Chapter 1 New job and a new life in one phone call

Chapter 1 New job and a new life in one phone call

"Another morning, another day closer to being homeless."

Those were my thought's on almost every morning for the last week and a half after getting fired from work. And my financial situation is not that good either, with no viable help coming from anyone from my remaining friends or family, due to them having moved away and having their own issues to deal with. Oh and my apartment rent is due the next day.
So here I am, drinking my morning coffee, trying to find anything in the morning paper, since there's no available job openings at the trustworthy employment sites that would pay early to get the bills out of the way. So the wanted-adds were pretty much the last monetary hope for me.

"No... No... No... Nope... Double nope... Sounds shady... Definitely a scam... How did that get printed here?"

I was about to give up on the job hunt, when something caught my eye. Some tiny ad tucked in the corner of the page.

'Help needed for a simple watching over few items. Terms negotiable. Call 1800-DeezPlaced-919'

Deciding to give it a try on a odd hunch, I dialed the number on my smartphone. There was a light buzzing sound before the familiar dialing tone began.

"Hello, DeezPlaced Co secretary F. M. Erchant here. How can we be of service?" came a chipper sounding voice.

"Hello, this is Hena. I'm calling about your ad on the paper to know is it legit?" I asked.

"Why yes it is. Higher ups did not want to pay for a bigger ad due to some budget cuts. Now what would you like to know?"

"Well is it possible to get a little advanced pay? I have some rent issues at the moment. And I will do the job of course, provided it is reasonable and legal work."

"Well I have to run that with my superiors, but I think it can be arranged. And the job is basically just keeping watch of two items for a period of time with some pretty good benefits. And we even provide a transportation to the location. And I think we can fit in a dwelling for the works duration too."

Ok, this gig was starting to sound a bit too good, but lets try asking a little more info.

"Is there anything else I should be aware of?"

"Well I'm required to ask have you played any kind of game lately?"

"What?"

"I'm sorry, I don't make the rules and my superiors are rather... Eccentric folk."

"Ok... Well, the latest game thing I remember was a homebrew of D&D with my friends a good while ago. We played as monsters to spice things up, which led me play the game as a gynosphinx. Not much else, due to me not really being into video games. Friends always thought it was a little weird but never questioned it."

"Aand were... Good. The job is yours if you're still interested. The pay can be talked about later due to some scheduling issues."

"Alright then, I guess I'll agree to work with you then, since I don't have much choice at the moment." I said nonchalantly.

"I guess that is true... Especially since you have now verbally agreed... Your transport will arrive soon, I hope you enjoy your stay. Byeeee. *click*"

Okay now that was either an error in the speaker or a red flag. And what did she mean by that transport is arriving soon? I did not tell where I lived and they did not say where to meet... Maybe I got tracked?
My thoughts were cut short by an orange glow outside my window. Looking out, there was something coming down from the sky... RIGHT AT M-...

A loud boom echoed out as a small satellite, with the text "DeezPlaced" on it, crashed into the small corner apartment, oddly leaving the rest of the apartment complex intact. No one knew what happened to the body of the resident or who even owned the satellite. And like so many things in social media and the news, it had its limelight and then was just forgotten by larger public.

-Ee!!?

That was my thought when I regained consciousness. Only now my surrounding was a lush forest instead of my absolutely wrecked apartment, myself leaning up against a tree next to a clear pond. Other thing I noticed was that my body felt different, like I had extra pair of limbs, and maybe even a different skeletal build.

"Okay... What the heck just happened?" I muttered while trying to get up, trying to get my limbs to wake up properly. After the initial numbness began to fade from my legs, which there were four now apparently, I stretched a little bit in a rather feline way. That made me have a better look at my new body.

Now I had a body of a lion, or rather a lioness after checking downstairs, with wings on its back that looked like they could indeed enable viable flight, along with a mane reaching almost halfway down my back. Front legs looked mostly lion-like at a first glance, but seemed to be some kind of fusion of lion and human, making it possible to delicately hold things or maul things with... Yep, with some wicked looking claws.

Wanting to see my face, I walked carefully closer to the pond to have a look, and maybe a drink too. I had ordinary flat human face, even though I think I looked prettier now for some reason, with my hair turning into a majestic lion mane in my back, while being mostly humanlike hair in front, with few locks of hair covering my front, that did have a vague shape of a nice and firm bosom but did not really have nothing else on it. Fat deposit maybe?

"Okay then... So I got screwed over the phone call, got crushed by something crashing on top of my place and me, and now I'm a gynosphinx. And not panicking???" I thought aloud in a confused tone, only to notice a rolled up parchment next to me. With nothing else to do at the moment, I carefully picked up and opened it.

'Dear Hena.

You have just been transported to other world in a new body and skills by our service, with the bonus of your instinct and capability to panic, etc, temporarily suppressed to make the transfer a little easier and smoother experience. Length of this suppression may vary.

With your new ageless body (,you can't die of old age but can be killed or hurt,) you have been given few abilities to go with it.

Enhanced strength: comparable to ten lions or so. Can be boosted with magic or physical training.

Flight : obvious right?

High intelligence; you are extra smart and have encyclopedic knowledge of riddles. You can also understand, speak, read and write local languages. Studying can boost it up

Magic: you can wield magic, but you have to practice and earn its power.

Divine spark; Enables you to bless or curse individuals or locations IF you keep doing your work and be loyal to said work.

Power over Time: You can control the time itself of individuals or items BUT ONLY in your home or with boost from outside source. WARNING!: This power WILL leave you extremely tired if used too much, with a potentially painfully lethal consequence from frequent overuse. Do not use too much in order to avoid legal for safety reasons.

Taxation free Lair: You have a pre-made lair that remains hidden from anyone else until you find it. (You should will feel a pull towards it.) Comes with a built in library.

Other stuff and skill have to be done, gained or trained on your own time if desired. More info might will be given once you find your set lair. Enjoy your new life! <3

Best regards; DeezPlaced.Co secretary F. M. Erchant, extraplanar dimension 35B94672CDF

DeezPlaced.Co
If you're disappointed, just suck it up or we WILL alter our deals.
Not responsible for any deaths or injuries caused by displacement of our customers.
'

After I finished reading it, the parchment simply poofed out of existence. Not even with a pop-sound. I wanted to panic, but something was indeed blocking it from happening, and the same something was also stopping me from fainting.

"Well... I guess I just have to learn to live in this place... Maybe starting with flying and getting food." I thought aloud, and proceeded to take a careful drink from the pond, followed by instinctual cat-like grooming of some wet fur. Already getting scared of the potential hairballs...

Later on the same day...

'By Ra that furball was a pain to catch...'

I was still licking my lips from my last meal, which had ended up being a beaver that had gone too far from water. It was most likely my new body, but it tasted pretty good, despite it being completely raw. What was left, mainly bones and and some entrails were being picked by some scavengers when i left. And flight attempt went pretty well... After four fails before I got how to do it properly. Not that it helped all that much in catching that beaver in a rather dense wood. Missed it maybe six or seven times while chasing the bugger, but the chase kinda made it more rewarding I guess. Now I only need to locate that lair the scroll mentioned.
While thinking that, I finally got out of the forest to a dirt road with a stone bridge a little walk away. There were also some large rocks near it, that almost seemed to call to me. And soon I was laying down on one, which was pleasantly warm. Bonus.
Before I knew, I was nodding off to sleep, lightly curled up like a cat.

Some time later, my ear twitched at the noise nearby. Sounded like a heavy wagon. And after opening my eyes, there indeed was a wagon full of boxes, full of whatever items, coming over the bridge, with two oddly colorful horses, or maybe ponies due to their size, pulling it. One brown stallion with a bushy beard and a lighter grey mare, who had a spiraling horn on its forehead. And the way they seemed to converse told me they were both sentient sort.
'This place has unicorns? Well I am a sphinx now, so can't be that surprising' I thought, while getting an odd itch to leap in front of them. which I did, greatly surprising the two of them.

"Halt travelers. I'm afraid that as a sphinx I cannot let you go past me..." I called out to them while spreading my wings, wondering where those words came from. Must have been some manner of an instinctual auto-pilot or something like that.
"...Unless you answer a riddle for me."

This seemed to calm the duo down, even if it was only a little, since they still looked very scared. Who wouldn't be after being stopped by something maybe three or four times your size. I also noticed that they had a small grey unicorn with blue eyes riding among the pile of boxes. I think the little one seemed to have a tiny goatee coming up early. The little fellow seemed like a smart one too, iI thought for some reason.

"And what h-happens if we fail that?" the stallion carefully asked.

"Well, then I might have to kill you... Or maybe give you chance to pay a toll of sorts." I answered.

I just stood there while they whispered feverishly between each other, before looking back at me.

"Alright... Ask your riddle, miss...?" the mare asked.

"Hena. And so, here is the riddle..." I answered politely, before giving them a riddle, still kinda going on by the 'auto-pilot'. I bet they would definitely not know the classical riddle of the sphinx, so I chose another one to give them a fair chance.

"As I was going to St. Ives,
I met a stallion with seven wives,
Each wife had seven sacks,
Each sack had seven cats,
Each cat had seven kits:
Kits, cats, sacks, and wives,
How many were there going to St. Ives?"

All three ponies looked initially confused, before starting to think the riddle over. I waited patiently for their answer, eventually sitting down after maybe five minutes. Maybe ten more minutes later they finally looked like they got the answer.

"We say 2,802... Is that correct?" Mare said confidently, then turning worried.

With the answer given, I felt a sudden rise in bloodthirstiness coming over me. I still decided to fight it, hoping that maybe they either get it right or think of something else.

"Oh dear, oh dear. I'm afraid you got it wrong..." I said while standing up and began stalking closer to them at a very slow pace. Both stallion and mare began to visibly panic but could not run, due to still being attached to the full wagon. Soon I was only maybe two to three steps away from them, feeling urge to raise my clawed paw-hand to strike...

"WAIT!!" came a young shout from the wagon, making me look up there. The colt from the wagon was stumbling out from wagon with something, finally stopping between me and his parents, all of them visibly shaking.

"Y-you said we can also pay a toll, yes?" the little one asked.

"Why yes, yes I did say that. Something in mind, little one?" I said, while bowing down to have a closer look, my thirst for blood being pushed aside by curiosity.

"W-well... We have plenty of items with us, b-but I thought that m-maybe t-this would be nice to you?" he said while offering a small box to me, opening it with a glow of his little horn to reveal... A pair of glasses?

"T-these glasses c-can make you read really, really fast, without missing anything between the lines. T-the speed depends on wearer though..." colt explained, still a little nervous.

I said nothing yet, but did carefully pick up the glasses. which even changed size to fit me. Carefully I put o them on, being wary of maybe somekind of jinx or nasty hidden spell... There was nothing. I only saw a bit clearer.

"Would you perhaps have something readable to test this, so you are not trying to fool me?" I asked. This time it was the mare who did something, pulling out a book out from one of the boxes, with the title "Maps of Equus; Vol. XII" on it, and offered it to me.
I took it on one hand-paw, opened it and began to read. The pages seemed to just fly by with an invisible breeze moving them rapidly, yet I still could read and see what was on in each page and basically just absorbed the current geographical knowledge of every page in my head. These glasses made maybe few hours worth of reading happen in less than a few minutes or even less. Needless to say, I was pleased with the toll.

After finishing the sped up read I gave the book back to the now hopeful looking ponies.

"I find your toll payment... Very acceptable. You may pass alive and well." I said while leaping back to the flat rocks.

"Don't worry, I won't be here much longer. I was merely resting before heading to find a more proper lair. So fare thee well travelers." I commented while bidding them farewells, before leaping off the rock to the air, spreading my wings and flying away from them, mostly following the pull towards the advertised lair.
I still wonder how long that darn suppression thing lasts?

Later with the travelling trio...

"Honey? Did we do the right thing letting our son to give that unique prototype-magic item to that... Sphinx creature?" Stallion asked.

"Dear husband, I would have given all the items in our wagon if we could just walk away alive. Especially since we could not get that riddle right." the mare answered.

"How did we got it wrong though? I'm certain we counted all the amounts right."

"i'm... Not sure. Maybe it had some kind of trick in it?"

They mulled it over, before being interrupted by a voice from their colt, still travelling in the wagon, making them turn their heads.

"ONE!"

"Pardon?"

"The answer to that riddle! It started 'As I was going to St. Ives', but the stallion and his wives where not going anywhere! The narrator of the riddle is! I think the rhyme was there to maybe distract."

"That... Actually makes sense!"

"Well thought son. Keep that up and you just might reach great heights. Maybe you become a great bearded magus someday."

"Oh, you mean our son could one day be called Starswirl 'The Bearded'? Yeah, that'll never stick."

They all laughed heartily to that and carried on with their trip on the road to the next village.

Chapter 2 On the troublesome road to a new home

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Chapter 2 On the troublesome road to a new home

'Wait... Waaait...' Hena repeated mentally to herself, while trying to stay still in the long grass near some rocks on a meadow near the edge of some forest. She had flown maybe a day and a halfs worth of time, with some rest too, after the bridge meeting and getting new glasses, and now hunger had really started to grumble up her tummy. So now she was on the hunt for some food, specifically a trio of wild deers. Fresh adults by the looks of it. One of them had an obvious limp on it movement, making it an ideal target.
Her patience had managed to hold for about five-ish minutes, simply waiting in her hiding spot for the deer to come close enough for her to pounce.

Finally the trio did move a little bit closer, but Hena did not pounce yet. She had to wait for just the right moment... Which came when all three deers had their head low to eat.
With them wide open, the sphinx pounced at the limper, pushing it to the ground hard, spooking its buddies, who ran away fast, simply trying to survive. There was a small cracking sound as the full weight of the sphinx came bearing down on deers frame, with an added bonus claws of the predator digging in on its flesh.
Not wanting her prey to suffer much longer and to not let it get away, Hena opened her mouth and bit down on the nape of its neck, and gave it a hard bite. Deers panicked movement ceased rather quick.

'Thank you hunting instinct and memories of nature documentaries' she thought while licking her still human-like lips. before going in for another bite, intent on tearing some meat off from her fresh kill. Thanks to her new body, the flesh tearing was much easier to accomplish despite her human face. Teeth and bone strength had also most definitely gone up a bit, maybe along with muscles. So a good meal was most likely necessary to keep up its physical strength.

After getting few more hunger satisfying mouthfuls of meat eaten, Henas pointed furry ears picked up the sound of something approaching her, making her look up, deer blood still dripping down her chest fur a little bit.

'Is that some version of manticore?' she asked in her head, while looking at the large lion creature, maybe a little bit larger than her, with bat-like wings and a tail of a scorpion. And it had two friends with it, eyeing her kill, and seemingly even her in a hungry way. Only the latter type of eyeing seemed to be different kind of hungry, which made Hena uncomfortable, causing her to arch her back in a threatening manner, with some hair already starting to stand up. She even began to growl a bit, as if to say 'don't come closer'. It did not seem to work.
When they kept approaching, Hena had enough and let out an angry roar at the trio, which sounded like a mixture of woman screaming and an extremely loud lion, most likely having a varied level of intimidation. This only caused all three of the manticores roar back little bit louder.

'Yeah, frick no I'm staying here and fighting. I may have new body, that apparently has potential powers, but I ain't suicidal'

With that thought, Hena turned her back at the three manticores and kicked the partially eaten deer carcass to their direction. While walking away she could hear them digging in on the free meal. She did not care, due to survival overwriting completely full stomach.
Her stride was interrupted when she felt something grab on her rear, like trying to stop her from leaving. Culprit turned out to be a claw of the biggest member of the manticore trio, remaining two now almost fighting over the deer carcass. This one though obviously was hungry for something else.

'Oh heeell no!' Hena mentally groaned, accompanied with an eye-roll, and then physically followed by her wriggling loose from the manticores grip. It tried to grab on her again, only receive a whip-like smack from Henas lion-tail, right in the eye even. It clearly did not like that, growling at her, sounding frustrated.
With a glare Hena tried again to leave, only to get stopped by the manticore again. Only this time it outright leapt on her, trying to get a hold of her waist area. This obviously lascivious move brought a rush of adrenaline and a wave of anger to Hena, making her suddenly rise up on her back legs with a furious roar, managing barely to push the manticore off of her and taking a furious swipe with both of her claws at its head.
Manticore let out a pain filled roar as sphinxes claws repeatedly raked and shredded its face, even putting one of its eyes out with some lucky swipes. After receiving few more angry scratches, the manticore finally backed away from her, while trying to protect its remaining eye. Even its fellows understood to back further away from this female, who was now giving a few more angry roars at them, while beating its feathered wings furiously, finally taking to air and flying away from the trio, who now focused more on their injured fellow and the remaining deer carcass.

'*Tsk* That was way too close. I seriously need to get to that lair and get to fighting shape before something worse happens to me...' Hena thought, now more determined to get to her new promised home. Hopefully it would be defencible sort of place at least.

Nearby...

"Did you see that?" asked a light purple unicorn stallion from another dark green one next to it, both wearing some kind of scouting armor and had a bag of mail scrolls with them.

"Yes Sparkler, I'm not blind. That thing just made a lecherous manticore and its buddies to back off and then left."

"No, not that. I meant the glasses that female creature seemed to have on its face."

"How did you se-? Never mind. How do you think it got such item?"

"I'm not certain Spirit Shield. I did hear from the grapevine that some travelers payed a toll to a creature with some enchanted glasses. Maybe that was the said creature."

"Well, if we get lucky we don't meet it on our way to next town. We still need to get these scrolls to the local lord and mayor there."

With a shared nod, the stallions kept on with their travelling, which did take them the same overall direction where the female feline creature had flown. Mainly they followed the road, while keeping an eye out in case of more beasts appearing. With the earlier manticores, and the new creature unknown to them, they could not be too careful with their surroundings.

The road took them to some rock filled hills, with plenty of rocks that were almost size of an average cabin, with the road winding between them. Excellent place to set an ambush but also the shortest route to their destination, which was necessary due the urgency of their scrolls.

"Hey Spirit? Do you think we might get ambushed or stopped by some bandits here?" Sparkler asked as they walked into a little more open area between all the large rocks.

"Not likely Sparkler. Latest report said that the bandit gangs from these part were caught. So if anything, maybe at worst we get accosted by few wolves."

"Oh dear. Well now I feel partially sorry for my need to burst that notion, my good sir." came a new voice ahead of them. Both stallions looked who was talking to them, only to freeze what they saw. There ahead of them down the road, laying on a rocky protrusion was the feline creature they had seen earlier. And now it was coming down and approaching them in a calm manner, or more like a cat ready to start playing with some fresh mice. And it did indeed wear a pair of glasses on its oddly flat face.

"Wha- what are you?" Sparkler managed to ask, while Spirit was taking a defensive stance.

"A sphinx. And I take it you are heading down this road, yes? In which case you first have to answer my riddle. If you get it right, I will let go past me. Get it wrong... Well, then I would have to kill you."

"Both or just one one of us?" Sparkler asked.

"Well, it might depend how will you answer. Together or alone. In latter case you both have to answer separately to different riddles. Your choice."

It did not take long for both stallions to share a look, and turn back face this sphinx creature.

"We'll answer together." Spirit Shield said.

"Very well than, listen closely then." sphinx said back with a smile, before starting her riddle.

"I will devour you from the inside out.
I must be conquered every day, or I will take your life.
Only in death can you stop me.
Who am I?"

Both stallions went silent, clearly thinking over the given riddle. After a couple of minutes had passed, they turned their back at the sphinx to whisper this over. She did not seem to mind that at all.

"Any idea Spirit? Clearly we only got one chance here or we'll be dead..."

"Not sure. I was thinking that maybe its someones enemy. It sounded believable in my head, but now whispering it out loud it feels like a wrong choice. I mean what enemy you would need to beat daily, but can only be stopped when you're dead? And then there's the whole 'devour you from the inside out' part. None of our enemies have done that... Well unless we count in that one really remote village that went crazy after being starving so long and so badly that they started eating their fellow villagers and anyone who arrived there..."

"Yeah, I heard it was a nightmare to deal wit-... Wait, I feel like you're on to something there... I... I think I got it."

"Really? Tell me too. That sphinx is starting to lick its lips a little too much..."

The stallion duo whispered a bit more, before turning back to face the sphinx, looking a little more confident about their situation. Sphinx merely turned her head to the side questioningly with one brow raised.

"We think we got the answer..." Sparkler said after audibly swallowing his fear back.

"And what it may be?" the Sphinx inquired with a smile.

"Hunger. The answer is hunger... Right?" stallion said carefully, followed by moment of silence that felt like something was stretching it to create some kind of dramatic tension.

"That... Is correct. Congratulations to both of you. You may go past me alive and well." Sphinx said in an almost jovial tone, while leaping off from the road to sit on top of a nearby rock.

"Oh... Well... Thank you ma'am... Should we tell at our destination that you dwell here, or something?" Spirit Shield thanked and asked, while sounding very relieved.

"Oh do as you like. I won't be staying here for long. I'm intend on finding myself a proper lair, hopefully far, far away from any serious annoyances. Think I just take a short nap and then keep on travelling somewhere else." Sphinx answered, while stretching herself a little bit and headed to lay down on one of the more flatter rock.
Deciding not to waste their permission to keep on going and avoiding to waste any more time, Sparkler and Spirit Shield carried on with their travelling, now with a story to tell when they would get to the towns tavern.

Later at the village tavern...

"So this sfinks thing just asked you a riddle or it would have killed you?"

"Yes my good barkeep. And we saw it earlier drive off a manticore too."

"So where is your travelling partner, Sparkler, then, if you answered correctly to it?"

"Oh hes just delivering some mail scrolls to your mayor and local lord around this time. I just needed a stiff drink after that kind of encounter with potential death. He'll probably also report about the sphinx too."

"Allrighty then. Where do you think that kitty thing was heading? Or what it is after?"

"Hard to say. It only mentioned of trying to find a secure lair somewhere else. So no, you don't have riddle asking beastie as your neighbour. Although I do wonder where it does make its lair, or how long it has to travel?"

Elsewhere...

"Where in the heck is that lair?! And how darn far do I have to keep going?!" Hena cussed on her own, while gliding to the overall direction which the 'lair-pull' was guiding her. She did try to figure its overall location from the map knowledge gained from the map-book that unicorn family let her test the glasses speed-reading magic on. Only now the memories of all of those maps had began to fade little by little. Most likely she would need to refresh those memories with another reading session. Fast reading or not, Hena would need a text of something physically in front of her in order to memorize it for a time, or just do a good study session on a regular phases do get the info stay in her head. It was probably mentioned in that scroll too. So no photographic memory for her outside of riddles.

While she kept on gliding, little higher in the low hanging clouds, there were two pairs of eyes looking her go. One cloud had a pair of pegasi, wearing a golden armor, while the other had a pair of griffins in thick leather armors, all of them making a mental note to report this sighting, before the feline creature was too far to see and returned to look at the other duo and surroundings, due to their orders to only keep watch over the ever changing borders between towns, city-states and traderoutes between them in case of bandits or monsters.
And all four were sure they just saw a new kind of beast without being seen by it, and were very much relieved by that fact for some reason.

Chapter 3 More road before reaching the finish line.

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Chapter 3 More road before reaching the finish line.

'That was a good nap. Now to stretch and maybe get some grub.' Hena thought after waking up properly from her long rest thanks to a nice looking sunrise. Or just sleep, due said long rest lasted a whole night. This time she had found a resting place on some white rocky cliffs near the ocean, on the side of a little road that went along the edge, with a higher cliff on one side and a sheer drop to the ocean on the other, with an old but sturdy stone bridge going over the river, that roared lightly as it went over the edge and to the sea. Even some fish seemed to be swimming along with the stream too, maybe doing some migratory thing. Some even jumped over the bridge with ease.
To the hungry sphinx the fishes simply meant food. And so she began trying to catch some. It took her almost an hour to catch only one, and another two to catch a few more for now-late breakfast. In the end she caught maybe five fishes.

