep Spike safe!” Twilight could barely hear herself shout over the ringing in her ears, but she was off before she could make sure Rainbow Dash had heard. With a few swift beats of her wings, she closed in on the changeling from behind. A piece of debris from the explosion ‒ a rock the size of herself ‒ flew straight at her, and she used her magic to slingshot it around herself and into the changeling's side with bone-crushing force.

The thief gave a roar of pain as he tumbled down toward the pathway far below, wrapped around the large rock that carried him downwards. He didn't seem especially wounded, however, as he soon blew the boulder apart with a blast of magic, catching just enough air with his wings to hit the ground smoothly.

A volley of magical projectiles whistled forth from his horn, arcing up through the air and exploding against the sturdy force field conjured about the airborne alicorn. Twilight dispelled her shield and whisked away the smoke thrown up by the explosions so that she could retaliate, but the thief had already closed in on her.

His left claw-hoof amalgamation backhanded her across her face, breaking her focus, and his right seized her throat, its claws tightening around her neck.

“So small... for an alicorn,” the thief chuckled, and his entire body inexplicably grew a little larger as Twilight watched.

She was aiming a desperate kick at the changeling when a rainbow blur bowled into him, knocking Twilight out of his grip and throwing him off balance. Before he could recover and strike back at Rainbow Dash, a magenta blast caught him in the chest, sending him flying backwards half a hundred feet.

Twilight teleported into the air just above the thief, hammering him downwards with another blast of magic. Rainbow Dash flew in a wide arc around the changeling as he fell, nimbly dodging his volley of hastily fired energy bolts before closing in and delivering a devastating kick to the area below his left wing. Before the pegasus could get away, however, the changeling twisted around to counter with a powerful burst of magic, sending Rainbow Dash hurtling toward the scarred mountain while the recoil carried the thief back onto the cliff Twilight had first spotted him on.

The thief's left wing hung at a slightly crooked angle, Twilight noted, meaning that Rainbow Dash's strike had either broken or paralyzed it somehow. It would give her the height advantage for now, but it wasn't an advantage she was confident in holding. The heavy rain ‒ beating down on her and drenching her fur ‒ was weighing her down more than she would have expected. She could already feel herself slowing down as a result.

The changeling's twisted horn and the cerulean crystal just behind it both lit up, acquiring an almost blinding luminescence within seconds. Twilight recognized the spell that had destroyed the cave before it was even fired, and she began charging her own spells. Between her flight and teleportation, the changeling had no chance of hitting her.

Without warning, however, the thief turned and fired his spell at Spike, who stood unprotected further back on the cliff. Seeing the pulsing green sphere hurtling toward her friend, Twilight instantly forgot all about her spells. The moment the changeling launched the fireball, she teleported past him to stand in front of Spike. She summoned the sturdiest force field she could muster between herself and the changeling, then another, and another, casting as many as she could in the few seconds she had.

The fireball punched through the first three of her shields before exploding and shattering the rest, launching both Twilight and Spike across the craggy surface of the cliff. They slid to a halt by a steep precipice on the opposite side of the cliff, overlooking a vast, forested valley several hundred feet below.

Twilight groaned in pain and shook her head, making sure Spike was okay before trying to stand. The dragon was lying almost motionlessly on his side a few feet from her, but he was at least breathing, and in one piece. He wasn't bleeding, which was more than she could say about herself. Her forelegs buckled underneath her own weight, and she gritted her teeth, holding back another groan.

A large hoof bore down on the back of her neck, smashing her face into the rocks before claws curled around her throat again and hoisted her up, bringing her face to face with the smiling thief.

“You put up a good fight, I'll give you that.” A few puffs of smoke escaped his nostrils as he chuckled.

Twilight saw a brief flash of color from the other side of the cliff, but she kept her eyes on the changeling. Her hooves scrabbled uselessly against the iron claws gripping her throat, and she gave the thief a caustic glare. “Give me back his heart!”

A rainbow blur appeared from the other side of the cliff, racing across its surface and heading straight for the back of the changeling's head. He must have seen it reflected in Twilight's eyes, however, for he sidestepped the attempted sneak attack a split second before it connected. His tail whipped upwards and caught Rainbow Dash in the midriff, knocking the wind out of her and robbing her of her momentum.

The changeling gave Twilight a long sniff. He chuckled again, blowing a cloud of smoke at the alicorn's face. Once more, his entire body grew just a little larger. “You really want it?”

His tail found the downed pegasus lying at his side and wrapped around her, picking her up like a sack of potatoes before throwing her aside. She sailed limply through the air and struck Spike, who had just gotten to his feet, and both went tumbling over the edge of the cliff and out of sight. The grip around Twilight's throat tightened just as she cried out to her friends, making her choke and gasp instead.

“Once that empty husk is gone,” the changeling whispered to her, his horn coming to life with a sinister green glow, “come find me.”

Twilight felt a numbness spreading throughout her body in response to the changeling's spell, and the edges of her vision grew darker. She tried and failed to call upon her own magic, and although she wrestled against the vice grip on her throat with renewed vigor, her struggles were ultimately futile in the face of the thief's power.

With a sigh of satisfaction, the changeling lowered her gently to the ground, releasing her just as her consciousness slipped away.

Chapter 5

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Dawn had broken over the eastern horizon half an hour ago, but it was only now that the sun rose above the dark clouds that had caused the ponies so much grief the night before. Sunlight brought with it a bare modicum of color to their surroundings. The dark sea was painted a faint cerulean, the restless waves upon it sparkling as they caught the glimmers of light. The bleached sand underhoof, however, turned only a lighter shade of beige.

That was about all the color that could be lent this place. Applejack sighed, squinting against the sunlight before adjusting her hat. For a mare who'd spent most of her life in Sweet Apple Acres, Gray Bay seemed... unnatural.

She didn't know much about these borderlands between the dragons and changelings. From what she had been told by the sailors aboard the Sunrise, it seemed the dragons had played no small part in making it what it was today. Seeing it now, she doubted anypony could ever believe any differently. The sand, the dirt, the rocks, the air itself. It was all the color of ash. Pale, gray, and lifeless.

There were no trees, no shrubs, not a blade of grass. No birdsong above nor pitter patter of critters below. The only sound on the wind was the wind itself; a lonely song in an empty wasteland.

Applejack had never thought she would envy Twilight and Rainbow Dash for having to cross the badlands up north, yet here she was. They were four ponies standing at the shore of Gray Bay: Captain Pepperbeard, who gazed silently upon the ruined ship anchored in the middle of the bay, and three of the four friends that had set off from Baltimare.

“It's unbelievable.” The captain, a dark brown mare bearing the unusual distinction of a large, scraggly, black beard, shook her head slowly as she regarded her ship, its damage made all the more apparent in the sunlight.

The alicorn figurehead that had once adorned the bow had been ripped off by a particularly vicious wave. Applejack remembered seeing that wave cresting almost half a mile away just before she was shoved inside the ship off the deck.

The hull was in shreds near the bow, revealing several gaping holes into the interior of the ship. The damage was less critical toward the stern, but the wooden gunwale had been crushed to splinters. She remembered the first real wave to have struck the ship, and the look of terror on Rarity's face as she was swept screaming into the pitch black waters frothing all around them.

The entire ship itself seemed tilted sideways at a slight angle, and Applejack remembered the creak and snap of wood she had heard while in the cabin with Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie, followed by the sound of rushing water inside the ship and the agitated shouts of sailors.

Applejack remembered a lot of things she'd rather not.

“Are you going to be able to fix your ship?” Fluttershy ventured, and Pepperbeard gave a firm nod.

“'Course! It'll take a few days 'fore he's fit for the high seas, but we'll make Zebrica yet.” The mare stroked idly at her beard as she looked around Gray Bay, frowning. “Repairs won't be easy 'round here, though.”

“Anything we can do to help?” Pinkie Pie offered, and Applejack grimaced.

The captain caught the look on Applejack's face and smiled, shaking her head. “Nay, the three of ye are down one mare, and on a tight schedule besides.” She nodded her head at the ship anchored in the distance and a group of pegasi taking flight northward. “We'll be on the lookout for Miss Rarity while we're patching up the Sunrise. If we find her, we'll have her back in Baltimare 'fore week's end.”

Applejack stepped up beside the captain and shook her hoof. “We appreciate it, Cap'n. Safe travels when ya get that far.”

“I hope you don't run into anymore storms,” Fluttershy added.

“Aye.” Pepperbeard scowled at the dark clouds in the east. “The weather off that coast ain't unlike dragons themselves: Big an' vicious an' untamable. Now that we're past it, we should be alright!”

“Tell your brother happy birthday from me!” Pinkie Pie saluted the captain, bouncing off toward the mainland and the three ponies' destination. Applejack and Fluttershy followed after, with Pepperbeard waving them off.

“I'll be sure to! Take care out there! The land between changelings and dragons is more like both than neither, I hear!”

The trio nodded their heads in thanks at the warning, hefting the heavy saddlebags draped over their backs before plodding on.

It wasn't long before their hooves were gray with ash, Applejack found. The deeper they went into the borderlands, the deeper the hoofprints they left behind. The pale blue sky became lost in the dark haze drifting off down the mountains up north, carried by the same wind that whirled the ashes on the ground into the air. The dust settled on their backs, their bags, their faces, and in their fur, slowly robbing them of all their color, making them part of the Graylands.

When Fluttershy started coughing and Pinkie Pie started sneezing, they dug out the scarves that Twilight had had the foresight of packing with them, fashioning makeshift masks to ease breathing.

Not many words were shared between the trio as they wandered westward. Although certainly overwhelming, Applejack knew it wasn't just the silence of the Graylands settling upon them.

Pinkie Pie was bouncing along in front of them, dousing both Applejack and Fluttershy in the clouds of ashes whirled up in her wake, yet her rhythm seemed off. Every jump carried with it half a heartbeat of hesitation. Fluttershy was much the same. Her head hung low as she walked, her long mane shielding her face against most of the ashes while she stared distantly at the ground. Her eyes would occasionally turn toward the dragon mountains to her right, just as Applejack kept glancing in the direction of the changeling border to their left.

It wasn't just the threat of enemies on all sides either.

It was dark as dusk by the time Applejack called for a halt, although they had only been walking for a few hours. The sun was directly overhead, no doubt, but the thick smog drifting down from the mountains up north was a constant shadow over the Graylands. It didn't really feel like they were outside. The small amount of light filtering down past the smoke looked more like a faint glow than actual sunlight. The shafts of light that managed to shine through where the smoke thinned were white and colorless. Although there was certainly something grand to the way the light danced across the landscape in tune to the wind, it was just more of the same to Applejack at this point.

She sat down heavily, cushioned by the ashes around her hooves. With a sigh of relief, she unbuckled the two pairs of saddlebags she had been carrying around all day and slung them around in front of her. Digging around through Rarity's supplies, she quickly found the crude map of the Graylands that Rarity and Fluttershy had managed to find in Baltimare.

“Alright, lessee...” Applejack unfurled the map and glanced at the sky, finding the vast gray expanse above her absolutely useless to navigate by. “Err...” She looked to her left toward the changeling lands, but found only flat, ashen wastes. To her right were bumpy, ashen wastes. Beyond those were blurry silhouettes of mountains, too obscured by the ashes falling constantly from the clouds above to identify any landmark in particular.

“Well, shoot.” She looked at the map again, tracing a path west from their point of arrival at Gray Bay. “We've been goin' this way for about, uh...” Without thinking, she tilted her head up to tell the time, but was once again stymied by the unrelenting smoke above. “Aw, for the love of ‒!” With a huff, she rolled up the map and stuffed it back into the bag. “Let's just start angling toward the mountains. Tangled Pass is bound ta show up sooner or later.”

“Are we lost?” Fluttershy, who had just shed her own saddlebag, seemed almost afraid to ask.

“We got dragons on the right and changelings on the left. We're fine.”

“But won't the hills slow us down?” Fluttershy asked of Applejack, repeating Twilight's warning. “We might be late if we go north too early.”

Wrinkling her nose, Applejack went through Rarity's saddlebag again, retrieving the map and tossing it to Fluttershy. “You try ta figure the darn thing out, then.”

The pegasus made a quiet “eep!” as she fumbled to catch the map, but otherwise made no word of protest as she unfolded it and set to studying it diligently. She turned to face the mountains up north, glancing in their directions frequently as she traced paths across the map.

Applejack sighed as she opened her own saddlebags and dug out their food rations. Rarity had been the pony in charge of the map. She would have paid attention to how far they had been walking today. Rarity would have known exactly where they were and where they needed to be.

Applejack's brow furrowed. In her mind's eye, she kept seeing Rarity after the first wave had hit, scrabbling at the wooden floorboards only inches from the splintered edge of the deck. The way she and the sailor were tossed across the deck by the second wave. The scream of terror as the white unicorn was lost to the black ocean.

“Applejack?”

The earth pony blinked, releasing the breath she'd been holding. She glanced briefly at Pinkie Pie, who was giving her a worried look. Applejack gave her a reassuring little smile before continuing to rummage through her own saddlebags. Only afterwards did she realize nopony could see her smiling through the scarf she was wearing across her muzzle.

“Sorry.” She found an apple and tossed it to Pinkie Pie, who managed to pull down her mask before catching it in her mouth. “Just worryin' about Rarity.”

Pinkie Pie took a big bite out of the apple, nodding as she chewed. “I wonder where she washed up...”

“If she washed up,” Applejack muttered, drawing a horrified look from Fluttershy.

“Applejack!”

“Y'all didn't see the storm!” Applejack defended herself. “It weren't like nothin' Ah ever saw...”

“Captain Pepperbeard said she'd be okay,” Fluttershy reminded her. “We weren't that far from the coast, and... the wind changed after the first waves hit.”

“Saltbeard said it was a special storm,” Pinkie Pie chipped in. “Rarity's fine!”

Applejack raised an eyebrow, but she refrained from pressing the matter. She dug out two more apples from her bag and tossed one to Fluttershy. “Ah hope you're right. Both of ya.”

“Ah. The princess joins us.”

It was a deep, rumbling voice that addressed Twilight, so much so that she felt tremors shake the ground she slept on. Rubbing a hoof at her sore throat, she opened her eyes slowly.

She was inside a cavern. Several times larger than the Ponyville town square, but dimly lit, shrouding the peripheries of her surroundings in deep shadow. Behind her, an opening in the cavern wall glowed a sinister shade of red, and ahead of her, a bright halo of sunlight surrounded a truly enormous dragon lying near the cavern opening.

The great dragon shifted, sending shimmers running down the cavern walls as its silvery lavender scales caught the light from outside. Piercing, golden eyes settled on Twilight, who quickly shook off her drowsiness and jumped to her hooves.

“Relax, Twi.” Rainbow Dash emerged from the shadows to her right, shaking her head. “She's... Well I wouldn't say friendly ‒”

“Neither would I,” the dragoness grumbled in agreement, and a light gout of smoke blew past Rainbow Dash. With the dragoness' massive size in mind, Twilight suddenly found the ground-quaking rumble of her voice almost feminine.

“‒ But she's not gonna eat us,” the pegasus finished, scowling at their host.

“Where are we?” Twilight looked to Rainbow Dash, then the dragon for answers.

“The Great Heart,” the dragoness answered her. “The heartbeat of this mountain sustains our land. From here, life flows to the farthest reaches of our territories. I am its keeper.”

Twilight nodded. She remembered Celestia mentioning this place a long time ago. If she wasn't mistaken, the princess and this keeper were on fairly good terms with each other. Twilight cleared her throat. “That must make you a great dragon. My name is ‒”

“I care not for names,” she interrupted her. “You are a princess of Equestria. The fourth and most recent, if I am not mistaken.”

Twilight nodded again. “Why... are we here?”

Even silhouetted against the light from outside the cave, Twilight sensed the dragon's eyes narrowing. “I could ask the same of you, pony.”

Twilight frowned for a moment at the hostility of the dragoness' tone. Her status wasn't helping her as much as she would have hoped, though it certainly wasn't much of a surprise. Celestia had told her not long ago that she would have to establish her own authority ‒ among dragons in particular.

So Twilight offered the dragon no reply. She lifted her head, straightening her posture, and she readjusted her wings, positioning them more comfortably at her sides. Standing still in the middle of the enormous cavern, she held the gaze of the beast several hundred times her own size.

Several moments passed as the two held each other’s gaze, but in the end, it was the dragon’s patience that ran out.

“I was awoken by your battle last night,” she relented, no small hint of accusation in her voice. “By the time I arrived, your enemy was gone. You were both unconscious, so I brought you here. My neighbors don't all have the same... respect for Equestria's royalty as I do.”

“Both of us?” Twilight echoed, looking to Rainbow Dash, who shook her head.

“He's not here, Twi. Sorry. Smokey here wouldn't let me leave the cave 'til you'd woken up.”

“A young dragon was traveling with us,” Twilight told the dragoness, turning towards her again. “Do you know where he is?”

“The dragon companion of the fourth princess,” their host rumbled. “I have heard of him.” Before Twilight could ask, she continued. “As I said: Once I arrived, the two of you were all that remained.”

“We have to find him!” Twilight took a step forward, but so did the dragoness, shaking the entire cavern with her weight.

“And why is that?” she hissed dangerously, a wave of smoke rolling across the floor past Twilight. She lifted her head slightly, towering above the ponies. “I have been forthcoming with my answers, Princess. Now, why is it two ponies find themselves in my land? Why is it you disturb my peace? Why is it that the day you arrive, The Great Heart answers with storm and thunder?”

Twilight hesitated a moment, looking at the ground before answering the dragon's gaze again. “We're hunting a changeling. He's stolen Spike's heart.”

The great dragon's eyes seemed to glow with rage at the revelation, and through the dim lighting, Twilight caught the flash of teeth as she snarled. “What?”

“He's been traveling through Tangled Pass,” Twilight continued, sensing the dragon's breathing growing erratic. “We've been chasing after him since Ponyville. His crime won't go ‒”

“This is an outrage!” the dragon bellowed, forcing Twilight to flatten her ears against the noise and take a step back. “How could you allow this to happen!?”

“I’m not! I'm hundreds of miles from home in the heart of The Dragon Territories!” Twilight shot back. “This is me not allowing it!”

“Not in a thousand years has a changeling ever stolen a dragon's heart! His heart of all hearts!”

The golden eyes left her as the dragoness turned away from Twilight and toward the cavern entrance, her wings unfurling and eclipsing what little light was entering the cave.

“Wait! Where are you going!?” the alicorn called out, running after her.

“The changelings must answer for this impudence! It seems their queen must be reminded why the Graylands are gray!”

“No! You can't!”

The dragoness whirled on her this time, and Twilight found herself scrambling backwards as her massive head bore down on her, stopping only a few feet from her. The smoke blowing from the dragon's flared nostrils stung at her eyes, and her breath was like an open furnace in her face.

“I can't!? Do you not seek punishment for this crime!?”

“For the thief,” Twilight insisted, wiping her burning eyes and glaring back at the dragon. “Not The Changeling Kingdom. And he won't pay with his life.”

“He has committed an unspeakable crime! I will not sit idly by while he wanders free!”

“I won’t condone a war on the changelings.”

“I do not need your permission,” the dragon growled.

“You do,” she insisted again. “Spike is from Equestria. He was born and raised in Canterlot, just like me. This is a matter between Equestria and The Changeling Kingdom. I'm sorry, but you're not part of this!”

“That changeling stole a dragon's heart!” the dragoness roared angrily, blowing another gout of smoke in Twilight's face. “This is a crime against our kind! I have ‒!”

“He's not your kind!” Twilight snapped, the sharpness of her tone managing to cut through even the dragon's booming voice. “He's nothing like you or any other dragon out there!” She took a step closer to the dragon, standing only inches from her snout. “If you're that worried for Spike, you can help my friend find him.”

The dragon's lips twisted into a snarl, and a low growl emanated from deep within her throat, causing the cavern floor to vibrate. Twilight jumped back in alarm as the dragon snapped at her suddenly, before pulling her head back up to the ceiling of the cavern. She looked down at the alicorn with narrowed eyes. “Go then. You have overstayed your welcome, Princess.”

Twilight regained her composure as best she could and nodded, trying to keep her legs from shaking too visibly. The dragoness stepped past her further into the cave and moved aside, allowing the two ponies to exit.

“C'mon, Twi.” Rainbow Dash sidled up next to her, and together they left the cavern, the pegasus nudging the alicorn subtly with her wing in order to hurry her on.

The light outside seemed less intense now that it no longer framed the dragon, and Twilight's vision adjusted to find nothing but blue skies above.

The cavern opened up onto a large, open plaza that overlooked the southern and western Dragon Territories. It was even larger than the cavern, larger even than Ponyville, and featured several overgrown gardens full of exotic plants Twilight had only ever read about. The gardens encroached on what had once been elaborately carved brick walkways, tracing an elegant, but fading pattern all across the plaza.

Passing outside, it became apparent that the cavern entrance was far from naturally formed. Time had worn away its edges, but carvings were still faintly visible all along the cliff face. Most were illegible writings, but Twilight noticed several equine faces of stone gazing down upon her as she and Rainbow Dash descended the steps connecting the cavern mouth and plaza.

The cliff face itself only extended a few hundred feet further up before culminating in the peak of whatever mountain the dragon had brought them to. Not a single cloud hovered in the air above the peak, leaving nothing but the blue pre-noon sky above the two ponies.