Before she could start her humble meal, she heard someone approaching down the road, causing her auto-piloted instinct to kick in once more. Hena backed away out sight, while still being able to see the road, and waited for the traveler, or travelers to come a bit closer. Perhaps it was due to her now different body, but she had felt some kind of a positive feedback, which seemed to happen when she did her 'sphinx-thing' of stopping travelers and testing them.
As the noises came closer, Henas ears could make out a set of hooves and a set of... Talons and pads... Two sets of the latter maybe... That was mostly just guess work at the moment.

"Move it you two! The market is not waiting forever!" came an angry male voice down the road.

Soon the travelers came into her sights. A scarred zebra stallion wearing a crude leather armor and a saddlebag, leading on a two golden brown griffins by the rope tied around their necks. They looked like to be a hen, or whatever female griffin is called, and her chick going by some little details. The zebra also looked much cleaner compared to the two feline-avian hybrids, and if the rope and mention of market was anything to go by, it was obvious why they where on a road of this level of seclusion; A potential slaver.
'Well, lets see how he deals with me.' Hena thought to herself, before stepping out from hiding right in front of the zebra and his 'companions', even greeting with a simple "Well hello there".

"What the-?! What hell are you?!" zebra stallion yelled out, while fumbling out a short blade with his rope-free hoof. The griffin hen and her chick looked like they wanted to make a run for it, but had not gotten much of a good night sleep or food lately.

"A sphinx. And I can't let you go past me... Unless you travelers answer my riddle."

"Or what? You kill us? Hah! I've taken down bigger beasties than you, but sure ask away. If I, Zaked the Slaver, can outwit these two chickens, then I can easily answer some dumb question. Heck, maybe someone pays a good money for a pretty creature like you. Might even get a taste myself too." zebra, now named Zaked, boasted, clearly very proud and VERY confident about his abilities and clearly for something else too. The griffins had stayed silent, but the adult one seemed to be trying to find an opening somewhere for a potential escape.

"Very well then, since you're so confident... How about we spice this up a bit with a time limit to give the answer? Say a time it take twenty fish to jump over that bridge?" Hena suggested with a clever fang flashing grin.

"Sure thing. And I will enjoy wiping that grin off your face. You know what, make it just ten fish." Zaked said confidently, even lowering his blade.

"If you say so." Hena shot back, before staring the riddle with a polite clearing of her throat.

"A beggar had a brother who had died.
But when he was alive, this male had no brother.
How can this be?"

Almost right away Zaked looked stumped about the riddle, with one brow shooting up in confusion, clearly being caught off guard. And he knew he was now on timer too, especially when the sphinx voice temporarily broke his confusion.

"One..." Sphinx said in neutral tone as one fish jumped over the bridge.

'Whuh? Wait , how did it go again? Some beggar died? No, wait...'

"Two..."

'It was some beggars brother that died.'

"Three..."

'But then there was some shit about him having no brother...'

"Four, five..."

'What?! That can't be fair! No, wait. She said the timer was going by the amount of fish jumping over that bridge. Of course there would be some double-'

"Six, seven, eight...'

'Gah! No, focus!... Shit, how did it go again?!'

"Nine..."

'Some beggars brother died, but then that brother had no brother. How it is? Is there some trick in thi-'

"TEN!"

Zebras overthinking came to an abrupt end when the sphinx leapt on him, pressing him down with her claws so hard it made him loose his grip on his blade and the rope holding the two griffins and ruining his armor, even sending his saddlebag flying. He managed to look up, seeing sphinx looking down upon him with a wide feral grin showing a lot of sharp teeth.
"Time's up, my stripey meal..." Sphinx said with a voice that sounded lightly more twisted compared to her earlier speaking voice. Like a crazy female with a sound of raining gravel mixed in its words.

"W-wait! Aren't you gonna ask those two?!" Zaked asked in panic, while pointing at the two griffins, who were going through his saddlebag in a visible hurry..

"Oh my dear meaty. striped equine. YOU ALONE chose to take on my riddle, and failed, while they just stayed silent. And price for failing a riddle of the sphinx is death..." Hena said while smiling wickedly at the now terrified zebra. And then she gave a nice and slow bite on his shoulder, clearly stretching it out. either to enjoy the taste or to make it extra painful. Nevertheless it made once so boastful and confident Zadek scream like a little brat in pain as his blood began to stain the white rock beneath him.
Soon sphinx tore out the first good mouthful, which indeed also hurt a lot, causing some more screaming. Zadek could not find enough strength to get away from under this beasts claws. In desperation he called for help from the nearest other creatures... Two griffins now free of the rope, carrying his saddlebag with some fish stuffed in it, heading over the bridge.

"You two!! Get over here and HELP ME!!!" he screamed at them. The mother griffin did stop to look back as the zebra yelled little louder as the sphinx bit down on his other shoulder. But the griffin didn't do anything to help him. Only turned her head away and hurried over the bridge, with her chick holding on to her back, as fast she could, not wanting to miss this chance to get away from her tormenter, and the creature devouring him alive, now swallowing second mouthful of zebra shoulder.
"WAAAIT!!! HELP MEEEeeeeeeeeergrrrggrrgghhh..." Zadek screamed out as he was now being bitten down hard on his throat, fangs of the sphinx puncturing his windpipe and some major blood veins, his voice soon becoming gurgled as flooding of blood began to find way to his lungs, suffocating him, And the vestiges of life definitely left his torn up body as Hena bit deeper on his throat and twisted his neck.
All this did not even bother Hena, mostly thanks to her hunters instinct yelling at her to just eat the meat before her. And she did so with gusto, not even remembering now lost fishes. Soon enough there were mostly bones and some pieces of organs and tendons left of the wicked zebra. Looking at the remains of her meal, Hena was somehow not disturbed by the fact that she had just basically eaten a person. Though she would've used said term very loosely in this case, and was a little thankful that the 'emotional suppression' thing was most likely still active.

"It would be waste to just leave the rest just laying there... Well maybe fishes or bottom feeders will finish it." Hena commented, before simply pushing the remains off the edge to the sea. She even looked at it falling down, but before it could have made a splash, it was chomped up by something that looked like a sea-serpent.

"Okay then. Definitely not going to any beach property or above oceans for a looong while...Potentially never..."

After witnessing the sea-serpent, Hena took flight once again to travel to her still waiting lair, while trying to stick to inland route. You never how high those serpents could leap...

Elsewhere...

Griffin kept on running down the road with her chick clinging on to her back. She could have taken flight, but did not want to take the risk of this... Sphinx creature maybe still being hungry and chasing after them. After running little more, she noticed a small crevice, stopping before it. It turned out to become a wider, more cavernous space, and the shining daylight revealed to be just big enough for griffin, or pony, sized creature to enter. Any bigger would just get stuck.
After looking around first, she entered the small cave carefully, and finally allowed herself to catch her breath and rest her feet, letting herself to fall on to her side. Little one was not hurt and just climbed over his mommy, looking at her worriedly.

"It's alright. We're safe for now... Now lets feed." she said in a comforting tone, taking better position to allow little one to nurse. Her chick could eat some solid foods but he was still in a middle of his transition phase. While little one fed, she picked out one the fishes for herself to eat. Hopefully the sphinx was not angry about them being stolen.

"Momma? Ar we gonna find home?" little one asked after getting his fill.

"We will, if the winds are fair to us." mother griffin answered.

"Will te mean zeeb com after us?"

"Most likely not. He is probably gone for good by now"

"Because te pretty sinx lady took him avay?"

"... Y-yes, yes indeed. Sometimes such creatures take really bad folk away so that little ones can grow safe."

"Do other ones eat meanies too?"

"... Now then, let's have a good nap now Hermes."

"Awww... A LADY!"

"Whuh? What do you mean?"

"Te begger is a lady. In dat widdle."

"Oh...Huh... That actually makes sense. I wonder why that... Mean zebra did not figure that?"

"Maybe he was dumb?"

"Perhaps... You just might have smart future ahead of you."

"Yay!"

Back with our sphinx, several days later...

'I... I can feel it. The lair is somewhere close' Hena thought while looking around from her perch upon a cliff in a majestic looking fjord surrounded by mountains. Taking flight once more, she tried to locate the source of the 'lair-pull' that had guided her for several days. And now its pull was getting strong, meaning she was finally about to have a roof of sort above her head, along with starting her new 'job' of guarding somethings.

In the next hour she flew around the fjord, Hena noticed that at the end of it seemed to be a growing and clearly well fortified town, with a road-in-the-making on the shoreline leading there. Smart considering the fjord was connected to the ocean and who knows if them serpents swim this far... And it was always good to have some defence at any settlement.
'Looks like a mining town, but not quite. Maybe they are converting one into something else? In any case, looks like I'm going to have some neighbours after all.'
Seeing nothing of interest in her vicinity, Hena kept on flying, heading towards the mountains while following the 'lair-pull', eventually reaching a small pass winding between some low peaks, also leading to the growing town. Perhaps it was also some kind of a overall short-cut there?

Finally sphinx reached an open area around the halfway-point of the pass, where ground was a mixture of smooth stone and polished white marble slabs. There stood four marble columns, ionic style, which left a wide area for say a wagon to move between them. On one side was a set of wide stairs leading to obvious entry to a cave, which was carved to look like a temple entryway of sort, also having an antique vibe on its style, with a pair of secure looking metal doors on it. And in front of it, jutting out from the middle of the stairs, was a wide elevated altar-like rock overlooking the area between the pillars, clearly meant for 'looking down on her victims'. Hena also noticed that on top of the columns were a small set of statues, resembling stylized eagle, hound, winged serpent and a... Equine? It was hard to tell accurately due to said statue appeared to have been broken down to smaller size by something.
Deciding to check the surrounding a bit more, Hena found a smaller side path around her 'turf' behind some thorny bushes. Only it was a really narrow path, like 'miss-one-step-and-die'-narrow, with a sheer drop down to dark, bottomless looking depths between the surrounding mountains. So it was basically either past her or trough that for those coming down this way.

'Well, might as well go and check the interior then.' she thought after having a closer look of the elevated 'altar-rock' in front of the doorway, only to hear something coming down the road. Sounded like a heavy wagon. Once again feeling her sphinx instinct pulling her strings, Hena moved to lay down on the elevated 'altar-rock' to wait for the travelers to arrive, which they soon did.
Down the road walked a pegasus, zebra, griffin and a minotaur, all wearing a rough uniform of some sort and working together to move a wagon, loaded with wooden boxes. Pegasus and zebra where pulling the wagon, while minotaur was pushing it with one arm, due to other being on a makeshift sling, and the griffin was also helping with the wagon on the side. All of them wore the same emblem on their shoulder pad; sword and a long rolled up parchment crossed over a round shield.

"Well, well, well. What do we have here? Four travelers hauling something across my lair?" Hena said aloud, lightly spooking the group.

"What the-? Where did all this appeared?? It wasn't here last time." griffin said, looking around the place.

"And you certainly weren't here either... Wait... Are you the creature called Sphinx that the some folks have been whispering about? You fit the description at least." pegasus inquired.

"My my, looks like I'm getting a bit of a reputation, am I? Interesting one perhaps?" Sphinx inquired back, with a gentle head tilt.

"Well, what little rumour there is that you ask riddles from anyone who would need to go past you... And that you slew one very rotten member of my kind. Of which I am personally thankful." the zebra answered, giving a humble bow to her, while not taking his eyes off of her, clearly wary of the obvious predator on their path.

"Aah yes, the slaver one. Dumb one at that. Could not even answer one simple riddle. Though I did get an average meal out of him."

"You... You ate him??" minotaur asked.

"Oh yes. A little bit screamy at first, but no issues afterwards. Don't know about the sea-serpent which ate the remains though."

"And... Do you plan on repeating that on us?"

"I guess, if you fail at answering my riddle. It's what I do, ask riddles and kill those who fail, while guarding my lair and treasure. You know; fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly?"

The four travelers looked at each other at that, and seemed to somewhat agree on it, before turning to face the sphinx again.

"So are you intent on asking us a riddle, or are we allowed to leave if we turn around?" pegasus asked.

"Only if you try to go past me. And yes, if you just want to leave, you may. So what's it going to be? Riddle or leaving?"

Travelers huddled together to talk the situation through. Henas pointy ears picked up them whispering something about maybe trying to take her on in combat, but apparently they had issues with some still healing injuries and the average fear of the unknown creatures abilities. There was something more, like something about the rogue winds being a lethal danger at the narrow side-path, but the rest of it was more muffled to hear properly. Finally they seemed to have come to a decision.

"We take the risk with your riddle. Our cargo is somewhat too valuable to risk getting jumped by some bandits or a wicked opportunistic individuals."

"I see..." Hena said, while sitting up on her rock, probably being somewhat majestic-like sight to the four travelers, before clearing he throat and starting her riddle.

"You throw away the outside and cook the inside.
Then you eat the outside and throw away the inside.
What did you eat?"

All four clearly started thinking over the riddle in a visibly studious manner, whispering and muttering suggestions to each other, having a miniature debates back and forth. Hena merely waited, even grooming herself a little bit when four minutes had passed. She considered herself lucky to have gotten used to that, most likely thanks for that 'auto-pilot-mode' her new 'bosses' somewhere had given to her. No hairballs had appeared yet.

"I think we got it. Only we came to two answers that seem to fit. Is such allowed?" Griffin called to her, asking for a confirmation.

"Why yes. If they are correct ones that is." Sphinx confirmed with a nod.

"Well... We say the answer is chicken and corn..." came the answer.

The group waited with baited breath for the confirmation from the sphinx, who seemed to be stretching the the tense moment on purpose, maybe for some kind of dramatic effect. They had no idea why it would do that.

"Both... Are indeed the correct answers. You all may go past me, all alive and well." Hena told them with a pleasant, if a little bit teethy smile. All four where visibly relieved, and proceeded to move their box filled wagon between the columns and across the sight of the sphinx, while still visibly being a little wary of her.

"Have a good trip you four. Feel free to talk about this little event if ya like. I would love to have some occasional visitor here..."

"...We'll think about it. Lets go then, better we don't keep our superiors at the town waiting too long."

With those words said, the four travelers kept moving their wagon down the road, soon disappearing from sight.

'Well now that I'm alone again, maybe I can finally check the interior of this place.' Hena thought to herself and headed towards the doorway of her lair, the doors opening slowly on their own as she approached alone. Hopefully she could find some detail scroll or something like that about the place inside.

With the wagon down the road...

"Anyone else think we got lucky there? I mean personally that sphinx made my feathers stand up. Like she could have taken us out in a flash." griffin commented to the rest of the group.

"Well, maybe I could have tried to hold it off long enough while you ran, even with a injured arm. But that's still a rather big 'maybe'." minotaur said while pointing his arm, still on a sling.

"I think she could have done even worse. But I felt that something was holding her potential powers back, like a cork holding in a great burst of divinely fine wine... Don't ask, it was just a hunch and I just pulled that comparison on the top of my head. Honest." zebra commented, making other look at him weird for a second, making him a little embarrassed.

"Well I think our superiors will be interested that they now have a unknown and clearly magical creature as a neighbour. I wonder will it affect the construction effort too much." pegasus tossed in his opinion.

"It most likely changes something. It is all ready ambitious to convert long abandoned mining town to a truly neutral seat of knowledge. And they don't even have agreed on the name yet. Any idea what it will be?" zebra asked the others, who gave the same answer almost simultaneously.

"Nope"

Chapter 4 Getting to know your new pad and a treasure test run.

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Chapter 4 Getting to know your new pad and a treasure test run.

The lair of the Sphinx...

'Well this certainly fairly simple looking place' Hena thought as the metallic door closed behind her. Only source of light was coming from some crystalline veins on the walls and the roof, some being in six smooth pillars going up, reaching the roof. Other than the glowy veins of light, the whole place looked like it was carved into the 'living rock' of the mountain. On the sides there were total of four doorways, leading to a set of empty rooms. Maybe they were just waiting the potential use?
And in a straight line from the doors, past the pillars was a wide humble stone platform with stairs going up to it and a comfy looking pillow nest on the middle of it, with three round platforms with stairs jutting out of it in different directions with something on them.
Left ones stairs going lightly upwards with a little zig-zag design on it, and on its platform was a tall oval mirror, maybe eight feet tall, with a simple golden rim with no extra ornament on it, just floating there absolutely motionlessly. Mirror looked like it was filled with grey mist and water, and only barely reflected anything.
Middle ones stairs went a little lower then the mirror-platforms, but were still elevated in a straight line. On it was an empty stone archway, most definitely leading somewhere...
And the right ones stairs went a little downwards in a twisty design, like a snake, and held on a small stand a green stone tablet with some unknown golden writing on it, maybe twenty inches tall, twelve wide and maybe two thick.

'I guess those two are the two items I'm supposed to guard. Now only to find if there is some info scroll here.'

After thinking that, a pair of scrolls popped up before her eyes, making her jump like a startled cat before picking it up and started reading the content of one with 'Treasure details'-label on it.
"Fascinating items... Truly fascinating ones indeed..." Hena mumbled to herself, before going to read the other one labeled 'Lair-info".

'Dear customerHena.

Welcome to your new workplace dwelling, where you shall live and watch over the items held within. Provided you read the other scroll first you know what they do. You are allowed to personally use them, but at your own risk. Never should both be used in conjunction, unless required by a truly serious situation, which will carry a penalty.
If you are wondering the purpose of the empty archway, that would be the portal to your library, in which all the past and present knowledge the world, which you are in, is stored. New knowledge will be added there if you happen to receive a toll in a form of book or if such written work becomes 'lost' in some event, like a fire or something similar, an intact copy of it will appear in your library. Also occasionally already existing works might join in, if the original becomes taintedModified by an outside party, changing the knowledge to fit the view of someone else.
Note; This may or may not happen a lot in time...
Note2; Future knowledge will not be added in the library, because RULES. Naturally re-found knowledge is okay to add though.

The other side of your work still includes stopping and testing passer-bys with riddles. It is a natural tick in your very being, and thus it is mostly better for your existenchealth to follow it. But you may also give your victimsVisitors a choice of 'Toll, Riddle or Combat?' to go past you. The toll can be anything from books to food, or just coins depending what the victTravelers can offer. Riddle should be obvious, right?
And combat is rather self-explanatory; challenger must defeat you in combat. Not to death, only to submission. In such case, you will receive a temporary power boost to make the combat unfaiFairly challenging. The amount of boost itself will vary depending on the challenger. For an example, if you somehow face some demi-god level thing in a combat choice, you will receive enough power to give it a unFair challenge. If the challenger dies, too bad for them.
FeedingLunch times are when you get hungry and go hunting or get food as toll.

Enjoy your new career!

From: DeezPlaced.Co

PS: You may offer the use of one of the treasures for those who solve your riddle as a bonus. If someone asks and/or demands to use one of them, they MUST answer the riddle first and they are not allowed to take them away from you lair. NO EXCEPTIONS.
PPS: No one can enter inside your lair, access the library, or find the treasures and/or your accumulated stuff without your presence and permission. Even if they try digging or magic or whatever, they would find nothing. But remember to still keep the door closed for a good night sleep.'

'... Okay, so now I have the ok from the top to give a choice to travelers then.' Hena thought while adjusting her glasses a bit. Before she could think of what to do next, a loud enough sound came out from somewhere, sounding like a gong, followed by voices coming from outside. Whole thing felt like a security system of sort. And then she noticed yet another postscript.

'PPPS: There is an alarm that goes off sometimes when someone tries to go past your lair while you're present there when either sleeping or doing other things in the lair, and the columns outside form a barrier that stops passer-by('s) from leaving without answering a riddle/paying a toll/dying. After one of those have happened, the keyword for shutting down the barrier is 'deorsum' that only works when you say it.'

'Well lets go see who are making the racket out there.'

Some steps and one door opening later, sphinx saw two saddlebag wearing ponies, green pegasus, red maned stallion and a white, yellow maned earth pony mare, trapped between the columns by a thin crystalline looking walls, pegasus one trying to kick the said barrier with no success, only making a sound of hooves hitting glass.

"Hello there travelers. It would seem you got caught by my lairs security measure."

"Obviously. Can we maybe get to leave here alive, ma'am?" stallion asked, after giving the crystal wall one more kick with no effect.

"Why yes. Your choices are paying a toll, answer my riddle or defeat me in combat. So what will it be?"

The two ponies thought for a moment before answering to now sitting sphinx.

"We don't really have anything of value with us, and we don't really wish to fight ya. So we both take a riddle each. Is that okay?" the mare said while stepping forward first, with the stallion nodding along.

"Certainly. But just be warned. If you fail to answer, I am obligated to kill you. It is a rule I am pretty much required to follow as I guard this place and some treasures, by some higher entities." Hena answered, before asking a first riddle from the now slightly scared looking mare.

"I was alive when I fell, but among thousands of others, I died from being alone.
Under your foot, my thin skin crumbles into dust.
What am I?"

White mare started to think over the riddle right away, clearly motivated to solve. And the looming threat of potentially bloody death might have been a good motivator too. Hena merely waited patiently, passing time by occasionally scratching the side of the altar rock. Maybe personally marking it or some other feline trait, like sharpening claws.

"I think I got it. The answer is dead leaves... Right?" mare said, getting a little intimidated as the sphinx looked up from her rock scratching.

"Smart lass you are. That is indeed correct. You may pass. Deorsum." Hena said with a smile, before lowering the barrier, allowing mare to get out from between the columns. The stallion did no move to try and make a run or flight for it. He simply just stood there waiting, which intrigued the sphinx. a bit

"Well this is interesting. I thought for sure that you'd try to get away the moment the barrier comes down."

"Nope. I was raised to behave honestly, and if ah fail at this I'll die honest to the bone." stallion said in a confident tone, clearly being true to his words about him being honest.

"Very well. Let's hope it will get you trough here then." Sphinx said, and proceeded with her second riddle.

"If you know me you'll want to share me,
but if you share me I'll be gone.
What am I?"

The pegasus stallion began to mull over the riddle, scrunching his brow while thinking intensively. Hena was once again not in a hurry, deciding to groom herself a little while waiting. The mare was also waiting her traveling companions answer, clearly hoping that he got it right. Maybe they where friends?

"A secret! The answer is a secret!" stallion called out, stopping sphinx grooming session mid-lick. Luckily she did not sem to mind that.

"Correct. You are free to pass. Deorsum"

With the word said, the barrier came down, allowing stallion to go on his way. Which seemed to be the other way than the earlier wagon crew.

"I see you are going other way than my earlier visitors. Are you perhaps in a hurry or did they perhaps not warn thee of the risk now living here?"

"Oh we met them, but we... Might not have taken them seriously, until the barrier came up. We just thought that all this here was just some ruin that got uncovered by nature or something." mare admitted.

"Not to be rude after getting past ya. But can ah see what are ya guarding? If it's alright that is." stallion continued.

"Actually yes. You both may see them since you both answered my riddles correctly. Maybe even use them a little... If you're brave enough." Hena said, while approaching the opening doors. To her surprise, both ponies followed her with curious look on them.

As they walked towards the treasure platforms, Hena decided to introduce herself by name, which was followed by ponies polite introductions. The pegasus stallion was named Tree Wind and the earth-pony mare was called Pyrite Blood, and they where mainly just both taking the same short cut through the mountains.

"Here they are. The True Magic Mirror and The Tablet of Secrets. You may choose one to use before leaving. Or just admire from afar and leave peacefully." Hena said to the duo, who looked at the items in a respectful awe.

Tree Wind ended up going first, walking carefully to the Mirror, almost like he was drawn to it. As he stopped before it, the misty swirls in it steadied, gathering on the sides and showing his reflection.

"Sooo...How does this mirror works or does if I use it?" he asked.

"It shows you what you ask to see, clear and true, never lying or tricking, piercing through absolutely anything what would be trying to block its sight, be it magical or physical at any distance. You only need ask it, in rhyme of sort. That is the Mirrors little unbreakable term and rule." was Henas answer. Tree Wind seemed to think for a moment, most likely thinking the wording of his question, until finally asking it.

"Please Mirror, so I can get going, show me what my fiances doing?"

After the question was asked, the mist in the Mirror began to swirl around for few seconds, before showing a clear image of a pegasus mare kissing a fancy looking pegasus stallion on a bed in some kind of place made out of clouds. There also seemed to be some parchment on a table next to them, which Tree also managed to read.

"I knew it... I fricking knew it! He was just visiting she said, while smelling of sweat. She's a pure maiden her family said. Bunch of opportunist, honorless, liars after my familys fortune!" he screamed out angrily, before taking off and ran out of the lair and eventually taking flight after getting out of the pass. He did yell a quick "Thanks" while running outside.

"Well atleast he got some use out of the Mirror. So what will you choose, miss Pyrite?" Hena said while turning to the earth-pony mare.

"I think I choose to try the tablet. How does it work?" mare asked.

"In a quite simple way actually. You ask it a goal based question or request, and it will give you an absolutely perfect answer. Like say, if you ask it 'how can I make or earn a million gold coins?' or perhaps 'I want to become the greatest warrior in the world', it will give you all of the information you need to achieve that goal, right into your mind, down to the time, place, deeds and words needed to make it happen. Sure it might overwhelm your mind if you're not careful, but if the goal is worth it, I'm sure you will pull trough it. And the Tablet will also take something from you as a price of sort."

"What is the price exactly?"

"Oh it can be absolutely anything from you. Be it all your earthly possessions, your left ear, your soul, all your body hair permanently, five pieces of your snot, half of your remaining lifespan, your latest or next lunch, or something else entirely, the list of choices is literally endless... Would you still like to try it and roll the dice of fates?"

"... Yes... Yes I am. Even if it takes my bones, I will try it." Pyrite Blood said without any fear-stutter in her words. She was either brave to take the risk, or maybe having a momentary madness. Soon taking place before the Tablet, Pyrite carefully set her hoof on it, making it give a mild glow, as if it was telling it was now active.

"How can I secure a good steady income and status for my descendants for all time?"

With the question given, the golden writing on the Tablet began to glow brightly, soon followed by tendrils of light coming out of the writing, twirling around each other, forming one bigger tendril and set itself on the Pyrites forehead and began to pulse at regular intervals, making her eyes roll back as her mind began to receive the ALL of the required information to reach her goal. Hena only kept watch as the mare began to lightly sweat profusely.

Maybe a full five minutes later, the Tablet ended its information stream and pulled its light-tendrils, along with her right eye, away from Pyrite, who collapsed to the floor, gasping loudly. the tendrils and the oddly painlessly removed eye disappeared into the tablet. It took almost a full minute for the mare to catch her breath and stand up without shaking.
"Ah-... Amazing... To imagine something like that actually exists here... So does that mean what I received will happen?" Pyrite asked, while carefully bringing her hoof to her now empty eye-socket. There was no blood or any other nasty things. Its like the eye had just cleanly left.

"I don't know. Most likely it will depend on if you choose to follow the information given or just ignore it and live your life normally. Only now missing one eye, but that would be a small price to pay, should you go for the goal you said. You have the knowledge, it is your choice if you make use of it." was Henas vague answer.

"... Well then... I guess I have several things to do. Like meeting somepony special it seems..." mare said before walking out of the lair and eventually the pass.

In the following days, Tree Wind broke off his engagement with his unfaithful fiancee, who indeed was after his moneys and reputation. He ended up eventually meeting a nice earth pony mare called Apple Seed, and had a happy family life with lots of foals, causing some ripples in the traditionalist members on both pony races, and even in some strands of fate.
Pyrite Blood, deciding to follow the guidance given by the Tablet of Secrets, heading to the unicorn majority town and found the wealthy family of House Blue, carefully worming her way into the family, giving them good advice which caused them to gain great and steady stream of wealth for years to come. So glad was the head of the family, that he asked Pyrite marry his son, Lord Sky Blue, who had his eye for the said mare for a while, which certainly helped them in achieving happy family life. And once again ripples were caused in some groups and in the strands of fate.

Hena had no idea that all this was happening, as she was amazed of the size of her library, which she went to check after both ponies had left.

The Sphinx's Library...

It was well lit and absolutely enormous in size, with spiraling staircases and pillars going waaaaay up towards the distant domed roof to and past the many floors, looong and wide hallways filled with shelves filled to the very brim with books, scrolls, stone tablets of many various sizes, some being even bigger than her, bindings and materials full of countless texts and pictographs of many kinds. Even the architecture seemed to change here and there, like as a mark of a civilizations long, long gone to the sands of time, making way for next one on the new era. Between the shelves there were plenty of tables, table-like platforms and seating areas to read or go over the content of the library. There was even stylized drinking fountains and something that could be called a food vending machines and some toilets here and there, along with some large to medium sized marble sphinx statues sitting on pedestals, that looked like they where keeping watch with their gem encrusted eyes. And all of them looked unique in some of their features.
No directional arrows or any other guiding implements where put anywhere, so it could be risky for someone to just wander in here and potentially get literally lost in books. Luckily there where plenty of empty archway-portals leading out of the library, but only one leading in.
After doing her little check around the library, or at least a small part of it, Hena returned to the 'starting area', where stood a huge sphinx statue made of solid gold or gold-like substance, wearing a majestic looking nemes (a striped pharaoh headdress) while laying down, clearly being some kind of a centerpiece of the place. At its base was a plaque with a text saying "Ask for a one book, scroll or tablet, and I shall find it for you" on it, with several comfy looking reading spots around it.

"Well I could read something light... May I have the earliest accurate history book of this era?" Hena said to the statue, which golden eyes glowed for a moment, then Henas ears heard something flying towards her, looking at the direction the sound. There she saw a book floating towards her, stopping at the grabbing distance of her.
Now having something to pass the time, Hena settled down on one the reading spots with the book and proceeded to start a hopefully enjoyable reading session for now. Until someone would try to go past her lair...

Chapter 5 And the time flies by, to meet the smart guy.

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Chapter 5 And the time flies by, to meet the smart guy.

"Another month, another claw sharpening session." Hena commented as she hopped up to lean against one of the stone walls surrounding her lair, let out her claws and just dragged a long set of claw marks, making a very nice scratching sound. Luckily for her, her ears had long gotten used to said sound. After that she had a closer look at the wall as a whole, and all the sets of long scratch marks. Maybe one or two sets for each month, depending how she felt. And a regular sharpening sessions are good for her claws.

"Now lets see if there is any travelers come this way today." she mused while settling down on her altar-rock to keep watch of the pass. The sphinx had gotten rather used to living in these conditions during the last several years, almost twenty to be exact, only leaving if hungry to hunt some food during quiet traffic times. The area around the pillars had also gotten some 'decoration' around them. Mainly some neat piles of bones of both her hunted prey and victims who had failed her test, those who did not want to pay the toll for some reason while trying to get past her or those who just came to challenge and defeat her for fame, honor and glory and also for clout and sexual favors from females of their species. The latter was mostly Henas own speculation, which sounded more half believable to her. Surely some would try to get naughty favors from members of their own gender too.

Some of her time was spent reading some books about spells and other powers that could be achieved with enough effort. With nothing much to do, other than wait, she decided to practice a little bit on her psionic-type telekinesis she had red about and began studying more after finding an instructive tome about it, written by someone named 'Qhenchoguassk The Master of Minds' who lived who knows how long ago in some grand empire that apparently reached little bit beyond this world, that eventually fell and seemed to like some kind of tentacle-theme on its culture. There was plenty of other psionic mind things in the said tome, but Hena had decided to start with the easier stuff. And even the author had written that 'with a creative mind, even the most simple psionic practitioner can be an extremely dangerous foe'.
Focusing her gaze upon a random set of bones, pointing the palm part of her right paw-hand, with an intense gaze on her eyes. After moving few of her clawed fingers around a bit, several bones began to move. Rather shakily, but still moving along the ground, eventually rising and floating in a vague unspecified pattern she was lightly visualizing. Among the floating bones were few mostly intact skulls, some older than others, bringing up some memories as they passed across her vision...

Memory-lane start...

Sphinxs ears twitched lightly as they picked up an approaching sounds. There was couple of beings coming down the pass, so she prepared to do her thing, depending how the travelers would choose when facing her. Soon she saw a group of three ponies, all of them unicorns and heavily armed, coming down the path.
'Looks like they have a holy trinity of classes going on there.' Hena thought as she watched the trio approach, noticing one of them brandishing a loaded heavy crossbow floating in a glowing light that matched the one on his horn.

"Greetings travelle-" she began, but was interrupted by a bolt flying by her head, missing by maybe an inch, and basically drilling itself halfway in the stone wall with few visible strands of sphinx mane on it. Thank you random head tilt to the side while greeting someone and the random smile from Lady Luck.
"-What the?!"

"Dammit! I missed it."

As the shooter began to reload the crossbow, the remaining two came forth, one in heavy armor pulling out a finely made sword, while the third waved his horn, making the aforementioned sword glow brightly.

"Say your prayers beast, for we, the Brighthorns, shall cleanse you off this world before you can become a menace!" armored unicorn called out like some boastful zealot knight, while pointing his glowing sword at the sphinx.

"I don't really pray. I only test the travelers, or alternatively gather a toll from them. And I shall extend the same offer to you three as well." Hena said back the trio, now all of them fully on her turf so to speak, while stepping down from her altar-stone perch..
"So what'll it be then? A toll? Riddle or Combat?"

"What do you think you dumb beastie?" shooting one said and took another shot at the sphinx, who leapt to the side, dodging the bolt, now clearly being prepared for it this time.

"Ah, Combat..." sphinx said calmly, before feeling a rush of power coming over her. And along with the rush of power, came some changes to her form. The sphinx visibly grew in size, maybe being half as big compared to her normal state at the end of the growth. This was accompanied by some other changes, like her claws becoming more visible and almost sabre-like and her tail taking form of a large hissing snake, which seemed to give her a wider field of view. Even her teeth became visibly more pronounced and mane more majestic. And as a tiny bonus, her glasses seemed to fade somewhere else for the moment.
"Now then... Come at me you three. Unless you wish to retreat now, last chance you see." Hena said in a challenging tone with a wicked looking smirk on her face, spreading her wings at the same time, looking ready to pounce.

"We will never back away from a monster, no matter how much it changes its form!" yelled the unicorn who had cast something on the other ones sword, his horn glowing a little brighter. The other two looked equally ready to fight.

"Your funeral..." Hena said and proceeded to give her wings a good flap, sending a strong gust of air at the trio, making them momentarily flinch and look away at the sudden current of air hitting their faces. And that was a long enough distraction for the now enhanced sphinx to take the advantage of. Which she did quickly by leaping over the sword and crossbow unicorns, aiming her claws at the dedicated caster one.
A sickening crunch of bone was heard by all four of them as the attacking sphinxs claws landed on the unicorns back, pressing it down against the stone path hard with her body weight behind it. Unfortunately the poor sap did not die from the attack, but was only in pain so agonizing that he could not even manage a scream.
The crossbow carrying unicorn turned around, only to see the now snake-headed tail coming at him with its fanged jaws open. He barely managed to dodge the bite, hearing it snap right next to his ear. He did take the shot at the beasts direction, now that it was mostly focusing on his rather doomed comrade.

A beastial roar of pain echoed in the pass, as the crossbow bolt hit the sphinx right on the left side of her behind. This made her angrily grab the nearly dead unicorn and throw him at the shooters direction, managing a good hit, knocking him down and hurting or maybe even killing the caster. This caused the armored unicorn to rush check on his comrades, while sphinx was obviously distracted by the pain for the moment.
Another sound of pain came out as Hena managed to pull the bolt out. Luckily for her there were no barbs on it, but it still hurt like hell. The unicorns were also in more emotional side of pain when their caster comrade drew his last pained breath, most likely just submitting to his injuries.

Two remaining unicorns looked at the sphinx for a second, barely noticing its injury seemingly healing itself a little bit, which was mostly just muscles surrounding it pushing against each other, temporarily closing the wound for the moment. Armored one picked up his still glowing sword and tried rushing the beast, only for it to just take flight and heading over him towards the crossbow wielder, who was trying to reload it in a hurry.

It did not end well for him, due to getting pinned down by the sphinx and getting a little too close of a look at its fangs, before they closed in on his face, puncturing his eyes. Unicorns screams of pain were silenced as the sphinx gave his head a good yank, snapping his neck.
After tossing the body aside, Hena turned her attention to the remaining one, who seemed to have wisened up a little bit due to him not trying to rush at her, but instead taking a defensive stance with his sword. He kept up the stance even as Hena began to circle him, like the predator she pretty much was at the moment, waiting for an opening.

'If I mess this up, I'm done for. And the spell wont last much longer in my blade. I just need to land a one good slash to cause more serious injury to the beast. But it can probably take me down in one good hit as well.' he thought to himself while keeping an eye on the slowly prowling sphinx, who was equally keeping her eyes on him.

'Allright then. I can do this... For the Brighthorns.' he thought more attempting to encourage himself, taking a deep breath to calm his nerves, reflexively closing his eyes for the short second. Which turned out to be a mistake, because the moment he opened his eyes, he saw the monsters claws only few inches away from his face.

'Oh buck my life...' was his last thought as the claws made contact, tearing his face and jugular apart, thanks to one mere second of an opening. On his last moments, he cursed his decision to take on this task without a good helmet.

With the last opponent taken down, Hena felt the extra power leave her body, which resulted her glasses re-appearing and the snake tail disappearing, along with the extra size and other fluff. This also brought with it a stinging pain in her rear on the bolt wound, that by some luck did not seem to bleed that much.

"Oooooowww... Okay I seriously need to learn healing magic or at least something to ease the pain... This will definitely causes me to limp for a while." Hena thought aloud while gathering the unicorn trios corpses, with a visible limp on her step. Hopefully a fresh meal and a study session would take her mind off the throbbing pain radiating from her wound with every step.

Back to the present

'That wound kept me half-awake almost a month, until I got the hang of some easiest basic mending spell to ease the pain a little, and another darn month for it to heal enough for some light leaping action with daily mending. I did not hunt all that well during that time.' the sphinx thought as she floated the three unicorn skull aside, now telekinetically picking up something else among the varied remains. This time it was a thick finger-like bone with a sturdy looking claw on it.
'Ah yes. You where the one who simply an honorable death seeker. And then there was that other shady fellow coming from that town at the other end of the pass.'

Yet another memory...

"Excuse me ma'am. Sorry to disturb your rest, but might you be the sphinx that is rumored to guard this pass?" asked the low voice reaching Henas ears, waking her up from her little nap. After a short stretch she looked around, seeing some kinda dog-creature, Diamond Dog if she remembered right from one the many books, standing in the middle of the four pillars.
"Why yes, I am. And who might you be, polite one?" she asked while taking a closer look at the dog. He was wearing an mixed-material armor, that was clearly made for protection while also being comfortable for long travels, along with the helmet, carrying a round, center-spiked shield and a large war hammer on his back, along with a rucksack, probably containing camping and such equipment. The dog also seemed like he had seen many, many, many winters.

"Names Carl. And just to save both our time and to get to the point, I am looking for a good death in combat, after leaving my pack. Had I stayed, I would have been exiled in shame with nothing in my name. Hoped to find it in these parts." was the dogs simple answer, while taking all of his equipment off his back.

"I see... Is that all then? A simple combat where you can go down fighting... I can respect that."

Having said their piece, both sides prepared for the combat, Hena transforming to the same form she had when fighting those three unicorns several months ago and Carl equipping his shield and hammer, holding said hammer with only one hand, which told the sphinx that despite being an 'old timer', he still had plenty of strength to wield it with ease.
Not saying another word, both sides simply began to circle one another, clearly seeing the other as a worthy opponent of sort. Almost half a minute of circling, waiting the other to make the first move... Both of them ended up doing it at the same time, with the hammer and claw meeting at the middle.

'He and his hammer are certainly strong enough to block my claws.' Hena though as she took a swipe at the dog with her other paw, only to have it blocked by the shield, with its spikes digging in, drawing a visible amount of blood. 'And knows how to defend well'.
Hena tried taking another swipe at the dog, only to be blocked by his spiked shield again. Aside from the somewhat worsened puncture injury, it did give sphinx enough leverage to hop back a little to try another attack, while also giving Carl a chance to fix his stance. He may be looking for death, but he was not planning on going down easily. With a fast attempt to hit the sphinx with a quick lunge of the hammer, which she managed to dodge with the aid of her wings, while keeping his shield up, the duel continued.

Their duel went on well past half-hour mark, with both of them exchanging blows and blocks with varied rates of success. After a full hour had passed on the fight, fatigue finally beginning to slowly settle upon both of them, with their breathing becoming heavier and movements becoming a little slower with less strength behind their blows. Hena had several nasty big bruises on her body and Carls armor was shredded in several places with plenty of claw marks on his thick hide and his shield had been used as an improvised throwing weapon at some point and now it was laying somewhere on the ground behind the sphinx and now holding his hammer with one less finger.

"Looks like it might come down to the next big attack for the both of us, eh?"

"Seems like it. Only my duty here requires me to be alive, so I kinda have to survive and all that."

"Fine by me. I have a full life behind and no regrets... Feel free to find nourishment in my flesh or just toss it to the vultures."

Final words now over, both of them took an attack-ready stance and just stood there for a moment. After few long seconds both of them rushed at each other with hammer and claw ready to strike.

And the strike fell as they passed each other, after which they stopped for a moment...

After a random dramatic breeze went by them, there was a delayed loud snap, as the sphinxs wing-joint popped out of its socket from the blow of the hammer. Around the same time, four gashes opened up around Carls throat, giving out few spurts of blood, staining some of the surrounding stonework. Neither really made too much sound, with Hena mostly gritting her teeth, which were starting returning to the normal form along with her body, and Carl simply let go of his hammer and managed by some small miracle to pass away standing. By the time Hena had returned to he normal form, the diamond dog was rather dead.

'As much as he managed to cause pain to my body, he was probably the most noble visitor thus far.' Hena thought watching the still standing corpse, while thinking how long it would take for her wing to heal back to flying condition. Even with her current mending skill it would be a gamble.

"Oh my. That was a rather impressive duel." came a new voice.

A glance revealed it to be a unicorn stallion, wearing some delicate eye-paint and robes of arabian or maybe egyptian style, carrying a full looking saddle back. Probably a traveler from afar?

"I am inclined to agree with that. *hisss* And what brings you to my pass traveler? Or what made you to wait? You might have had a good chance of free passage during my fight." she inquired while still in good amount of pain.

"I thought it might have been somewhat rude to do such a thing. And I actually have some coin to offer for the safe passage." unicorn said politely and pulled out a jingling bag and even showed its content clearly full of gold coins as if to confirm he was not lying.
"And I think we could help each other a little bit. You see I am doing some research which needs little amount of some material you could easily provide, and you are clearly in need of some healing, which I happen to very good at. What do you say? A little fair bargain on the side?"

"And what are you asking in return?"

"Only a little bit of your blood for my research. Nothing more, nothing less."

"...Very well, but only after you have done the healing and swear to never use whatever you are intending to do with your research against me."

"I shall agree to your terms." unicorn said, while also offering his hoof to sphinx to shake. Which she did with her still bloodied paw-hand. As they shook on it, Hena suddenly gasped out a wisp of black smog out of her mouth, that swirled around the unicorn before disappearing.

"Just a little curse to make sure you keep your word about our agreement." she said in a serious tone.

"No worries about that, but still understandable. And now to keep my end of our deal." he answered as his horn started to glow. This caused a golden hued glow to surround the sphinx, followed by her injuries seemingly reversing, with bruises and scrapes disappearing and broken wing mending itself admirably fast.

"Thank you. And now I will keep my end. Take out whatever you intend to use to collect the blood." Hena said after testing the feel of her now fixed wing, and proceeded to sit down. As the unicorn took out a small enchanted bottle, maybe size of a shot glass, sphinx slowly cut her palm with her own claw, drawing some blood and letting it drip down to the said little bottle. After a moment the unicorn shut the bottle, satisfied with the given amount, and even healing the bleeding cut.

"Thank you my good lady. This will help my research a good amount. Oh and before I forget, here is my toll for the passage through your pass alive." unicorn said politely while putting the the little bottle away and taking out his coin purse and giving it to the sphinx.

"Thank you for the business. Now off you go then." Hena said as she went to take the monetary toll to her personal treasure hoard, which was mostly just a smallish pile of items left of dead travelers and payed tolls in one of the rooms in her lair. As the lair doors closed, the unicorn took his leave with a smile.

"With the blood of an powerful magical entity in my hooves, my research on creation of life shall bear fruit... Once I get home first." he whispered to himself with a smile.

Later on the same day the sphinx added the mostly intact gear parts from Carls body to the pile of treasures and ate some of the meat, before burying the rest out of respect.

Back to the present... AGAIN.

"I wonder what he did with those drops of my blood? Haven't really thought of that for a good while. Guess I could ask the mirror one of these days." Hena thought out loud top herself.

Her thoughts were cut short as a parchment appeared next to her with a pop, almost making her hop up like a spooked cat. It had some odd mark she did not recognize, but could guess it was most likely from her 'bosses'.
"Allrighty let's see what it has to say." she said while picking up and opening the scroll.

"Dear customerHena

Due to some budget cuts and some words from higher ups, we have removed most of the anti-thief measures from your lair, including the pillar barrier thingy. This means if you want more security, other than the doors, stone walls and you guarding the two main artifacts, you have to get or make them on your own. The library will still remains secure from outsiders, but as a compensation? you are allowed to borrow a book, or other work in it. to those who only have to ask for ONE month and no more than that. After that the borrowed works will magically return back to their spot. This also happens if they are about to get damaged in ANY WAY. Any outsiders access to the library directly will be left to you personally, be it by another toll-fee or just a polite request.

From: DeezPlaced.Co

"Huh... That sucks for me on some level..." was all Hena could say after she red the message. Then some ideas to protect her stuff and set artifacts came to her mind as she processed it more. As the scroll faded away, the sphinx was mildly grinning.
"Well, guess now I have some cursing to do." she said standing up and heading in her lair smiling, cursing black smog already lightly billowing between her teeth.

But before she could get into cursing, her ears reached the sound of approaching set of hooves, making her take her place on her 'altar-spot' out of instinct. And just in time to see two unicorns, one grey youth and one blue elder, coming from the direction of the nearby town, which she had took only few careful glances now and then. She did not even know its name yet.

"I'm certain that whatever beast lives in this pass is nothing we can't handle my pupil." blue one talked to the grey one, who was also carrying their full looking saddle back, clearly not yet seeing the sphinx just sitting there.

"Really now? And just how would you handle me then?" sphinx asked, making both of the now startled unicorns to look at her direction. There was something familiar feel about the grey one. And the blue one seemed not to be taken aback by the sight of the beastie all that much compared to his pupil. When he talked to her, he sounded less than a mentor and more like a little pompous scholar.

"Well you're clearly an intelligent beast, but I think you don't possess anything special, other than knowledge of some riddles. So please, show us oh sphinx. Show me how can you counter my unicorn magic?"

Unicorns boasting gave Hena an idea, which seemed to in her skill range. She just needed to focus on a little area on unicorns neck and visualize the target from some anatomy works she had seen. Hopefully it would work without much of a fatigue.
Without saying a word, she lifted her claw and looked like she was trying to squeeze something invisible with her thumb and index claw, while mentally reaching for her still rather fresh psionic skills and focusing on the pompous unicorns throat.

"What? What is that supposed to b-..." blue unicorn tried asking, but suddenly felt like his throat was being forcefully closed and being unable to breathe. Few futile inhale attempts later, he began to instinctively try to reach for whatever was on his throat with his hooves but finding nothing, soon starting to visibly panic, which lead to loss of focus required for magic use.

"There are plenty of ways in this world for someone to make your precious magic useless to you..." Hena said with threateningly even tone, still keeping her squeezing up on the unicorn, who was slowly suffocating.

"Please lady sphinx, I think he has had enough. Please, release him..." grey unicorn asked politely, with a clear sense of urgency in his voice.

"Very well then." sphinx said as she broke her psionic hold on blue ones throat, letting him fill his lungs with some of that precious, precious air, visibly relieved.
"So I assume you know how my rules here go? Toll, riddle or combat? So what will it be?"