The clouds turned out to be beneath them, almost half a mile. They bled out from all over the mountainside below and trailed down the steep rock face before lifting into the air, forming trails of clouds that extended like a great cobweb out across The Dragon Territories as far as Twilight could see.

“This place is like Cloudsdale,” Rainbow Dash observed, reaching the edge of the plaza and looking down the steep drop beyond.

“She called it the source of all life in The Dragon Territories.” Twilight joined Rainbow Dash at the precipice overlooking the smaller mountains below. “She wasn’t exaggerating... I don't see Tangled Pass from here. You'll probably have to circle around the mountain to find it. Hopefully Spike won't have gotten too far.”

Rainbow Dash raised an eyebrow. “Why does it sound like you're not gonna be helping me?”

“I'm heading south.” Twilight pointed to the massive black clouds in the direction of The Changeling Kingdom, testimony to the hundreds of slumbering dragons polluting the air. “We can't save Spike without the thief.”

“You'll need help. He wiped the floor with you last night.”

Twilight swallowed, feeling the bruises all over her throat. “Too bad there's just two of us. He used Spike to get the upper hoof last time. I'll do better if I'm not worried about him. If I don't catch that changeling, Rainbow, he's gonna run into Rarity and the others' ambush.”

Rainbow Dash grimaced at the thought. “Good point. I guess. Sure you can catch him, though? Dunno if you noticed, but he didn't exactly have the wingspan of your everyday changeling.”

“It's the heart.” Twilight shook her head. “Not only is he feeding on its emotions, but he's somehow exploiting the inherent greed in a dragon's heart. Just like Spike did last year, the thief will keep growing the more he indulges in his greed.”

“Greed for what exactly?”

Twilight shrugged. “Power? It's not exactly physical ‒ you can’t really hoard it ‒ so it shouldn't work like that, but...”

“Changelings eat love,” Rainbow Dash finished, nodding her head in understanding. “Guess we haven't got much time then.” She unfurled her wings, feeling the flow of air around them. “Hit him hard with everything you've got, Twi. And stick to the north wind up here. If you're lucky, he's still following Tangled Pass. But with those wings, he could cut across the mountains easily.”

“When your servant has found the dragon without heart” ‒ the two ponies turned to find the lavender dragon gazing at them from within the cavern ‒ “Bring him here.”

“Servant!?”

“The heart of his homeland shall sustain him,” the dragon finished, ignoring Rainbow Dash's protest.

“Thank you.” Twilight gave the dragoness an appreciative smile while nudging Rainbow Dash in the ribs with her wing. “It's very generous of you.”

The dragon nodded her agreement.

“Be careful out there, Twi.” Rainbow Dash lifted into the air and hovered out past the edge of the plaza, giving the alicorn a wink. “But not too careful. Kick his flank!”

“And good luck finding Spike.” When Rainbow offered her hoof, Twilight bumped it. “I'll expect him back in that cave by the time I return!”

The pegasus did a short salute, dropping down a few feet below Twilight. “I better hurry up then! See ya soon!”

Rainbow Dash flipped around midair, gaining speed from a short dive before soaring off around the plaza, becoming nothing more than a blue speck within moments.

“You have slept a night away.” Twilight's gaze returned to the cavern, finding the dragon's golden eyes staring back at her. “Half a morning, too.”

Her head broke through the shadows, followed by her lengthy neck and hulking body. With her wings half unfurled as they were, she could barely fit through the forty foot tall opening, and it took her several moments to withdraw her entire body from the cavern, joining Twilight near the edge of the plaza. Remarkably, she avoided stepping on any of the plants or flowers situated beneath her.

Twilight caught herself staring as the great beast lumbered up beside her. During the argument within the cave, she had been acutely aware of the size of the dragon's head; how it had been noticeably larger than that of any other dragon she had seen, and how nearly a hundred ponies her own size would be able to fit between those jaws. But still the full size of the dragon before her was astounding. Her wings alone could span the width of Ponyville easily, and even as she stood with her on the other side of the wide plaza, the tip of her tail still lay within the shadows of her den.

The dragoness possessed an undeniable beauty as well. Her long neck arched and curved like a swan's, her feet rested lightly on the ground despite their massive size, poised as if she were some great predatory cat, and her lean, slender form betrayed no hint of decadence in so proud a creature. Even in the shadow cast by the mountain peak behind them, her silvery lavender scales seemed to be almost aglow. Her wings, as well as the scales along her belly and throat, were the color of milky gold, shimmering ever so faintly in shades of cerulean and pink.

“The thief will know you are coming,” the dragoness continued, eyeing the pony from up high. “And he will reach his kingdom long before you reach the Graylands.”

Twilight shook her head. “I'll catch him.”

“You know little of our geography,” the dragon rumbled. “You know less of your quarry. How is it you are so sure, Princess?”

Twilight gazed out across The Dragon Territories, silently despairing at how far away the distant plumes of smoke out south seemed. “Because I won't lose Spike. If I can't catch the thief here, I'll follow him straight to the heart of The Changeling Kingdom. I'll take on the thief, I'll take on his queen, I'll take on anything either of them throw at me. I’ll do it as many times as I have to. They'll regret taking his heart.”

She looked back up at the dragon, who was now giving her a small smile of approval. “You may be angry for what's been done to a dragon, but I'm furious for what's been done to my friend.”

Chapter 6

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“We oughtta be headin’ north by now,” Applejack murmured uneasily, looking at the murky, reddish spot of light shining through the ash clouds off near the west horizon. It had been dark even in the noonday sun, but dusk in the Graylands was darker still. Dark as night. She pointed a gray hoof at what looked like a break in the peaks off in the distance. “That's gotta be Tangled Pass, right?”

Fluttershy, ashen gray from head to hoof at this point, shook her head. “Sorry.”

Applejack and Pinkie Pie gave a collective sigh.

“Are you sure?” Pinkie Pie had long since stopped bouncing, and she had recently started trailing behind, falling to the back of the group. It was hard to tell if it was the depressing atmosphere of the borderlands, or if it were simply the vast amounts of ash caught in her poofy mane weighing her down. Applejack reckoned it was both. With all three of them wearing their masks, reading her friends' facial expressions had become difficult.

“It should take us longer than a single day to get there,” Fluttershy murmured uncertainly. “I can try to look at the map again if you want.”

Applejack gave shake of the head. “Naw. Sounds about right.”

“Maybe we're lost,” Pinkie Pie offered from behind them.

“We're goin' west, Pinkie.” Applejack nodded her head at the sunset ahead of them. “Plain as day.”

“But we're supposed to have changelings on our left, right?”

Applejack stopped and looked back at Pinkie Pie, then the direction she was pointing.

“Shoot.”

Off to their right, far enough that the dust in the air veiled everything to obscurity, the three ponies could see a bright green light, bobbing up and down as it slowly approached.

“B-but we're in the borderlands!” Fluttershy muttered, eyes full of fear as she looked to Applejack. “What are they doing here?”

“Maybe we are lost.” Applejack gritted her teeth in frustration, looking herself and her friends over. “They musta heard us,” she whispered. “But ain't no way they can see us from here. Not looking like this. C'mon.”

The three ponies dropped into low crouches and scurried across the ground as fast and silently as they could, putting the changelings' searchlight far behind them.

“Ahead of us!” Fluttershy whispered frantically, and Applejack noticed another green light, much fainter and farther away.

A third light sprung up off to their left, and the trio curved north, only to find another two lights ahead of them.

“Surrounded,” Applejack muttered, stopping for a quick moment to look for any way out between the changelings closing in on all sides.

“I don't think we can sneak past them.” Fluttershy pointed to the trail they were leaving in the ankle-deep ashes behind them.

“Ah guess we just punch straight on through, then.”

Behind her, Fluttershy's eyes widened. “W-what?”

“Charge!” Pinkie Pie called out exuberantly, shaking off most of the ashes stuck in her fur before dashing off toward the two groups of changelings ahead of them.

“Or we could try an' surprise 'em!” Applejack gave a groan before setting off after Pinkie, and Fluttershy soon followed.

Shouted commands rang through the air ahead of the three ponies, and the two lights split into four. The shapes of just as many changelings hovered into view before Pinkie Pie fell straight through the ground just in front of Applejack. Instinctively, the farmpony leapt forwards, just barely clearing the cleverly concealed pit the changelings had prepared and landing on the other side. She glanced down the hole, seeing only a huge cloud of ash and dust, but she could hear Pinkie Pie coughing from a few feet below her.

“Fluttershy!” The pegasus had avoided the trap only by a hanging hair, thanks in no small part to her wings. She was hovering above the pit when Applejack called her name. “Get Pinkie outta there! Hurry!”

Fluttershy nodded timidly and vanished into the cloud of ash below. Applejack barely managed to turn back before a changeling crashed into her, throwing her onto her back. Applejack slammed a forehoof against the changeling's chest, pushing it far enough away that her assailant's fangs snapped shut an inch off her own muzzle.

Twisting her body sideways, she threw the changeling off of her, delivering a swift kick with her hind leg to the creature's stomach. She leapt back onto her hooves and bucked a second oncoming changeling in the jaws, turning just in time to dodge a third bug, who stumbled into the pit behind her.

A bright green light erupted from a few feet ahead of her, and Applejack ducked a bolt of energy. Keeping her head low, she charged at the remaining fourth changeling, headbutting him into the ground and pounced on him.

After subduing the changeling beneath her, Applejack looked to the pit to see how far Fluttershy and Pinkie Pie had come. Instead she found herself surrounded by bright green lights. At least thirty changelings had mobilized all around her, too far away for her to reach any of them, but near enough that they would have no trouble hitting her with their spells.

A punch to the chin dazed her, and the changeling underneath her threw her to the ground, readying the magic in his own horn as he regained his footing.

Half a dozen changelings rose from the pit, carrying both Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy, and a seventh changeling emerged from among the ranks of his own kind. “Well, well...” He gave the ponies a satisfied smirk. “What's three ponies doing so far from home?”

“Ain't nothin' to ya!” Applejack spat, getting to her hooves slowly while eyeing the changeling at her side. “The Graylands are neutral territory!”

The changeling in command chuckled, shaking his head. “I'm afraid you're trespassing on changeling soil.”

Applejack's eyes narrowed. She made to step toward the changeling, but with the way thirty horns around her shifted in response, she thought better of it. “Are not. Yer border's a few miles south o' here. We ain't nowhere near.”

The commander nodded at the changeling beside Applejack, and suddenly she lay sprawled against the ground, the changeling's hooves pushing down on her back. She glared up at the commander as he approached. “What're you three doing here, pony?”

“Nut'n.”

“Sightseeing!”

The commander snarled and looked back at Pinkie Pie. “Is that supposed to be funny?”

The pink pony giggled playfully. “Come on over and I'll tell you!”

The commander raised an eyebrow at Applejack, who only shrugged. “For the last time: Why are you here!?” he demanded, stomping toward Fluttershy, who was visibly trembling. “If I don't get an answer, we're going straight to the queen!” He stopped just inches in front of Fluttershy, who whimpered in fright as the changeling's horn lit up.

Pinkie Pie gave the pegasus beside her a worried look before blurting, “we're on a secret mission!”

Applejack grimaced. They'd never make Tangled Pass at this rate. Still, if they couldn't avoid being brought before Chrysalis, perhaps truth was their best option.

“What mission?” the commander snapped, turning on Pinkie Pie.

Pinkie Pie's gaze shifted left and right conspiratorially, and she gave a devious smile. She whispered something Applejack couldn't hear from where she stood, and the commander approached her cautiously.

The two changelings on either side of Pinkie Pie gripped her forelegs, restraining her movement, and the commander stopped just inches from her face, leaning in to whisper something to her in a menacing tone.

Applejack gave Fluttershy a questioning look, but the frightened pegasus looked just as confused, shaking her head softly.

Without warning, the whispered conversation was interrupted when Pinkie Pie suddenly sneezed. Confetti exploded out her nose and ears, knocking back the commander and the two changelings holding her while cloaking her and Fluttershy in a thick cloud of glitter and streamers.

The moment of stunned confusion lasted longer among the changelings than it did among the ponies, and Applejack used the distraction to throw off the changeling on top of her. A pair of pink hooves wrapped around the changeling restraining Fluttershy and pulled him into the cloud, freeing the pegasus. Applejack charged into the surrounding ranks of changelings, knocking out two of them with swift kicks before being tackled to the ground. She could barely manage to move before the weight of a second and third changeling threw itself upon her, making escape impossible.

She looked toward Pinkie Pie, only to find her similarly bogged down by soldiers. The commander got back onto his hooves, coughing out small pieces of confetti as he did so. He threw a vehement glare at both ponies, before casting his gaze about the area, frowning.

“Where's the pegasus!?” he demanded, eyeing each of his surrounding soldiers in turn. “Where!?”

“Off ta kick yer queen's butt, Ah reckon.”

The commander gave her a scowl before turning to a group of seven changelings. “Find the pegasus. They were going west. She'll be headed for Tangled Pass.” He gestured at another two subordinates near the pit before approaching Applejack. “Send word to Queen Chrysalis.” He stooped down to look the downed Applejack in the eyes, smirking. Using his magic, he pulled off her ash-laden hat and mask, revealing her blond mane and orange muzzle. “Tell her we captured two of the wedding crashers.”

Rarity woke to numbness. She couldn't feel her legs, and her chest and face felt like rubber, leaving her helplessly stranded in whatever dark corner of the world she now found herself in.

It was only later she had the sense to open her eyes, though that didn't help her much at all. There was a faint sliver of a semblance of light somewhere ahead of her, but the rest of her surroundings were almost pitch black.

She could see the white of her fur, at the very least. She looked down and found her body sprawled across some large piece of wood, no doubt off the S.S. Sunrise. Her left foreleg was securely hooked around a nook in the wood, but refused to budge no matter how much she tried moving it. Though she couldn't quite feel it, she could see and hear water lapping at her hind legs, washing in under her piece of flotsam and dragging it backwards across a smooth stone floor, inch by inch.

She blinked her eyes a few times, allowing them to adjust to the darkness, and her surroundings became clearer. She was inside a small cavern, perhaps the size of her workroom back in Ponyville. Any cranny, crack, or crevice in the floor or along the walls had long since been worn away by the passage of time and tides. Behind her, most of the cavern was underwater. Gurgles and vacuous sloshes emanated from somewhere in the back, sounding most of all like the empty stomach of some great beast.

She tried wriggling her limbs again, and this time she felt a gradual coldness spreading from inside out, replacing the complete numbness.

Directly ahead of her, the slick, wet, stone floor curved upwards at a gentle incline. A tiny stream of water was trickling down the floor, running past her and into the pool behind her. Following the stream to its source, Rarity found that the cavern was more of a tunnel, extending farther than she could possibly see from where she lay. But the faint light she had seen before lay at its end, meaning that was where she would have to go.

Inch by inch, she managed to uncurl her left foreleg, releasing her death grip on the piece of flotsam. She reached out to the stone floor, but it was too smooth and slippery for her to gain any purchase on. Sensation had returned to her limbs by now, bringing with it an unbearable, searing cold. It took her a few minutes, but eventually she wriggled her way off the slab of wood and into the shallow, icy water.

The sudden spike of cold spurred her into action, and she managed to pull herself up the slippery surface and out of the water. She used her tongue to pry open her dry lips and dipped her mouth to the small stream running through the cavern.

She tasted salt, but she assumed that was either her own lips or the rocks beneath. In any case, she hardly cared. The water, although a tad cold, was refreshing, and the promise of more beyond the tunnel ahead of her was enough to keep her going.

The struggle continued for what felt like hours. Slowly but surely, she made her way up through the tunnel, past slimy, fungus-riddled rocks and smooth, polished pebbles, through twists and turns and dips and rises, across great pools of icy water, and through narrow passageways half her own size.

At first she crawled, but as her legs gradually limbered up, she began walking and stumbling through the darkness, seeking out the elusive light ahead, brightening with every step she took.

It was night by the time she could see the sky, though truth be told, that could mean any number of things. Whether it was still the same night she had been thrown overboard or if it was the night that followed, she had no idea.

After overcoming a final steep incline, the tight, rocky walls around her opened up into an old, overgrown forest. The trees all around her were many feet across and positively dwarfed her with their immense height, their vast canopies stretching out a hundred feet in each direction. The forest was situated on a steep slope, and past the trees, Rarity saw mountains and valleys all around her.

“The Dragon Territories,” Rarity whispered, surprising herself with the hoarseness of her voice. It was only now that the hopelessness of her situation dawned on her. She had no idea where the coast was. The chances of anypony from the S.S. Sunrise finding the route she had taken were miniscule at best. She didn't even know it herself. As far as Applejack and the others knew, she might as well have drowned.

The coastline could be in any direction from where Rarity stood, perhaps just behind the mountain she stood on, or miles and miles away. Without it to guide her, she had no idea where in The Dragon Territories she was.

Her stomach rumbled, cramping with pain, and Rarity sighed. She grimaced, but eventually bent down to take a bite out of the knee-high grass growing all around her. It was as bitter and bland as the grass back in Equestria, which was strangely comforting, she supposed, gagging several times before swallowing.

Her best bet would be to wait out the night inside the cover of the forest, she figured. Once she could see the sun, she'd know where to find the coast. Hopefully, she could follow that north to Equestria and be back in Ponyville before the others made it back with Spike.

Or without.

Her heart clenched up painfully just at the thought, and Rarity gave a worried sigh, looking out upon the mountain ranges far away.

Her breath caught in her throat when she spotted a glint of color between two of the peaks in the distance. She squinted and ducked to look past the branches blocking her view, and she caught sight of a distinct rainbow trail tracing a straight path across the night sky. As soon as it had appeared, it was gone again, vanishing behind another mountain.

Rarity stood stock still for several long moments as she contemplated what she'd just seen. Nothing she could think of made sense, however. Rainbow Dash was supposed to be following Tangled Pass. Either Rarity had traveled a hundred miles inland through the underwater caverns somehow, or Rainbow Dash was horribly off course.

As much as she wanted to believe the former, she knew there was no way Rainbow Dash would be flying at such an altitude if she was above the pass. Something had gone wrong.

Before she could continue the thought, she was distracted when the trees around her caught a flash of fire from somewhere behind her. A few hundred feet or so up the slope from where she stood, the steep cliffs rising up out of the ground on either side of her converged, forming a large cavern opening where they met. From where she stood, the entrance was partially obscured by the forest, but even as Rarity looked, it was impossible to miss the second bloom of fire from within.

Rarity ducked behind a tree as quickly as she could, creeping around its base to the other side in order to get a better view of the cavern. Ahead of her, the forest ended abruptly in a charred field, littered with the burnt stumps of the same colossal trees that surrounded Rarity. A single tree was still blocking her view of the entrance itself, however, so Rarity felt compelled to venture closer.

She stepped in something soft, and she looked down to see most of her hoof submerged in a thick layer of damp moss. It caught the light of a third blast of fire from within the cavern, allowing Rarity to notice another set of footprints running across the patch of moss.

She had seen those before. Recently. In the Everfree Forest.

Rarity was running before she could even wonder what was happening, and by then, she could only wonder why on earth she was running toward the dragon's cave instead of far away. She could find no answer to either question, yet the compulsion that had set her running in the first place was too strong too simply ignore.

“Begone!”

The roar was loud enough to snap Rarity out of whatever madness had drawn her to the cave. She winced at the ground-shuddering volume, stopping dead in her tracks just a few feet outside the opening in the cliffs.

Fire flashed again, much closer to the entrance, and a small, black form sailed through the air from deeper within the cavern. It hit the wall near the opening before dropping to the ground, and Rarity felt the madness that had just left her return. There was no doubt about it: It was Spike lying there before her, stained black from head to toe with soot.

Before she knew it, she was beside the small dragon, gazing into a large cavern filled with more treasures than she could ever dream of ‒ and a dragon a hundred times her own size, scarlet scales glowing in the vermillion fire leaking from between its fearsome teeth. Its eyes, the color of burning coals, settled on the pony, and with a snap of its jaws, the dragon extinguished the fire it had been ready to unleash.

“L-leave him alone, you... you ruffian!” Rarity shouted hoarsely, stepping in front of Spike protectively. “I don't know who you think you are, but ‒”

“Is this your work, pony?” the dragon demanded of her hotly, growling as he lowered his head to Rarity's level.

Rarity took a step back as the head of the dragon approached. She shook her head. “This is my friend! I will not have y‒” A vivid, excruciating pain suddenly seized her left hind leg, and with a piercing scream, Rarity collapsed, twisting around in a futile attempt at escaping whatever was happening to her. With her eyes shut tight against the pain, she could only register the sound of her own blood pounding against her eardrums and the dragon in front of her snarling.

The pain only grew more unbearable by the second, and Rarity opened her eyes to look back at her leg. She saw Spike, a strange, vacant look in his eyes as his teeth sank into her thigh. Instinctively, her free right hind leg coiled back and kicked Spike in the face. The little dragon seemed undeterred, and Rarity kicked out at him again with all the strength she could muster, loosening his hold on her leg.

Every shift of Spike's teeth sent fresh, nauseating waves of pain crashing against every fiber of her leg, inducing a surge of adrenaline in her other leg. After a fourth, desperate kick, Spike finally blinked, looking Rarity in the eyes. A small flicker of recognition ‒ and perhaps surprise ‒ passed across his features, and he opened his mouth slowly, releasing Rarity. With a frightened, teary-eyed whimper, Rarity withdrew the leg gingerly, scooting a few feet away from the small dragon staring at her blankly.