"Well we have some coin to pay the to-"

"We both take your damn riddle! No beast will humiliate the High Mage Azure Star and his pupil!" blue unicorn interrupted his pupil.

"But teacher, we might die if we get it wrong."

"We won't fail Starswirl. And didn't you tell me you faced one of these creatures as a foal?"

"I... I think this is the same one sir. I know those glasses she wears." grey unicorn said, while looking at the sphinx a bit more thoroughly. It also brought back some memories for Hena.
'Well now. Let's see how the little has grown in smarts then with a teacher like that...' she thought while pushing her glasses up a little.

"Now then, let us begin with my riddles my good sirs. Masters first of course."

"It cannot be seen, cannot be felt,
cannot be heard, cannot be smelt.
It lies behind stars and under hills and empty holes it fills.
It comes first and follows after. Ends life, kills laughter.
What is it?"

Azure started to think over the riddle right away, most likely going it over few times and thinking over potential answers. He even started to sweat a little bit. Was he thinking his answer over that hard over the riddle, or was it perhaps the remaining stress from almost being choked to death with someones mind? Hena did not care much of that, while she merely waited for the answer.

"I think... The answer is Darkness. It at least fits all the terms mentioned in the riddle... Was it right?" he suggested little warily, clearly not wanting another choke-session.

"Your answer... Is correct. You may pass safely." sphinx said, pointing at the other end of the pass with her wing. And the blue unicorn walked carefully past her and started to wait for his pupil. At least he did not just run for it and abandon the other.

"And now you then. Brave enough to find out if you can figure out my riddles this time?" sphinx inquired curiously.

"I will try. I'm not the little colt riding on my parent cart like last time." Starswirl said, seeming confident but still wary. Still sphinx gave him a kind-ish smile before the riddle.

"This thing all things devours,
Birds, beasts, trees, flowers.
Gnaws iron, bites steel,
Grinds hard stone to meal.
Slays king, ruins town,
And beats high mountain down.
What am I?"

Both unicorns seemed visibly stumped, even though only one of them had to answer. Starswirl racked his brain, desperately trying to figure out what was the life-saving answer, soon even starting to tap his head a little bit with his hoof as he was taking longer to answer compared to Azure, who also was starting look worried.

'Could... Could it be some ancient monster lost before our time? No no, none of the known or vague ancient horrors were not that big to take down mountains. Well maybe some truly powerful magic could, but then there is the detail of it devouring basically all nature. I think it needs to be something existing for the riddle to be viable. But what thing can do all of that mentioned in it?'

"Having problems there? You are shaking a lot." Sphinx suddenly pointed out while tapping her claws rhythmically on the stone. Was she in a hurry to do something?

"Please, just give me a little more time." he basically 'whisper-shouted' due to slowly rising panic.

"Pardon?"

"Time. I asked a little more time." he said again, this time louder for sphinx to hear, who now started to smile for some reason.

"Correct, young lad. You may pass safely." Hena said pointing with her wing once again.

It took few seconds for Starswirl to realize he had accidentally given the right answer, followed by connecting the dots withing the riddle, which now made sense. Even his mentor could make sense of the riddle now.

"Oh... Uuuh, well thank you ma'am... Have a good day...? We'll be off your hair then."

"Yes, you do that. And name's Hena. Ma'am makes me feel older than I already am." sphinx said back to Starswirl while absentmindedly grooming her mane a little bit, like the large feline she basically was. Not needing any other prompt, both unicorns began to take their leave, while also being happy to have survived the little riddle-test. Before they got out of earshot Hena called out to them.
"Nice little goatee! Take care of it and you might get a good beard!"

This made Starswirl stop for a second and turn back to look at Henas direction, only to catch the sight of her tail disappearing behind the closing doors of her lair, after which he tried to look or feel the mentioned goatee. He could not see it, but it indeed was there.

"I don't think I even want to have a beard. That would definitely make me look much older." Starswirl commented, receiving a good hearted chuckle from Azure.

"Well who knows. Maybe it would eventually suit you pupil. Just have to see if it grows. Now let's go, we have a long walk ahead of us still."

And so the unicorn duo carried on with their travel, not bothering to think what the sphinx was actually doing in the pass, until they heard about it in a tavern they stayed later on. Meanwhile Hena proceeded to try and curse most of her personal treasure-pile with varied levels of nastiness that she was still uncertain how well such hexes would work, if at all. She might have to read up on that.

Chapter 6 A new day to meet some old faces.

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Chapter 6 A new day to meet some old faces.

"Thank you for the toll. You may pass alive." Hena said politely, receiving equally polite nod from the pegasus carrying some books in a bag with the familiar symbol she had seen couple of times during her stay. Namely a sword and a long rolled up parchment crossed over a round shield. After having taken carefully a little closer look she had seen It on the banners on some of the buildings in the fortified town on the other end of the pass, and after asking few non-riddle questions from ones carrying such symbol, she learned that they were members of an neutral order, dedicated on preserving knowledge of any nation they could, calling themselves "Guardians of Knowledge" and town apparently was named "Wissen", apparently meaning "Knowledge", which was chosen from one of the translated old scrolls they had gotten from other continent.

Apparently after having transporting issues on the main road, which went around some mountains following the coastline and finally to the end of the fjord where their base town was, from pony lands, either due to a cold weather suddenly arriving oddly early or even some bandits or hired thugs, more and more of their members had started to take the risk of taking the shortcut through the mountain pass, which even now officially named 'Pass of the Sphinx' by them, even if it did end up killing handful of their members, while losing few books to sphinx, the word spread among their other members, making them to make sure they always had something to offer as a toll for her for safe passage, usually in gold coins of varied amount depending on the individual, with few piece or two of different jewelry tossed in here and there.
While this meant that Henas personal treasure pile grew rather nicely, it also meant less of the 'easy meals' coming by. So it was most likely only a matter of time till she had to only hunt for her food, unless some complete outsider who had no early warning of her or had nothing to offer as a toll came by. Even the would-be-challengers had become a bit rare, some even backing off after she changed her form.

'I just hope I'm not going to get reduced into just some roadside show... Should I perhaps go to some riddle-only system on every other day or something like that? Could get more riddles done that way. It could be nothing but I have been feeling rather weakened in the past weeks, and I always feel some nourishing feeling when I get to test someone with a riddle... Maybe its due to me being a sphinx, and its kinda their thing to ask riddles from passer-by's.' Hena thought as she added the new patch of coin to the pile of treasures and other items given as a toll. She spared a glance at the two treasures, both still safe and sound on their spots. Only maybe a handful had actually used them out of curiosity after the first ones, and only just asking to use the mirror to see something, clearly not wanting to lose anything in a gamble for absolute answer to any question.

'Well, have think that later. The day is still young, so maybe someone asks for the riddle. And I think technically they can still pay the toll if they're quick enough or something, since that Starswirl did so many years ago. Doesn't fix this little loneliness I have though, and the bone theatre only goes so far until it gets boring.' she kept on thinking as she went back outside to continue keeping watch over the outside of her lair.

Luckily for our sphinx, she did not need to wait that long for someone to come down the path. This time it was a trio of creatures; one unicorn stallion pulling a small wagon with a chest in it, one griffin tom with full looking bags and one earth pony mare, the first two looking more youthful compared to the more mature white, yellow maned mare... Who was also missing an eye, if the eye patch, with a compass and rose design on it, she was wearing was any indication.

As they all stopped just a little bit before the pillars, Hena noticed that the mare was the only one of them with no fear in her presence, while the two lads had some fear coming off from them, but was mostly covered by amazement and awe. For the location or for being so close to an obviously dangerous creature.

"Good day to you, miss Hena. I know it has been a long while since our last meeting, but would it be polite to assume that you might still remember me?" the mare asked politely, slightly tapping her eye patch as if to hint.

"Ah yes, Pyrite Blood. Doing well I see... So how's the eye-hole?" Hena inquired.

"Quite well actually. Took some time to get used to seeing with the remaining one." was Pyrite's answer. "Oh and here is my firstborn son, Blue Iron Blood." she continued, pointing at the unicorn, who bowed politely while not taking his eyes off of the sphinx.
"A pleasure to meet you, miss Hena."

"And this friendly griffin is Hermes, who was just heading the same way as we were." Pyrite said, while nodding at the golden brown griffins direction, who had taken out some kind of sketchbook and looked like he was drawing something in it with an admirable speed.

"I'm not sure if you remember, but you kinda saved me and my mother little over two decades ago... By eating a zebra... Almost alive." the griffin mentioned carefully.

"Oh right, now I remember that piece of work. Went down surprisingly well despite being obviously a rotten one. So what brings you down to my pass? Surely the main road is safer for a time?"

"Well I decided to come this way, partially because we are little in a hurry and this pass sure saves us a lot of travel time. We intent to see some if some tomes Wissen holds within its walls might have something to explain this oddly early and harsh winter weather. The unicorn council is already blaming other tribes, who are blaming them back. But at least they have agreed on to get together for a meeting. Hopefully things will work out for everyone... And to hopefully thank you for the help you kinda had in the success of my family." Pyrite explained, sounding a bit worried about the upcoming meeting, changing to more positive tone when talking about thanking the sphinx.

"Oh? And what about you, Hermes?"

"Well I'm just heading to Wissen to apply to some work there. So really nothing too special." griffin said, sounding little bit embarrassed, maybe thinking his reasons being 'lesser' compared to the travelling ponies.

"I see. Any other business for coming this way?" Hena asked the group.

"Well I was hoping if me and my son could have a go at your riddles, while getting to go past you alive via toll. Is that perhaps allowed?"

"Hmmm... I'm not quite sur-" Hena started, but was interrupted by a popping sound, which startled all of them a tiny bit, bringing a little scroll in front of her. After opening it she saw it had only one word.

"Yes."

"Looks like it is." said the sphinx as the scroll just faded away. "I'm guessing you go first? Show these lads how it goes?" she continued, receiving a confirming nod from Pyrite, who stepped forward while taking out a small coin purse for the toll and gave it to the riddling feline.

"A golden liquid to burn the throat,
Thirst quenched, reason smote.
What am I?"

Pyrite hummed thoughtfully for for few minutes, before smiling.

"I think the answer is alcohol. After all, I have had a taste of it few times in my life, before and after getting happily married." she answered still smiling, receiving a smile back from Hena.

"Correct. Still keeping your mind sharp I bet."

"Oh I have to, if I wish to keep my family together and in business. There are still plenty of those who didn't like the heir of the House of Blue marrying a 'filthy mud pony', but are still forced to do business with us if they want to survive."

"That so? And may I ask what business that might be?"

"To put it simply; food business, both production and delivery. Its still for a moment a slow grow, but it sure as heck is a steady income for the long run. No matter how rich or powerful pony, or any other of the civilized creatures is, they all eventually have to eat. So basically a win-win in a way."

"I see. Now shall we see if your son here is as sharp as his mother?"

"I guess we shall. Blue Iron, if you would take your turn with her riddles. And don't forget the toll, as we are still on a trip. Might as well give her the gift we brought for her too."

"Yes mother." he said politely, proceeding to pull the small wagon behind him as he stepped before the sphinx, also offering her his toll, a small purse full of coins like his mother had offered. He then levitated the chest out from the wagon and set it next to the riddling feline, who looked a bit curios about its content.
"Ask thy riddle please, Lady Hena."

"Very well my dear boy..." she said back at him with a smile.

"What comes once in a minute,
twice in a moment,
but never in a thousand years?"

Blue Iron began mulling over the riddle right away. Even Pyrite clearly decided to think about it, if the obvious 'thinking-face' on her was any indication. And as for the Hermes... He was back to scribbling on his sketchbook, looking at the pillars and the doorway behind the sphinx. Probably just sketching some details of the architecture for later study comparisons or maybe something similar along those lines?

"The letter M!" Blue Iron finally answered, sounding sure about it. It also startled Hermes a little bit, making him adorably 'poof-up' for few seconds, which did bring a little smile to Henas face.

"Correct. Good luck finding the potential answer from Wissens library's... Unless you wish to try your luck in mine."

"You have a library? Or is it just some books in a toll pile of sorts?" Pyrite asked politely, not wanting offend.

"Oh its behind a portal in my lair, not sure if you noticed it during your last visit. And it holds within it merely all the knowledge of the the present and the past."

"I see... I think its better we take our chances in Wissen, despite the potential time saving possibility. I fear that both of us might get overwhelmed by the mere sight of the amount of knowledge you mentioned..." she said, while her son nodded next to her looking a little intimidated about the prospect of a library of such vast amount of knowledge existing. Mostly due to the amount of time it would potentially take to go through ALL of it.
"Oh and before we leave, do open the chest we gifted. I think you might like its content with the cold season approaching, especially if rationed a little bit."

This piqued Henas interest as she began to open the simple lock on the chest. As the lid loosened, she smelled something tasty, which urged her to open it little faster to reveal...
"Some of the finest meats from the Griffons we could fit in that chest, which also is enchanted to keep its content fresh. We hope it could eventually be in wider use, or maybe help develop something new one day." Pyrite commented as the sphinx was already taking the first smaller slice of meats, clearly enjoying their taste.

"Thank you for this gift. In fact, I think this might just deserve a little gift back." Hena said after swallowing first piece of meat, delaying the two ponies a bit. The sphinx inhaled slowly in a very focused manner, followed by moving her right paw-hand like she was grabbing hold of something invisible. Then she opened her palm like she was holding something on it, and slowly blew the inhaled air at the ponies direction. Only instead of air, she exhaled something akin to golden dust, that floated around the two ponies before disappearing.
"There. I just blessed you with maybe one weeks worth of good luck. Don't get careless though, blessed good luck does not mean absolutely everything you during its duration will succeed."

"Oh. Well thank you. Hopefully good luck comes to you too. It must get lonely here."

"You have no idea... Have a good trip."

After giving their farewells, two ponies continued their trip to Wissen, leaving sphinx alone with Hermes, who had once again started to sketch something. After waiting a full minute, Hena cleared her throat a bit to get the griffons attention, causing him to 'poof-up' again.

"So are you perhaps travelling past me, or just hanging here to draw something for the rest of your days?" she asked with a raised brow.

"Huh? Oh, yes. Yes I am. H-here is my toll." Hermes said as he gave a small bag of coins to sphinx, who accepted it with a smile.
"Úmm... May I also try my luck with your riddles on the side as well? I vaguely remember figuring out the last one I heard. Or that is what my mom told me."

"Why yes, yes you may. Hopefully you have gotten sharper with time." Hena said, still smiling warmly.

"I'm the beginning of the end and the end of time and space,
I'm essential to creation and I surround every place.
What am I?"

Hermes visibly started thinking over the riddle, still holding his sketchbook as he brought his claw to his beak, almost smacking himself with it. That drew a short gentle laugh from sphinx, but luckily it did not seemingly disrupt griffons focus, both the accidental self-smack and the laugh.
As the minutes seemed to stretch by, Hena started to absentmindedly fiddle her mane a bit while keeping Hermes in her field of view. For some reason, this seemed to catch the griffin youths attention for a short bit, causing hi to shake his head in order to get his riddle-focus back. He had no idea why, and Hena assumed he just dismissed a potential answer.

"I think I got it. Letter E is the answer." Hermes finally answered hopefully.

"That... Is correct. Good job, you can pass now. You did have business at Wissen, yes?" Hena said with a smile.

"Yes, I intend to eventually apply as a student there after some work. Maybe one day as a member of their order there..." he started before carefully checking the position of the sun, which caused his eyes to widen.
"Oh crap, I really need to hurry before sundown! Talk to ya later Hena!" he said before leaving in such a hurry that he dropped one of the pages from his sketchbook. Before Hena could mention that, the griffin was long gone.

'Well, he just might return if this is something important.' she thought as she went to pick up the dropped paper. As she looked at it, it turned out to indeed be a simple sketch of the surrounding pass. And it even included portrait her in it, being seemingly more detailed then the sketched surroundings in the page.
'Huh. He certainly has some good artistic skills. Could have used little more work on the surroundings.' Hena concluded as she took the chest and the tolls inside via simple psionic levitation, as she still looked over the sketch.

Later on the evening...

'Damn this is a tasty piece of meat' sphinx thought as she simply snacked on one of the meat pieces, this one being a bit chewier than the previous piece, but still tasty for her mainly carnivore taste-buds. She would have to rations remaining ones if the winter was going to be oddly cold and early, since some wild prey might get somewhat trickier to catch. But at least she now had a way of passing time while waiting for travelers, just laying there chewing on some meat like a big cat.

"Oh, am I perhaps interrupting your meal?" came a deep voice, drawing her attention away from the chewy piece of meat. There stood a blue ram with some impressive pair of curved horns, wearing a red collar with golden ornaments on it. The whole collar looked like it would look nice with a proper bell.
"Should I wait until you are done, or can we get on with the passage thing?" the ram asked, clearly knowing about the passage-rules already.

After thinking it over a couple of seconds, Hena decided to just swallow the remaining meat as it was. No way she was gonna waste a single piece of gifted food. Then she nonchalantly hopped in the middle of the four pillars, being now face to face with the blue ram, with a generous 'safety-distance' between the two of them.
"Yes, we can get on with the 'passage thing' as you said. So what will it be for you? Toll, Riddle or Combat?"

"Hmmm... May I perhaps see what combat would bring forth? Rumor and scuttlebutt tell that you take a different form depending on the travelers power or something along those lines." ram asked, seeming to be simply curious about the said part of sphinxs apparent power.

"I guess I can do that. Combat for now..." Hena said, as she closed her eyes anticipating the power boost for Combat-choice to come down upon her. And boy did it come down and HARD.

https://youtu.be/-MhNBGY_1j8

It began with the ground beginning to shake along with her eyes suddenly opening, now turning completely bright red, sparking with other-worldly energies with burst of something that looked like miniature lightnings. This brought forth a grey-ish, silvery-white aura that surrounded the sphinxs body, causing her to float up slowly, followed by a gathering storm of similarly colored energy beginning to surround her.
The ram merely observed the proceeding spectacle in an extremely well hidden awe, as the magical storm grew in size, with only things visible inside of it being the now glowing red eyes of the sphinx and her vaguely changing barely visible silhouette. As if it was taking on a bigger form, while seemingly gaining some manner of head-wear in the progress. It was rather hard to tell with all the wildly swirling energies covering the creature.

https://youtu.be/VdO63IuN--8

Finally the new form of the sphinx seemed to stabilize, now practically towering over the ram while sitting up, but still surrounded by the silvery maelstrom of magic, which now felt more like a cocoon, just barely holding an uspeakably powerful entity within itself.

"Well? Is this perhaps enough?" Hena asked with a whisper, that sounded like it was coming everywhere and nowhere at the same time.

"...Yes, very much enough... I will just humbly pay the toll and maybe take the riddle on too. If it allows me to see the artifact you are rumored to guard here?" ram answered with even voice, while wiping away few drops of sweat, while taking out a coin purse out from some magic-pocket-dimension with a flash of gold and black colored magic glow. With the actual choice given, the sphinx reverted back to her 'basic-form', shaking her head a little bit after coming down from 'temporary power-high' of such magnitude.
"Very well. Other than being powerful, you must also be a sharp minded one." Hena said as she accepted some extra brighter and shinier silvery coins stamped with majestic ram-horns. Made of platinum perhaps?

"What can run but never walks,
has a mouth but never talks,
has a head but never weeps,
has a bed but never sleeps?"

The blue ram thus started to think the possible answer for given riddle, while Hena waited patiently, passing time by flipping one of the given coins with a soft *ting* every now and then.

"Ah yes indeed. The answer is river." the ram answered with confidence.

"Correct. You may pass safely, after you have seen the artifacts if you still wish." sphinx said politely, to which the ram nodded.

And so they entered the lair of the sphinx proper, passing the toll-pile-room in which Hena tossed the shiny coins after puffin some black smog on them for some curse-security, before arriving before the artifacts; the tall oval mirror with golden rim and gold lettered green stone tablet still in their respective platforms.
"Now which one you would like to perhaps use? The mirror can show you anything anywhere, no matter what might be in the way, magical or not. And the tablet will give you absolutely perfect answer to any question asked from it, for a price which can be absolutely anything... So which will it be, my good sir?" sphinx explained and asked still in polite tone.

This seemed to give the blue ram a short pause as he looked between the artifacts, looking puzzled about which one to choose to use. After almost a full minute of thinking, the ram walked to the tablet, putting his cloven hoof on it respectfully as if knowing that the item held enormous power within itself.

"How can I get a well enduring long-term revenge on ponies?"

After hearing the question, the tablet came to life with pure golden glowy tendrils coming out of it, planting themselves on the rams temples, pulsing slowly as they fed needed information to his mind. Soon enough the tendrils withdrew away from the ram, pulling a whisp of something with them. Maybe a thought process of some sort?

"So? Is the answer to your liking?" Hena inquired.

"Yes... Yes very much indeed. I think I take my leave and do something with this information. Thank you for this chance, miss...?"

"Hena. My name is Hena. And yours my good goat sir?"

"Grogar. Have a good day miss Hena." the goat, now named Grogar said as he took his leave from the lair of the sphinx, with the sphinx probably preparing for the approaching night. As he kept walking down the pass, Grogar had a lot in his mind.

'Hard to say what that tablet took from me as a price...At least I can still think normally and I don't physically feel different... Eh, maybe I figure it out eventually. And I most definitely was beyond lucky to decide not to challenge the sphinx in that combat-form aimed for my level of power... Almost felt like she could have erased me with a mere thought... Good thing I did not have breakfast or else I might have left something there... But now I have to focus, I've got lot of writing ahead of me, and some application to fill up...'

Now determined, he kept on walking down the pass and path leading to Wissen.

Chapter 7 Sketches and loss of "Royalty"

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Chapter 7 Sketches and loss of "Royalty".

Two months later...

'Looks like that the ordinary winter season is up now.' Hena thought as she looked across some the horizon, after having flown high enough up in the air to see far. There was some light snowfall coming to the nearby areas, which was probably a relief after a short lived giant blizzard that had reeked of olden magic. That had driven sphinx to seek some answers from the books and other text in her vast library.
It had taken a couple hours and some cross references, but she figured the cause of the storm being made most likely by a spirit called a Windigo, a cold spirit that feeds upon negative emotion to grow stronger and colder, or maybe even a several of them together for the storm to reach that level of magnitude. She also suspected that ponies might have been the source of their power, if it was connected to that meeting of angry pony leaders, but that was mostly just a hunch. She could ask Pyrite, but she probably had returned home by the main road, maybe even with some trading business done too.

'Welp, now to return to keeping watch over the pass. Maybe something interesting just might happen'

With that thought the sphinx began her descent back to her lair in a leisurely glide. As she kept descending, something caught her eye from the direction of Wissen. Looked like somecreature was coming towards her lair for whatever reason. Sphinx kept gliding closer to the movement, finally seeing some golden brown spot moving on the path at a steady pace.
'Well well well. Looks like something is indeed happening today. Let's see if it includes some riddles.'

After stealthily gliding closer, Hena saw that the traveler coming down the path was a certain golden brown griffon, Hermes. And it looked like he was carrying his sketchbook and a compact saddlebag adorned with the symbol of the 'Guardians of Knowledge' with him, and had not noticed her gliding up above him, maybe because of the still significant height she was still gliding in. The griffin lad must have been thinking or focusing on something hard as he did not notice the sphinx approaching him from behind, first by slow gliding and after silently landing by sneaking after him while laying low.
Finally Hermes reached the part of the path where it began to open up for the lair-area of the sphinx. And he still had not noticed that the owner of the lair was sneaking right behind him.

He peered around the currently empty pillared area with some bones, that had survived Henas little power-surge with the blue goat fellow, still remaining here and there, with the sphinx silently mimicking the peering around movement. Was he waiting for something or someone to appear?

"Hmmm... Guess she might still be sleeping..." he thought aloud to himself.

"Who might be sleeping where?" Hena inquired while being almost right next to him in the blind spot of his focused vision.

This was followed by a loud startled squak from Hermes, who even hopped up on top of an nearby stone like a cat who just noticed a cucumber. Hena had to admit her did look kinda adorable when it happened, even smiling warmly at the spooked and pooffed up griffin.
"I see you decided to come back to my pass. Any special reason to it?"

"By the Cardinal Winds, please don't do that! I think my heart almost stopped there..." Hermes exclaimed while trying to catch his breath from the sudden surprise.

"Well if you would have been a bit more vigilant, maybe you would have noticed me gliding down in your direction. Such a lack of attention to your surrounding might get you killed if someone flies in silently above you."

"I'll keep that in mind... And as for my reasons for being here is... To study you..."

This gave Hena a pause, making her tilt her head with one brow raised.

"Study me? And why should I, A: allow that? and B: why did you decide to try that? Oh, and C: WHY?" she asked, sounding more confused than angry.

"Well... I could pay a toll or some kind of a fee for that to you. And I find you a fascinating being to learn about, while even the library's in Wissen don't have much about your kind. Only things we have are mentions about you and a another one in a far southern desert regions. Only the one there is apparently much larger than you. And deep purple"

"I see. So that's what happened to that blood I guess... And as for your request, I have no interest for tolls or treasures all that much for the moment. Despite of me having a pile of things in my lair, it is still just a 'pile' of things, but its my 'pile' to keep... No idea where I was going with that... But still, why should I allow you to study me and how?"

"... I could maybe keep you company? I think you said something like that Lady Pyrite when she mentioned it getting lonely here. And it would just be some sketches of your build, like on your paws and claws, wings, your beautiful eyes-... I-I mean sketches of overall build of your body for safe study!"

Hena was about to say no to lightly tongue tied griffin, but was interrupted by a sudden rumbling of her stomach, reminding her of hunger, basically ruining the air of certain aloof dignity she seemed to have. It also reminded her about her now emptied meat-stash, while making her almost as embarrassed as Hermes probably was right now.

"I also have some extra meat with me. Its dried strips sort, but still tasty." he offered tentatively, taking out a package that did smell good to her, clearly holding said dried meat.

"Hnnnngg... Fine... One hour for sketching, some questions are okay if you come up any and no intrusive touching. Try to touch me and I WILL rip off your tail and make a necklace out of it. Are we clear?" sphinx said, giving in to the request.

"Crystal." Hermes said as he gave the meat package to sphinx, who did not waste much time opening it and digging in.

First minutes went on rather quietly as Hermes started sketching Hena who was currently laying down on her 'altar-spot' with her wings lightly spread, leaving out the meat package she was basically devouring, focusing more on the overall build of her predators body.
As the time flew on, this seemed to cause some focusing issues to Hermes, due to him slowly starting to find sphinxs leonine frame rather attractive, causing few errand lines here and there that he had to quickly erase, accompanied with few quiet annoyed sounding grunts from him.
'Come on Hermes, focus! You're here on purely academic business. Don't let yourself get distracted by her body... Her big, strong, beautiful body that could overwhelm yours with ease- Oh c'mon!! Get a hold of yourself!! At this rate the sketch will get ruined!' he practically screamed internally to himself, erasing yet another errand line. And his shaky wings were not helping his focus.

"Is something wrong? Your claws and wings are visibly shaking." Hena suddenly asked, tilting her head while correcting her glasses a little bit. Hermes could feel his face getting red for some reason, trying to hide it behind his sketchbook.

"No. Nothing's wrong here whatsoever... How much time we have left?"

"I think we're almost done, maybe minute here or there. Do you have any good sketch there?"

Hermes checked the his work, and despite some light smudges on the erased parts it did look enough for some study.

"Oh and while you're still here, I have something for you." Hena said as she got up and headed inside her lair. She soon returned with a page of some sort and gave it to Hermes, who recognized it as his sketch he thought he had lost somewhere.
"If you need some more sketches, I think we can negotiate about it some other time."

"Very well... I see you then I guess. Farewell." Hermes said before leaving back to town, face still lightly hued red. Later he would beat himself over not actually asking at least some academic questions about her.

"Well that was at least some change to my routine... And by the sound of it, its back to work then." sphinx thought aloud as she heard a group coming down the other end of the path.
It turned out to be a group of ten ponies, most of them unicorns. Six of them hornheads and four pegasi. All flyers were wearing armor, and five of the horned ones were in robes of varied quality, fanciest looking bearded one of them having actual little bells on his blue hat and robe. And then there was the fanciest one of them, a light yellow unicorn stallion who was wearing some VERY expensive looking fur-lined cape and a fricking fancy piece of a crown.

"Well aren't you all looking fancy there. And just what might bring you all around my pass?" Hena inquired while adjusting her glasses in a somewhat refined manner.

"Beast, you are addressing the King-regent of unicorns, King Gold. You should be bowing." one of the unicorns called out to her, sounding offended, while the Gold seemed to just nodded in "I am superior to everyone else" kind of way to that. The bearded one looked like hes fighting an urge to hit something when hearing that. He also seemed a little familiar to sphinx.

"Only one I would even consider bowing are my superiors, who are most likely beyond you by a unimaginably wide margin. And I don't bow to prey animals. Well expect when I'm biting down on their throats." was her nonchalant answer, which really seemed to piss of some of the ponies and especially one called Gold. Who actually names their kids after precious metals?

"We don't have to take this kind of behaviour from a beast like you, who just lets anypony pass for pennies or for answering some dumb riddles. I think any of us could answer one right now, as we in a hurry to talk that town beyond this pass to join our growing nation." crowned pony said in an obviously pompous tone. This brought a wicked sort of fang filled smile to sphinx.

"Ah, so you take a riddle at group-rate then?" she asked, receiving confident nod from Gold and few other ponies in the group. "Very well then, if any one of you who answers correctly, you will get to go past me alive." she continued, still smiling wickedly.

"Greedy and pompous,
I grumble and moan!
You know who I am,
I'm the one on the throne...
Who am I?!"

This seemed give a pause to everypony present. Half of them looking confused about the riddle, while the other half looked slightly worried about the riddle, almost like they where actually wary about answering for whatever reason.
"Well? Any idea what that is about?" Gold inquired from his entourage, clearly still baffled about the riddle. He seemed to even have a vein almost popping. Maybe he was thinking harder than usually?

"Just take your time there, I'm not in a hurry. Just don't hurt yourself too badly while thinking your answer." Hena commented nonchalantly, still smiling her fang filled smile. This only seemed to annoy some of the ponies more, especially the regent.

"Starswirl! Do you have any idea of this blasted riddle? You are one the most talented unicorns we have." Gold demanded from the bearded unicorn, who's name mentally reminded sphinx about their earlier meeting.

"Well I do actually... But I'm not quite sure if you want to actually hear it sire..." was his careful answer. This only seemed to make the regent even more angry, causing him to yell at the whole group of ponies, while the sphinx simply watched the whole thing, now looking clearly entertained.

"Does anypony have any smarts here?! How hard is to figure who is greedy and pompous, grumbles and moans and is on the throne?! Who is that?!"

"The king" came an answer from one unicorn mare from the back of the group wearing a rather shabby looking brown cloak. A silence followed her words as the regent was clearly embarrassed of the implications of the answer, along with some of the entourage.

"That is correct. Well done my good lass." Hena said politely. "And who might you be?"

"Clover the Clever..."

"A fitting name I'd say." she continued, before being interrupted by the regent.

"Well then, now that we answered the riddle, let us all continue our trip." he said as he tried to walk past the sphinx, who suddenly put her wing in front of him.

"What?! How dare you?!"

"Toll, Riddle or Combat?"

"But Clover answered your darn riddle already!" Gold yelled.

"indeed. Which means that SHE can go past me." sphinx said as she effortlessly pushed him back, looking at the said mare, who did began to walk past everyone present, looking a bit embarrassed about the whole situation and being center of attention.

"But... But you said that if we answer correctly, we get to pass!" regent Gold kept ranting.

"I said that if any ONE of you answers correctly, they get to pass and you did not bother to correct or inquire tiny details about it. So what will it be now then for the rest of you?" sphinx corrected with some smugness in her voice. The regent now looked like he might pop several veins.

"Starswirl! Do something about this!" he roared, making said bearded unicorn to step closer to the sphinx.

"So now you do have a nicely growing beard. Now what will it be for you this time?" Hena inquired.

"A toll please. We are indeed in a bit of a hurry" was only thing he said as he pulled out a fresh apple, offering it to sphinx, who surprisingly accepted it.

"Thank you. I was thinking of adding some fruity snack to my diet after my previous small meaty snack." she said while taking a hearty bite out of the apple after inspecting it for a short moment.

Following after Starswirl, the rest of the ponies chose to just pay the toll in some way. Around half offered food, while rest offered some coin, and all of them got to go past her. All except the King-regent Gold.

"Sire, just pay the toll to her." Starswirl tried reasoning with the unicorn royalty. Or maybe ex royalty?

"No. I absolutely refuse pay anything to some beast. And since you don't clearly want to have the honor, I just take care of this thing by myself!" royal unicorn ranted, now sounding rather insane with his apparent boast. Was it really that hard for him to just offer a simple toll? Apparently so.

"Ah, combat it is then..." sphinx said, her smile once again turning wicked. She did feel a tiny boost of power coming over her, visibly not changing all that much, seeming to only gain a bit more defined muscles if you really looked her over. The unicorn just kept on with his madness filled boasting

"Yes you freak of nature! I shall take you down for goo-!" he started, only get interrupted by the charging sphinx, who tackled him down on his side, pressing down hard with her claws. The other ponies could only watch on rather horrified as the feline creatures jaws descended on regent Gold's throat hard, silencing any pleads for help. They where either just frozen in place out of fear or something unseen was just stopping them from interfering with the results of regents poor choice.
After tearing at now very dead regents throat open with gusto, sphinx spared a glance at the rest of the ponies present.

"What are still doing here? You can go on now to your business, I have a meal to finish here. Well, I guess you can keep the cape." sphinx said, before picking up the regents now bloodied fancy cloak and psionically floated at the ponies general direction, before returning back to her meal.
Despite having greater numbers compared to the sphinx, the ponies in the end silently decided to just go along with their diplomatic task of trying to negotiate the town Wissen into potentially joining their growing nation if possible, by the request of their newly appointed rulers. One Queen and two princesses.
And so they took their leave while carefully picking up former king-regents bloody cape to take back home to his daughter Platinum, since it was rather unlikely that they would get not much then maybe few bones, and maybe even not those if sphinx decided to go all out on the body. But for now they will just try to get their given diplomatic task done in one way or the other.

"My good diplomats of Equestria. The Council of Wissen have thought over your suggestions at length, and have reached a conclusion. We have decided to decline your offer of being integrated to your nation. Here is your copy of the full list of our reasons, but the main one is our dedication to stay neutral for the sake of preserving knowledge from outside influences. While our community is open for trade, we hope you understand."

"Very well. We will deliver your answer to Queen Faust. She most likely will be understanding, but some of the nobles might try to pressure the royal family to try again in the future."

Now having received the towns answer, the equestrian ponies left by the main road to deliver it. And it most likely would not be the last time their diplomats would be sent to Wissen. Most likely travelling by the main road after the news of former regents death were delivered.

Chapter 8 Another ske-DISCORD TIME!O.O-tch and a question or two.

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Chapter 8 Another ske-DISCORD TIME!O.O-tch and a question or two.

Two and a half months later...

Winter had proceeded at its usual pace without any kind of malicious spirit popping up. Food was somewhat scarce here and there, mostly for certain animals. Luckily for them and some poorer communities the spring was approaching and food would be easier to come by soon. One of the beings with light food finding issues, was Hena.
Since fruits were not available in nature and viable prey had moved a bit further than she was comfortable flying, due her instinct commanding her to keep watch of the pass. She had grown used to it during her stay, but it was still an overall uncomfortable feeling to through annually.

'Been little quiet for now. Ends of the pass don't exactly get much of the winter maintenance. Maybe them ponies are trying to make less of them to come by this route? Or are they perhaps dealing with the food issues or just mourning the death that regent fellow? Hopefully dealing with the food for now.' she thought as she halfheartedly blew some light snow away with few gusts of air created by the beats of her wings. Had to keep the lair clean and clear every now and then.
'Some not-passing visitor would be a nice change of pace. Kinda like Hermes, who merely came to visit for some academic sketching. Forgot to ask questions though, so I guess he might come back one of these days... Its just taking a while, probably due to all the academic stuff and studies and whatnot. And weather might also play its role too.'

Her thoughts lingered on the griffin youth for a few more moments, until they were broken by the sudden change in the build of the snow she had blown to the side. It had turned into much more solid form and taken different color too. A mixture of light brown and orange. After taking few careful sniffs and touching it lightly, Hena dared to taste a tiny crumb of it.
"Is this... Nougat?"

"Awww, got it right on the first, my good kitty." said an oddly echoing voice, causing sphinx to look around. Finally she noticed the eyes on one the statues, the winged serpents, on top of the pillars moving oddly, and they were now bright yellow with red pupil. Finally they just decided to pop out from the statue, proceeded to roll to the pile of nougat while making a cheery clinking sound, which then morphed into... Something...?

The resulting chimeratic creature(?) seemed to have a head of the pony, serpentine body covered in brown fur, mismatched limbs and wings, which included bird claw, lions paw, hoof and clawed foot. Even its horns were different to one another.

"And what might you be?... Sir?" Hena inquired, not being hundred percent sure how to address the creature, despite it sounding male. Mainly because of its mindfrick of an entrance.

"Oh? You don't know of me? But on the other hand, I don't think I've ever seen your sort either..." the creature said, while pulling out a comically huge magnifying glass from somewhere to have a better look at Hena. After humming thoughtfully for a few lengthy seconds, while moving the glass back and forth few times, the creature just tossed it to the side, where it hit a sharper rock and fizzled out of sight like a deflating balloon.
"Moi name is Discord, a draconequus, spirit of chaos and disharmony. So what are you then? Some odd kitten far from its litter box?"

"I am Hena, and I'm just a sphinx guarding this pass and two artifacts within my lair, while asking riddles from those who try to get past here. And you seem more like an overcompensating magical comedian rather than actual spirit of chaos. But that's just my initial view of you." Hena basically deadpanned at the creature now named Discord, who seemed to get mildly offended by her lack of reaction.

"Oh, spunky one aren't ya kitten? Just so you know, I could just turn you into an actual kitty with just a snap." he said while putting his claw hand into a snap-ready gesture.

"Is that a challenge for combat? I could think something worse and more creative to do to you if that happens..." she said back at Discord.

"Oh I just might ta-" he started to say, only to get interrupted by a small dark-grey scroll that puffed into existence between the two, which then floated up to Discord and started aggressively poking itself against his snout, almost like it was demanding him to pick it up, while causing a honking sound.

"Ugh, what's this about?" Discord grumbled while rolling his eyes around his face as he picked the scroll with his paw-hand. Hena just decided to watch what would happen as he started to read the scroll. Apparently its word were either mostly reversed or he was just being his own brand of chaotic.

"reaD Discord fo esrevinu rebmun 4982B-932d. eW dluow yrev hcum etaicerppa fi uoy dluow esaec ruoy stpmetta ot tpursid eht krow fo ruo remotsuc Hena. dluohS uoy eunitnoc siht ecnabrutsid, ew lliw llet IRS erehw ot dnif uoy...

Signed; CEO of DeezPlaced Co."

After Discord finished reading the small scroll, the color visibly drained off from his face. Hena merely looked at his reaction quite confused. Did this creature somehow know her 'employers' somehow? It did not make much sense to her, but it just might be the point. In any case, that acquaintanceship felt like being WAAAAY above her theoretical pay grade.

"I knew I shouldn't have helped that floating pile of pasta to embezzle that much noodlerinos or take funding advice from that annoying top hat wearing pyramid cyclops about deer teeth..."

"Huh? Did you say or whisper something, mister Discord?"

"Nope, nothing, nada. Juust remembered that I have some scheduled chaos to do elsewhere. Too-da-loo!" he said, clearly now in a hurry to leave. And so he left the pass... By opening some suddenly existing zipper in the air going through that and closing the said zipper behind him, leaving no proof it was even there.

"...Okay... That was odd. If he could something on that level of reality bending, I almost dread to think what I could have been able to do if boosted to his level.. Think I'll just sharpen my claws and try to forget that..."

Nearby...

'All right Hermes. You got those translations done early and got some free-time. Even got some credit for that sketch, but still need a bit more information to get anything done about it academically there.' golden brown griffin lad thought as he walked the path towards 'The Lair of the Sphinx', as they had named that certain section of the pass, which was also named 'pass of the sphinx' as a whole. Naming was not that creative, but some did not see much point to go with more creative names.
'Hopefully lady Hena is in a good mood today and maybe agreeable for another sketch. And this time I will try to ask something too.'

As hes target location was just around the corner of the path, Hermes's further thought's got interrupted by an ear-piercing grating sound, making his feathers and fur stand up. As the sound continued a bit more, he ended up letting out a loud painful squawk, which made the nasty sound suddenly stop.

"Who's there?" came Hena's demanding voice.

Seeing not point in potentially hiding, Hermes thought it best to just come out.

"It's just me again." he called out while walking in sight of the sphinx, who was still leaning against the stony wall covered in long scratch marks. Such position also gave griffin somewhat of a good view of her body. Which ended up being a distraction he had to actively try to ignore. He came here to sketch and ask questions, not to ogle the beautiful built of this creature.

"Ah, Hermes. Here to visit again I see. Did you perhaps bring something as a 'toll' for whatever it is you have in mind academically?" sphinx inquired as she hopped off the wall back to basic standing position.
"Don't mind the wall. It's just my spot for sharpening my claws."

"Quite regularly too it seems. And yes, I have some meat pies with me. Could be nice variety aside from the raw meat I think you potentially usually eat."

"Hmmm... Very well, guess that earns you another sketching session. That is what's you are here for, yes?"

"Indeed, and I was hoping to maybe ask some questions too. Last time I accidentally forgot."

With words and the meat pies now exchanged, Hena was once again enjoying some meaty goodness this time sitting down, while Hermes began sketching her, even managing to focus properly. No stray lines this time.
After a good and lengthy while of sketching few different pictures, he tried asking some things.

"So... Does your species have any specific name? Other than just sphinx?" he started.

"Indeed we do. The sphinx is just the name of the species as a whole. Kinda like ponies, despite there being three or four sub-species of them. I am what is called a Gynosphinx, sole female subrace, possessing some magical aptitude and a natural knack for riddles. Got that up?" Hena explained, recalling some of the past knowledge from back when she used to be... Human? Some of her past-life memories were getting a little hazy. But the basic knowledge of her current species seemed to more clear.

"Aand... Its in my notes. So you're saying that there are other kinds of sphinxs?"

"Yes, though I'm not sure if there are any of those in this world. And I am not really counting the big purple one you mentioned, since it is more of a 'created' one. The other sphinxs are all male. There are magical yet prudish Androsphinxs, more or less a male version of Gyno. Basically just imagine me, but with more masculine facial features and different bits in the back."

"I don't think I want to imagine that... At least not on you... And what do you mean by prudish?"

"Well the Andros are usually more interested on knowledge and wisdom, rather than actively finding a mate and taking care of the resulting cub. And then there is the fact that Gynos are on average smarter then them. I guess it annoys them."

"Okay... And are the other types of sphinxs aside from Gyno and Andro?" Hermes inquired after taking down some more notes.

"Yes... There are the male ram-headed, somewhat dull Criosphinx and the wicked, hawk-headed Hieracosphinx." Hena answered, sounding a bit sour.

"And just how bad they are on average?"

"Well let's just say that the Crio is lesser of the two more animalistic evils so to speak. The main goal of both of them is essentially to find a Gyno to mate with. At least the Criosphinx usually bother to try and actually court first, unlike Hieraco who just up and try to forcefully take her. Other things special of them are that all Crio have a perfect memory of hiding places of their gathered treasures, while Hieraco are superior fliers among the sphinxs. And only copulation with Andros might result daughters, while others can only give sons of their own sort."

"So if female sphinx ever wants to have children, their choices are a serious prude, animalistic courtier or a rapey birdface?" Hermes inquired, looking rather aghast about the given information.

"More or less under normal circumstances. Not sure how it would go down in this realm, since as far as I know... I am the only 'pure' sphinx here."

This revelation caused Hermes to stop his sketching for a moment, followed by a sympathetic look aimed towards sphinx.

"Oh... That must be hard for you. And more than lonely I bet..." was all he could say for the moment. Even Hena looked a little crestfallen, due to really thinking over her situation a bit more. Even the still active emotion-suppression did not stop some depressing, lonely thoughts from entering her mind.

"Yes... It is... Hence why I try not to think about it all that much." she said, trying to keep her tone even. If Hermes noticed this, he did not show it. After a stretched up moment of silence, he slowly started to pack up his sketching gear.

"I think this is enough sketching for today... Ummm... May I ask you a riddle? No magical or deadly hook, I promise." he managed to inquire, which did pique her interest. Partially by curiosity since no one had ever tried to ask her a riddle, and other part was the instinctual interest for riddles natural for sphinxs.

"Unusual for my usual routine, but yes, you may." Hena said, already waiting to hear it.

"What costs nothing, but is worth everything.
Weighs nothing, but can last a lifetime.
That one person can't own, but two or more can share?"

Due to her encyclopedic knowledge on riddles, Henas mind managed figure the answer out in few short moments. But instead of her saying it right away, something stopped her and made her think over what had gotten this griffin to ask such a riddle? Was it perhaps the sympathy for her overall situation? Maybe a hidden way for him to get more knowledge of her at later date with less danger for himself? Or for someone else?
Or was it perhaps a true, genuine hope to alleviate her loneliness?... That was something she could not figure out on the spot, no matter how hard her strong mind tried... So she decided to take the potential risk, actually hoping for the best for things yet to come.

"A Friendship... Is the answer." she said, sounding oddly hopeful for some reason.

"Correct. And aaah... I wish we could build such a thing between us... Provided nothing out of our control happens..." Hermes said, also sounding hopeful. He also knocked on the wooden part of his sketching gear three times. For luck most likely.

Hena did not give her answer right away. Instead she walked towards Hermes, until she stopped maybe three or so feet away from him, making him look a little bit up at her. Then she offered her paw to him. Peacefully due to her sharp, tearing claws not being nowhere in their aggressive 'out'-form.
"I would like that very much, Hermes." she said with a genuine smile, which grew a little wider as Hermes took a hold of her paw and heartily shook it with a smile.

"I'm so glad to hear that. Unfortunately though I have to go for now... But I will try to come and visit you more often, as your friend and not as academic."

"That would be very nice change of pace for me as well. Guess I'll see you later then?"

"Something like that. I will just have to work harder to have time for visits, hopefully way more often than between few months."

"Very well. But promise that you don't overwork yourself."

"It's a deal."

With their farewells said for now, Hermes took his leave, now carrying with him few better made sketches and some information about the sphinxs, along with, maybe more importantly from a certain point of view, a new friendship.
Hena could not help smile as she looked the bird-lion hybrid creature leave, feeling a little bit more comfortable with their situation. It would be much easier for him to visit her, rather than other way around, since it was not certain how the folk at Wissen would react to her arrival. Maybe by torches and pitchforks? Or maybe by a massive avalanche of questions? Neither option did not feel that good to her.

'I think this might be a start for something nice...' Hena thought herself, but this line of thought was interrupted by a sudden and odd 'tick-tock'-like sound she barely managed to hear from somewhere nonspecific, causing her to look around confused. Finally due to sound not not repeating, she brushed it off as nothing too special, and carried on with remaining time of the day before retiring back to her lair, with no other traffic happening on the pass for that day.

Chapter 9 They have combos of those now?

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Chapter 9 They have combos of those now?

"This... This is a truly amazing place... I... I can barely even wrap my head around to even trying to start comprehending the amount of knowledge stored here." Hermes said, clearly over his head as he looked on the countless books and other written, carved or otherwise recorded works of the Sphinxs Library. He had thought that he was crossing a line when he finally, after a full month of being friends with Hena, dared to ask to perhaps access the rumored library she was also guarding. He had chosen to steer clear of the two artifacts, after hearing Henas explanation of what they can do. He just wasn't a peeper and liked his body wholly intact.