“He is cursed,” the larger dragon rumbled from behind her. “An unliving husk. I would be doing him a favor.”

“No!” Rarity winced at the intense pain pulsing all throughout her leg, drawing her breath in short, shallow gasps. With a series of grunts and whimpers, she pulled herself up to stand on three hooves, taking a few more steps away from Spike. She glanced back at him, shaking as a hundred different emotions clashed within her. “I‒ We'll... I'll take him with me,” she breathed, looking back up at the scarlet dragon. “We'll be out of your hair.”

The dragon hesitated, narrowing his eyes at her. After only a short moment, however, he sniffed, turning and heading back into his cave without a word.

“I-I don't suppose you have any medical... supplies?” Rarity called out after the dragon haltingly, realizing quickly that she was being ignored. “Or bandages?” She winced again and looked back at her leg, keeping an eye on Spike as well. A red, swollen crescent had swallowed her cutie mark, and she could feel a warmth running down both sides of her thigh, already pooling around her hoof.

She cast a furtive glance at the dragon's hoard, and ‒ not far from where she stood ‒ found a red tablecloth of embroidered silk half-buried beneath a stack of gold and silver trinkets. Gulping nervously, she eyed the larger dragon further within the cavern, his back turned to her for the moment. Using her magic, she made a neat incision through the silk, cutting out the exposed part of the fabric without making a single sound. She rolled the cloth up quickly and hurled it outside the cavern out of the dragon's sight.

When the dragon didn't react, she turned back to Spike, nodding her head at the cavern exit. “Go.”

The dragon obeyed wordlessly, innocently, turning towards the cavern exit and walking stiffly out. Rarity frowned at him as he went. Of all the emotions roiling within her, confusion and anger seemed paramount at this point.

“Spike.”

Spike didn't react. He stopped in front of the rolled up piece of silk, making to grab it before Rarity pulled it away with her magic.

“Why did you bite me, Spike?” Rarity demanded, holding the roll of silk near her head in order to hold the dragon's attention.

Spike shrugged. “Trouble why it soot... pie is... kiss empty,” he muttered nonsensically, frowning in confusion as he stumbled over his words.

Rarity's own frown melted away as worry quelled her anger. Biting her lip, she looked toward the distant mountain peaks where she had seen Rainbow Dash. There was a great many miles between those peaks and the mountain Rarity and Spike were standing upon. Fortunately, only a single, large valley lay ahead of them, densely forested as far as Rarity could see in the moonlight, but relatively flat. Traversing it shouldn't require much climbing, though she figured it would take them at least half a day.

“Your birthday all over again,” Rarity sighed, grimacing at the climb they'd have to make to reach the valley below. “Only worse.” A coldness was gripping her back leg. She hoped it was simply the nip of mountain air, but her mind quickly wandered to grimmer scenarios. “Much worse.”

She rolled out the piece of silk she was holding, measuring its width and length roughly by eye. She might have enough fabric for five, maybe six bandages. Hopefully, it would be enough.

Rarity sighed again, turning back to Spike. She nodded her head down the slope, back the way she'd come and toward the cavern she'd first emerged from. There was a large pool of water not far underground, and it was most likely her best bet at cleaning her wound.

“Come along now, Spike.” Rarity's eyes bulged in pain as she shifted her weight forwards to walk. “I‒! I-I suppose we could both do... with a bath.”

Chapter 7

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Rarity blinked her eyes rapidly as she gritted her teeth, taking her breaths in short gasps. Behind her, the newly bound bandage about her thigh tightened in response to her magic, and each end of the silk strip tied together in a large bow that covered her cutie mark.

Rarity lifted her head and closed her eyes, taking a few deeper breaths to steady herself. Eventually, the pain faded, returning sensation to the rest of her body. She stood still for a few moments, enjoying the tranquility of her surroundings.

It seemed a long time ago she'd felt the sun on her face like this. She had lost a day after being thrown overboard, she was almost certain of that. The skies had been unseasonably cloudy the day she had spent at sea. The day before that had been spent cooped up in a train cabin all day.

Spike's birthday, she concluded, smiling thinly. That was the last time she'd truly felt the sun. Ironic. Both of them had been such lovely days, and she would be spending them stuck with Spike.

She heard the leaves of the surrounding forest rustle before she felt the breeze on her face, robbing her of the warmth brought by the sun. Sighing, she opened her eyes and lowered her gaze to find Spike standing inches beside her.

With a loud yelp, the unicorn jumped backwards in surprise, immediately regretting it. Rarity suppressed a scream even as her left hind leg screamed back at her, flooding her vision with a million swimming stars.

“Spike!” she complained, shooting the vacant dragon a glare. “How many times must I tell you not to sneak up on me!?”

“Inside sleep thaw hair eye.”

Rarity gave the dragon an uneasy look, and a chill went down her spine, just as it did every time Spike spoke in his jumbled words and phrases.

She looked through the foliage of the surrounding forest and toward the peaks that marked their destination, still hopelessly far away. It would be long past midnight by the time they came anywhere near. Provided, of course, that they kept going for that long.

Her gaze dropped once more to Spike. She hadn't noticed it at first when they had met last night, but without the soot and in the daylight, it was made all the more clear. Spike's condition was far worse than Twilight had anticipated. The twinkle in his eyes was long gone, and whenever Rarity looked at them, she was met with the distinct impression of something... not quite alive watching her. His scales were several shades paler since she had last seen him aboard the train, and he was constantly shivering, giving him a frail, decrepit appearance.

She wasn't certain he would last past midnight.

Even now, after the morning's descent down the mountain and having spent noon traversing the valley, the little dragon looked utterly exhausted. Still, he stood where she had left him, holding what remained of Rarity's roll of silk. In hindsight, having him carry her bandages ‒ while fair ‒ had perhaps not been the best idea.

She took hold of the silk with her magic, tugging at the roll a few times before Spike let go. She debated on whether she could balance it on her back somehow before simply unfurling the cloth and draping it over herself like a cape.

“I hope you're up for a little more walking, Spike.” She motioned toward a break in the undergrowth ahead, the only one afforded to them in the increasingly dense forest covering the valley floor. “Little ones first.”

Spike glanced slowly at the proposed path, then looked back to Rarity for a moment before shuffling his feet forward at a snail's pace.

Rarity tried her best at an encouraging smile, despite the situation. “Come now. If I can walk this far on only three legs, you can walk... without a heart, right?”

Somehow, for whatever reason, Spike seemed to agree, lengthening his strides. He set into the forest at brisk pace, leaving Rarity struggling to keep up.

Although they had been traveling through the woods for several hours, they had yet to find a single trail or just the slightest hint of a path. It was impeding their progress far more severely than Rarity would have imagined when she had seen the valley from above the night before. Seeing the path that lay ahead of them now, Rarity began doubting her previous estimate of reaching the mountain before dawn. Not that they'd be able to keep going for that long.

Picking their way across the jungle-like terrain had at least one benefit, Rarity consoled herself. Spike's smaller size meant he could duck and weave through the brush much easier than Rarity. The unicorn could maintain a healthy distance between herself and the dragon without having to pace herself.

Rarity ducked under a branch, glancing at her freshly bandaged leg as she did so. Spike had always been so mild-mannered around her, around everypony. She couldn't remember ever seeing him losing his temper, or showing the slightest hint of even being capable of anger. There had been his growth spurt a year ago, but even so, it had never occurred to her just how dangerous he could be. Not until those gem-crushing jaws had been closed around her thigh.

She knew it wasn't his fault. His missing heart was affecting him somehow. He had been cornered by a ferocious dragon. It was completely understandable for him to lash out.

And yet, she had barely slept last night, knowing that he was lying there beside her, only a few steps away. The fact that he not once shut his eyes all night had made her all the more wary. More than once, she had considered using the silk to tie him up. Even now as they walked, Rarity refused having him trailing behind her.

Great, fire-breathing dragons would occasionally circle around in the sky above, the valley forest was a nigh impassable mess of roots and branches, and her left hind leg throbbed painfully with every step she took. But if anything was making this journey so much more unbearable than the one they had made from Canterlot to Ponyville, it was the distrust. Needing to constantly stay alert ‒ around Spike of all people.

The foliage overhead thinned for a brief moment as Rarity struggled past a series of drooping branches, taking care not to snag her makeshift cape. Miles and miles away, she could just see the peaks of the mountain they were pursuing. Unsurprisingly, they seemed as far away as they had fifteen minutes ago.

Rarity shook her head. She wasn't even sure what she was doing anymore. She had seen Rainbow Dash fly past those peaks last night. With the pegasus' speed, there was no telling how far away she'd be by now. She could only hope she and Twilight would remain in the area. Whatever had led to Spike becoming separated from their group, the two ponies couldn't expect him to have gotten far.

Rarity stole a glance back the way she and Spike had come. The mountain they'd started at still seemed deceptively near, discouragingly so.

They should have stayed where they were, Rarity realized with a sinking heart. Signaling Rainbow Dash from atop a mountain would have been easy. But stuck in this forest, the pegasus could be flying by right overhead without either noticing the other.

A soft thud drew Rarity back to the matter at hoof, and she looked ahead to find that Spike had abruptly vanished.

“Spike?” The unicorn hurried forwards as best she could through the path trod out by the dragon, finding him lying face down on the grass. Rarity circled around him carefully, looking for any injuries. “Are you alright, dear?”

Spike stirred, but made no further effort to get up or reply. Not that the reply would have been in any way intelligible.

“Can you stand?”

Again, Spike neither moved nor replied.

Rarity lifted him up onto his feet using her magic, only for him to flop right over again when she let go. “Come on, Spike,” she pleaded, pulling him up again. “We're in the middle of a forest a hundred miles away from anything resembling civilization! I need you to walk!”

Push and pull and plead as she might, however, the dragon refused to move a muscle, looking for all the world to be asleep were it not for his tired-looking, half-lidded eyes.

Rarity grimaced. “I suppose there's nothing for it...” She lifted the dragon again, bobbing him up and down in the air gently to test his weight. With a despairing sigh, she dropped him to the ground again, realizing he would be much too heavy for her to carry in her magic.

Chewing at her lower lip in thought, she paced about the dragon one more time before finally giving in.

“If you bite me again...” she warned Spike, lifting him up onto her back. “I'm leaving y‒” Rarity yelped in surprise the moment she put Spike down, feeling a deep chill emanating from the little dragon even through the silk cape she was wearing. When Spike slumped down further and the side of his head touched her uncovered neck, she screeched even louder. To say he was cold as ice would have been an exaggeration, but only barely. He was far colder than any pony should ever be, and absolutely freezing for a dragon. Compared to the almost tropical heat of the valley, it was an unsettling, unnatural cold.

Rarity shivered. From the cold. From Spike's dire state. From knowing his teeth were inches from her neck.

The mere thought gave her a mild surge of adrenaline, and with a grunt of effort, she moved forwards, limping toward their shared destination.

“Here we are again,” she sighed, finding the forest a good deal harder to navigate without Spike clearing the way first. “You're too tired to stand, and I'm stuck carrying you home. A hopelessly long path lies ahead of us, and a disaster lies behind us.” Rarity scoffed and shook her head. “Really, though, after our trials of fire and water I can hardly call a simple date a disaster. No horrid dragons, no storms at sea.”

The sound of a twig snapping somewhere off to her right distracted Rarity, and she threw a wary gaze in the direction of the sound. She didn't stop. Walking on three legs was hard. Doing so while balancing Spike on her back required a rhythm she couldn't afford to break.

“I do appreciate it,” she added after a moment, deciding that there was nothing out there. “Nopony in town knows how to woo a lady quite like you. Not many try.”

A short, steep incline greeted her after pushing aside a cluster of ferns, and the unicorn groaned with exasperation. “If only... things weren't so... complicated. I wish I... didn't need you, but...” Rarity shook her head, panting as she reached the top of the incline. “I wish I could show you I don't need you. Find a nice stallion, preferably a prince, or some member of the Canterlot elite. No ordinary pony will do, you see. I hope you appreciate just how high you've managed to set the bar, Spike.”

She hadn't expected much of a reply, but even so, Spike's silence was disquieting. She chanced a glance backwards, finding the dragon slumped motionless across her back. It was not unlike how she'd originally positioned him, yet his stillness remained... unnerving.

“Spike? Say something, Spike.”

Spike stirred sleepily, muttering incoherently. “Super, ugh, pond everpluh...”

For what felt like the umpteenth time that day, Rarity grimaced, frowning with worry at the dragon. With a swift tug of her magic, she yanked the silk out from underneath him, gasping at the sudden cold when the rest of his body came in contact with hers. She draped the cape over Spike, covering both him and herself.

Rarity continued on through the forest, feeling Spike slowly going from motionless to shivering. It was a change she could only hope was positive.

“Don't die, Spike,” Rarity muttered, returning her attention to the forest ahead of her. “Not like this. Not when it's my fault. You're not supposed to die for another thousand years. Or however long it is you dragons live.”

Spike's hands tightened momentarily, giving the fur on her throat a tiny squeeze that both encouraged her and terrified her. She chastised herself for the latter. Spike was in mortal peril, and yet she was still worrying about his teeth.

“I need you Spike,” she repeated, her tone more subdued. Spike's chill was slowly creeping into her bones, making her shiver every now and then despite the warm weather. “I'm not sure what it is you see in me. What you love about me. But you make me feel like so much more than I am.”

She gave the half-conscious dragon a sad smile. “Why, I'm afraid without you, I'm just some mare living alone with her cat. One of Equestria's hundreds of dressmakers trying to make a name for herself.”

She retained her bitter smile as she looked forwards again, focusing her attention on climbing yet another incline. “I can't help but wonder if that's what love is. Needing someone. Not being able to ‒”

“Rainbow. Iron own rainbow.”

Rarity raised her eyebrow at the interruption, and lifted her gaze to the skies. “Now, that was two 'rainbows'...” She took hold of a thin overhanging branch with her magic, and pulled it aside with her magic, just in time to see Rainbow Dash hovering by not far above her.

The pegasus must have caught the glint of magic, for she looked down at that exact moment, spotting both Rarity and Spike.

“Rarity?” Rainbow Dash threw a quick glance at the mountain the unicorn had come from before dipping through the foliage and landing beside her. The pegasus stood there panting for a short moment, giving her a confused look. “The hay are you doing here? And is that Spike?”

“It's a long story.” Rarity pulled back the front of her silk covering to reveal the sickly pale scales on Spike's head. “We need to get Spike his heart at once. At this rate, I doubt he'll make it through the night.”

“Right...” Rainbow Dash gave Rarity an unmistakably suspicious look. She nodded in the direction they had to go ‒ a ways to the right of Rarity's original course ‒ following after only when the unicorn began moving. “But how did you end up here?”

“A storm hit our ship,” Rarity explained, trying her best to ignore Rainbow Dash's stare. “I got thrown overboard, and the next thing I knew, I woke up here.”

“You woke up here? In the middle of The Dragon Territories? That's not exactly what I'd call a long story.”

“Well, we don't exactly have time ‒” A sharp prod to the back of her head interrupted Rarity's reply, and she whipped her head around to shoot a withering glare at Rainbow Dash hovering behind her, still wearing her suspicious frown. “Do tell if there's anything I can you help with, Rainbow Dash,” she growled through gritted teeth.

“Sorry.” The pegasus sounded anything but apologetic. “It's just last time I saw Spike, me and Twilight were getting our flanks handed to us by a mutated changeling. And now here he is, riding my friend, who's supposed to be in the borderlands right about now.”

“You didn't catch the thief!?” Rarity gave the pegasus a wide eyed stare. “How are we going to save Spike!?”

“Shuh... hay ink princess.”

Rainbow Dash, looking ready to burst with a reply of her own, paused at Spike's sleepily muttered interruption. “Uh. What'd he just say?”

“Absolute nonsense, dear,” Rarity replied, ducking under an overhanging branch. “I haven't gotten a coherent sentence out of him since I met him last night. I suspect it may have to do with the fact that he's dying. How could you lose the changeling!?”

“Hey! No changing subject!” Rainbow Dash flew up over the branch Rarity had just passed and overtook the limping unicorn, turning around to face her as she hovered in the air in front of her. “Tell me something only the real Rarity would know!”

Rarity raised an eyebrow, but when Rainbow Dash didn't seem inclined to back down, she sighed. “About a year ago, I had a brief, delirious obsession with a boulder I named Tom.”

Rainbow shook her head. “Everypony knows about that.”

“They what!?”

“Try again.”

Rarity gave her another scowl, then smiled. “A certain pegasus ‒ I believe she had had more than a few tankards of cider ‒ once confided in me that 'she kinda liked the color pink'. Said it made her feel more ‒”

“Nuh-uh!” Now it was Rainbow Dash's turn to glare at the unicorn, who smiled smugly back. “Not in front of Spike!”

“‒ girly.”

The pegasus' scowl was broken when she bumped her head into another branch from her continued backwards hover. “Fine. I believe you.” She let herself drop to the ground at Rarity's side, matching her rather sluggish pace. “And don't worry too much about Spike. He should feel better once we reach that mountain up ahead.” She nodded her head at Rarity's bandaged leg. “But what about you? You've been leaving a trail of those from all the way up the mountain back there. What happened?”

Applejack had never much liked riding trains. The ride from Ponyville to Baltimare had been no exception. Sailing with the S.S. Sunshine had been far worse. The Graylands had been a living nightmare. Not frightening or all that dangerous, just... soul-sucking.

And now, after a day's march with little to no rest, she and Pinkie Pie found themselves wandering through a smelly swamp. The young farmer had thought she missed the shade of green after all the time spent in The Graylands, but the ones surrounding her were all wrong.

The sickly olive green of the moss underhoof, squelching wetly with every step. The pale green and autumnal colors of the lichen clinging to every tree and rock in sight. Trees were sparse in this area, and the few that hadn't succumbed to fungal infections bore leaves of unhealthy yellow shades. Immense stretches of stagnant water surrounded them on both sides of the narrow path they were being led along by the changelings. Bright yellow-green algae covered every inch of the water, giving the surface a deceptively solid appearance.

It seemed all they had done was wander from one wasteland into another. From one that sustained nothing but ashes, to one that sustained nothing but the mosquitoes and flies buzzing incessantly all around her.

Oddly enough, she was more annoyed with her current predicament than scared. She'd convinced herself a long while ago that Chrysalis wouldn't be bold enough to hurt her or Pinkie Pie. She had no reason to, and every reason not to. The two ponies were close friends of the princesses. All four of them. At best, Chrysalis would release them for fear of further antagonizing Equestria. At worst, they'd be held hostage and the princesses would have to ransom them.

Even so, Applejack threw a worried glance back at her fellow captive. Her legs had regained their usual bright pink color after the group had waded through a flooded area a few hours ago, contrasting the slightly gray tinge that still clung to the rest of her coat.

Applejack was used to long days working the orchards. Even with her hooves shackled, she had the endurance to keep up with the forced march of the changeling party. She couldn't say the same for Pinkie Pie. She looked absolutely exhausted, dragging her hooves and hanging her head, yet she kept going. Neither of the ponies had much of a choice in the matter.

“For Pete's sake, an hour's all Ah'm asking!” Applejack groaned, turning her head to glare at the changeling commander that had been utterly ignoring her for the past twenty minutes.

This time, however, he finally turned his head to give her a haughty look. “Gag her.”

Applejack opened her mouth to protest, only to have a coil of her own rope jammed in between her teeth. Whichever changeling was working his magic, he wasted no time on pleasantries, tugging the piece of rope back forcefully and tightening it around her skull before tying it up securely.

“You can have your rest on the ferry.” The commander returned to the front of the changeling party, approaching, Applejack realized belatedly, a great wall, forming the periphery of a circle that must be several miles wide.

The wall seemed simple enough in its design, consisting of hundreds, probably thousands of thick, wooden logs raised on end, one end buried deeply and securely in the soft ground or within the murky, stagnant waters, and the other end, fifteen feet aboveground, sharpened to a needle point. The logs were all arranged in a sturdy-looking bi-layer formation, mortared to each other by some tar-like substance that coated every inch of wood, making the wall look more like it had been hewn from a single piece of stone rather than its individual timbers.

The whole thing was covered in a thick layer of moss and lichen, explaining why Applejack hadn't immediately noticed the structure. Its massive size made it anything but subtle, but it didn't seem out of place either, not after having passed by the dozen changeling outposts between here and the borderlands.

Applejack stepped forward to follow the rest of the changelings approaching what she assumed to be their final destination, but she was surprised to find herself simply stepping out of the ropes that had been securely bound about her hooves. At the same time, she felt the knot on her gag loosen, allowing her to spit it out with ease.

None of the changelings in front of her seemed to have noticed, but warning shouts instantly rose from the back of the party. The changeling commander turned, immediately adopting a guarded stance. Applejack did the same, but quickly realized none of the changelings were looking at her. She turned her head to look at Pinkie Pie, who had been similarly untied. Her attention was turned to the back of the party like the rest of the changelings, and she wore a bright smile.

Applejack followed her gaze, and her jaw nearly dropped when she saw Twilight approaching the party of changelings, Fluttershy walking at her side. The pegasus looked distinctly uncomfortable, trying her best to hide her face behind her mane as she shuffled forwards cautiously. Twilight, on the other hoof, seemed strangely at ease, smiling at each of the changelings in turn as she strode confidently forward, almost passing into the midst of the group before the soldiers in the rear had the presence of mind to block her path.

“Hello!” Twilight greeted them jovially. Whether she was speaking to Applejack and Pinkie Pie or the changelings, Applejack had no way of telling. “I'm not sure if you recognize me, but ‒”

“I recognize you,” the commander spat, striding through his fellow soldiers while sneering at Twilight. “You blasted me halfway across Canterlot!”

Twilight gave the changeling commander an empty smile. “I'm sure I did.”

A green glow flared up around the commander's horn, and the other changelings rearranged themselves quickly, moving into a defensive formation around the two earth ponies.

“I can't recommend that.”

The commander promptly ignored the warning and fired a magical bolt at Twilight. The spell flew forth with blinding speed, bounced off an invisible barrier a few inches in front of Twilight, and struck the commander in the chest, bowling him over and sending him plowing through the moss.

“These ponies were caught trespassing!” one of the changelings behind Applejack piped up, his voice wavering ever so slightly. “They must be brought before Queen Chrysalis!”

Twilight nodded, walking forwards toward her friends' captors. The alicorn's smile was gone, leaving her expression unreadable. When she showed no sign of stopping, the changelings that had been blocking her path parted before her, watching her guardedly as she walked straight past them.

Applejack gave an appreciative smile and was about to thank Twilight when the alicorn walked straight past her and Pinkie Pie as well, sparing them little more than a crooked smile. Every pony and changeling stared at the princess quizzically, watching in silence as she made her way to the front of the group.

Once she had passed the last changeling and the commander, still groaning as he lay buried in the damp moss, she turned to face everyone once more. “You can bring my friends to Chrysalis. They'll be coming with me.”

The changelings closest to Twilight gave each other questioning glances, but two of them eventually stepped forwards past Twilight and their fallen commander. Their horns glowed in unison, and a large hatch hidden beneath the moss between the group of changelings and the timber wall opened up with a rusty creak, revealing a narrow stairway leading underground.

Twilight nodded her thanks at the two changelings and promptly disappeared down the stairs, leaving the two changelings staring at each other uneasily, no doubt wondering what Chrysalis would have in store for them. The rest of the group, including Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy, followed after in awkward silence, broken only by a few murmurs from among the changelings.

“What exactly are we doin'?” Applejack whispered to Fluttershy as the pegasus joined them, still looking visibly terrified from being around so many changelings.

Fluttershy shook her head in bewilderment. “I'm not sure.” She hesitated a moment. “She and Rainbow Dash couldn't catch the thief.”

Pinkie Pie gasped. “They missed it?”

The pegasus shook her head again. “Well... no. But he got away.”

The three ponies passed down the stairs, and entered out onto the shore of an enormous lake. On the other side of the wall, Applejack realized, the ground fell away into a gigantic crater-like depression, filled halfway with stagnant, algae-infested water.

A wavy trail split the algae, straight across the lake, leaving a brownish, murky streak of water through the green, stretching out from the shore they stood upon to an island out in the center of the lake. Upon the island, Applejack caught her first sight of what her captors had always referred to simply as 'The Hive'. Chrysalis' fortress. The capital of the changelings.

Not unlike the structure of a termite mound, the hive rose at least a hundred feet into the air, and was wider at its base than Ponyville itself. The entire structure was black, likely coated or consisting of the same resin that held together the walls surrounding the lake. The hive was completely asymmetrical in its design, with twisted spires and spikes sticking out of the main structure every which way, and giant holes pierced the structure, much like the changelings' own anatomy. It seemed the perfect cross of a bug's nest and an evil tyrant's lair. In many ways, it looked exactly like Applejack had imagined it.

“So Ah take it Twilight thinks we'll find the thief in there.”

Fluttershy nodded timidly. “It looks like it.”

Applejack gulped. “She have a plan?”

“Not that I know of.”

A large raft was tied up by the shore, and Applejack assumed that its recent passage from the hive was what had left the trail across the green waters. A group of four changelings had been guarding the ferry, but it seemed Twilight had already commandeered it somehow, standing at its front and gazing at the hive in the distance, half a mile across the lake.

“We should ask her!” Pinkie Pie chirped, trotting across the shore toward the ferry.

Applejack frowned as she looked at Twilight. There was something about her she couldn't quite put her hoof on. The way she stared so intently at the hive. She had greeted the changelings with smiles and mien that could rival Rarity's, but that made it all the more worrisome. Whether it was the jovial or impassive expression Twilight wore, Applejack was sure they both concealed a storm.

Time would be running out for Spike soon, Applejack realized, and only now did she feel truly anxious for their meeting with the queen. Chrysalis' options were limited, but Twilight looked to be capable of almost anything at this point. If she had a plan, Applejack wasn't sure she wanted to know it.

Pinkie Pie bounced merrily onto the large raft, sending the whole thing lurching up and down to the consternation of the changelings already on board. While a few of them shot her dirty looks as she kept bouncing across the raft, none of them intervened, continuing their hushed argument amongst themselves.

Applejack and Fluttershy followed more cautiously, stepping gently onto the raft and joining the two ponies at the front.

Twilight turned her head to smile at her friends as they approached. “It's good to see you both safe and sound.”

“Ah'd feel a lot safer if we weren't heading straight into the lion's den,” Applejack remarked, seating herself on the mossy timber of the raft. The crude vessel seemed to have fallen into disuse over the past many years, if indeed it had ever seen much use at all. Applejack assumed the latter, considering the inhabitants of the hive. A raft such as this was likely reserved exclusively for prisoners.

“Whatcha planning?” Pinkie Pie asked, cutting straight to the chase.

Twilight glanced at the changelings boarding the raft behind them, then shook her head. “Not now.”

“Twi... you're not thinkin' of doin' anythin' stupid, are ya?”

Twilight turned her head to look at the hive, her gaze hardening somewhat. “I'm going to find the thief. What happens from there is up to Chrysalis and him.”

“You're not alone in this,” Applejack reminded her. “We got your back, o' course, but it also means you'll be involvin' us if ya decide to take on Chrysalis.”

“I won't.” Twilight's horn was wreathed in magenta, and the raft set into motion on its own, accelerating gently across the surface of the lake. The changelings that hadn't yet boarded didn't seem to mind much, hovering after the raft at a leisurely pace.

Applejack wasn't quite sure she believed her. “Just remember we'll be in the middle of her hive. Don't go antagonizin' her either.”

Twilight's eyes settled on Applejack for a brief moment, laden with an uncharacteristic annoyance, before her gaze returned to the hive ahead. “I'm not stupid.”

“Ah know ya ain't, ya just... look like you're about to do somethin' stupid.” Applejack put a comforting hoof around Twilight's shoulder, and Fluttershy, having walked up on the other side of the alicorn, did the same.

“We'll get Spike's heart back,” she assured Twilight gently. “You'll see.”

Twilight nodded. “He won't get away again.”

It wasn't long before they reached Chrysalis' hive, and Twilight followed the trail in the water around the dark palace. They sailed under a low archway into the hive itself, finding a small, well concealed dock.

A few of the changelings from their party must have flown ahead to inform the soldiers guarding the dock of the situation, for no one seemed that alarmed at the four unrestrained ponies' arrival. At Twilight's approach, the doors into the interior of the hive opened, and a large group of changelings escorted the four visitors through twisted, tight, darkened corridors.

Applejack was more partial to the term 'tunnels', just as she would have identified their dock as a cavern. The interior of the hive was the same shade of black as the outside, with a few streaks of what looked crystallized green goo along the walls and ceilings. Every surface was rugged as stone, threatening to trip up the ponies as they struggled to keep up with the natives of the hive. The sparse number of torches put up along their way, burning with green fire, did little to illuminate the almost impenetrable darkness of their surroundings.

After having been led around the hive for almost ten minutes, the group of ponies came upon a much wider corridor than any they'd seen previously. At its end stood a large pair of studded iron doors, painted black with some sort of green insignia on them. As with all other doors they’d come upon, they parted before Twilight, their loud groan reverberating within the cavernous room beyond.

Unlike every other part of the hive, it seemed the throne room ahead of them was the only chamber with natural lighting. The first thing Applejack noticed upon the doors opening was the massive stained glass window on the other side of the room. It showed a simple depiction of the insignia that had been on the doors, done in varying shades of green. A shaft of light shone through the great window, falling upon the throne near the center of the chamber, raised upon a ten-foot dais overlooking the entire throne room.

The chamber itself was rather private as far as throne rooms went, especially considering the owner's arrogance. Less than fifty feet lay between the entrance and the throne, and the room was no more than about thirty feet wide, just enough to accommodate the large window in the back. The walls to the side were lined with many interconnected alcoves, making the room seem both larger and darker, and green banners hung from the walls near the ceiling, forty feet above.

With the light of the window from behind her, Chrysalis was but a silhouette to the four ponies entering, hidden in the shadow of her own black, thorned throne. Her green eyes were fixed on Twilight as they all entered, ignoring the three other ponies. A half-circle of armored changelings surrounded the doorway, parting to let the alicorn princess pass, but barring the way for the others. Applejack gave the changeling in her way a dirty look, but stepped back, keeping a watchful eye on Twilight.

“I must say, I love your new wings,” Chrysalis complimented the young alicorn as she approached the throne, her voice dripping with malice. “What brings you here? It certainly wasn't my invitation.”

Twilight stopped a few feet from the throne and gazed up at the queen. “You have something I want.”

Chrysalis' eyes narrowed. She didn't immediately say anything, but Applejack had the feeling no words were necessary. She could almost see the sparks flying between Twilight and the queen.

“Weird,” Pinkie Pie remarked quietly to the two ponies standing with her. “My fur's standing on end.”

“Me too,” Fluttershy replied, giving a little shudder.

Applejack nodded. “It ain't no Pinkie Sense,” she whispered. The hairs on Twilight's mane had started fluttering subtly, she noted, as if moved by a breeze that wasn't there.

“Celestia didn't send you, did she?” Chrysalis surmised, rising from her seat. “What is it you want?”

A brilliant glow suddenly sprung up about Twilight's figure, and a white-hot beam of light blasted out of her horn. Chrysalis leapt aside just in time, and the beam struck the back of her throne, blowing it to smithereens. The queen was caught in the explosion, and the beam continued on through, striking and shattering the massive stained glass window.

The entire throne room erupted into chaos instantly. The sudden influx of sunlight from the broken window blinded the ponies and changeling guards momentarily, and what little they could see was obscured by the cloud of dust formed by the destruction of the dais.

A whirlwind seized the entire throne room for a brief moment, sweeping the dust out of the air and nearly bowling the three ponies over. The changeling guards had recovered much faster, and promptly rushed toward Twilight, who seemed to be approaching the stunned queen with lethal intent. Green bolts of lightning flew from their horns, ricocheting off the invisible barrier surrounding Twilight.

The alicorn threw an angry gaze back at the guards, and Applejack swore she saw a flash of green in her eyes before she smiled. Her tail erupted in green flames, and a black, tapered tail shot forth in its stead, growing more than twenty feet long with blinding speed. The draconic tail whipped across the floor, sweeping aside most of the changelings and smashing them into the wall on the other side of the throne room.

The fire that had erupted from her tail traveled further down Twilight's body, leaving black chitin and scales where there once was fur. Her hind legs tensed as they doubled, tripled, quintupled in size, the floor beneath her cracking under the growing weight of whatever Twilight was becoming. She lifted a forehoof and stepped down with sharp claws that dug into the floor. Her feathered wings expanded in great clouds of fire, leaving enormous dragon wings sprouting from her shoulders. Her head was lost to the flames, and a long, sleek neck coiled forth toward Chrysalis. The fire petered out only a few feet from the queen's prone form, revealing the head of a dragon, sporting a changeling's twisted black horn and a straighter, dark cerulean crystal horn right behind it.

The doors behind Applejack burst open, and half a hundred changelings poured in, pushing aside the three ponies. The draconic changeling turned its head again, a deep chuckle rumbling from deep within its throat as it beheld the soldiers. Its crystal horn flashed green, followed by a fiery emerald glow spreading from within its chest and up the length of its throat.

Applejack had been too stunned by the whole ordeal to really comprehend what was happening, but suddenly Pinkie Pie was beside her, pulling her down onto the floor. A moment later, brilliant emerald fire washed across the entire throne room. The armored changeling soldiers acted as a makeshift cover for the three ponies, but even so, Applejack cried out at the searing wave of heat rolling over them. The screams and shouts from further within the throne room suggested the changelings were faring no better.

Something tugged at her hoof, and Applejack saw Pinkie Pie motioning toward the exit, shouting something she couldn't hear over the sound of fire and screaming. Pinkie Pie got to her hooves shakily and ran off toward the doorway, following closely after Fluttershy who was at the door already, struggling to get past the crowd of changeling soldiers rushing in.

By the time Applejack had stumbled to the door, however, it seemed the tides had changed. She and her two friends were swept along by the surge of retreating guards, making it a few feet past the door before the changelings around them seemed to realize who and what they were. The three ponies were quickly forced up against the wall by one group of half-panicked soldiers while another group ‒ completely out of it ‒ slammed the two iron doors shut behind them, trapping the dozen changelings that hadn't yet made it out.

A changeling near Applejack cast some sort of spell, summoning glowing shackles around her hooves, then shouted at her to move down the corridor. Applejack nodded and complied, shaken just as badly as her captor. She had no intention of challenging a horde of a hundred hysterical changelings, nor did she fancy being anywhere near whatever had disguised itself as Twilight.

She followed Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy along with the majority of changelings filing out of the corridor, trying her best to filter out the sounds of screams coming from within the throne room, Chrysalis' loudest above all.

Chapter 8

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“Rainbow Dash, this cloud is falling apart!” Rarity complained nervously, watching increasingly larger numbers of small fluffy tufts break apart from the cloud she and Spike sat upon. “I'm fairly certain we're sinking!”

“Well, get better at casting that cloud walker spell,” Rainbow Dash grunted from behind her. “That's the third time you say you've been sinking through.” The pegasus grunted again. “Yet... here you are. Still complaining.”

“I wish you would take me more seriously. Especially when we're thousands of feet aboveground!”

“We are not,” Rainbow Dash chuckled, enjoying Rarity's panic far too much. “Mountainside's just a few hundred feet below us. From there it's about two miles down. Give or take. “

“Rainbow! My hoof is poking through!”

The pegasus went silent for a moment, but the unicorn wouldn’t risk looking behind her to see what she was doing. At this point, she felt the slightest movement on her part would cause her and Spike to sink right through the bottom of the cloud they were nestled in.

“Nope.”

Rarity felt Rainbow Dash's hooves return to the cloud, pushing it a little faster up along the mountainside. She dared to twist her head around, not quite far enough to see Rainbow Dash, but far enough that she would see the unicorn's scowl.

“What do you mean, no!?”

“You're being paranoid, Rarity. If you want up a mile-high mountain without hiking, this is the safest way. Provided you're half-decent with that spell.”

“I never said I was! There has to be a better way.”

“Oh there's a better way, alright. Remember the Best Young Flyer competition?”

Rarity grimaced. “Yes?”

“I bet I could carry both of you all the way up the mountain if I was going supersonic. It'd take a few seconds, tops.”

Rarity scoffed. “If you could do that, then why aren't we already at the top?”

“Well you guys aren't exactly aerodynamic,” Rainbow Dash explained, grunting with effort to make her point. “I'd need a running start.”

“And smash into us at the speed of sound? How is that a better plan?”

“Obviously you need to be moving too.”

“If I could move, Rainbow, we wouldn't even be having this problem. Honestly.”

“Didn't say you needed to move up.” Rarity shifted around a little further, giving Rainbow Dash a questioning look. The pegasus was giving her an unsettling, mischievous smirk. “Best Young Flyer competition, remember?”

“No.”

“You sure?” Rainbow Dash cackled. “Bet it'll take just one good kick, and this cloud'll fall apart.”

“No!”

“I give you a few seconds, and then I swoop down. I do the 'Boom, grab you and Spike, and pull up just before we hit the mountainside!”

“Alright, you've made your point, Rainbow Dash!” Rarity conceded, turning around and reclining against the plush cloud, trying to ignore the sinking sensation.

“What point?”

Rarity rolled her eyes. “I never took you for the sort to hold grudges.”

“Was that a 'yes' on the skydive?”

“No! Absolutely not! If you had any idea how much my leg is ‒” Rarity paused, catching sight of the first green thing she'd seen since they had passed the tree line. Not far above the trio, the craggy mountainside that they had been faced with for the past two hours receded, forming a small plateau. A strange-looking tree grew at the very edge of the plateau, and as the pegasus continued to carry her farther up, Rarity saw many more exotic plants hover into view.

“Oh, I think we're here! This must be the garden you described!”

Rainbow Dash peeked up from behind the cloud and smiled. “Finally! How's Spike doing?”

Rarity leaned in over the dragon sitting in her lap. His expression was somber as usual, and he was freezing to the touch. “He hasn't changed much since we left the ground. I suppose you were right after all. I'm surprised he made it through the night, let alone the trip up here.”

“He almost looks a little better,” Rainbow Dash observed, repositioning herself to push the cloud toward the garden.

“And you're sure this dragoness won't mind us dropping in?” Rarity inquired, spotting the cavern entrance beyond the garden plaza. The sheer size of it filled her with a sense of dread.

“Er, well, Spike was welcome. The two of us might have to camp outside.”

“Then why did we go through the trouble of getting up here?” Rarity demanded, ears folding back in annoyance.

“You'd rather stay down there with the dragons? I'm not flying up and down the mountain all day just to check on you two.”

“Do you at least have a tent?”

“Nope. All my stuff got blown to smithereens.”

Rarity groaned. “Maybe the dragoness will let us sleep in her cave.”

Rainbow Dash offered only a scoff in response.

She set them down past the center of the plaza, relieving Rarity of the chilly dragon before helping the unicorn disembark. Although she was grateful for the return to terra firma, her injured leg did not take the transition well. Either she had been sitting still for far too long during their flight up the mountain, or she had gotten too used to the weightless feeling of riding the cloud. Judging from the pain, it had to be both. She hobbled stiffly toward the dragon's lair, leaning heavily against Rainbow Dash for support.

The dragoness herself emerged from the cavern ahead, taking only a few great strides to meet the ponies in the garden.

Rarity found herself quite stunned at the dragoness' beauty. Rainbow Dash had led her to believe that a brutish beast would greet them upon their arrival, but the magnificent creature of gold and lavender seemed to be living proof of the two ponies' difference in perspective.

Her golden eyes slowly swept across the two ponies, finally settling on Spike, riding on the back of the pegasus. Upon seeing the half-comatose dragon, the great dragoness' lips curled back into a frightening snarl. A low growl could be heard all across the garden, and the air around the two ponies heated up noticeably.

Even so, Rarity felt far from threatened. She had faced a truly furious ‒ or perhaps fearful ‒ dragon not long ago, and the one standing before them now was neither. Angry, perhaps, but above all else upset, just like Rarity herself.

“Whatever justice your princess has in store for this thief,” the dragoness rumbled, another wave of heat washing over the two ponies, “it is not enough.” Her eyes found Rarity's, and suddenly the unicorn felt less safe. “You will take him to The Great Heart.”

“She's hurt,” Rainbow Dash pointed out, shifting slightly to readjust Spike's position on her back. “I'll do it.”

The dragoness spoke no words, but her low growl returned as she looked briefly to the pegasus.

“It's alright, Rainbow.” Rarity grabbed onto Spike with her magic and draped his unmoving form across her back. The added weight was slightly larger than she had anticipated, but she shouldered both the pain and the dragon coolly. “Compared to Spike, I haven't much to complain about.”

“Or, you know, the hundred-ton dragon could carry him six steps,” Rainbow Dash observed, raising an eyebrow at the dragoness. Nobody paid her any mind, however, and the pegasus found she could do no more than watch as her friend hobbled across the garden at a pathetic pace.

The dragon moved aside and stepped past the two ponies, reaching the far side of the plaza with a few steps. Rainbow Dash remained where she stood for a while longer, giving Rarity a worried look. Unlike Twilight, she had no desire to challenge something a thousand times her own size, but she couldn’t help but wonder why Rarity had been allowed in. It was better than Spike going in alone, she supposed.

Eventually, she turned to look at the dragon behind her. She stood upon the precipice of the plaza, gazing southward. Throwing one last glance Rarity's way, Rainbow Dash decided to join the dragoness, flying the short distance across the garden. If she wanted somewhere to sleep for the night, she'd have to fly down the mountain to get more clouds, she realized, passing the remnants of the one she had carried Rarity and Spike in. For whatever reason, the dragons' clouds seemed a whole lot less solid than the ones in Equestria.

She landed next to the dragoness, not bothering with any greeting. It would go unanswered, she was sure. Instead, she followed the dragon's gaze, trying to see if she had found anything out upon the southern horizon. Besides the columns of smoke rising from sleeping dragons across the realm, however, the pegasus could see nothing.

“You ponies are frail things,” the dragon offered softly, her eyes scanning the horizon slowly. “I could smell the infection on the white one.”

“Oh.” The pegasus looked back again at Rarity, nearing the stairway to the cavern now. True enough, the unicorn's condition had seemed to worsen during just the short time they’d spent together. It was always hard to tell with Rarity, though, so she hadn't thought much of it until now.