"And all it required was a simple request to see and enter it. I think you are the first outsider who has got to visit here." Hena commented as she followed after the amazed griffin lad.
"I still find it hard to believe that your fellows and superiors in Wissen are apparently okay with you coming to visit me."

"Well they do expect me to bring back some little crumbs of knowledge if possible. They are at the moment trying to make educated conclusions about the other sphinx types you once mentioned and are doing some research about the purple one and its potential connection to you. Some rumor at the moment points at some level of lost blood magic, and you did mention something about your blood once."

"Why yes I did, although I haven't really studied said art. And sometimes the lost knowledge outside of this library can get found again, and used for varied purposes. Even knowledge about the powerful ways of healing can be used for wicked ends."

"What? How would that even happen? Or maybe I just don't see such a way."

"Well... All it would take is a creative mind, a restrained target, lets say for a torture as an example, plenty of sharp things for causing pain and that healing knowledge, and you have excruciating and prolonged torture session, like say breaking someones fingers repeatedly. Imagine someone being hurt by the other so much that they begin to beg for the sweet release of death for hours and hours, and all they get is being hurt to the very brink of it, hoping it to finally end... Only to be cured to the perfectly healthy state of their body and then the torture is repeated again and again... Need I go on?" Hena explained, while gently putting her claw his cheek, dragged it down on to his throat and up to his other cheek. No blood was drawn, but her point certainly got through, if griffins slightly paled face was any indication.

"No, no need for that. So all I have to do is ask the golden statue for a type of book or other work and it is delivered here?" Hermes said, while changing the subject.

"Yes, just do that if you don't want to go exploring this place on your own. And if you get lost, there are portal archways that will get you out form its depths. So no need to worry about me or someone else finding your elderly body among the shelves. Plus there are these food dispenser things to keep visitors fed if they decide stay a longer while."

"I think I just take some notes for later use for now from few books that might come to mind. Maybe something in the history sections... May I work alone, or will you be keeping me company?"

"As much as I would like to, I have a feeling that I need to be on guard today in the pass. Enjoy your little reading session. And I trust you won't damage the books or other works stored here."

With that Hena left somewhat giddy Hermes to his task, while exiting the library through the gateway back to her lair, passing the artifacts and her toll-pile, to do her job for the day. With the visits from the griffin, she was starting to gradually feel more happy with her current situation in life.
Now taking her position on her usual altar-stone-spot, she began to wait any potential travelers to test, or gather a toll. Or by any potential chance off them.

It only took almost an half an hour for something to happen, which turned out to be a familiar mix-and-match creature coming down the path, hurriedly pedaling some weird contraption that kinda looked like a giant horn on two wheels with gears here and there on it, along with some small pipes puffin smoke as it moved. It even had a little flag in the back.

"Well that certainly looks like a good way to get around town." Hena commented as the draconequus stopped before her spot in the middle of the pillars, as his drive seemed to suddenly run out of juice, or whatever it used for locomotion.

"Sure is, if only it had a good warranty." Discord said as he got off from the contraption and a folded it like a paper cutout and put it behind him... Somewhere...
"So looks like we meet once again, miss Hena. Any chance I could get by for free? Pretty please?"

Before Hena could answer, a small scroll popped up next to Discord, which he picked up and red aloud, once again most of it reversed except for the names.

"oN Discord. sihT emit uoy yalp yb eht selur, ro ew tel ruoy efiw-xe wonk erehw uoy era...

Signed; CEO of DeezPlaced Co."

"That darn wailing harpy. She already got the house and the kids. What more could she even want?"

"I'm guessing you have to take the riddle, pay me the toll or try to combat me?" Hena commented as she thought what Discord muttered this time.

"Yeeesh... Guess I'll take the riddle then. So go ahead and ask. Shouldn't be too tricky for me." Discord said while tossing the small scroll away, that just disappeared as Hena began her riddle, middle of which he realized the self induced jinx.

"I come for all who grow, crawl, and walk.
I am the perfect hunter.
In the end, I am the victor.
What is my name?"

Discord did not instantly answer, mostly due to his powers seemingly getting a sudden nerf that luckily felt temporary in nature, thus blocking him from looking up the answer instantly in some comedic way. Must have been something enforced by some silent bylaws and side-notes of The Rules set up by sphinx blackmail-happy superiors.

"Ookayh, lemme think a bit..." Discord said thoughtfully, while tapping his eyeball, which made a squeaky sound like that of a dog-toy. During the following minutes, the draconequus floated and walked back and forth, making varied humming, bubbling, raspberry, bird and other kinds of sounds while clearly thinking. Hena managed to keep up her 'professional-poker-face' during the whole thing, while keeping a steady and calm looking watch over Discord.
"Maybe future?... No, no it just feels almost right, but not quite... Or maybe..."

"So are you getting there yet? I might be ageless but I'd like not be kept waiting too long." Hena inquired.

"Ugh, fine. I just say the answer is future. Right? I'm kinda in a hurrrry..." Discord said with some impatience, when a terrifying feeling of dread interrupted him. Even the sphinx looked taken aback with the sudden oddness in the power-boost flowing into her, barely managing to say one word in a twisted sounding tone.
"WrOnG..."

https://youtu.be/KFRhYuB93qk

The spirit of chaos and disharmony could only watch as the sphinx began to morph into... Something incomprehensible, even to him, as the time seemed to slow down around them, seemingly stretching out the moment on purpose.
Finally the new form of the sphinx seemed to stabilize itself enough to look down, up, front, behind, around, everywhere and nowhere at the draconequus with its eyes. Or what was its equivalent to such an earthly organ that actually made sense.
"FiNaL cHaNcE, I gUeSs, tO tRy sOmE oThEr pIcK..."

"I switch to toll, I SWITCH TO TOLL!" Discord called out urgently, even waving a cute and tiny white flag. With the last second swap, Hena returned back to her normal form, looking rather relieved of having normal amount of organs and limbs again.
"How about we DO NOT do that again?... EVER..."

"Agreed... I maaybe could have duked it out, buuuut... I don't think anyone will wan't me to 'let loose'... Even I would go beyond mad even more than usual from that."

"Right... So what will you be paying the toll with? Not with catnip I hope?"

"No no, no worries of that. Way too easy and too obvious for my taste... Hold on a bit if you please..." Discord said while pulling out a tiny book, titled 'THE Rules' and something else written with odd symbols. After speed-reading few pages, he seemed to come up with an idea.
"How about I grant, or 'unlock' if you like, the knowledge to your Time magics capability to its most basic level in return for the safe passage? Safest I can do without getting into trouble with the cops... Absolutely no hook, plan, catch, flirba, trick or any other small print equivalent. The latter would require an actual written contract too."

"You swear?"

"By my scout's honor, by the river Styx and by the vacation home of my dear mommy."

"Very well then... So do we do this? You seem to have some odd ways of doing things."

"Oh I think I do have one good method give you the basics." Discord said as he started to dig around his ear, finally pulling out a small book named 'Time-magic for rookies' and handed it to Hena. Oddly it was made with two backs, like it was not meant to be physically opened without damaging its content.
"Here you go. Just eat it whole. Don't ask, just do it. The book will do the rest."

With a raised brow, Hena looked at the double-backed book for a moment before tentatively bringing it to her lips. That was when the book began to glow, now feeling much more flexible. Deciding to follow Discords advice, sphinx started to push the glowy book deeper in her mouth and finally forcing it down her throat with an audible gulp. With that came a rush of knowledge in her mind, telling her what was okay and what was not in the use of Time-magic.

'I see now. So now I can semi-freely move the time of things or create a bubble of frozen time for six minutes worth of time at maximum, while personally being able to move freely. With the exception if I have some boost of power from somewhere or while working in my lair, where I can make my targets age up or regress by twenty years at best... But with a truly potent boost, there most likely are so many possibilities I could do to a suitable single target. Only have to remember to use it sparingly and not too far in a large scale, and that it won't and can't kill or bring anyone back from the dead...' Hena internally monologued about the basic information she had just received.

"There you go my good lady. Oh and remember; never, ever, ever, EVER... Mess with the Time lines. That WILL get you in trouble with the cops. Try starting and sticking to small things or singular mortals most of the time. The rest of the power and potency stuff you have to acquire with the good old practice, and it still most likely will tire you out BAD. Oh and before I leave, what was the answer to the riddle, if I may inquire?" said Discord, who was now preparing his odd horn-on-wheels-thing for travel.

"Certainly. It was Death. Quite simple if one thinks it over from several angles I'd say."

"Darn, my second guess would have been legend... That darn clever bird always giving a vague list of answers..." Discord mumbled as he began pedaling away, disappearing behind a random rock.

"Definitely a good way to get around town." Hena commented, while noticing a small rock falling down near her. After thinking about for a short moment she decided to test her newly unlocked knowledge of wielding Time.
Focusing on the rock, she began to see an after-image of its falling route, that looked like an another rock was stretching out of the original. There also seemed to be a stopped ethereal clock face or a dial of sorts floating next to it, clearly waiting for something.

Deciding to take Discords advice and start small, she pointed at the dial, making its hand glow, and moved it maybe forty seconds worth of time backwards and then broke her focus. And almost right on that second, the stone began to move backwards, climbing up the rock face it fell down from, before stopping and falling down again, right down to the exact spot it originally fell.
Hena decided to leave it at that, and not examine it too much. She was not that concerned if it was THE exact angle it landed on or not. And since there was no signs reality tearing itself apart or collapsing on itself or any sign of 'the cops' the chaos spirit warned her about, this was most likely safe sort of moving the time of some things.

"Hmmm... Might need some more livelier test subjects for some other time." she thought out loud, feeling a sudden spike of tiredness come over her, that made her yawn quite widely. This lead to decision to take a short nap to maybe recover a little.

Later after a short nap...

'Hmh? Beating of wings? Two, no... Three pairs of wings... Well time for another group of visitors then.' Hena thought as she woke up, stretching very much like a cat, being fully awake by the time when the new visitors arrived by landing from a low flight to her lair area. Said three visitors looked like a mix of all pony types she had seen mushed together and polished up a little bit.
First one was a rather tall pony was pure white in its fur color, with a simply cut red mane, wearing a simple laurel on its blue-eyed, horned head. The second shorter, magenta eyed one was also white, or maybe a very, VERY light pink, with a vibrant pink mane and wearing small golden crown and peytral. And finally the third little shorter one who was deep blue with lighter blue mane with equally light blue eyes, wearing blackened crown and peytral.

"Well aren't you an interesting set of equines." Hena commented, drawing the attention of the trio. Were they perhaps family or something?

"And thou must be the beast that terrorizes this pass." the whitish-maybe-perhaps-pink pony said back to her, with her wings bristling a bit. The comment seemed to make the tall one sigh quietly, like this was not the first time when such a comment had been made.

"Sister! Didn't thou promise mother not to say such comments to other creatures?" the blue one said.

"Yes, but this one has killed many travelers already. Clearly it is dangerous and must be contained."

"Oh please pink-head, there most likely are things faaaar more dangerous in and on this plane than me. And if you really think like that, you might need to take a look in the mirror first and actually think things over first." Hena butted in the conversation while looking over her claws a little bit.
"Pardon me for a moment, if you please." she continued, standing up from her spot and walking over to her sharpening-wall, with the three ponies actually waiting. Or maybe it was due to the tallest one giving the other two a look that pretty much said "WAIT" and practically radiated Authority.
With her moment of peace secured, Hena proceeded to sharpen her claws with a nice, long drag on the wall, leaving yet another set of claw marks on it, while causing that oh so wonderful grating sound she had gotten used to. The two siblings of the trio clearly had not, if the ample bristling of their fur was any indication, along with some shaking and visible teeth clenching. The tall one merely folded her ears a little bit, definitely being the one with thicker skin compared to the other two. With her sharpening work done, sphinx returned sitting on her spot.
"Now then. Who might you be coming this way? Certainly you have heard of me somewhere? Or at least most of the ponies have herd a rumor of some level of this pass being a dangerous one. Oh and before calling me just a creature, I am a sphinx. Hena is my name." she introduced herself, clearly talking only to the tall pony, who gave her a respectful nod before talking.

"I am Queen Faust of Equestria. These two are my daughters, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna. We are following the trail of an chaos spirit known as Discord and it led us this way. Have you perhaps seen him? He looks like a mix of several creatures, and may have been travelling on some odd contraption." Faust asked in a surprisingly polite tone for a ruler of a country.

"Perhaps. Many creatures go past here every now and then. Some get to pass, some do not. So what will it for you? Are ya going trough here or maybe turn back and go by the main-road? Because the former requires you to pay me a toll, answer my riddle or to defeat me in combat."

"Then all we have to do is to defeat you beast!" the one called Celestia called out while stepping forward, followed by her magically summoning an golden armor and a fancy looking halberd, both looked more fitting for a parade than an actual battlefield.

"Oh? So you're thinking of choosing combat right away?" Hena inquired as she started to stalk closer to Celestia, like a predator approaching its potential prey. Finally standing almost right before the little princess and she bowed her head to have a closer look at Celestias now clearly a little intimidated gaze, now that the beast was basically right at her face.
"Are you certain? If you have a killer in you, I don't see it in your eyes. All I'm seeing there, is just a little princess playing a warrior. So I ask you again, little princess... Are you certain you wish to challenge ME?!" sphinx said, even shouting suddenly at the end of her question, while spreading her wings wide open, which in turn caused the 'little princess' to stumble backwards and fall on her bottom.

"Celestia, don't do any more rash decisions while we are still here. You and Luna should just go and pay the toll for your safe passage." Faust said, perhaps feeling a little disappointed for her daughters behaviour.

"But mother, this thing-"

"IS NOT OUR TARGET!! Now pay her a toll and wait. Do you understand?" she interrupted Celestia with a very firm order and a glare so strong that even Hena felt it. And it was all that was needed to cow the disobedient foal of a princess. Younger of the sibling also seemed also intimidated of their mothers apparent disapproval, even though it wasn't targeted at her.

"... Yes mother..." was all the little princess could say, before she removed her armors helmet and grumpily offered it to the sphinx, who of course accepted it.

"Hmmm... Looks expensive and impractically fancy. Almost like its former owner." Hena commented out loud, mostly to herself, not really caring at the moment if these ponies took offence. Aside from pink maned princess stomping past her.
After the first passage of three was done, the one called Luna sheepishly approached and offered a curved dagger, which was also accepted.
"Also expensive, yet finely crafted. Could actually be useful at something." Hena commented to herself out loud once again, as the blue pony walked past her safely.

"And what will you choose, your majesty?" she inquired Queen Faust, who seemed to weigh her options a bit, before talking.

"Is there a special reason for your stay in this pass?"

"Why yes there is. It is a resting place of two artifacts of great power, which I am tasked to guard over. One will grant you sight to see anyone anywhere, even if they're hiding. And the other will give a perfect answer for a price, which can be and is anything and nothing, depending how one thinks of it afterwards."

"So the price could be ones soul or a lock of mane?"

"Yes, and anything in between. And to get a permission to use ONE of them, you need to answer my riddle or defeat me. So what will it be? Toll? Riddle or Combat?"

Queen thought it for a moment, which seemed to make her daughters nervous. Finally she made her choice.

"I would like to try my luck with your riddle."

"Certainly. But as you might guess, IF you fail I am required to kill you... Nothing personal, it's just required by my duty."

"Well, let us see what way the Fates have chosen for us."

Hena was actually pleased to meet such a polite member of Royalty as she asked the riddle.

"There are two sisters.
One gives birth to the other
and she, in turn, gives birth to the first.
Who are these two sisters?"

As the queen seemed to take her time thinking over the riddle, the two princesses looked worried. Both of them most likely stumped by the riddle. The sphinx waited patiently, even taking a short moment to groom her mane a little bit, as the queen kept on trying to figure out an answer. Neither of them seemed to pay attention at the moment to the two princesses whispering in the background.

"Sister? What should we do? If mother answers wrong, the kingdom will certainly collap-"

"It won't Luna. If that beast even thinks of cutting one hair on mothers mane, I will make her regret it..." older sister said, either trying to soothe younger ones worries or perhaps making a promise to herself?

"I think I got, Lady Hena." Faust finally said in a polite tone. "The answer is Sun and Moon, and alternatively Day and Night. Am I correct?"

"Indeed you are correct. You may pass, and use one of the artifacts in my care. If you wish that is." Hena said with a pleasant smile.

"Actually I think I might have a looksie at those artifacts. Who knows, maybe they give me a hint where that chaotic trickster is now. Luna? Please make sure your sister stays here and waits."

With the choice made, Hena led the alicorn queen to her lair proper, who looked around with some curiosity, before focusing on the two artifacts, while sphinx deposited the received tolls to the pile with the rest.

"The Tablet will give you an absolutely perfect answer to any goal-based question. And the Mirror will show you the requested target with absolute clarity, no matter how hidden they are, but only when asked in rhyme. So? Which will you be using, your majesty?" Hena asked Faust, who was visibly thinking over the given choice. Finally she stepped towards the Mirror, which was already showing its neutral mist filled image, waiting for the rhyme.

"Hello Mirror, how are thee? Can thy show me where Discord might be?"

After the rhyme was said, Queen Faust watched as the mists in the Mirror swirled and finally parted to show shoreline of a fjord with a familiar looking city at the end of it, before it zoomed closer to something in the waters. That turned out to be an odd boat with some kind of paddle-wheels on it and small smoke clouds puffing from pipes at the top of it. And on the rudder of it was a familiar draconequus wearing some kind of sailor hat, seemingly whistling an unheard tune.

"There you are Discord. Thank you for letting me use such an artifact." the pony queen said with a small thankful bow, which sphinx gladly returned. It's not everyday you get a visit from an actually polite member of royalty.
The shared moment of seemingly mutual respect ended abruptly when someone bumped against the rear of the sphinx with a startled squawk, making both of them turn to watch at the direction of the sound. Source turned out to be, now slightly panicking, griffin Hermes leaving the portal arch of the Library, carrying a bag full of notes.

"I am so sorry Lady Hena. I was just rather excited from all the bits of knowledge I managed to scribble up-... Oh, I did not know you had a guest of royal status here too..." he said in a hurry, somewhat calming his hurried tone when seeing the royal alicorn and gave a proper bow at her direction.

"Please young lad, no need for that, this is not my court. You must be one the scholars of Wissen, yes? Your bag at least has their emblem. "Faust commented pleasantly, while looking at the emblem on Hermes's bag. A sword and a long rolled up parchment crossed over a round shield.

"Y-yes, I am. I was just about to thank lady Hena for allowing me to enter her library to take some notes for my fellow scholars. So much knowledge in there I can't even fathom..."

"Well you might have to hurry. The Spirit of Chaos Discord seemed to just leave you town of scholars."

"What! By gods and spirit, if anything has gotten damaged!... Lady Hena if such thing has happened I might need to come by more often. Hopefully it won't be a problem?" Hermes visibly panicked with suddenly puffed up feathers, looking at Hena pleadingly.

"Of course it won't be. Now hurry up and fly home you fluffball." Hena said nodding at the direction of the doors. Without hesitating, Hermes spread his wings and took flight right out the doorway, not even bothering to greet the two princesses when flying by them. Not out of disrespect, but out of the urge to help preserve valuable knowledge the town had gathered for safeguarding.

"He seems like a nice griffin."

"Yes, he is." Hena answered with little smile to Faust's comment.

"Are you two an item perhaps?" alicorn asked with a mischievous smile, which caused the sphinx to flinch and stutter, while also neding to correct her glasses.

"Whu, what?? What makes you think that?"

"Weeell, his gaze did linger at your rear for a moment and you spoke to him with a pet name. But now I too have to hurry. Hopefully we can meet again, farewell!" she continued while leaving, still smiling. By the time Hena could have answered, all three alicorns had left, most likely to continue their chase after the Chaos spirit.

"Why would she say something like that? Me and that parchment smelling fluffball are just friends...Aaand were did that come from?" Hena thought out loud, while getting mildly confused at the choice of her own words about her fluffba-... Hermes! And to add to her small confusion, she once again herd the odd 'tick-tock'-sound.
'There is that sound again... What on earth does that mean? Could it perhaps be some vague hint of things to come? Or just a random sound in my head that I'm overthinking now?' she thought, before checking the outside of her lair and then heading into the library to do some light reading. Maybe a little bit from a two thousand page block of knowledge this time, followed by some light time-training?

Wissen, edge of the town...

Hermes felt his wings and lungs burning from the nonstop flying, stopping to land near one of the town guards, another griffin, doing a routine patrol. He definitely needed some basic physical exercise.

"Oh Hermes, you came back alive. And even got some notes by the look of things."

"Hi Mark. And yesh, I did gather some interesting knowledge, bhut I think I need to make some more trips in the fhuture. Is everything all right here? I heard that Discord came this way." Hermes gasped back, still catching his breath.

"Oh he certainly did, but we got off easy. Most he did was turn the water in the west-squares fountain into whipped cream. Then he took a look around, noticed one of our building project, apparently said 'Nope, not touching that bureaucratic hamster wheel' and just left in a odd looking boat."

"Huh? Which one was it? We do have couple in progress in town."

"Oh it was the one that Archivist Grogar planned and commissioned to be built."

"Odd. One would think someone like Discord would cause much more mayhem. But on the other hand he seems to have the Queen of Equestria and the two princesses on his tail."

"Well then, lets take those news to the city Council. And they will definitely want to see the notes you collected from your beastie girlfriends library."

"Whuh?! Lady Hena and I are just friends, that's all. Why does everyone in the campus keeps saying that?"

"Well you keep mumbling about 'a trim sphinx bum' whenever you nod off when translating scrolls, and some creatures like to gossip."

"Aaaaaargh..."

Chapter 10 Time's up with a side of confession.

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Chapter 10 Time's up with a side of confession.

"DIE FOUL BEAS-*urgh*!"

That was all that yet another pony mercenary, or maybe a hunter, managed to say while rushing towards the guardian of the pass, before having their insides impaled, by now surprisingly long talons, followed by having them pulled outside. He barely managed to look up from them to the being looking down at him, before succumbing to the injury. Potentially first by blacking out from the shock and then claimed by death.

"Fourth professional killer coming after me. And it is not even past a full week. A new record." Hena commented to herself as her power-up transformation ended, and proceeded to look over the poor sod that had come to make an attempt on her life. Typical travel-armour made out of mix of metal and sturdy cloth, some fancy looking knives, overly complex looking axe more fitting for a show-case rather than actual battle, even with potential enchantments on it, if the mild glow on it was any indication. And finally in the hunters bag found among some rations, a wanted poster adorned with a rough illustration of her. Most likely done based on semi-vague description of her.

"And another poster too. No payer name given, but that bounty sure seems to be big enough to make ponies walk to their deaths." she muttered while watching over the posters details. Nothing out of the ordinary things. Just her overall location, looks and now a five digit bounty. It used to be in four digit when the first ones started coming a month ago.
Due it having been around a week or so after meeting the royal alicorns, Hena had a potential idea of who might have put such a high prize on her head, mostly suspecting the pink maned one, who seemed to have issues with any presumed 'monsters' while also having access to resources in order to offer a bounty of this level.

"I can only guess the pink maned brat must be held back by the Queen since these are not soldiers. I wonder how long will it take for her to try and bankrupt the nation to just have me dead or otherwise gone?" Hena mused while levitating the hunters weapons with her still below average psionics to her treasure pile, which had visibly grown with several more sets of varied weapons and pieces of armor. Some much more expensive than others.
"If this keeps up, that rooms is going to get a bit full. And this one was rude to attack just after I had eaten. Gonna have to toss it to the side-chasm too." she continued while dragging psionically the fresh corpse to the start of the extra-narrow side-path, still behind some bushes, leaving a red trail to be cleaned later.
As she tossed the mangled corpse to the chasm, a strong gust of wind from its depths seemed to catch it, before letting it fall to the unseen bottom. She sometimes thought if the chasm below the side-path was alive in some way, just waiting someone to try and get past her that way. She had not personally seen anyone use it, so there was no idea how many bodies lie at the bottom.