Perhaps the dragon was more perceptive than Rainbow Dash had given her credit for. “Will she be alright?”

“The Great Heart will sustain her, as it will the youngling. But not for long... I hate to see such weakness in a dragon,” the dragoness murmured, her gaze hardening. “I could have reached the borderlands and returned twice by now, and yet here we wait.”

“I coulda done it three times,” Rainbow Dash agreed.

“It is taking too long.” The dragoness opened her wings halfway, but folded them again, as if thinking better of it. “I should not have permitted it. Her failure will cost us his life.”

“She's late. It can't be easy lugging that monster back here, but she'll pull through. She always does.”

“Until she does not. I should not have gambled the life of a dragon in the way your Celestia gambles her kingdom.”

The dragoness seemed to hesitate for a moment, as if seeing something on the horizon. Rainbow Dash tried to follow her gaze, but as before, she saw nothing.

The dragoness gave a throaty sigh, blowing a thick cloud of smoke into the mountain winds. “A storm is coming. The last one brought nothing good with it.” Awaiting no reply, she turned and stomped away past Rainbow Dash, back into the cavern.

The pegasus eyed the remnants of the cloud behind her, all but gone at this point. With a sigh, she spread her wings and stepped off the edge of the plaza, gliding steadily down the mountain toward where clouds seeped forth from the cliffs far below.

Rarity had reached the mouth of the enormous cavern by the time the dragoness appeared behind her. It had taken minutes for Rarity to walk just a fraction of the distance the dragon had cleared in a matter of seconds. She passed by the unicorn without sparing her much of a glance, sending tremors throughout the cavern with every step. The great dragon laid down along the right side of the cavern, her long neck extending across the opening deeper within the cavern, on the far side from the entrance.

The golden eyes regarded Rarity with something akin to curiosity, following her unblinkingly as the unicorn made her sluggish way toward their owner. She would have felt self-conscious to be sure, having such a magnificent creature scrutinizing her every move, but she was too exhausted to worry about it. Her leg was in agony, growing more unbearable with every step she took, but she had found her rhythm. If she stopped now, she wouldn't ever make it across the cavern.

It was an odd silence that lay between unicorn and dragon, enforced in a way by the latter's awing, yet quiet presence. Yet it was constantly disturbed by the former's grunts and gasps as she proceeded down the length of the cavern, casting whispering echoes from wall to wall. It was a silence that would neither settle nor break. To Rarity, it seemed a thin veil between the dragon's current courteous disdain and an underlying, more dangerous disposition. It was a silence that wore on for several more minutes as Rarity kept walking, until finally the dragoness deigned to speak.

“He would give away his heart... to you.” There was no small hint of accusation in her voice, but she sounded curious as well, as if she were posing a question to either herself or Rarity.

Despite the protests of her bandaged leg, the unicorn found it necessary to stop. The way before her was blocked by the dragon's head, several times larger than her own Carousel Boutique. She had the feeling it wouldn't be moving aside before the dragoness had said what she wanted to say. Besides, Rarity had already wandered far too close to those titanic jaws to feel anywhere near at ease.

“Do you love him?”

Rarity blinked. She looked back to Spike, resting unconscious on her back.

It was the question she had asked herself just before running into Rainbow Dash. Of course, the answer seemed as elusive now as it had then. Perhaps even more so, given the enormous golden eyes weighing heavily on the back of her head.

“I... I suppose I do.”

The dragoness regarded her silently for a good while longer, judging the sincerity of her words. Eventually, she lifted her head, as clear a gesture as any for Rarity to continue. The unicorn did just that, all too aware of the dragon's scrutiny, but too preoccupied with regaining her rhythm of walking to do anything about it.

“Would you surrender your heart to him? As he has done for you?” the dragoness asked suddenly, just as Rarity passed beneath her.

The unicorn grimaced, making sure the dragon above her didn't see. “That's a rather personal question,” she muttered evasively, continuing on past the dragon.

The opening ahead of her lacked the elaborate equine carvings that had decorated the entrance behind her. And while the entrance had possessed an obvious symmetrical design, the opening leading deeper into the cave had a much more irregular, natural appearance. Most of its edges were jagged and rough, giving Rarity the impression that the opening had once been much smaller, before it had been forced to accommodate a dragon's size. Many other edges had been smoothed out, and the surrounding cliff face bore strange ripples, no doubt the result of a prolonged exposure to dragonfire.

Rarity raised an eyebrow at the apparent vandalism, but made no comment. She passed through the opening, and the chamber of The Great Heart opened up before her. This area was fairly well lit compared to the antechamber behind her, and even larger. The chamber was vaguely ovoid in shape, with vein-like trails carved into the surface of the walls, giving the whole place a very organic feel. There wasn't much of a floor in front of Rarity: The stone floor jutted out a good fifty feet from the entrance before ending abruptly, forming a jagged balcony overlooking the chamber.

The bottom of the chamber lay far below, though most of its floor was concealed beneath the dragoness' vast hoard: Absurdly huge piles of gold, gems and other treasures filled the enormous chamber, swept away from the center and hugging the walls all around. The piles closest to Rarity were so large that they reached up and above the narrow overhang she stood upon, more than a hundred feet above the bottom of the chamber.

In the center was what Rarity could only assume was The Great Heart. It was a large structure in the shape of a rounded cone, following the curvature of the chamber's walls, and the same vein-like carvings riddled its surface, though much thicker. Although the Heart appeared to be of the same stone as the rest of the cavern, a deep red glow emanating from all over its surface made it hard to tell. The veins in the stone ‒ both in the Heart and along the walls ‒ shone with slow pulses of multi-colored light, traveling from the Heart, across the floor, up the walls and into the ceiling where the veins all converged.

Rarity wasn't sure if she was hearing the dull thumping of The Great Heart, or if she was simply imagining it. Standing where she stood now, she could feel the power of The Dragon Territories. The abundant force of life and creation that flowed between The Badlands and The Graylands, the fire of every mountain around them, the richness of the air in her lungs, the majesty of the towering mountain ranges, the ferocity of the storm that had brought her here. It was overwhelming to say the least.

“You do not deserve to be here,” the dragoness muttered disdainfully, her head poking through the entrance into the chamber. “But you need it.”

Rarity almost felt inclined to agree. Compared to the heartbeat of the land, she felt small. Insignificant. “Will he be safe here?”

“Perhaps.” Rarity felt the sweltering heat of the dragon's breath against her back. “You must go deeper.”

Rarity frowned. A hundred feet separated her from the ground below, making it quite clear that the chamber had been designed for those with wings. “How am I ‒?” she started, before seeing the piles of treasure rearing up on either side of her. Knowing she'd get no help from the dragon, she sighed, making her way to the pile on her right.

“Hearts are the realm of emotion,” the dragoness told her, stepping into the chamber after her. “The Great Heart is no different.”

Rarity nodded weakly, focusing on lifting the unconscious Spike off her back and onto the treasure pile. Giving him a little push with her magic, she sent him sliding gently down the steep incline.

“Do you love him as he loves you?” the dragoness pressed, rephrasing her question this time.

Rarity glanced at the dragon uncertainly, sensing concern in her voice. True enough, although her expression could be hard to read, Rarity now saw a certain measure of anxiety written plain on her face. “Why... I-I'm quite...” The unicorn trailed off awkwardly. The look she was being given by the dragoness, so abruptly earnest and compassionate, was throwing her off, filling her with uncertainty. “I don't know,” she admitted, lowering her gaze almost shamefully. She stepped gingerly out onto the pile of gold, worried about leaving Spike for too long.

“Love will nourish him,” the dragoness explained, following the unicorn further inside. “Within the Heart, it is a tangible force, the heart's very essence. I have seen its miracles many times. But doubt, hesitation...” The dragoness' head snaked down after her as Rarity began sliding uncontrollably down the pile, stifling a scream as her leg inadvertently shifted back and forth. “They are constructs of the mind. Poison to the heart.”

Even if Rarity had had a reply, she was unable to deliver one, her teeth clenched tight in pain. She finally reached the bottom of the treasure pile, skidding to a stop next to Spike, who lay face down in a scattered collection of golden chalices.

It took her a few moments to rise to her hooves again, gasping all the while. Her thigh felt as though it were on fire, burning with the same pain she had felt when Spike had first bitten her. While she was rising, the floor beneath her trembled as the dragoness stepped down into the lower recesses of the chamber with her, sending cascades of gold and silver trickling down the mountains of treasure all around.

The massive creature stepped halfway around The Great Heart. Although the structure was almost a hundred feet tall and wider around its base than most of Ponyville, she had no trouble wrapping herself almost all the way around the Heart, her head coming to rest on a mound of gold coins not far from Rarity and Spike.

“If you do love him,” she said, the slight movements of her jaws scattering coins everywhere. “Then go.”

Rarity was grimacing with pain. She pulled Spike off the floor with her magic and slammed him onto her own back in frustration, succeeding only in making the pain worse. She spotted the entrance to the Heart ‒ an unassuming gap between two veins, just large enough for a big pony to pass through ‒ and set off toward it, stumbling and limping.

The dragoness watched her go quietly. She looked far from convinced of Rarity's resolve, but she made no move against the unicorn, allowing her to enter the Heart unchallenged.

The slow, rhythmic beating of the Heart ‒ imagined or otherwise ‒ grew louder and more powerful as Rarity passed into its hollow core. The heartbeat almost drowned out her own, clashing with its frantic throbbing. Something about the discordance elicited a deep ache in her chest, and she found her vision darkening after taking just a few steps. Before she knew it, she was lying on the ground, gasping for air.

Beside her, Spike was stirring, but Rarity could hardly concern herself with that now. She rolled onto her back, easing her breathing somewhat.

The inside of The Great Heart was stone like the rest of the outside chamber, but the walls surrounding Rarity now were perfectly smooth, nearly unmarred. Unlike the pervasive, deep red outside, the inside walls possessed a glow of cornflower blue, its brightness varying in a chaotic pattern that kept shifting all around her. The color was oddly comforting, but its constant motion was enough to make her nauseous.

Scattered across the inside of the Heart’s walls, like stars on a bright blue sky, were hundreds of large gemstones, each glowing with a hue of their own. Rarity's eyes were drawn to each of them in turn, sensing the deep power emanating from every one of them.

Her pained grimace was broken by a confused frown as she quickly, instinctively, realized what she was looking at. “These are... hearts?”

“They're gonna hear us...” Fluttershy whimpered, wincing at the dull clang of hoof against steel. Her face was pressed firmly against the bars of the trio's prison cell, eyes darting nervously left and right to peek down the dungeon corridors.

“If they cared about us, they'da brought us food a long time ago,” Applejack grunted. She inspected the increasingly crooked steel bar in front of her with a smile. It was slow going, but they were getting there.

She took a step back and nodded to Pinkie Pie, who swung her tail back in front of the dent in the steel bar. “I can't believe they'd lock us up and just forget about us!” the pink pony complained, trying to keep her tail steady for Applejack.

“The guards that locked us up must have left with the others,” Fluttershy gathered, cringing in advance when she saw Applejack turn her back on the crooked bar. “I suppose they were in an awful hurry.”

“Or they just didn't care,” a voice spat from the cell across from the three ponies'. A lone changeling sat within, incarcerated only two hours after the ponies had been imprisoned. The prisoner had spared them few words, but Applejack assumed she had been a ring leader of the riots that had broken out after the battle between Chrysalis and the heart thief. Either a loyalist of Chrysalis or a supporter of the usurper, depending on who had ended up winning. Applejack suspected she was the former.

Returning her attention to the task at hoof, the farm pony lifted her backside, coiling up like a spring for half a second. Her forelegs shuffled backwards a few inches before both her hind legs lashed out with tremendous force, landing a perfect hit against the bar. The recoil, as well as the sound of the impact, was softened by the fluff of Pinkie Pie's tail, leaving Applejack with only a dull ache in her hooves.

“Don't sweat it, Fluttershy,” she reassured the pegasus, panting from the effort. “If they didn't come runnin' half an hour ago, they ain't gonna now.” Pinkie Pie removed her tail, and Applejack gave a short laugh when she saw the crack separating the top and bottom half of the metal bar. “Now we're talkin'!”

The changeling across from them watched with a curious eye as Applejack kicked against the lower half of the bar again, not bothering with dampening the noise with Pinkie Pie's tail. After just a few kicks, the bar was bent completely out of shape, opening up a hole large enough for the ponies to squeeze through.

Applejack went first, closely followed by Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy. The changeling prisoner across from them pressed up against the bars of her cell, giving the three ponies an imploring look. “I know every square inch of this hive. I can help you get out of here.”

“Sure.” Applejack scoffed, throwing a wary glance up and down the prison corridor, trying to remember where the exit lay. “Let's trust a changeling to get us outta here.”

The changeling frowned. “I'm in this prison for a reason!”

“She's got a point,” Pinkie Pie offered.

“Yeah. Even her own kind don't trust her.”

“I know where that dragon monster is going,” the changeling insisted. “I'll tell you when we make it outside. Trust me,” she added, noting Applejack's raised eyebrow. “If you want to save Equestria, you'll want to know.”

Applejack frowned. She looked to Pinkie Pie, then Fluttershy. After a long moment of hesitation, it was Fluttershy who spoke. “We went through an awful lot of twists and turns getting here. I wouldn't know how to find the exit.”

Pinkie Pie nodded her agreement, and Applejack sighed. “S'pose you're right.” She eyed the changeling. “If ya know this place so well, where do we find the keys to your cell?”

“Warden's quarters are that way,” the prisoner replied, nodding her head right. “By the exit. I doubt you'll run into anyone.”

Applejack nodded warily, following after Pinkie Pie, who had already begun bouncing off in the proffered direction. Together, the three ponies made their way through the twisted, narrow corridors of the dungeon, passing by several empty cells of vastly varying sizes and conditions before coming upon a stairwell that no doubt led up into the rest of the hive.

Just left of the stairs was a heavy-looking door, unlike any they had seen in the rest of the dungeon. It was locked, but it only took a few kicks for Applejack to knock it off its hinges. As the door fell to ground with a heavy thud, the ponies were faced with a surprisingly small chamber. Its only furnishings were a large, black desk and a solid, stone chair, reminiscent of a throne. Another door led deeper into the warden's quarters, but Pinkie Pie quickly found what they were looking for in one of the drawers of the desk.

It didn't take them long to return to the imprisoned changeling, who very promptly pulled the key from Pinkie Pie's mouth with her magic. The changeling gave a relieved sigh when the key clicked in the lock, and the cell door swung open shortly after.

“Follow me,” she told the three ponies, heading down the corridor in the opposite direction of where they'd just come from. “Keep close. I'm not coming back for you.”

Applejack plodded along after the changeling, giving a shake of the head. “Figures.”

“Where are we going?” Fluttershy asked softly, falling in behind Pinkie Pie as she bounced off after Applejack. “The exit's the other way, isn't it?”

“The entire hive and everyone in it is what's the other way,” the changeling retorted without even looking back. “I plan on avoiding them.”

“Good plan!” Pinkie Pie commended her.

The changeling drew to a halt, almost as if in response to the pony's compliment, but turned her attention instead to the two empty cells on either side of her. Her magic grabbed hold of four steel bars, seemingly at random, and gave each of them a swift twist.

Something beneath them clicked in response, and the changeling opened a large hatch that had been expertly concealed within the floor of the corridor.

“This leads out beyond the hive's fortifications,” the changeling told them, jumping through the hatchway and lighting her horn to drive away the darkness below. “Mind the step.”

Wary of any traps, Applejack approached the hole in the floor, noticing that the 'step' was an eight foot drop. The changeling stood at the bottom, waiting at the entrance of a narrow, unlit tunnel. One by one, the three ponies leapt down the cramped shaft, and the changeling closed the hatch above them, leaving the four of them completely reliant on the light shining from her horn.

“You weren't kiddin' when ya said you knew this place,” Applejack muttered, pushing ahead to the front of the group. The tight confines of the tunnel were making her uneasy, and the last thing she wanted was the changeling running off with their only source of light.

“A little paranoia is healthy for our queens,” the changeling told them, motioning for Applejack to start walking. “There are a dozen of these secret tunnels all over the hive. Very few know about them.”

“Ah take it you were close to Chrysalis, then,” Applejack observed. The floor was rougher than she had expected, and her own shadow was making it hard to see in front of her. “That how you ended up behind bars?”

“Something like that.”

“What happened to your queen?” Fluttershy piped up from behind.

“Nothing good.” The changeling's tone bore a grim finality to it, and she fell silent for a while.

Applejack frowned to herself. She couldn't say she was surprised with the changeling's revelation. The transformation she had witnessed within the throne room had been truly terrifying. Only the changeling soldiers' bravery ‒ however brief ‒ had gotten the three ponies out of that throne room alive.

Chrysalis was no friend of Equestria, yet somewhere, it bothered Applejack that no one had saved her. And if the thief had taken her place, the ponies' situation had only worsened. Not only would recovering Spike's heart be that much harder, but the changelings could very well pose a real threat to Equestria. Especially with Twilight off who knew where and the other princesses up in The Crystal Empire.

It wasn't long before the farm pony bumped her head against a sloped wooden surface above her, marking the end of the tunnel. She pushed against the wood, and with a great creak and moan, the half-rotted hatch opened up, revealing the all too familiar marshes outside the hive.

“Color me impressed,” Applejack muttered. She stepped outside and held the hatch open for the other three. “Didn't imagine we'd get out the hive that easily.”

Looking around, Applejack spotted the hive's fortifications behind her, quite a ways away. A large copse of trees stood between the ponies and the imposing palace, shielding them from view.

“I wouldn't count yourselves safe just yet,” the changeling warned them, scanning the skies. “If a patrol catches us together...” Her eyes narrowed, and her face fell. “Ah. Well I suppose we'll find out.”

Applejack followed the changeling's gaze and spotted a dark shape against the early evening sky. “Great.”

“There's just one,” the changeling observed. “If we're lucky, we can ‒”

“That's... not a changeling,” Fluttershy ventured, and Applejack gave the approaching figure a closer look.

True enough, the creature's wings were flapping much too slowly to belong to a changeling, and the figure itself was much too small to be a dragon. The wings beat with an erraticism that didn't seem quite right for a pegasus, however, leaving Applejack stumped as to what it was.

“It's Twilight!” Pinkie Pie exclaimed, waving a hoof in the air excitedly.

Fluttershy nodded her agreement with a smile, and the changeling rolled her eyes.

“Another one?”

“I never noticed how well the fake Twilight was flying,” Fluttershy remarked, marveling at the distant Twilight's wobbling flight. “That should have been a dead giveaway.”

Twilight seemed to have spotted the group even before Pinkie Pie started hopping and waving, and within moments, the alicorn landed none too gracefully in front of them all, breathing heavily. She gave the changeling a confused look before turning her questioning gaze to Applejack.

“What are you girls doing here? Where's Rarity?”

Applejack grimaced. “She's... It's a long story.” She gave a nod to Twilight. “But, uh... What about you?”

“She's probably after the thief,” Pinkie Pie pointed out, and Twilight gave the three of them a worried look.

“You saw him,” she murmured, sounding much like Applejack felt.

“We did a lot more than see him,” the farm pony explained. “We only just busted outta their prison.”

“He took over the hive,” Twilight gathered, looking out at the distant fortifications. “What about Chrysalis?”

Everyone's eyes turned to the changeling, whose gaze was fixed on the ground. After a long moment, she looked at Twilight. “He struck her down in front of the whole hive. He took her crown and threw her in the dungeons.”

Applejack's brow furrowed at that, remembering all the empty cells she'd passed during their escape. The changeling noticed her expression and shot her a quick look that told her to keep her mouth shut.

“He took her crown...”

The changeling's gaze returned to Twilight, spotting the look of despair that had crossed her features. “You know what that means, don't you?”

The alicorn nodded quietly.

“What? What does it mean?” Pinkie Pie asked them, looking back and forth between the changeling and Twilight.

“Chrysalis wore a crown of sorts the last time we saw her,” Twilight explained, looking north, presumably toward wherever Spike and Rainbow Dash were. “A growth, behind her horn. Attached to it were four crystals.”

“Like the big one growing out of the thief's head,” Fluttershy whispered in understanding.

“Four hearts,” Applejack muttered, seeing the problem.

“They were the source of Chrysalis' power,” Twilight continued. “But now he's claimed them. His dragon's heart is fuelling an unquenchable thirst for power.”

“And he knows the power of the heart now,” the changeling added, catching Twilight's attention again. “You won't find him here. He took our entire army north almost two days ago. More than a thousand changelings. He's going to conquer The Heart Vault.”

Applejack raised an eyebrow. “And what's that?”

The changeling shot her an annoyed look and sighed. “A long time ago, before the dragons came and when The Changeling Kingdom was at its highest, our kings and queens did not inherit the right to rule as they do today. They fought each other for the throne. To do so, they claimed the hearts of... 'lesser' creatures, growing more powerful than you can imagine. Rather than passing down their power, they chose to be buried with the hearts they had taken. In The Heart Vault.”

The changeling sighed again and shook her head. “There must be hundreds of hearts in there, ripe for the taking. If that monster makes it inside the vault... not even your princesses will be able to stand against him.”

“Where is this vault?” There was a deep worry, a fear perhaps, in Twilight's eyes. It was one of the last things Applejack wanted to see at this point.

“You'd have passed right by it to get here,” the changeling replied wryly. “It's in the middle of The Dragon Territories. I believe they call it ‒”

“The Great Heart,” Twilight finished, turning halfway north. “Oh no...” Applejack was feeling plenty worried with the changeling's revelations alone, but Twilight obviously knew something the others did not. Her breathing quickened as she looked to The Dragon Territories, and the color drained from her face. Her eyes found Applejack's. If they had held worry before, they were most definitely filled with fear now. “Spike's there. I left him there.”

“Oh,” was all Applejack could manage. She tried to think of something to say, to console her friend, but something about Twilight's eyes robbed her of all words. She hadn't seen eyes like that in a long time.

Luckily, Pinkie Pie came to her aid, putting a reassuring hoof on Twilight's shoulder and giving her a comforting smile. “Hey, calm down, Twilight!”

“He'll be trapped in there,” the alicorn muttered weakly, shaking her head. “He can't leave or he'll... And the thief is coming straight for him. Nothing can stop him from reaching that vault.”

“Except you,” Fluttershy offered meekly. “Right?”

“Yeah!” Pinkie Pie agreed, giving Twilight a little shake. “If anypony can do it, it's Twilight!”

Twilight shook her head softly, shrugging off Pinkie Pie's hoof. “I couldn't beat him when he had one heart. How am I supposed to do it when he has five?”

Her eyes passed over each of her friends in turn, looking for any kind of answer.

“You can't,” was the changeling's helpful response.

“He ain't gone yet, sugarcube,” Applejack offered when Twilight's eyes met hers. “Pinkie's right. If anypony can stop that thief in time, it's you.”

“But how?”

Applejack gave her a shrug. “Ah don't know. But... it's Spike.”

Twilight hesitated for a moment, then nodded her head weakly. “You're right. I ‒” She stumbled away from the others, her wings extending haphazardly, trying and failing to align themselves with each other. She stopped, taking a few deep breaths. “I have to go,” she said, sounding a little more collected. Her horn began glowing, and her wings unfolded fully, catching a wind that seemed to surround only her. “I have to do something.”

“There's no way you can make it,” the changeling told her, shaking her head. “They're almost two days ahead of us. If they're not already there, they'll reach the vault before dawn.”

Twilight lowered her stance, ignoring the changeling's warning.

Applejack gave a small smile. “She can make it,” she told the changeling, keeping her eyes on the alicorn. “Friendship's what gave Twilight those wings in the first place. For Spike, she'll make it.”

Though her gaze was fixed north, Applejack caught the glimpse of an appreciative smile on Twilight's lips. The alicorn leapt upwards, promptly vanishing in a flash of magenta. She reappeared a hundred feet above the three ponies, diving a short distance to gain speed before blasting off toward the Dragon Territories, propelled by the magically summoned wind around her.

“That thing wiped the floor with Chrysalis,” the changeling remarked cynically, watching the alicorn zoom across the sky. “She's gonna need more than friendship to beat him.”

“You can cut the act,” Applejack told Chrysalis, giving a sigh as Twilight vanished past the horizon. “But ya ain't wrong...”

Chapter 9

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She was not welcome here.

Rarity liked to think fashion was a language without words, appreciated by many, but spoken by few. She was not unfamiliar with the idea of garments speaking to her, and art and architecture certainly had their fair share of stories to tell as well.

Yet when the chamber known as The Great Heart spoke to her, it was quite a different language. Although just as wordless, this was not the language of simple aesthetics. It was something far deeper and primal.

The slow thrumming of the Heart, the twinkling of each crystal heart around her, the agitated dance of blue lights across the walls and ceiling. They all told her the same thing.

She was not welcome here.

She could hear it with every beat of the Heart, driving the breath from her lungs. The immortalized hearts surrounding her, with their own strange brand of awareness, had all judged her feelings toward Spike and found her lacking. The swirling colors of her own magic were but a sample of the turmoil her presence wrought within the Heart.

Yet Rarity stayed where she was, seated near the entrance of the Heart, watching Spike standing within the center. It had been feeling the touch of his claws against her hoof that Rarity had first awoken. He had been standing over her, waiting for her to open her eyes. And now he simply stood there, staring at nothing in particular. He seemed as unaware of his surroundings as he had been for the past few days, but at least he was conscious.

She liked to think she stayed only for his sake, but the incessant throbbing of her left hind leg kept reminding her that wasn't the case. Her wound had opened up again after she had arrived at the mountain, leaving a dark, crusty splotch on her final bandage. She had been contemplating whether she should remove the bandage or not, but she simply had no experience in such matters. The pain had gotten better since entering the Heart at least, and Rarity had to admit that was her main reason for staying.

“Are you awake?” The dragon's booming voice shook Rarity out of her reverie. As if awaking from a trance, her pains all seemed to return to the forefront of her mind. She turned her head to look outside the Heart, but she could only see a long, lavender tail stretching past the entrance from where she sat. Somehow, she hadn't even been aware the dragoness was present until now.

“I've been up for a few hours, yes.”

“And Spike?” the dragoness pressed, before Rarity could elaborate any further.

Rarity looked back at Spike, a small measure of surprise evident on her features. Spike's was the first name she had heard the dragoness speak so far. According to Rainbow Dash, she had refused to properly address even Twilight.

“He's fine,” Rarity assured her. “Better than I've seen him in a while.”

The dragoness made a grunt of approval. She went quiet, and the long tail just outside the Heart curled up out of sight, accompanied by the soft clink of coins as the dragoness settled down once more.

Rarity's gaze rested on Spike for another several moments. The little dragon paid her no mind, as had become the norm the past few days. He turned slightly while she watched him, but that seemed to be the extent of his concerns at the moment.

Rarity's lips parted in an admission unspoken, her hesitation beckoning only silence. Her gaze fell, and her ears were filled once more with the rhythmic throb of The Great Heart.

“I shouldn't have come here,” Rarity muttered, but at the same time, the dragoness outside shifted about noisily. The unicorn waited for a reply, but it seemed the dragoness had not heard her.

Her courage left her and Rarity returned her gaze to Spike with a heavy sigh. Perhaps she was trying to apologize to the wrong dragon. Her bandage crinkled drily and she grunted with pain as she rose onto her hooves, taking a few steps toward Spike before giving up and sitting back down again.

“Oh, I'm sorry, Spike. Somehow I have the feeling this is all my fault.” Outside, she heard the dragoness give a snort. Rarity frowned and scooted a little closer to Spike. Although a few feet were insignificant in the face of the distance between the two, it was the best Rarity felt she could do. She continued in a slightly more private tone. “You showed me something last year, on your birthday... and I've been confused ever since. I've been leading you on all this time, and I'm not even sure why.”

“You know,” the dragoness outside told her as Rarity trailed off.

Rarity shook her head. “I've been asking myself why since I left Ponyville. I thought I loved him. And yet this Heart of yours doesn't want me here.”

“You do not love him.” The words were blunt, but the dragoness' voice was soft, almost compassionate.

Despite that, Rarity frowned again. “And how would you know that? We have barely met. I came all this way for him. I carried him through a valley while I was bleeding. I've faced dragons and stormy seas to be here!”

“I know you do not love him,” the dragoness replied, unfazed. “I knew it before I met you. Because I have met the one who does already.”

Rarity's frown melted away in surprise. She glanced briefly at Spike before she looked to the Heart's entrance.

“She carried him farther than you,” the dragoness continued. “She faced the storm and a dragon's fury to save him. Now, she challenges a kingdom to reclaim the heart she loves. What is your love to that fire?”

The lights dancing about Rarity seemed to slow as she stared vacantly out the chamber entrance. The lights pulsed, but for once, they did not carry the sound of the heavy heartthrob.

Strange. She hadn't ever considered Twilight in that way before. Of course, there was no question about it: Twilight had always cared far more for Spike than Rarity ever had. She had loved him far longer than Rarity had even known him, but she had always perceived it as some sort of familial love rather than romantic. Perhaps she had misunderstood the dragoness. Perhaps there was no need for the distinction. Regardless, the dragoness’ question still stood.

“An echo,” Rarity muttered. Her gaze returned to Spike. “I suppose I've only ever... responded to his love. His adoration. It made me feel like so much more. I've wanted to return it, even more so these past few days, but... well... Now that he doesn't even have his heart, it's just an echo.”

The chamber pulsed once more, but again, no sound came. Ahead of her, Spike turned to face Rarity, though his gaze was fixed on the wall above her.

“But even if my feelings are just an echo,” Rarity continued, her voice dropping to an uncertain murmur. “Even if Twilight cares for him more than I do... He's been pining for me ever since we met. I've never seen him look at Twilight the way he looks at me. If it's what Spike wants… I’d say he deserves it. Doesn’t he?”

Outside, the dragoness was silent for a few moments. Rarity heard massive claws scratching against stone and the sounds of several piles of treasure shifting about. “Your question shares the answer with the one I first asked of you,” the dragon told her. “Do you love him?”

When Rarity hesitated, the dragoness huffed. “Wants corrupt,” she rumbled. “This goes especially for dragons. He may want your love, but it is not what he deserves.”

Spoken so bluntly, the words left a sting, especially when Rarity found she had no rebuttal.

The dragoness lingered outside the Heart a moment longer, as if waiting for a reply, but eventually, with a low growl rumbling from her throat, she slithered up the treasure piles back toward the cavern entrance.

Rarity gave a pained sigh, wincing as she stood up again. Her bandage stuck to her wound, chafing and pulling at the sensitive flesh as she walked. Still she continued on toward Spike. She felt better now, somehow. Not physically, but it was as if she'd become lighter, more attuned with The Great Heart. She had no doubt it was the admission coaxed from her by the dragoness that had led to the change. Perhaps now she would be able to lend Spike her strength or whatever it was the dragoness had originally intended for her to do.

After several long minutes of hobbling across the stone floor, she finally reached Spike at the center of the Heart. She was about to sit down next to him when she noticed the small dragon turning his head once more. A strange look was in his eyes as he stared at the walls surrounding him and Rarity, but the unicorn found it impossible to read whatever fledgling emotion sparked within the young dragon.

Before she could contemplate it any further, the clink of coins from outside the Heart drew Rarity's attention. Something heavy was moving around out there, she realized, and Spike's head soon swiveled about, tracking the movement of whoever was outside as they circled the Heart. Rarity stepped back to stand with Spike as heavy footfalls sounded from just outside the Heart's entrance ‒ too heavy to be anything other than a dragon, but too clumsy to match the elegance of their host.

The lingering echoes of the footfalls almost masked the far quieter series of footsteps approaching the Heart, and soon a small, familiar purple claw grasped the edge of the chamber's entrance. Some... thing wearing the guise of Spike peered inside. His eyes lit up as they darted about the enormous chamber, and a toothy grin overtook his features.

The cornflower blue of The Great Heart receded in favor of a brilliant emerald light, spreading out along the walls from the entrance until it covered half the chamber. The green lights thrashed about chaotically, pushing up against the blue that, by contrast, seemed almost static. It was a dance of pain, Rarity knew, watching the turbulent movement of green, so very similar to the agitated dance of her own heart when she had first entered.

But more importantly, it was the dance of Spike's heart.

The small dragon at her side was trembling, and he grabbed firmly onto Rarity's foreleg as his doppelgänger entered, claws digging into her fur.

The heart thief's eyes settled on Rarity and Spike, and his smile widened even further.

“Well, well. You ponies keep showing up wherever I go.” The fake Spike's pupils narrowed into slits, and his eyes underwent an almost imperceptible change in color. “How are my two favorite lovers doing?”

Rainbow Dash rolled onto her back with a groan, blowing a raspberry in exasperation.

She looked down her nose at the twilit sky above her. From the garden atop the mountain, she was afforded an impressive view of the multicolored heavens: from the golden sunset west, to the violet dusk creeping in from the east. But at the same time, with the clouds so far below her, the sky was without movement. Even the air around her was stagnant, void of even the slightest breeze. For all the life The Great Heart allegedly exuded, not a lot of it stuck around the area.

The various plants and misshapen statues in the garden had provided a few hours of distraction, but after all the flying around she'd been doing lately, the solemn, ancient inertness surrounding her was getting on her nerves.

Her eyes searched the horizon again, but there was still no sign of Twilight. At this point, Rainbow Dash had no doubt she'd crossed into The Changeling Kingdom in pursuit of the thief, despite the many warnings she'd given Applejack and the others. And if that was the case, there was no telling when she'd be back. The pegasus had a good idea of where the borderlands lay, but the geography beyond that was a mystery to most ponies. She could only hope Twilight knew what she was doing. For Spike's and her own sake.

Meanwhile, Rarity and Spike were just out of her reach, each suffering from the wounds that ‒ some would say ‒ they had inflicted upon each other. Applejack, Pinkie Pie, and Fluttershy were out of reach as well, almost a day's journey away. Whether they had confronted the thief or not, Rainbow Dash had no way of knowing.

It seemed every single one of her friends were in mortal peril, yet she could do nothing but sit and wait for Twilight's return.

Thunder rumbled from somewhere far below the garden, and Rainbow Dash rolled back onto her hooves to get a better look, approaching the edge of the plaza with sluggish steps.

She had entertained a few ideas of what to do with her time, but none of them had seemed particularly helpful. She could have flown off south to check on Applejack's group, but unless they were still hanging around the ambush point, finding them in The Graylands would be impossible. She could have gone north to warn the other princesses, but that would have taken days. Definitely not helpful.

Rainbow Dash reached the precipice and found the world below her consumed by an enormous swathe of dark clouds. Flashes of lightning raced about the seamless cloud cover, evoking the thunderous roars and growls that reached all the way up to Rainbow Dash's vantage point.

The sun had sunk far enough below the horizon that everything below the pegasus was now steeped in the shadows of the surrounding mountains. Combined with the huge storm clouds, night had fallen early in these parts of The Dragon Territories.

Rainbow Dash flinched when a hulking figure broke through the dense cloud cover suddenly, hurtling up the mountainside at an alarming rate. The creature shook of the fluff of the clouds clinging to its body as it flew, revealing itself to be a dragon, a good deal smaller than Rainbow Dash's current host.

It was, however, still the size of the average dragon, large enough to dwarf the pegasus, so Rainbow Dash found it wisest to retreat.

She made it inside the relative safety of the cavern just as the newcomer clambered onto the plaza outside, panting with the effort of the quick climb. The dragon, clad in bright yellow scales and wicked-looking spines, lurched forward toward the great cavern, sporting a very noticeable limp in its gait. Looking closer, Rainbow Dash spotted a charred wound on one of its hind legs, surrounded by smoldering green embers.

A low growl drew Rainbow Dash's attention to the depths of the cavern, from which the lavender dragoness now emerged, looking none too pleased at the unannounced intrusion.

“What is the meaning of this?” she demanded, casting an accusatory glance in Rainbow Dash's direction before passing by the pegasus and striding out the cave to meet the other dragon outside.

“The insects have snuck past our borders,” the yellow dragon revealed, giving a low growl. “They are at your doorstep.” He craned his neck to look at his wound. “They are many.”

“Then the Equestrian princess has failed,” the dragoness gathered. Judging from the other dragon's look of confusion, it seemed her words were meant for Rainbow Dash rather than him. Her voice climbed in strength as she spoke, along with her temper. “If the thief has come to steal, then so be it. He will find I demand a steeper price for his crimes!”

She stepped past the yellow dragon, spreading her wings before stopping again. “Do not let them near The Great Heart.” The other dragon nodded dutifully. The dragoness threw one last gaze toward the shadows hiding Rainbow Dash from view. “And do not eat my guests.” The yellow dragon gave another, more hesitant nod, watching the dragoness set off from the mountain and dive into battle.

His gaze lingered on the precipice for another few moments before he turned back toward the cave, giving a soft snarl as he started limping forwards.

The dragon's eyes found Rainbow Dash as soon as he entered the cave. A look of surprise crossed his features, mixed with some other expression the pegasus couldn't quite read. The dragon's surprise didn't stop him, however, and he continued inside the cave, regarding the pegasus with that odd look all the while.

Rainbow Dash returned the gesture, keeping a careful eye on the massive beast. There was something unsettling about the dragon, she was sure of it. It was something about the way he looked at her. Beneath the fading surprise... there was a sense of triumph, sparkling in those familiar, green eyes.

“You..!” Rainbow Dash muttered, taking half a step toward the massive dragon before thinking better of it. She didn't get much farther than that, however, before her whole body seized up, surrounded by a glowing green aura.

“Perceptive,” the changeling chuckled, morphing back into his natural form while lifting Rainbow Dash into the air. He had grown since they last met. A lot. More dragon now than changeling, he was only a little smaller than the giant yellow dragon he had been masquerading as.

Rainbow Dash couldn't speak under the powerful influence of the changeling's magic. Even her face was rendered completely immobile, locked in a fierce scowl. The changeling wasted no more words on her, and threw her against the roof of the ceiling. The restrictive grip of the changeling's magic prevented her from crying out, but the blow was enough to send her vision swimming. She felt the world shift and lurch around her before she was suddenly tumbling across the cavern floor, blacking out.

It took her a long while before her vision returned to focus, and longer still before she could lift her head to look toward the depths of the cavern.

The changeling was gone. She had no idea how long she’d been out. He could already be at the Heart for all she knew. Probably was. And again, Rainbow Dash found, there was nothing she could do about it.

After a few tries, she managed to push herself back onto her hooves. She threw a last gaze in the direction of The Great Heart before turning toward the entrance. Her wings were smarting from the heart thief's blows, but they seemed fine beyond that. As she walked, then trotted toward the outside, she stretched her wings, working out their kinks before finally setting into the air.

It took her but seconds to fly past the garden, but by now, the sun had passed behind the surrounding peaks. The world below the mountaintop was black as night, revealing no sign of where the lavender dragoness had gone. She would have expected to hear sounds of battle, but either the heart thief had lied, or the thunderstorm was drowning out the changelings and dragons far below.

Rainbow Dash gritted her teeth. If the thief had been bluffing, the dragoness would almost certainly have been back by now. But that only raised more questions. Where would the thief even have gotten an army? Why was he attacking The Great Heart? But perhaps most importantly...

“Where the hay are you, Twilight?”

Rainbow Dash folded her wings and dropped down the mountainside, shielding her face with an outstretched forehoof as she dove through the thunderclouds. They were thicker than she had expected, and when she finally broke through, she found herself in a world transformed. As she had expected, the clouds blotted out any shred of light from the evening sky. Heavy, biting rain lashed at her from all sides, and the constant sound of thunder was deafening, far louder than it had sounded from above.

The landscape below was darker than night, lit only by incessant bursts of lightning and the even more frequent gouts of dragon fire and bolts of changeling magic. The changelings' green outnumbered the dragons' myriad of colors by far, but everywhere Rainbow Dash looked, the enormous bursts of fire swallowed dozens of the green lights.

The scene unfolding all around her was far too chaotic for her to determine any winning side. To her right, a dozen black shapes were engulfed in scarlet fire, and ahead of her, an enormous silhouette fell through the air, roaring as countless bolts of changeling magic rained down upon it.

It was too dark for the pegasus to properly tell the shapes and sizes of the few dragons she could spot, and far too dark to tell apart their colors. Rainbow Dash had never seen the dragoness' fire breath, the only recognizable feature in all the chaos, and so she quickly gave up hope of finding her in time.

Only too late did Rainbow Dash realize the implication her presence bore to the context of the situation. A smaller dragon, albeit still more than twenty times her own size, launched itself from the mountainside behind the pegasus, who only barely managed to dodge the ferocious snap of its jaws. The young dragon's momentum carried it past Rainbow Dash, close enough that the side of its head almost brushed against her.

The pegasus repositioned herself midair and used the dragon's jaw bone to kick off, zooming back up toward the clouds. A blast of fire soon followed after her, but she outsped it easily.

“I'm not a changeling, numskull!” Rainbow Dash shouted, but the only reply she received was the beat of the dragon's wings as it set after her.

A bolt of lightning arced around her while she flew through the cloud, setting her mane on end, but otherwise passing harmlessly by her. The burst of thunder that accompanied it was deafening, however, causing a fair bit of disorientation for the pegasus. She broke free of the clouds at an angle and was forced to spend a second or two taking in her surroundings, giving the pursuing dragon enough time to catch up to her.

A huge, vertical arc of fire erupted from the dark cloud immediately below her, and Rainbow Dash dodged left. The dragon's head burst into view a second later, jaws snapping shut around where the pegasus would have been had she gone right.

Rainbow Dash flew around behind the dragon and climbed into the sky rapidly, leaving her would-be attacker in the dust. Once she had reached the same altitude as the cavern she'd come from, she drew to a halt, watching the dragon below approaching steadily.

It would be an easy matter luring it to The Great Heart, she supposed. Hopefully it would recognize the heart thief as the greater threat by then. But even so, Rainbow Dash doubted this younger dragon would be of much help. The thief was bigger, and his magic certainly wasn't to be trifled with. Even if this dragon was trying to eat her, it seemed wrong to sacrifice it just for a chance at saving Spike and Rarity.

The dragon below her spread its wings suddenly, braking all movement. It was far from any kind of attacking range, but its attention seemed to have left Rainbow Dash for a moment. The pegasus followed the dragon's concerned gaze south and found a squad of at least fifty changelings flying above the clouds toward them. They were still miles off, however, too far away to attack.