With the corpse now disposed, the sphinx sauntered to the nearby stone wall with two smaller scratch marks on it and put her paw on it. With a focused expression, followed by a light glow from the wall, the marks began to mend themselves like someone had turned stone wall into modeling clay and started to smoothen it out, practically erasing the wall of any sign of there ever been any damage done to it. This also seemed to happen to the red trail left behind earlier body dragging, with stone moving to cover or swallow the mess.
"Aand that's the 'no-hunters-countdown' reset done, and before evening too. Maybe the next one would pick the riddle. Though that feels unlikely with this trend of many more hunters coming here lately... The things some will do for some coin." Hena muttered, while returning to her altar-stone spot to wait something to happen, starting to pass time with some grooming to get the blood off her fur, very much behaving like a huge cat.

As she carried on with getting herself clean, Hena's thought's began to wander towards Hermes, and thinking when that parchment smelling fluffball would come visit next time? Certainly there would be a need for more notes and copies of manuscripts of old in Wissen? Maybe she should pay them a short visit and maybe actually go and see what the Guardians of Knowledge had built there.
But that would leave the artifacts vulnerable, which means that such a visit would go against her given duty. These thoughts then began cause different pulls in her mind. One for staying and keeping up with her duty of guarding the artifacts and the location, and the other for going to see Hermes at his place of work. And finally a third pull for wishing for the said griffin coming to just visit her outside of working in the library.

The final one brought with it a pleasant feeling of warmth, along with some confusion. Sure Hena thought of that fluffball as a good person. Also smart, hardworking and not that bad looking either, latter thought was most likely aided a little bit by her changed physiology. She also found his eyes and well kept wings rather alluring.
After thinking a couple of literal minutes about Hermes, she finally came to a conclusion, standing up while spreading her wings in a determined manner, even taking her glasses off for a moment, with a growing warmth in her hearth.

"It is decided then. Next time he comes to visit, I shall ask if we could possibly take our friendship a little further. I just hope he is not afraid of the thought of potential intima-"

*tick-tock...*

Hena's rather pleasant thoughts were interrupted the mysterious ticking noise, that had been tickling her mental ear for a while, not really understanding what it meant. Only this time, instead of being only a teeny tiny attempt of an annoyance, it was followed by an absolutely searing Granddaddy of all headaches, bringing with it a mental image of her first riddle-kill. A torn up zebra if she remembered correctly in her state of agonizing pain. She just barely managed to power through it while grinding her teeth, before another image flashed by with another wave of pain, and a flooding of far too many emotions.
And as more mental images of her past victims flashed by at increasing speed, maybe few starting to repeat themselves, the pain began to spread all over her body. One second she felt like white-hot needles stinging her on one spot, and several spots on the next, followed by the feeling of absolutely freezing water being poured on her, among plenty of other kinds of painful stimulants to follow.
All the while more waves of pain were coursing through her mind and body, all she could do was just scream in agony, while falling off the altar stone, almost twisting her wings, and to instinctually try and claw the pain out of her head. By the time tears began to flow, the once quiet ticking noise had now turned from tiny annoyance into a feeling of someone trying to hammer her skull open. With no sign of stopping...

"Please... I'm begging... Make it stop..."

*TICK-TOCK...*

"Well... I was not expecting this kind of assignment for today. Maybe aiding in some decoding or taking copies of copies into archives, but a request and delivery for miss Hena... Not that I would mind..."

Hermes had plenty on his minds, as he kept walking up the path to meet Hena on a semi-official and also other perhaps a bit more personal matter, with some specific items in his bag, along with some basic rations. It had taken him around a week to go over about his thoughts about that beautiful creature, which led him to finally try to take a drastic step, at least in his mind, in their friendship. And then he was given a little task by his higher-ups, luckily also with the sphinx, so maybe he could get both errands done on one trip. Perhaps done in a single evening too. He just hoped thing were going well for her recently.

Those hopeful thoughts got rudely crushed as his ears caught something in the wind. An agony filled screaming which was coming ahead, which clearly belonged to the guardian of the pass. And it made hair in the back Hermes's neck stand up in panic and fear. Not for himself, but rather for Hena. Even though she was clearly a powerful entity, she still could get hurt, even by her own account.
Thus now driven by serious urgency, Hermes took flight and pushed forward in a hurry to reach the center of the pass to hopefully to try and stop whatever was happening there. Even at the cost of his own life if needed...

Finally arriving to the lair of the sphinx, wings aching, Hermes was left lightly stunned upon seeing the situation Hena was in. The sphinx was writhing and squirming in the middle of the path, seemingly trying, emphasis on trying, to claw her own head open, while whimpering something to no-one in particular. Almost like begging and pleading for something.

"Please, please... Just end IIIIT!..." Hena hoarsely begged through her tears, before her plead got twisted into a loud scream, making her throat even more sore.
After seeing his friend in such state, all Hermes had in his mind was to somehow to help her... Somehow... But first he simply started to carefully to try and get closer to her, even discarding his bag aside.

"Miss Hena! What's going on here?" Hermes managed to call out, drawing the badly bloodshots gaze of the sphinx to him.

"He-... Hermes? WhaAAAAAAAAGH!!!!" Hena whimpered out, before once again starting scream mid-sentence, while writhing in some unseen pain onto her side. Still confused, Hermes kept approaching her slowly, not wanting to risk causing some kind of curse to blow up on both of them by accident.
"N-no! Stay b-back! I... I d-don't... Wan't to... Hurt..."

Despite clearly begging him to stay back, or potentially to even run away, Hermes managed steel himself and kept approaching the sphinx. After ignoring maybe five or more pleads of him leaving, the griffin was now almost at a swiping distance.
"I can't just leave you in such state... And I would fully trust you with my very life..." griffin said, before taking a leap of faith... And put his arms gently on Hena's shoulders and managed to actually pull her into a heartfelt hug, despite her being larger of the two.

This made Hena fall still and almost completely silent. She had not expected her fluffball to pull such a move at situation like this. Even time felt to have slowed down in her point of view... Along with the tormenting vision of her past victims and agonizing pain fading away, soon almost ceasing completely, leaving behind physical soreness and some lingering phantom pain. Almost as if Hermes had some kind of soothing effect on her, while making pain inducing visions to go away.

"Did... Did something happen just now? You stopped shaking."

Hena initially stayed silent to griffins question, before getting the feeling back on her limbs, which enabled her move both her foreleg and wing of the same side and enclose her fluffball into a hug of her own. This in turn made Hermes go stiff, with his eyebrows jumping high in surprise.
"I... I think... I'm going to be just fine... Can you help me get back inside? I'll tell you more there... Maybe everything... Do... Do you perhaps have some water on you?" sphinx managed to finally say in a calm, yet still a bit hoarse voice.
"Of course, miss Hena." griffin said to the sphinx, while moving into better position help her walk back inside her lair. Luckily the doors had been left ajar the entire evening, only closing behind them.

As the evening went on, Hena told Hermes nearly everything. Starting from the fact that she was once... Something else from a different world entirely, who accepted a somewhat of a dubious job offering and got transferred into this realm of existence in her current form. Followed by the instinctual need to ask riddles from any passersby... And then just eating them alive when the unlucky or just less-intelligent ones answer wrong or try to kill her, while feeling absolutely no regret or any other moral dilemma of doing it. Until today that is, seemingly bringing with it ALL of the regret and several other mental stress's, potentially amplified.
Needless to say, Hermes was both amazed and baffled of all the things Hena had told him, while keeping her company on her pillow nest-bed, due to her somewhat embarrassed sounding request, which he had complied since she seemed to be in a desperate need company.

"Wow... That is... Quite a tale. And you barely remember your previous life?"

"That is correct. And more I try to knowingly remember, the more said memories seem to fade a bit more. I guess I just started to ignore them, shoving what remains in some crevice of my mind for safekeeping... So that is my story. Now then Hermes... What brought you to my lair today? Did you need to cross-reference for something or another batch of scrolls to translate?" sphinx inquired.

"Well about that... The High council of The Guardians of Knowledge back at Wissen came to a conclusion that it would be more effective if more members would be able to visit your library instead of heaping it all on me, under very specific terms of course. They know it would be too easy for some of our members to end up abusing the vast knowledge withing..."

"I see... And what would their terms for the access be?"

"Purely for fact checking and finding solutions or answers for specific issues parts research or other work our order has going on. Which would be after, and only after, all the other venues and methods we have access to have been absolutely exhausted with no true solution found. Of course any visitor would need to follow any terms you set up in turn." Hermes explained.

"That so?... I might have to somehow figure if my superiors are fine with-" Hena started, but was interrupted by a small scroll popping into existence in front of her nose. In there was a short message.

"Yes, but it must be with a 'wicked-like' terms. Just hold your paw-hand-thingy up towards to the library's doorway and set some specific-like terms."

"Well they are okay with it. This should only take a moment." she continued as the scroll faded out of existence, much to Hermes's confusion, and proceeded to hold her foreleg towards the library's doorway, in which appeared some swirling mist.
"Alongside with me and those with my direct permission, those who honestly are genuine and loyal, full members of the order known as the Guardians of Knowledge, may enter and search for the knowledge they need for a specific task they are sent find and nothing else. Should they ever be distracted and break away from their search of that specific knowledge or decide to betray the order, they shall forfeit their chance to leave the Library forever more, or until their order disbands or is destroyed or otherwise erased from this realm..."

After saying her words, the swirling mist withing the doorway spun a bit faster, until it spat out a scroll right at Hermes's beak. Curious of its content, he carefully skimmed through it, finding it containing the rules sphinx had just set upon for their orders permission to enter the library. The scroll itself also felt like it was enchanted with something exponentially powerful... Maybe to make the rules on it supernaturally binding and to keep itself intact?
"Quite harsh of a penalty there... But I think I can understand why. To keep the content safe and to your...'Superiors' happy?"

"Indeed. Was there anything else they wanted?"

"Well they gave me this to give you, should this task be successful." he said as he put the scroll in his bag and dug around its pockets to reveal a compact medallion on a long enough necklace chain, with the orders emblem carved on a small gemstone embedded on it; a sword and a long scroll crossed over a round shield.
"They thought it would polite to offer you a purely nominal honorary membership of our order. Mostly a sign of friendship and occasional co-operation, with no requirements or hooks of any kind, so it won't disrupt your own duties. It does allow you to ask for small favors from our order if needed though."

"That so? Well it would impolite to say no." Hena said as she accepted the medallion by allowing Hermes to fit it around her mane covered neck. After some careful moment of moving it around a little, the medallion fit quite well, chain mostly hidden under the mane.
"Do tell them that I am thankful for this small honor... Now was there perhaps other reason for you'r visit today?" she inquired, sounding a little bit uncertain about something.

"Uuuhh... Weeell... I was thinking... That maybeee... We could... Perhaaaaps... Takeourfriendshipatinybitfurther... If its okay with you that is?" griffin managed to mumble out, while getting some nice levels of adorable redness on his face, while desperately avoiding eye-contact with the sphinx. Hena was quite surprised to hear Hermes's mumbled suggestion, but grew more interested with a gentle smile. And decided to give her answer to her shyly blushing, parchment smelling fluffball.
Hena's answer came in the form of slowly opening her wing and gently setting it on Hermes's back, which made his feathers and fur to 'poof-up', and carefully trying to pull him closer. His body had gone a bit stiff in surprise, but did not resist as he was pulled into leaning against Hena's side.

"Does this answer your mumbled question, my little fluffball?" she said with a head tilt, while reaching to pet the still fluffily poofed-up griffin. The gentle petting motion helped to smoothen up the poofiness, while also causing Hermes to shake a little and to let out a sound, that was like a mix of cat purring and pigeon cooing. Obviously he was enjoying himself.
"Y-y-y-ye-eeEess, it does..." Hermes answered back while leaning into Henas forelegs gentle ministrations.'

For the next several long sets of minutes, the newly minted couple just kept silently just enjoying each others company and closeness, even Hermes finally daring to pet Hena under her chin and nape of her neck, making her purr a little bit in turn.
"While it is still in my mind, there is another thing I wished to give you..." blushing griffin mentioned and went to dig around his bag again, finally pulling out another necklace. This one was more intricate in appearance, resembling a stylized eye of sort, with a fine looking gem in a center of artistically curved metal linking it to the chain.
"I read once that griffons of old used to give a self-made necklace to someone they intent court. And I always ended up thinking about you... So I gathered enough funds to have it made and enchanted."

"How sweet of you... It has an enchantment on it? What kind may I ask?"

"Something called a 'lover's link'; one speaks the name of their lover to their piece, which enables them to hear and speak to the owner of the other piece, who hears them only if they are wearing theirs. Apparently the enchantment requires an... Intimate relationship between users to work. Otherwise they are just jewelry." Hermes explained while pulling out another necklace, which also looked like a stylized eye. If one for Hena was the right-eye, Hermes's would be the left-eye. It would certainly enable them to communicate with significant ease.
With a wordless permission given, shared via loving eye-contact, both of them were soon wearing linked necklaces. Hena even gave Hermes a thankful kiss on his forehead, making him to start blushing again. The exchange was followed by some gentle cuddling, the couple just enjoying each others warmth.

"It's... It's starting to get late. I... I should probably return to Wissen and give report of the task." Hermes finally said, with some heavy reluctance in his voice. As he was about to leave, he felt sphinx gently, yet firmly, gripping his lower back, making him to turn to look back at her. Hena looked almost frightened of something.
"Please... Don't go... At least... Stay the night here... With me... I... I'm afraid the vision might return...Please..."

"Okay..."

Next day, Noon...

"Five coins he got himself killed this time."

"Oh yeah? Ten he's just stuck in that giant library for a longer while."

"What about you Mark? Any bets from you?"

"Hmmm... I'd say fifty for him returning with the council's task done, while getting to the second base with the sphinx."

"Wow... Hope you got that much on ya."

"Well we both lost anyway, 'cause there he comes."

The three town guards, two griffins and a unicorn, went to greet the approaching griffin, who looked to be quite happy about something.

"Hey, Hermes! Nice to see ya coming back alive and all. So how was the task? Some of the Council were starting to get worried."

"Here. It has Lady Hena's terms for visitations of our members." Hermes said semi absent-mindedly, while giving them the scroll, before just walking past them. He did not notice two of the guard paying Mark. All of them knew enough about things to recognize a male who had felt the loving touch of a female, yet not going 'all-the-way'. As Hermes kept walking away, they took a peek at the scrolls content, due it not being sealed.

"Wow... That is some potent magic on it."

"Yeah, even I can feel it in my feathers... Wanna try shooting at it?"

"Give a hundred and I do it in front of the Council."

"Deal."

And so they took the term scroll to the council, and ended up breaking a part of a wall and few cabinets. Hermes received a couple of day offs for his efforts. Some of his friends saw him sketching some absolutely beautiful pictures of the sphinx, who was now a bit healthier in mind, having slept very well, which enabled her keep up her duty, with much more peaceful visitors to come.
The term scroll remained unharmed.

Chapter 11 A hiding Queen and a deepening bond.

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Chapter 11 A hiding Queen and a deepening bond.

"Phew, that trip was a close one. I thought I had been in there maybe two days, not a whole week."

"Well I think you and I are some of the lucky ones. We still have twenty-seven members still in the library, and thirteen of them are almost declared lost."

"Oh right. How long have they been there?"

"Approximately around thirty-six days, give or take an hour or two." came an sphinxs answer for two pegasus scholars, one helping the other carrying their note filled saddle-bags. Both of the winged equines bore the mark of the Guardians of Knowledge on they travel robes. And both of them got spooked lightly of the sudden answer, combined with the sight of the sphinx herself, holding a dead wild deer carcass on her paw-hand. Talking with your mouth full is not exactly polite.
"Nothing to worry. I don't eat your members these days anymore. That seems to be the Library's thing now. Metaphorically of course."

As soon as she finished saying that, another member of the order, a minotaur, came bursting through the library portal and tripping down on all fours, looking out of breath and also carrying a note filled bag with him, along with a five o'clock shadow.
"What day is this?" he coughed out.

"About twenty-four days after you went in. And take a moment to steady yourself." Hena answered while sitting down and adjusting her glasses a little. After the trio swapped some tales of their trip to the depths of the library and catching their breath, all of them left sphinx alone with her meal. None of them had that strong of a stomach.

Thing had been going rather nicely for the last month and a half, with the visitors from Wissen, with no one in particular raising any stink over the terms of visitations to the library for fact checks and answer finding for specific issues. Or at least no one had come to her to voice any complaints. If there was any, they sure kept quiet either out of respect, or fear. Sometimes the two had a rather blurry line between them.
Few had even dared to visit her just for the sake of visiting, sometimes even tossing in a small session of riddles, first confirming it being no-death bout. Some had also left some goodwill gifts, which were now part of her treasure-pile.

Overall, things were not as lonely for the sphinx as they were before, or could have been if not for the now-expired emotion-dampening. That had been an interesting conversation starter a couple of times, some apparently starting a debate about what it would be like have ones emotions suppressed in any way. Hermes told that the debate was still ongoing, most thinking that it was better to keep most of the suppressions out.

And of course there was Hermes, her mate, mostly due to her liking to call him that more, much to his embarrassment from his co-workers and friends little harmless jabs at him, mainly little jokes about him making her 'purrr' on his visits. Which was partially true. Him visiting, or just contacting her, always made Hena happy. Most they had done physically was some shared preening on each others wings, which apparently was a sign of deep trust and an intimate thing among griffin couples and occasional griffin-pegasus pair.
Other thing Hena had liked doing, was giving Hermes an occasional kiss on the cheek or top of his beak. It usually made him poof-up for minutes at a time, but recently he had managed to shorten the resulting poofiness reaction to half a minute. He also had told her about him getting to work on a major project, which apparently involved some ancient scrolls and a couple of clay tablets about the art of golemancy.

But for now Hena decided to focus on her meal, and leave the dreamy thoughts of her partner for later...

Later after the meal...

"Hmmm... Maybe if I put this one more to the left... Noo, then it might cast a shadow wrong at certain time of day..."

"Um, good day, miss Hena. What are you doing?"

The sudden, yet polite, greeting managed to startle the sphinx a little, making her drop the freshly licked-clean bone she was about to re-adjust next to one of the four pillars outside of her lair. A head turn revealed a new visitor being actually someone familiar; a tall white coated, red maned alicorn, as they were called apparently. Hermes had told her of the subspecies specific term of the Equestrias ruling royalty. She seemed to wearing a travelling cloak and carrying a saddle bag, both looking rather simple, yet practical.

"Oh, hello there Queen Faust. And just trying to make something constructive with the remains of my latest meal." Hena answered as she tilted her head at the direction of the nicely cleaned deer skull, that she had set up on a tall rock to 'look at' where Faust was currently standing. Some older leg-bones of various prey-animals were set up leaning against the said rock.

"I see... At least you seem to consume all of the easily edible parts..." alicorn said, clearly trying to make a conversation but was clearly instinctively a bit iffy about the semi-artistic displaying of bones, both fresh and old. The crunching of her snout hinted the reason most likely being the still lingering smell of blood and such.

"Most of the time, yes. Sometimes I do leave something to nibble on for an occasional scavenger... So what brings you here this time? Chasing a hidebehind maybe?"

"No, I actually gave up on that chase a few years ago... I was actually planning on asking to see the library you are partially guarding, or so I have heard. Would it be alright for me to see its content? Or will I have to answer a friendly riddle first?" Faust inquired politely.

"... Well since you actually asked nicely I can allow you entry. But also since you so politely offered to answer a riddle, we can do that too. And since you aren't trying to go past here, we can make it non-lethal... You are NOT intending go past here, right?" Hena said, while inquiring back just in case, giving alicorn a serious look. There would be no trick-passerby's on her watch.

"No I have no such intent. Please, do ask your riddle, or maybe two if you like." Faust confirmed, and gave a nod for sphinx to begin. Which she did with a smile.

"I move without legs.
I push without arms.
I speak without words.
I howl without a mouth.
What am I?"

Faust sat down and took her time to think over the answer with a thoughtful expression, while Hena waited patiently and finally set the bone she had dropped earlier on a suitable spot, and adjusted two other bone pieces a little to the left. Maybe a ten or so minutes of thoughtful humming later alicorns eyes lit up with realization.

"I think I got it. You are wind."

"That... Is correct. Now lets have another one then..." Hena said, receiving a friendly looking smirk from Faust. Perhaps she was enjoying herself while preparing to hear the second riddle.

"Your hand cannot contain me.
Your eye cannot see me.
I am fleeting when held,
but you can catch me if you stand still.
What am I?"

Once more Faust's face took a thoughtful expression, even bringing her hoof to her chin. Hena took this moment to groom her fur a little bit- This time Faust seemed to mull over the riddle a bit longer, taking almost fifteen minutes this time, until she got a knowing smile on her face.

"Breath. The answer is breath."

"Correct once again. Now then, if you would follow me to the library." Hena said and led the alicorn to her lair proper, both soon going through the misty archway, passing by the two artifacts, and arriving to the vast library. The mere initial sight of the place made Faust's jaw drop as she looked on at all of the gargantuan shelves at a short distance away from the central-entry area, still decorated by a huge golden guide sphinx statue, that seemed to stretch far beyond her sight.

"This... This is amazing. I originally thought that this was inside the mountain, but obviously it is more on its own level of existence." Faust commented, clearly amazed of the sight.

"Indeed it is. With you here, there are now twenty-seven visitors again. By the way, did you perhaps have any specific for coming here? Seeking some of old maybe?"

"A place to hide."

"...Excuse me?"

"I came here to look for a place to hide away for a non-specific amount of time."

"... I see... May I hear the reasons for such decision?"

"Of course... You see, I posses a rare gift of prophetic sight, which allows me to occasionally see glimpses of the potential future... But lately all of them have been consistently that of our kingdom falling into complete and extremely bloody anarchy should I stay on the throne... Or even be on easy reach of anypony... My spymaster also confirmed that several influential groups of nobles were planning on either overthrowing or even assassinating me in order get more personal power, or pave the way for my daughters to take the throne while securing a future for the country and thus for their fiefdoms."

"And if you were to remove those nobles, it would cause a power vacuum and lead into a potential civil-war? Or cause other kinds of waves in your nations power structure, and none of them being good?"

"Yes... And from what I have heard, my eldest is actually supporting some of their public plans, without knowing what they are planning for me... I think?... So after a good while of thinking things through, I decided to spare Equestria, and potentially other nations around it from a bloody conflict, that kept swallowing the known world in all of the visions were I still sit upon the throne. An absolute chaos... Which did not include Discord, for he apparently considers war, and I quote 'the most boring form of chaos'..."

"... Wow... That does sound like good reason to hide away somewhere... So might as well go somewhere with basic necessities and plenty to read?"

"Something like that... And my eldest daughter would never learn to truthfully respect other species properly with me around constantly apologizing for her mistakes and fixing her messes concerning them... I hope you don't mind me hiding here?" Faust asked, looking a little embarrassed for asking such a thing. Even with her reasons. She even let out a sigh of relieve, when Hena gave a positive nod for her.

"Yes, you may. Just don't try break things here and we don't have any problems. And my superiors haven't really given any time limit for anyone staying here. So maybe one day, there might even be unfortunate mummies between some shelves. Not yet I think." she said, making alicorn brow shoot up at the mention of potential mummified remains.

"Weeell... If I ever find one, should I clean it and bring it somewhere for someone to take away or just leave them there?"

"I don't care what you do. Not even if you decide to practice kissing on one."

"I'm just going to ignore that... Sooo... Do you have any recommendations where should i start burying myself in books,scrolls and other works here?"

"Not really. Just pick a direction and go from there."

With the sort-of advice given, Faust gave Hena a thankful smile and nod, before carefully walking to the edge of the central-area, and taking a curious peek over the edge. Not surprisingly, it was a chasm filled with endless shelves of written works with occasional platform area to read and rest here and there.
Just as she was about to say something to the sphinx, her eyes suddenly got glossed over, as if receiving a message of sorts. It did not last long and alicorns eyes returned to normal. And for some reason she also had a light smirk on her face while looking at Hena.

"What? Did you see something considering me?"

"Oh you'll find out soon enough... Well, here I go then. Maybe we meet again sometime."