The dragon's gaze was not on the changelings, Rainbow Dash realized, but the bright light immediately behind them. Seeing it from even several miles away, Rainbow Dash felt her heart drop at the sheer speed exhibited by what she could only describe as a low-flying comet.

Any doubts Rainbow Dash had about the newcomer's alignment was quickly put to rest when the squad turned as one toward the rapidly approaching surge of light. A tiny ball of energy flew ahead of the newcomer and into the midst of the changelings before exploding into a massive, six-pointed starburst, scattering the changelings everywhere and parting the black swathe of clouds below.

Before Rainbow Dash could even utter her name, Twilight had closed the miles-wide gap separating them and blown past the pegasus. Rainbow Dash found herself caught in an unnatural reverse slip wind, drawing her tumbling through the air and into Twilight's wake. The sound of the explosion that had scattered the changelings reached her half a second later, as did the residual shockwave, sending Rainbow Dash tumbling even further.

Rainbow Dash's eyes widened in shock. Her gaze found Twilight just as she vanished in a bright flash, only a few feet short of crashing into the mountainside.

The pegasus managed to stabilize herself midair without giving it much thought, her eyes fixed on the spot where Twilight had vanished. She frowned, going over in her head again whether it had been the alicorn or the sound of the explosion that had reached her first.

“Did she just..?”

Rarity took a shaky step forwards, putting herself between Spike and the thing pretending to be Spike.

“What do you want?” Rarity snapped at the intruder, trying to sound more intimidating than scared.

In way of response, the faux Spike reached an outstretched hand toward the wall right next to him. The emerald lights there were whipped into a frenzy, forming a pulsing, spiraling pattern centered on one of the protruding crystal hearts.

The crystal vibrated under the influence of the changeling's spell for a short moment before ripping free of its socket and flying into his open palm. The crystal heart was in the shape of a teardrop, perhaps the size of Rarity's hoof, shimmering with a warm, golden glow. Alien feelings of devotion and anger, love and suffering, happiness and betrayal suddenly assaulted Rarity, all of them stemming from that single heart in the changeling's grasp, radiating waves of emotions that spread throughout The Great Heart.

A simple farm mare, not unlike Applejack, in a time where winter ruled the land, not Celestia. The concepts, bereft of picture, sound, scent, and touch, sprung to life within Rarity's thoughts, stretching her mind from The Great Heart today to that eons old pre-Equestrian society. A unicorn, shining like the sun, overshadowed by a father's disapproval. A secret note, a meeting in the dark, and a poison kiss.

The heart vanished between the fake Spike's lips, silencing that last call for help ringing in Rarity's mind. The changeling shuddered with ecstasy as he swallowed the heart, his whole body glowing green with energy.

“Thousands of years ago, we ruled these mountains,” the changeling finally explained, speaking first with Spike's voice. As his disguise became lost in fire, however, his voice slowly changed, dropping in pitch and sounding more monstrous by the second. “Our kings and queens were the gods before your princesses. Before the dragons came.”

The fire burning where the fake Spike had stood intensified, growing in height and spreading out along the edges of the chamber. “They cast us from our homes and took this, our tomb to our old gods, as their prize.” A black and dark cerulean wing sprouted from the fire to Rarity's left, blotting out most of the ceiling. A hind leg erupted from somewhere near the entrance, and a foreleg appeared behind Rarity, close enough for the dragon-changeling to easily reach out and grab her. “When we tried to retake our lands, we were met by fire and ash. So ended our golden age.”

A reptilian visage, not quite dragon, but bearing only small hints of the changeling it once was, broke free of the flames to Rarity's right. The fire surrounding her and Spike finally dissipated, leaving them standing on a small island of empty space in a chamber otherwise occupied completely by the enormous changeling, coiling around the walls of The Great Heart.

Either Rainbow Dash had severely understated the size of the thief when she had recounted her and Twilight's battle with him, or he had grown to several times his former size in the short time between then and now. Rarity doubted it was the former. If the claws scraping at the floor right next to her had grabbed hold of Twilight, there would not have been much left.

“What I want... is to reverse our sordid history.” The heart thief's voice was so deep now that it was barely comprehensible, a constant underlying growl masking his words. “The changelings of that time failed. Reverence of their gods kept them from using their most powerful weapon.”

The changeling's maw opened, and another crystal heart was pulled from the ceiling above. A young mare's scream and Discord's laughter was all Rarity registered before the changeling's jaws snapped shut. The chamber was heating up now as even more raw magic seemed to seep from of every pore of the thief's body.

“I'll show the world,” he growled. “The power of the changelings. My power!”

His eyes found Rarity again, as if just remembering she was still there. “And you. Will you try and stop me? To save the one you love?”

The unicorn glanced back at Spike, clutching her bandaged leg. Her gaze went over him to the dragon-changeling's torso behind her, and moved around the circumference of the chamber, taking in the thief's immense size. She couldn't fight him. A flick of his claws and it would be over. Several reasons prevented her from running, chief among them the thick tail blocking the exit.

“I... I can't stop you,” Rarity admitted, lifting her gaze to the changeling monster looking down at her. She stepped aside, leaving Spike standing prone before the heart thief. The little dragon didn't move, but his claws still held firmly onto Rarity's leg. “I suppose... it's lucky I don't need to save him.”

The changeling's head moved closer to the two as he chuckled. “You may be misreading the situation ‒” Greenish smoke rose from his nostrils as he gave a throaty growl “‒ if you think he doesn't need saving.”

Rarity offered no reply but a thinly veiled smile, waiting as the changeling's head moved closer and closer. The heat radiating off the changeling's scales struck Rarity in waves, succeeding in driving her a few steps back before the monster stopped his advance.

His eyes shifted from Rarity to Spike, narrowing. His nostrils flared, taking in the scent of the small dragon, who promptly ducked behind Rarity again. “I left him to die last I saw him...” he muttered, breathing smoke at Rarity. “How is he still alive without a heart?”

“Oh, come now,” Rarity berated the beast, allowing a nervous smile to play across her lips. “You were clever enough to steal his first heart, weren't you? The answer is all around you.”

Rarity snuck a step forwards as the changeling's eyes left her and Spike momentarily, darting around the chamber uncertainly. “The vault... would it sustain a ‒? Could it?” His eyes found Rarity again, noticing her smile. “His first heart?” Rarity had to shield her face from the hot gust of smoke blowing over her as the changeling snorted with anger. “You stole a heart!?”

“Your... 'gods' certainly didn't need them,” Rarity defended herself, hoping she wasn't pushing her luck too far. “The dragoness ‒ you must have passed by her just outside ‒ told us to help ourselves.”

Behind her, the changeling's massive claws scraped against the floor as his fist curled up. “Impossible!”

“At first, to be sure. We fed him half a dozen of the hearts.” Rarity looked back at Spike and shook her head. “But it just didn't work.” She motioned with her head toward the back of the chamber, where the wall was obscured by the changeling's torso. “Until we found another dragon heart.”

The lie had the desired effect. The changeling's eyes widened with surprise at the revelation, and his entire body shifted. He was, of course, much too big to be able to see the wall in question, along with its supposed missing gem.

With another growl, the enormous dragon-changeling became consumed by flames once more. His neck retracted back into the flames burning at the edges of the chamber, and the tail receded as well, revealing the thin crack in the wall that was the entrance.

Rarity fired up her horn immediately and grabbed Spike with her magic. Before the changeling could finish his transformation into something less ungainly, she whirled the little dragon around herself and threw him toward the entrance as far as she could.

Rarity took a deep breath and set after the dragon at a gallop, watching him fall short of the entrance and come to a rolling stop. A backwards glance revealed Twilight standing at the back of the cave, inspecting the wall for any missing gems. The changeling's head turned toward her and Rarity shut her eyes tightly as she ran, waiting for the inevitable punishment.

“You won't get far without wings, Rarity!” Twilight's voice called out after her, filling the unicorn with a small sense of relief. The changeling was being overconfident, toying with her. Justly so, perhaps. In any case, it supplied Rarity with at least a few more precious moments to think of a way to save herself and Spike.

She passed by the small dragon and picked him up with her magic, reaching the Heart's exit a moment later. If she could get Spike up to the main cavern entrance, he could get help.

Shortly after passing outside The Great Heart, Rarity's head jerked around suddenly, severing her hold on Spike. Looking back, she found the dragon lying on the floor just within the Heart, shaking his head in confusion.

“Twilight?”

The changeling wearing that guise shook his head at the dragon, smiling. “Nothing but a husk after all. I actually fell for it! You would have made an excellent changeling, Rarity! I couldn't have done any of this without your groundwork!”

Rarity grabbed hold of Spike with her magic again, but when she tried to pull him back toward her, it was as if an invisible wall spanned the entrance to The Great Heart. Green lights danced across the invisible surface preventing Spike's escape, hissing and popping against his scales in protest of Rarity's magic until she was forced to give up.

The changeling's horn wasn't glowing, but he was smiling, approaching the dragon slowly. “Little Spike here goes against the very nature of this place. A heartless husk like him can't just walk outta here. Not before we settle this question... ringing in my skull!” The false Twilight winced, and a long, green crystal slowly grew out of her head, a second horn behind her normal one. “Who does this heart belong to?”

Rarity looked up toward the entrance to the main cavern, high above her. “Rainbow Dash! Anyone!”

“The pegasus can't save you.” The changeling was getting dangerously close now. He would be able to grab either of them with his magic by now if he felt like it. “And your dragon friends are a little preoccupied with the changeling assault outside. They all think we're taking The Heart Vault by force. So it's just the three of us.”

Rarity didn't much doubt the changeling's words. She could hear noise from outside, like the rumble of thunder, though it could just as well be the sounds of battle for all she knew. Knowing Rainbow Dash, she would be out in the thick of it, far away from Rarity's pleas for help.

She looked back toward the Heart. The changeling, still wearing Twilight's guise, was well over halfway across the chamber, and picking up the pace. If only one of those two were leaving the Heart alive, there wasn't much hope for Spike. Nor herself for that matter.

“Oh, why was I born a romantic!?” she cursed herself, stepping back into the Heart to stand between Spike and the oncoming changeling. “You can't have him!”

The changeling rolled his eyes, continuing his approach. “You know, I wasn't expecting much delay down here. So if you are literally lining up to share his fate, then fine.”

The false Twilight lowered his stance, taking a deep breath. A few green flames spilled out of his mouth as he exhaled, and his lungs took on a fiery glow. Seeing the flames on that first breath of fire, Rarity quickly lost her nerve. She glanced at Spike briefly, wondering how fireproof those scales of his were.

The changeling took another breath, much deeper than the one before. His lungs puffed out impossibly far, growing incandescent with the fire within. Rarity panicked and grabbed Spike with her magic, swinging him in a wide arc at the changeling. A short, concentrated jet of fire escaped the changeling's mouth just before Spike connected perfectly with the side of his head, scattering the blast of fire intended for Rarity and sending them both tumbling across the floor.

Rarity threw herself to the side, but the first jet of fire still ended up grazing her, searing the side of her face and burning a hole through her mane. The smell of burning hair filled her nose as she hit the floor with a shriek of pain, and she was forced to squint with dried-out eyes when she looked toward the changeling and dragon lying further within the chamber.

The changeling was of course the first to recover, but as soon as he was on his hooves, Spike grabbed onto his leg with surprising speed. His jaws clamped down on his foreleg, teeth sinking deep into the faux pony's skin. The changeling's voice slipped back to its original, deep pitch as he screamed out in pain, shaking the dragon off with a surprisingly strong flick of his leg.

Spike went rolling off even further into the chamber, and the changeling quickly lowered his horn at his prone form. Rarity reached blindly outside the chamber with her magic, tossing the first object she could find at the changeling. A golden chalice sailed through the air a second later, missing the heart thief's head by an inch. Fortunately, its trajectory brought it straight into the path of the changeling's spell, not only saving Spike, but causing the spell to blow up in the changeling's face.

The explosion didn't seem to do much damage, but it did serve to turn the heart thief's attention back to Rarity. “What exactly do you think you're doing!?” His magic wrapped around Rarity, hoisting her into the air and slamming her against the wall next to the chamber entrance. “You say you love him one minute, but use him as a wrecking ball the next!”

As he charged another spell, Rarity sent another chalice flying at him. The heart thief grabbed it long before it hit him, crumpling the gold up like a wad of paper before tossing it to the side.

“I don't love him,” Rarity gasped, struggling to breathe under the changeling's choking grip. “Not enough. But I know who does. And if I can help it... that who is going to find him... alive and well... when she gets here.”

The thief's eyes narrowed, and his horns ‒ both Twilight's and Spike's crystallized heart ‒ glowed once more. Before he could fire any spell at her, however, his ears twitched in response to a popping sound just outside the Heart.

Something flashed just outside the entrance to Rarity's left, and the changeling's eyes widened in surprise. A blast of magic glanced off his face half a second later, stunning him briefly. A circle of light formed around the thief, flashing briefly before exploding into a roaring column of magenta fire, hurling him up against the ceiling. The flames dissipated quickly, but an explosive bolt of energy struck him as he dropped from the ceiling, slamming him against the far wall of the chamber.

The magical grip that had held Rarity suspended against the wall released her, dropping her to the floor. She looked left again, just in time to see a lavender hoof step through the entrance. The green lights of the surrounding walls receded, allowing a strong, magenta glow to spread throughout half the chamber, melding almost seamlessly with the green on the other half.

A frightening look of determination dominated Twilight's features when she finally stepped fully into The Great Heart. Her horn was ablaze with a magenta so vibrant it hurt Rarity's eyes, and the very air around her shimmered; whether it was a force field, sheer power, or both, Rarity didn't know. She was uncertain if Twilight even saw her, so intensely was her gaze fixed on the changeling across from her. When she spoke, it was through the gritted teeth of a contemptuous sneer.

“Let's try this again.”

Chapter 10

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More than a few questions came to mind when Twilight saw Rarity drop to the floor of The Great Heart beside her, gasping for air through gritted teeth. The side of the unicorn's face was swelling from a minor burn, though judging from her smoking mane, she'd been lucky. A damp, make-shift bandage was wrapped tight around her left hind leg, mottled with dark red splotches both fresh and old. Her disheveled, dirty fur lent the unicorn an uncharacteristically ragged appearance, and her labored breathing told Twilight that her questions could wait.

Spike lay further into the cavern, near the center. He was a mere ghost of himself at this point, trembling as he tried to push himself to his feet. Physically, he seemed unhurt: a fact Twilight could only attribute to Rarity's presence.

The heart thief was struggling to rise as well, crouching near the wall opposite Twilight. He still wore her appearance, charred and burnt almost beyond recognition, sporting the green crystal of Spike's heart growing out behind a blackened, warped horn.

Magic surged to the front of her horn as she gritted her teeth in concentration, taking a second to make sure all of her prepared spells were in order. “Let's try this again.”

Her blazing horn brightened, unleashing a salvo of explosive bolts at the downed changeling. A green bubble sprung up around him before his surroundings were lost in smoke and fire, and a lightning bolt glanced off of Twilight's own shield a moment later.

The smoke around the changeling was instantly whipped away under his magical influence, revealing the thief back on his hooves, smiling behind his crackling energy barrier.

“I was wondering where you were! Thought you'd given up on the husk!”

A dozen magenta lights flared up all around the surface of the changeling's shield, whirring loudly for a moment before arcs of lightning erupted all over the inside of the force field.

“Sorry. I would have stopped you sooner.” Twilight stepped further into the chamber, distancing herself from Rarity. “I had a little trouble finding your hive.”

Even with electricity coursing through his body, the changeling chuckled. “No need to apologize!” The green bubble exploded into flames as he transformed, consuming almost the entire chamber in fire.

Twilight teleported herself to the center of the chamber, untouched by the flames, and teleported Spike and Rarity out of The Great Heart. The injured unicorn vanished in a bright flash, but Spike, lying right next to her, remained where he was, held in place by some outside influence. She tried again, but was met with the same result.

“You won't stop me.” Black claws several times the size of Twilight rose out of the flames and came crashing down on her force field, putting an end to her attempts at getting Spike to safety.

“In fact, I've been missing the love you have for that dragon of yours,” the thief continued, his head breaking out of the subsiding flames. The great green crystal sprouting from his head was now joined by six smaller, dark cerulean crystal spikes. Together, they formed a jagged crown growing straight out of his skull, between his oversized changeling horn and Spike's crystal heart. He had already feasted on two of the Heart's treasures, Twilight realized. “It's surprisingly strong” ‒ The large crystal on his head glowed for emphasis ‒ “Considering he gave his heart to another mare.”

Twilight fired an explosive bolt at the massive claws bearing down on her force field, using the shield to protect herself and Spike from the recoil of the explosion. With the claws gone, she turned to fire another bolt at the thief's head, only to have it hit the inside of a shield dome separating her from the beast coiled around her.

“You can be my queen,” the changeling offered with a smirk, ignoring the additional two bolts exploding against his shield. “After I've wiped out your little friends.”

“You're getting a little clingy,” Twilight responded through gritted teeth, taking a step back and feeding an extra large dose of magic into her horn. “I think there's something wrong with your diet.”

“Now, don't say that. You'll come to love me... one way or another. Given enough persuasion, I’m sure you'll gladly give up your heart.”

The enormous magenta blaze coiling around Twilight's horn collapsed into a crackling sphere of fire and lightning. It launched forwards with a roar, vanishing in a bright flash just before hitting the thief's shield. It reappeared on the other side of the barrier and carried on straight into the changeling's brow.

A bright white blaze instantly overtook the entire chamber and the thief, and the ground heaved violently beneath Twilight as the whole Heart shook from the blast. The heart thief's force field held only for a few seconds before shattering, collapsing in on Twilight's shield with almost overwhelming force.

When the dull rumble shaking the ground faded along with the bright glare of the explosion, however, her force field still stood. The changeling's massive body had shifted outwards from the center of the blast, hugging the walls a little more tightly than before. The wing that had covered most of the ceiling of the chamber was in tatters, slowly folding up as he groaned in pain. What looked like a dark yellow bruise was faintly visible on the his forehead, but he seemed unharmed beyond that.

His hind leg kicked out at Twilight's shield, hitting it like a freight train. The force field flickered for just a second this time, allowing one of the claws to slip inside. It came within a mere two feet of hitting Twilight before the shield materialized around it, trapping the entire foot.

Twilight grunted with exertion when the dragon-changeling's front paw smashed against her shield again. Combined with his foot trying to pull free of the force field, the alicorn could concentrate on little else than keeping herself and Spike protected.

Things weren't quite playing out the way she'd hoped they would. Her spell casting was severely limited by the close quarters of The Great Heart: Just about any spell powerful enough to damage her opponent would cause devastating collateral damage to both herself and Spike. Spike's presence was proving to be a problem as well. Bombarding The Great Heart from outside would have been a simple matter had the thief been alone. But as it stood, she was effectively as trapped within the chamber as Spike was: Leaving him alone with the changeling wasn't an option. Unless...

Twilight reached a hoof out to touch the giant black claw poking through her shield. She let her magic course through her foreleg and into the changeling, suffusing them both with her magical influence while the thief was busy attempting to destroy her shield. She shut her eyes tight, envisioning the outside of the mountain they were in.

She and the changeling both dematerialized in a flash of light. As soon as they did, however, Twilight felt a drag similar to whatever influence was keeping Spike trapped within the Heart. To her consternation, they rematerialized within the chamber containing The Great Heart instead of outside the mountain.

She was falling through the air before she knew what was going on, straight into the palm of the thief. His claws closed around her with almost crushing force, but only for the short moment it took her to teleport free.

She reappeared atop a pile of treasures near the cavern entrance, just in time to catch a blast of fire from the changeling, who now stood atop The Great Heart. Her shield kept the flames at bay, but when her footing began melting away, she was forced to teleport behind the thief.

In the moments it took him to find her, she had prepared a second powerful spell. The thief's tail came crashing down on her treasure pile just a second too late. Twilight teleported to the stone precipice jutting out from the opening of the cave, shutting her eyes for half a heartbeat as she finalized the spell. When she opened her eyes again, they were glowing white. She pointed her horn at the changeling's chest. Something cracked audibly as he was hammered backwards by a tremendous, yet invisible impact, sending him crashing into the wall opposite Twilight.

She didn't relent. Even as the changeling was sliding down piles of gold and silver, her horn pulsed, and a bright beam of energy shot out of her horn. The thief answered her challenge with stunning speed, meeting the beam with one of his own. Twilight felt an immediate, most severe drain in her energy just from maintaining the struggle, but the heart thief seemed unperturbed.

He winced slightly as he leaned back forwards from the blow Twilight had dealt him earlier. Even so, he gave her a self-assured smile. His body stretched forwards unnaturally as he dropped back down onto all fours, growing even larger than before, almost as big as the dragoness. His front claws landed on top of The Great Heart with a resounding thud, and the point of impact between the two beams of energy shifted forwards along with his head.

“You said you visited my hive?” The heart thief chuckled darkly. “A day ago? Even less? It must have been. Then you must have made the same mistake again.” His eyes pulsed green, and their shared point of impact shifted further toward Twilight.

The alicorn grunted with effort as she was pushed a step back. She poured everything she could into her spell. The glow in her eyes flickered out, but her beam crept forwards, slowly but surely eating away at the changeling's.

“You used up all your magic rushing to come catch me. Or are you still going easy on me?”

With a snarl, the seven crystals atop his head lit up in unison. The power of his spell tripled, snuffing out Twilight's in a second. She teleported once more, dodging the ensuing explosion and reappearing atop The Great Heart, between the changeling's front legs. The stone precipice she had stood upon, strong enough to carry a full grown dragon and big enough for one to fit, snapped in half as the changeling's beam struck it. With a mighty groan and a cacophony of clinks and clatters, it came crashing down into the scattered treasures below.

Twilight struck upwards at the changeling's chest with another tremendous telekinetic punch. She couldn't gather the same amount of power, but the point blank range allowed her to at least shift him back off The Great Heart.

“Are you getting tired? I think you are.” The changeling's grinning maw opened wider, and a torrential green inferno washed over the top of The Great Heart.

Twilight's summoned shield parted the flames for an instant, but their ferocity shattered it almost immediately, knocking her clean off her hooves. She hit the cracked stone precipice hard, riding it down the slope of gold and diamonds before it came to a jarring halt, resting at an angle just in front of the entrance to The Great Heart.

Twilight rolled down the slanted stone a few feet before she managed to pick herself up, shaking her head with a groan. Her groan grew louder, transforming into a final, defiant roar. A vividly violet haze flowed from eyes that now shone a brilliant green, focused on the massive dragon-changeling looking down at her from above the Heart. Violet and black flames curled out of her horn, reaching out to touch the thief's invisible shield and setting the whole thing ablaze.

The changeling recoiled as a blast of magic hit his head, howling in pain. With his head receding out of view behind the Heart, Twilight turned her attention to his right wing, visible just left of the Heart. A scattered beam of energy left its membrane full of holes, and the thief roared in anger.

His claws wrapped around the Heart and his head resurfaced as he pulled himself up onto the cavern's centerpiece again. A smoking wound had scarred the side of his face, and now both his wings were in tatters.

Twilight fired another blast at him, but it succeeded only in shattering the shield the thief had just recast. He drew his hind legs up onto The Great Heart, lurching close enough to Twilight for his jaws to reach her should he extend his coiled neck.

Bracing for just that, Twilight drew more power into her horn, preparing the decisive blow.

The thief launched himself off the Heart with a mighty roar, but when Twilight unleashed a crackling bolt of lightning at his open maw, he vanished in a sea of green fire. He broke out of the flames a moment later and landed on the stone slab just a few inches in front of Twilight, appearing now in the smaller form he had had when they first met.

With her opponent now mere inches from her, Twilight realized far too late that she had failed to recast her personal shield after it had been destroyed by his dragon fire. She tried teleporting, but the thief was too fast. His claws closed around her horn just as the spell activated, causing a critical misfire which in turn triggered an excruciating lance of pain down her spine.

Her vision darkened for a second, and when it returned, she was back in the Heart, held aloft by the changeling's grip on her horn. Her knees buckled as soon as he let go. She barely felt the fall. Pain was cascading down her spine and throughout her body. A splitting headache was pounding at the inside of her skull, and her horn felt as though it were on fire.

The changeling stepped back from the alicorn, shaking his smoking hand with a slight wince. He faded once more into flame, reverting to his larger form. He coiled tightly around the circumference of the chamber, allowing the occupants only a few square feet of space within the confines of The Great Heart. Twilight felt a hand on her shoulder, and she turned her head to see Spike standing beside her. It seemed he hadn't moved far from the center while Twilight had fought the thief outside.

“Aw, I went and broke you.” The dragon-changeling's breath fell hot upon the pair in the center of the Heart. “Another good fight, little princess.” His breath grew even hotter, and the insides of his throat lit up with a fiery green glow. “Now, please leave me with the husk. I want to see how well he burns.”

Twilight fixed the changeling with a defiant gaze, fighting herself back onto her hooves once more with a grunt. She collapsed again as soon as she tried calling upon her magic, however, exacerbating the pain in her horn.

A dull roar rose in volume ahead of her, and she looked up see the changeling's maw open up in front of her.

“C'mon...” Twilight winced, and her horn fizzled uselessly. No matter how hard she tried powering through the pain, her magic simply wasn't responding. There was no force field to call upon, no bolt of lightning to strike down her enemy. She neither could nor would teleport away. Not without Spike.

Fire was welling up in the back of the thief’s throat, spilling into his mouth. If he did indeed mean to spare her life, he seemed fully convinced Twilight would escape the Heart. Or perhaps he no longer cared, too drunk on his own power.

The thief was right. She had used up all her energy getting to The Great Heart in time. Without it, she was no match for him. Even if she had had her full strength... The green fire burning brightly between those massive, razor fangs inspired little hope. The only reason she had even considered fighting the beast standing before her had been Spike. If Chrysalis and her four hearts had defeated Celestia, what hope did she have against his seven?

Twilight turned her gaze from the fires that would soon wash over her, to the small dragon standing at her side. His complexion seemed to have improved, though it could of course just be the intense green light shining down on them both. Not that it mattered anymore. His eyes found hers, reflecting the fear she felt herself.

The roar of fire grew to a deafening crescendo, and the air turned too hot to breathe. Twilight reached out a hoof to embrace Spike, but he lifted a hand to grasp her hoof instead. A strange spark lit his eyes, and for the first time in days, he looked lucid.

His gaze turned right, toward the changeling, and his grip on Twilight's hoof tightened. She followed his gaze and was blinded by the wave of fire hurtling at her and Spike, burning so bright that the world went dark.

She barely felt it when her hoof dropped to the floor again. The flames hit the floor several feet in front of her and spilled forwards in a great, inescapable wave. The pain coursing through her body as a result of her magical misfire seemed to evaporate. As the flames closed in on her, it was replaced by a much purer form of agony.

A small figure moved in front of her, silhouetted against the oncoming inferno. Arms outstretched, Spike took the full brunt of the changeling's fire breath. His diminutive form did little to shield Twilight, but as the flames enveloped her, she was shocked to feel an uncanny, but welcome, coolness washing over her. From one instant to the next, it was as if the heat had been sucked from the flames.

She raised a hoof to marvel at how the fire passed harmlessly across her fur, as if it were nothing but colored smoke. Once her eyes had adjusted to the brightness of the sea of flames rushing past her, her gaze found Spike, still standing protectively in front of her, as unharmed as she was.

The rush of fire was sustained for another few moments before finally abating, leaving the world in darkness once more. A grunt of annoyance, or perhaps surprise, was the first thing Twilight heard in the vacancy of roaring flames, and a strong, green glow was the first thing that caught her eye as her vision slowly adjusted.

“I don't know how you... What the ‒?”

Light flooded back into Twilight's vision, and she realized the green glow in front of her was Spike. His crystal heart protruding from the changeling's head mirrored the glow.

The light filling Twilight's vision didn't come from just Spike, she realized, but the walls of The Great Heart. Every single crystal had taken on a vivid shine, surrounding the Heart's three occupants with lights brighter than the sun.

The changeling grunted and winced, making it clear to Twilight that the glow of his stolen heart was none of his doing. She stepped up next to Spike, whose eyes found hers immediately, filling her chest with a warm sensation.

“That dragon fire was stolen,” Twilight said, looking deep into Spike's eyes, but speaking to the changeling. “You can't use it against its true owner. And its true owner wouldn't let you use it against me.” She turned to face the heart thief, scowling down at her. “I ‒” Her gaze swept past the myriad of hearts shining all around her “‒ We will ask you one last time. Give back Spike's heart.”

The thief's eyes narrowed. His horn lit up, but the light was immediately choked out by a single jet of azure fire from a nearby heart. The changeling snarled, only to be struck in the side of the face by a spray of pink light from another crystal. His claws found the offending heart, but as soon as they closed around it, the thief cried out in pain, withdrawing a smoking paw.

“These aren't just hearts,” Twilight told him, not entirely sure where she was drawing her knowledge from. “They're the hearts of those who gave away everything in the name of love. They were betrayed by your kind, but the love shining from them now is no less true. They aren't on your side. They're on ours.”

Smoke was rising from all sides of the chamber, where the changeling's oversized body was pressed up against hundreds of hearts. His roars of pain drowned out Twilight's words, but she continued nonetheless.

“In this place, our love is stronger than your greed!” Another blast of dragon fire washed over Twilight and Spike in the thief's last attempt to stop them, but it passed by them with no effect. “You're just as power-hungry as Chrysalis, and you'll meet the exact same fate!”

Massive claws lifted up over the pair, ablaze with fires of all the colors of the rainbow. Twilight turned to Spike and knelt down as the claws came down upon them. She touched her horn to the front spine on Spike's head, and the whole world went white.

Spike groaned and gave a mighty yawn. He felt as though he'd been asleep for days, yet he was oddly exhausted too. A bright light kept him from opening his eyes, and when he stretched his arms, he ended up hitting something soft behind him.

Spike flinched, only now noticing the rhythmic breathing of whomever he was lying up against and the sound of their heartbeat. He sat up with a grunt and rubbed at his eyes until his vision adjusted to the light. As he had half suspected, it was Twilight lying beside him, snoring softly on the stone floor.

Raising an eyebrow in confusion, Spike ran a hand along the smooth stone, feeling the warmth of the green and magenta lights moving across its surface. It felt almost like a pulse, as if the rock surrounding him was alive. Wherever he was, it certainly wasn't Ponyville.

A soft murmur escaped Twilight's lips just as Spike rose to his feet, and her eyes fluttered open. Her gaze found Spike, and she gave a sleepy smile.

“Twilight, where are we?”

The alicorn's smile widened a bit, and she gave a quiet chuckle. “A long way from home.”

It wasn't quite the answer Spike had wanted, but he realized Twilight looked just as tired as he felt. Maybe even more so. A thin, glowing trail of magenta ran in a spiral up her horn, surrounded by black scorch marks, and there was a distinct red tinge beneath the fur on her chest, forelegs, and face, as if she'd been badly sunburned.

More and more questions welled up in Spike's mind, but he watched silently as Twilight slowly rose to her hooves, not wanting to disturb her. As soon as she was sitting, however, Spike felt as though a magnet were suddenly pulling him toward her. He flew through the air separating them in an instant, landing firmly in Twilight's tight embrace.

“I'm glad you're back, Spike.”

“Where... where was I?” Spike managed to respond, coughing as the air was squeezed from his lungs.

“It's a long story.”

“Am I in trouble?”

The grip around him loosened, and he looked up at Twilight. She wore a confused look as she hesitated, before giving him a crooked smile. “For running away?”

Spike nodded hesitantly, murmuring, “I'm sorry.”

Twilight sighed. “You have no idea how you ended up here, do you?” A slight hint of disappointment colored her smile when Spike shook his head. “Well, I guess we can talk about it on the way home.”

Twilight stood up and turned toward a large crevice in the surrounding walls that Spike hadn't seen. When she started walking, he followed after without much hesitation. For the moment, Twilight seemed content to walk with him in silence, and despite his many questions, Spike felt the same way.

He used the opportunity to take in the details of the enormous chamber, now that his eyes had adjusted to its brightness. The light seemed to come from hundreds of crystals set into the surrounding walls, each shining a different hue. Beyond the protruding crystals, the walls were alive with the magenta and green lights he'd seen before, moving slowly in a pattern too intricate for him to comprehend.

“Oh!”

Spike tore his eyes from the glimmering walls and followed Twilight's gaze toward the chamber exit not far ahead of them. Four hearts of crystal, about the size of The Crystal Empire's Crystal Heart, rose from the floor as Twilight grabbed them with her magic.

Her horn made a strange sputtering noise, and Twilight winced when a few sparks escaped the crack in her horn, but her grip on the crystals remained. Each heart was slightly different in shape and size from the other, and they each bore their own distinct color. Rose quartz, fire ruby, cloudy sapphire, and pure diamond.

Spike's stomach growled, and Twilight laughed, bunching the crystals together in the air before continuing toward the exit. “Don't even think about it.”

“What are those?” Spike's eyes followed the hearts as Twilight moved them around herself, out of view.

“What do they look like?”

Spike gave a little frown. Twilight was being unusually stingy with her answers. “Crystal hearts?”

“Yep.”

“Like the Crystal Heart? In The Crystal Empire?”

“I'm not sure,” Twilight muttered, bringing the sapphire heart around to float in front of her. “I think so.”

Spike's eyes widened, and he took in the surrounding gem-studded walls again. “Where exactly are we, Twilight? And who is that?” He pointed ahead as they both exited the glowing chamber, entering into a huge cavern. A massive stone slab lay ahead of them at a crooked angle, and in the middle of it lay what looked like a changeling, groaning softly as it slept.

“He seems familiar,” Spike added, scratching his head in confusion.

“Uh, that's a long story too.” She looked up toward the top of the cavern and then back at Spike standing behind her. “I need to take care of a few things outside before we go. It shouldn't take too long.”

Twilight's horn brightened very briefly before releasing a few sparks. She touched at her horn gingerly, wincing while it made odd buzzing noises. The crystal hearts dropped out of her magical grasp, clattering loudly against the stone floor. She shook her head, then lit up her horn again, successfully winking out with a bright flash. The unconscious changeling went with her.

Spike was left in the dark cave alone, standing next to the abandoned collection of crystal hearts Twilight had dropped. Of course, the cave wasn't as dark as he would have expected a place of the same size to be. The outside of the chamber he'd just left glowed softly red all over, and the vein-like protrusions covering every surface around him glowed in all the colors of the rainbow. But the inside of the chamber that lay behind him was as bright as day, making it hard to appreciate the softer lights surrounding him now.

He spent a minute or two wandering around near the four hearts, inspecting what he quickly realized was a dragon's quite massive hoard. Too many metals for his liking, but he did find a nice-looking emerald that nobody would miss. Probably.

He had just finished chewing when something flashed behind him, and he once again felt an irresistible magnet-pull wrest him off his feet. This time, it was Rarity who grabbed hold of him, hugging him just as tight as Twilight had.

“Oh, thank goodness you're okay, Spike!”

They’d been in some kind of fight, Spike realized, seeing the burn on Rarity’s face and recalling Twilight’s injured horn. Curious as he was, he knew better than to comment on it.

Taken aback by the unicorn’s forwardness, he hesitated for a moment before he hugged her back, blushing.

“I'm sorry,” he wheezed, causing Rarity's grip to loosen.

The unicorn gave him a puzzled look. “Why, whatever for?”

“For tricking you...” He wanted to say 'yesterday', but truth be told, he had no idea how long he'd been sleeping. “On my birthday.”

“Ah.” A hoof reached up to stroke the back of his head, ruffling his spines. “Well, I may have... overreacted.” Rarity gave a little chuckle that turned into a sigh. “Don't be sorry, Spike. Even if nothing went as either of us had planned, I certainly can appreciate the gesture.”

Rarity's gaze rested on the egg-shaped chamber in the center of the cavern when Spike turned his head to look at her, her ears twitching rhythmically.

“The truth is,” she muttered wistfully, “I'm the one who should be sorry. I appreciate everything you've done for me, Spike.” She gave a small smile. “And I've known why you've done it for a long while too.” She looked back down at Spike, who averted his own gaze, feeling his blush growing brighter.

The words sounded somehow familiar, Spike noted. Like a dream. Distant, not unlike his memory of the changeling Twilight had taken with her. He was growing more and more certain that he didn't like where Rarity was going.

“That look in your eyes was always... different.” she continued. She touched a hoof against Spike's chin, tilting his head up to face her. “It's nice to see it again.” She gave a sad smile. “Flattering, but intimidating. Something there... It runs so much deeper than what I've ever seen in anypony else's eyes. I've wondered if it was something for me alone, or if it's just your nature. Whichever it is, I know now that what you have to give is more than I can return. And I realize that I've known it for some time. A year, perhaps? So I'm sorry, Spike. For not telling you long ago. For causing all this.”

“So... you don't love me?” Spike felt his voice faltering, but for some reason, his eyes remained dry. He felt he had heard all this before. Again, he wondered how much of his dreams had been reality. Whatever was happening, it did seem to lessen the impact of Rarity's confession.

“Of course I love you, Spike.” The hug tightened. “Just... not enough? Or the right way? I'm afraid I'm not sure. But I'm not what you need, Spike. In a way, I wish I were, but I see the one that truly loves you. You deserve each other.”

“Who?” Spike was having difficulty following Rarity. Either he was still too tired, or Rarity had been through a whole lot while he had been gone. Judging by her injuries and her disheveled appearance, he would have to guess the latter. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, I'm sure you'll find out.” Rarity finally let go of Spike, just as Twilight called down to them from somewhere above.

“Ready to go?”

Bracing herself for the spike of pain, Twilight teleported the pony and dragon up alongside her by the opening between the two caverns. Whatever had happened to her in the Heart, it had helped her horn. Getting her friends and the changeling back to Equestria would still be quite a challenge, but weak as it was, her magic was at least responding.

Spike's eyes widened almost as soon as he materialized, and his jaw dropped open. “Whoah.”

The dragoness had parked herself at the main entrance of the cavern, eclipsing the night sky outside. She was a dark leviathan where she stood, framed by the argent glow of moonlight against polished scales. They cast glimmers of light down the length of the cavern as the dragoness took her breaths in mighty heaves, exhausted after her victory against the changeling assault.

Without another word, Spike walked toward her, leaving behind Twilight and Rarity.

“On the way home, I hope you'll tell me how exactly you ended up out here,” Twilight told the unicorn, her gaze lingering on Spike a moment before turning to Rarity. “I... I don't know how long you stood up to him in there, Rarity, but I can't ever thank you enough. If you hadn't been with him...”

“I couldn't just leave him,” Rarity responded, giving her an appreciative smile. Her hoof reached up to fidget at her burnt mane, and her gaze turned to Spike again. The dragoness had lowered her head to his without a word, touching the tip of her snout against his forehead in an unexpected show of affection. “He is a special one.”

Twilight nodded. They were both silent for a moment, watching the strangely intimate greeting between dragons unfold. The dragoness had closed her eyes, taking in Spike's scent in deep breaths.

“Does he know how you feel?” Rarity asked Twilight quietly. “For The Great Heart to have reacted the way it did...”

“He saved me,” Twilight answered, smiling fondly at the dragon before turning her attention back toward the chamber of The Great Heart. “It was just like my brother’s wedding, when Cadance finally got to him. But I think Spike was acting instinctively.” The alicorn concentrated her magic for a moment, and the four crystal hearts she had left at the bottom of the chamber popped into existence beside her. “Spur of the moment thing. I doubt he remembers it.”

“It doesn't seem so.”

“Memories don't quite bind without emotions, I think. He might remember what happened in time, but until then, they'll probably be floating around his subconscious somewhere. He'll want to know what happened, but perhaps we should leave out the heavier stuff. I don't want to overwhelm him. Besides, I'd hate to tell him how he feels about me. If what I saw was even real.”

“Oh, it was real,” Rarity told her, nodding her understanding at Twilight's suggestion.

Rarity had been with Rainbow Dash near the main entrance of the cavern when the heart thief had been defeated. The two ponies had been nearly blinded by the piercing light emitted by The Great Heart. Whatever had caused such a reaction in the Heart was most definitely real.

The dragoness lifted her head, stepping past Spike. “Would they be better served remaining with their brethren?” the dragoness wondered out loud as she approached the two ponies, her golden eyes falling on the four crystal hearts Twilight had brought up from the main cavern.

“The hearts he took from your Heart have been returned,” Twilight replied, bringing the hearts a little closer to herself. “These belonged to ponies originally.”

“So did most of the hearts behind you.” It was clear the dragoness was merely testing her at this point. If Twilight wasn't mistaken, the corners of the dragon's mouth were curling up slightly in a hint of a smile.

“Even so,” the alicorn insisted, a smile of her own playing across her features. She started toward the mouth of the cavern. “I'd better take it up with the other princesses.”

“Very well.” The dragon lowered her head, preparing to duck into the rear cavern. She hesitated where she stood, looking the two ponies over. “I misjudged you,” she admitted. “Princess Celestia's faith in you is well placed, Twilight. And you, Rarity, have a most beautiful heart. Without either of you, The Great Heart ‒ and The Dragon Territories ‒ would surely have fallen. All dragons of this land owe you a debt of gratitude. And for all that you have done to protect Spike... you have my deepest thanks. You will always be welcome within my mountain.”

“And you're welcome to stop by Ponyville,” Twilight returned, her smile broadening.

The dragoness released a puff of smoke as she chuckled, stepping into the chamber of The Great Heart and leaving behind the ponies. “I should hope so. I expect an invitation to your pony ceremony.”

Rarity couldn't help but guffaw at the dragon's bluntness as she followed after Twilight. The alicorn had more restraint, disguising it as a sudden cough. She shot a glance back at the receding form of the dragoness, then gave Rarity a nervous look. “She's joking, right?”

“What ceremony?” Spike asked them when they caught up to him, looking as confused as ever.

“Nothing,” Twilight brushed him off, levitating him onto her back.

It didn't seem she'd fought the changeling thief all that long ago, yet outside the caverns, night had fallen quite suddenly. Being so far above the clouds and the lights of civilization, more than a thousand stars shone brightly down upon the three. The full moon in the center of the sky shone brighter still, revealing Rainbow Dash standing in the center of the garden, tying up the unconscious changeling.

“Applejack and the others are probably still wandering around the changeling marshes,” Twilight said, changing the subject. “We should arrange for somepony to pick them up.”

“Should I, uh, write a letter to Princess Celestia?” Spike offered from atop her back.

Twilight smiled. “I'd love that, Spike.”

The Heart Thief

by Helrael

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10