Having said her piece, Faust climbed upon the lightly elevated edge of the central area, and simply jumped off, like she was parachuting, which did make Hena to come closer to the edge to have final look.

"I TOLD NOPONY WHERE I WAS GOING!!!" Faust called out as she started to shrink smaller as she fell deeper and deeper to the lower sections of the library, finally being just a small white-ish speck, that seemed to glide out sight somewhere between the giant shelves.

"Well, I guess now there will be a long time visitor here." Hena simply commented and started to head back outside. As she sauntered through the doors to her lair, the stylized eye looking amulet on her neck began to vibrate lightly and seemed to whisper her name. This caused a happy smile to appear on her face, as she lifted the amulet closer to her lips.
"I'm here Hermes. How is your little research project going over there?" she spoke softly to the amulet, which also answered.

"Oh it is going great, thank you for asking. I think me and my team might be on the verge of a major breakthrough. If it goes well, it might actually enable us to restore the art of golemancy to the modern day. But the reason for my call was to mainly to inform about me coming to visit by the evening. I was even given leave to stay the night if needed too. Should I bring some beef jerky or some spiced fish? I know you like both."

"Ooh, fish. Definitely fish this time. It really hits the spot after a deer. Think I can fit a little nap before your arrival?"

"Sure thing. I might try wake you with the meals aroma, if that's alright?"

"Yes, you try that, dear. I'll see you then, my little fluffball. *mwah*"

Hena could not help but smile a bit mischievously as she heard her griffin mate stuttering. He tended to do that when called by her pet names for him. Especially if it was accompanied with a little kiss, even via their 'lovers link'. With the little embarrassment done, Hena went to curl up on her usual spot on the stone altar, and slowly let herself fall into a comfortable sleep, as she waited for her griffin to arrive. She did not notice a small pleasant warmth, that had started rise within her...

Later...

Hena was awakened by a small breeze whiffing past her nose, bringing with it a familiar scent of her Hermes. And for some reason, it smelled really, really, REALLY alluring to her. As she stood up oddly fast, she also felt strangely hot, despite it being comfortably cool evening, and weirdly a little out of breath too.
And she felt that she absolutely needed to have her fluffball of a griffin close to her... Right this instant.

Just before Hermes came to the lair area proper, Hena decided for some reason to leap to a random higher ledge, out of sight, while leaving her lairs doors ajar. Soon enough Hermes did arrive, carrying a bag smelling of spiced fish. As he started to look around while approaching the doors left ajar, Hena began to slowly and quietly climb down from the ledge, followed by her silently stalk closer.
Oddly enough Hermes did not seem to notice this happening, with the sphinx approaching him from behind, almost looking like she was just about to intending to leap on top of him. Maybe she was managing to be just that quiet, or maybe the tasty smell from the spiced fish covered Henas scent from him. Or he was just basic distracted looking for her at the direction of the doors and not wanting to potentially rudely wake her up from her nap.

"Hmmm... Odd. Usually Hena naps upon the altar stone or on her bed..." Hermes thought out loud in a quietly while peering between the doors, still not noticing the sphinx approaching him from behind, now being only maybe a few feet away and slowly standing taller, very much focused on him with smile.

"Hello there my dear." she said pleasantly, obviously causing the griffin to let out a startled squawk while poofing up a little, before turning around to see her.

"Oh, there you are Hena. I-I got the fish here with me so... Is something wrong? You look a bit out of breath and... Also your face is a bit red and you smell like a *sniff-sniff*... Griffoness in a serious heat..." Hermes started to inquire, first sounding a little worried, before his tone and expression went through realization. Followed quickly by a mix of different worry and some serious anxiousness, while he took a careful step back. Clearly not trying to leave, but more trying to hide something at his nether regions. Perhaps the sphinxs feminine musk was starting to have an effect on him?

"Well... That might explain this bothersome warmth and my ever growing need to be very close you then... And I don't think I would mind that right now... Think you'd mind staying up further into the night?" Hena said with a smile while slowly walking towards Hermes, who instinctually walked backwards, both of them soon indoors with sphinx blocking the still ajar doorway... Which then got closed shut via psionically powered glance from her.
"Not that you really have choice now... My little fluffball..."

"hoo boy..."

Elsewhere...

"No way Mark. I find it unlikely that would happen."

"What? Are chickening out of the bet?"

"Fine. I bet Hermes just spends the night with his sphinx lady, and nothing else happens."

"And I bet that he finally gets some from his exotic lady, AND returns with some love-injuries on him."

"Okay. Have fun losing your pay this time."

Back to the lovebirds...

'I can't believe this is actually happening. And this is definitely not a dream either. Her scent would not be this potent in my imagination, or her fur being so soft while its smushed against my face... So warm too.' Hermes thought as he indeed was being pressed against Henas chest fluff, due to her pulling him into a loving hug one handed.
He hadn't even dared to resist the said hug-pull. Partially due to their obvious difference in size and strength, but mainly it was due to him not wanting to hurt her feelings while she was in such a state. After minute or so of being snuggled, Hena finally let go of him, allowing Hermes to step back enough to lock eyes with her.

"Sooo... What would you... Like to us to do?" he finally asked, with his growing blush starting to burn through his facial feathers. Metaphorically of course.

"Well, how about first you come over and kiss me? And not the usual little kisses we have given to you..."

With the permission very much given, Hermes steeled his resolve and approached his beloved sphinx and had to stand on his back legs to actually reach her lips, due to her still standing tall. And Hena gladly accepted her fluffball of a griffins tentatively approaching beak.
To her pleasant surprise it was semi-flexible, so she had no fear of any cuts on her lips, which encouraged her to push her partner gently towards her pillow nest of a bed, while opening her mouth a little to allow griffins curious tongue to come and explore a bit. Both of them enjoyed the feeling it brought.
Soon enough Hermes found himself falling backwards, right into Henas bed-nest, even letting out a small startled 'eep'-sound, before calming down when seeing Hena join in, standing above him with a playful smile.

The sphinx then proceeded to kiss her partner a bit more, before starting to slowly move lower. This brought a feeling of potential shame for Hermes, as Hena started get closer to his member, which was already visibly peeking from its sheath.

"Well look who's coming to greet me down here." Hena commented as she adjusted her glasses, while taking a good look at the tip of her griffins member.

"I-I'm sorry Hena. I know I may not exactly really that large enough for you..."

"Oh hush you my dear. To me personally its more about who is wielding it and knowing what you're doing. Good size is merely a plus. Heck, maybe some huge dragoness likes her partners tool small. Oh? Looks like your 'little soldier' agrees."

With her partners confidence boosted a little bit, Hena proceeded to give the slowly growing member a gentle, slow lick, making Hermes gasp at the feeling. As she continued giving more oral enjoyment to the griffin, who was clearly enjoying it, she couldn't help but be a bit more than impressed of his member as it finally reached its full length. At that point she couldn't even fit the whole thing in her mouth.
Nevertheless, she continued with her licking and eventually sucking on it, enjoying the sounds Hermes made during it.
Finally after several long, and very enjoyable, minutes Hermes let out a animalistic screech, sounding like a mix of falcon and mountain lion, and Hena felt him reach his peak as her mouth was filled with his seed.

"My goodness... You're actually quite a well hung male. And a potent one too..." she commented after having swallowed her lightly salty tasting little treat.

"You... You think so? I always thought I was below average." Hermes managed to answer back, clearly being a bit out of breath for obvious reasons.
"Should we have a break for me to recover, before I return the favor?"

"Oh I think I have something in store for that, from the pages of the library." Hena said back to him with a small smirk, before she gently taking hold of his family jewels with one paw-hand and putting other one upon his chest. She then took a deep breath to focus a bit, before speaking out a spell.
"Plena Recuperatio."

The instant word left the lips of his darling sphinx, Hermes felt a potent jolt of energy to flow into him from both touched areas and spreading from there. Soon enough any fatigue he felt was completely gone, including from his 'little soldier'.
"There, that should do it. Now then, how about you get to work? And don't worry too much about details... This heat is starting to feel stronger by the minute..." Hena said as she went to lay down on her back next to Hermes and waited for his next move.

With a excited, if a little nervous gulp, Hermes got up and sauntered into better position, having a beautiful view of his mates belly side before him, even receiving an encouraging look from her to continue. So he did, lowering himself closer to her sweet smelling snatch. It did not take all that long for the alluring scent overpower his more hesitant thoughts, and he just dove in, first carefully rubbing his beak upon those sweet lower lips, receiving an appreciative moans from Hena.
Wishing to hear more, he went in with his tongue, making his sphinx mate visibly shudder with a very audible gasp. This only drove to lick her leonine pussy some more, ending up creating, to him at least, a sweet sounding melody of sorts out of the noises Hena made. Clearly she was enjoying herself, and wanting her to enjoy some more, Hermes kept up being 'a talented linguist' for several sweet minutes. And going by a couple of a little louder moans and even a squeal or two, she reached her peak at least once or twice.

"Hermes... I need you to take me... Please..." Hena managed to finally say after coming down from her orgasmic high, in a pleading husky tone. And Hermes started to comply right away, for it would be rude to keep a lady waiting, especially with both of the participants very much ready for the main dish so to speak.

It took a moment of careful fumbling, due to some barely held back excitement, for Hermes to get into proper position. Not wanting to tease the sphinx any more, the lucky griffin slowly pushed his shaft deep as he could in her soft confines. This caused both of the to gasp in pleasure and shared happiness.
With no words or further guidance needed, Hermes soon got into a nice rhythm of thrusting, feeling like he was on top of the world as he made his beloved make very pleased sounding moans and gasps, among other sexually pleasing sounds.

Neither did not notice just how long they kept on mating, until Hermes felt his peak approaching fast and thus grabbed tighter on Henas hips, soon practically hugging her, with his chin just barely reaching Henas chest fluff with all the forward pushing he was doing at the moment, trying to reach as deep in her as he could.
Hena on her part could not help but enjoy all of the feelings her griffin mates movement was causing, letting it show through her loud gasps and moan, even letting her tongue loll out. As he kept on pushing forward at a faster thrusting speed and took a firmer grip with his claws, she decided to answer in-kind by reaching out and managing to take hold of his rabidly moving back with her own claws, trying not to disrupt griffins quick thrusting motion.

"Do it... Fricking claim me!!"

Just as soon Hena barely managed to say her piece to Hermes, her world went white, as some would say when experiencing an intensive orgasm, arching her back while pulling her griffin closer so tight with her claws that she drew blood.
Hermes on his end felt his beloveds velvety walls grip his dick tightly, finally pushing him off the edge and just let loose a proverbial torrent of his seed. To him all of it felt just so good, that he did not even acknowledge Henas claws making his back bleed, while he was doing pretty much the same to her sides; clawing them and drawing blood, trying to push himself just a little bit deeper.
In other words, both of them were leaving their mark in a couple of ways on each other. And they absolutely loved it all. Finally both of them visibly relaxed and just laid there together, a lucky griffin still on top of a very satisfied sphinx, coming down from pleasurable high and catching their breath.

"...Wow... That was... Amazing... Sorry about your back. I just wanted you even closer to me..." Hena finally said, clearly feeling a little sorry about the back injuries she had caused.

"Yeah... It was... And I don't really mind. I take it as a kind of a badge of honor and as a more visible mate-mark of sort." Hermes said back, while carefully stretching his wings, which were luckily in one piece, to get a feel of the overall status of his back; some stinging, but luckily no overt bleeding.
"So it is okay if I heal both of our love-cuts just enough to stop the bleeding and fix the skin, but leaving a mark?" Hena asked, receiving a nod from her mate. And small healing spell later, both of their wounds were closed, leaving only some scars as a reminder of their loving little romp.

"There, all better now. I take it you stay the night, dearest?" she inquired sweetly. Hermes seemed to think something over before answering.
"Actually, I was thinking if you could use that energizing trick again?"

With a raised brow, Hena did as requested, curios to see what Hermes was thinking. And the answer came in a form of him standing up a bit and taking hold her back-legs with a visible confidence and a small grin on his beak.

"Since you are in heat, and clearly a long lived being, it stands to reason that it might take a long while for next one to arrive, and I might be occupied with the research for a good while. Sooo, I think we should make the most of it... Very thoroughly..."

"Oh dear..."

Next day, around noon...

"Hey look! I think Hermes is coming back." Mark called out to other present at the edge of town, after seeing a familiar griffin gliding down the path from the pass.

"Good day everyone. Sorry it took so long, but everything is fine."

"Uh-huh... And where did those scars on your back came from?"

"Uuuuh... We might have wrestled a bit roughly to pass the time... Well I'm off to work now. That golemancy research is on the verge of a breakthrough." Hermes said as he walked by his peers, seemingly wincing a bit on every step of his back-legs, with an occasional 'ow'. He did not notice Mark collecting a pay from another bet won.

Three months later... Hena's lair

"Hena! I'm back. We succeeded! We actually made a set of working golems!" Hermes announced proudly as he stepped in his mates lair, who was looking at him with a loving smile from her pillow-nest bed, with her wings folded a bit differently.

"That is wonderful to hear darling. What are you doing with them at this time?" Hena asked curiously, clearly happy for his teams success.

"Well, currently we are going through basic trials with them doing some manual work, like tilling the soil, building simple things, before trying to move onto more complex orders and try making them from different materials. Currently we have a dozen made out hardened clay... Is there something wrong? You look like you're hiding something..."

"Funny you should ask, my dearest fluffball... Remember our little intimate wrestling three moons ago?" sphinx said, as she beckoned him to come closer.
"How could I? It has been in my dreams all that time..." he started to say while coming closer, as he seemed to realize something. "Wait... Do you mean... That..." he continued, putting two and two together, while watching Hena lift her wing, revealing a visible bump on her lower belly.

"That's right dearest... You're going to be a father..."

"This is the happiest surprise of my life..."

Chapter 12 A happy family...

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Chapter 12 A happy family...

Six months later...

A soft melodious humming echoed slightly from the walls of her lair, as Hena laid on her side on her pillow nest, with one wing folded and the other relaxedly open upon her bedding, seeming to be very satisfied on her current situation, hence the humming. For the moment, trespassers had chosen to take the main road if they were heading towards Wissen for any reason, instead of the much shorter pass. Either her reputation had spread enough to scare foolhardy ones away temporarily, OR her 'superiors' were giving her a 'vacation leave' of sort by diverting attention away from her.

Whatever the truth was, she was truly content for now. At the moment she was waiting for her mate to come visit with an associate, who had earned her trust a little while ago. Another griffin, named Vesalia, who had been studying the anatomy of several species and trying to apply the said knowledge to the field of non-magical healing, which had been ignored by most of the known world, due to the spread of either healing services of magic wielders, mainly unicorns, or specialized potions that zebras sometimes sold outside their homelands. Her reasoning being a desire to help those who did not have access or money, often loads of it, to afford the quick solutions. Sure it will take time, but would surely be very useful in the long run. At least it would be a lot better than leeches.

She had also being a great help in aiding Hena during some tough parts of her pregnancy, eventually even allowing her to carefully listen to the little heartbeats...

Her thoughts were interrupted by a polite special-knock on the door, which told her Hermes had arrived with their friend. With a wave of her paw, the doors opened slowly and quietly, allowing the two griffins to enter. Both of them had travel-bag on, clearly full of things, and one on Hermes smelling tasty.

"Welcome back dearest, and you too Vesalia. I hope your studies for being an actual doctor are going well." Hena greeted them with a kind smile.

"Oh it is going rather well and gaining some traction too. And so is Hermes's golemancy experiments. They are getting skilled on making some iron ones for basic guard duty. Not sure how they got them to breathe gas when needed."

"Oh that's not all. We are trying to figure how to swap poison into something else. Then they could used to apprehend criminals at a distance, or. with enough work, maybe to put out fires with some specialized breath." Hermes said in a excited tone, clearly being passionate about the success of the potentiality the research was bringing forth.

Before their conversation could continue, a little yet sharp chirp sound made itself known beneath Henas extended wing, drawing their attention. Feeling tiny movement among its fur and feathers, sphinx lifted her wing, allowing the little creature beneath more room to crawl around, while also revealing three other little ones currently latched on her mammaries. Hers and Hermes's cubs. Two little drakes and two little hens.

At a first glance all of the four little ones resembled average three month old griffin chicks with varied shades of golden brown fur, with their little eyes just barely open, but they had some difference compared to their griffin papa. Most visible one, was that they had five digits on their little front legs instead of typical griffin four. The other seemed to gender specific also on the front legs, with females having full fur on theirs, while males had their scutes (, basically the 'leg scales' on some birds,) reaching from top of their still soft talons to past their elbow about halfway to the shoulder.

"Hey there my dear Antheia. Did you hear daddy and auntie Vesalia coming to visit us?" Hena spoke softly to the little crawler, who noticed its mama carefully leaning closer, clearly trying not to disrupt cubs who were still feeding, and let out a happy chirp, while adorably trying to stand. Emphasis on trying.
"Oh? Almost getting on your feet again? Very good."

"Interesting. Full blooded griffin chick usually tries standing around six months. Although it could also be a side effect of the build of the nest and maybe the diet of the nursing mother." Vesalia commented in an academic tone, while observing the sphinx mother giving the active cub a gentle nuzzle.
"Somewhat hard to get an accurate measure of their growth within six month period by just looking..."

"But you remember the rule, yes? Nobody, outside the family, touches my babies, unless it is an emergency..." Hena reminded the griffoness, even giving her a mild glare. Hermes felt lightly uncomfortable watching the exchange. Active cub was currently trying to curl up in her chest-mane for a nap, not really noticing what adults were talking about.

"I know, i know. And me being your midwife was one such exception. It's still tough for my academic side... While. the other side just finds them absolutely adorable little hybrids." Vesalia confirmed quickly that she did remember the said rule, before silencing the excited squealing in her voice, so it did not spook the little ones.
"Have you decided on the name for their kind? They are practically progenitors of an entirely new variant of griffins in a certain way, somewhat similarly to all the five tribes of ponies I think."

"Not really certain about the last part, and its a bit early to name them progenitors and all that. But no, we haven't yet decided on the sub-species name. For now, I think its better for them jus- Ow. Well, Hesperus' beak seems to have some hardening happening already. Adlar and Yulthi should be full right about... Now." Hena conversed, until her attention returned to her little ones, two of which did just finish having their fill of mamas milk. Remaining cub finished soon after, letting out a little sound, that was some sort of mix of a small chirp and burp. Soon all of the little ones followed the example of the most active one, and found their own spot to have a nap; One joined its sister in mamas mane, other one just curled up next to sphinxs belly, and the final one managed to find its way to the nook of mothers wing.

"Now then, now that the little ones are napping, how about you show me what good smelling thing you have with you in your bags?"

Time skip ahead...

"Mama, come on! You promised we can go see daddy in town today!"

"Yes, yes, no need to shout. Just let put some security up first."

With a few arcane words and some selected symbols drawn to air, the doors to the lair closed shut, followed by a symbol, resembling a watchful eye in the center of a hexagon, surrounded by circles of runes, appearing upon it. Satisfied in her spellwork, Hena turned to her now soon-to-be six year old cubs, all of them visibly excited to go visit their father. Usually it had been him coming to them due to work.

"There we go. Now climb aboard everyone and hold on tight. Your wings are not quite ready for a long flight." Hena advised the little ones as she lied down for them. Soon enough she felt her cubs were climbing on her back, followed by finding favorite spot to grab on mommys mane.
"Allrighty, everyone there have a good grip?" she asked, receiving positive answers, while spreading her wings. Soon enough the sphinx was flying above the path to Wissens side of the pass, trying to fly low enough for the safety of her cubs, just in case.

After a good while of flying, they reached the edge of town, landing at a visible distance. Most likely the town watch had already noticed their approach. A thought that was confirmed when a couple of guards came to greet them.

"Good day to you Lady Hena, the Sphinx of the Pass. What brings you, and your children, here today?" a griffin guard asked politely.

"Hi Mark, and just drop the overt politeness, it makes you sound like a licker of rear-end. And just bringing my little ones to see Hermes, instead of waiting him to come see them." Hena answered, while trying to mildly censor her own tongue in the presence of her kids.

"Sure thing ma'am. And if you're looking for your dear Hermes 'The Iron hips', he should be at the study-building six, looking over this one interesting stone tablet our Searchers found and managed bring over from the same spot some of the golemancy stuff was found." Mark answered as he started to guide the sphinx to the mentioned location in town.

"Please don't use that title, he dislikes it when its used near our kids. And was there any issues with the transportation of that tablet? I don't really get much of the news." Hena commented while walking, clearly interested on the goings of the said sect of the Guardians of Knowledge, which was formed and especially trained to locate and excavate ruins of old for lost knowledge more effectively.

"Well only issue came from a group Equestrian ponies. Said something about Searchers not having permits to move cargo through Equestrian lands and trying to confiscate the findings. But they finally gave up trying that after being pointed out that they had no legal authority to do so in said area in the unclaimed wilds and that we never intended to move the cargo through their lands. And of course if it got out that Equestrians were accosting a neutral organization would be rather a rather bad look for them. Especially with the current political mess going on there. I think it also helped that the Searchers had a dozen Iron golems with them for security."

"I see. What kind of a mess are we talking about?"

"Well, the word is that their Queen Faust just up and left almost six years ago, and has seemingly just disappeared, only leaving one message to her daughters. But they haven't really told what it exactly holds, other than that she has faith in them in watching over the nation. This of course has caused plenty of headaches for the Two Sisters; some coming from their own nobility, while other coming from the diplomats of other races. Many of them don't exactly trust the Solar princess due to her past offences, some of which apparently even cost more than few lives outside of Equestria. According to latest news, she's currently still trying to get three or maybe four different parties to come back to negotiation table. But of course it ain't easy when the mother dearest is not there to help her anymore."

"That so? Well this world does have a lot of places to hide if one knows where to go. And what of the second sister?" sphinx inquired, managing to cover anything that might hint her knowing anything about the queens whereabouts.

"The Moon princess? Apparently she's keeping the military in line rather admirably, mostly to stop any zealous commanders from getting any wrong ideas, while apparently also watching over the dreams of the citizens. My guess for why she does the latter, is either for mental health or to look for any dirty dreams."

"Really?... Do you have a bet going on that too? Hermes told me that you have a bit of gambling about plenty of things."

"Maybe... Oh, here we are. Please try not to make anything blow up... It happens some times."

With the visitors brought to the promised location, Mark left to continue whatever patrol duty he had left. Maybe also to inform the Council that Hena was merely on a family visit. With a polite knock and a given permission to enter received, Hena went to look for her dear mate, with their cubs still on her back, mostly looking around with visible curiosity, but luckily content to just look, as she walked past few open doors to various studies, both big and small.

"Now then all four of you, we don't know what daddy is working on right now, so lets try not to cause a mess of any important work. Are we clear?"

"Yes mama!"

After few moments of walking down the hall, and receiving few polite greetings from few researchers and students passing by, they finally reached the doorway to Hermes's study. Peeking in they saw him looking over an absolutely huge, carving filled, stone tablet and several parchments worth of notes, strewn across the tables.

With his attention elsewhere, mainly on the lunch sandwich, for the moment, Hena took this moment to slowly and silently stalk closer to him. Cubs decided to play along and hid among her mane as best they could. After getting behind Hermes, instead of just announcing her presence out loud, sphinx decided to be a bit playful this time. First she quietly laid down, followed by reaching with her tail to brush against her griffin mates leg.

The sudden touch had an immediate effect on Hermes, if his feathers puffing up was anything to go by. Luckily there was no choking or spit-take, or other thing that might be harmful to him his work. He did seem to suppress a gasp, but she was not completely sure of that.

"Ah! Hello dear Hena. What brings you to Wissen? We currently have no need for extra texts." Hermes said with a smile after turning around.

"Oh? Do I need a specific reason or perhaps a special permission to visit my mate?" Hena asked with a subtle head tilt.

"No, not really. There's nothing in the rule of conduct about an unannounced spousal or family visit, as long it is civil in behavior."

"Well I think we can manage that. Unless someone wants to go today without dessert?"

Said little 'threat' worked as a unspoken signal for the little ones to come put of hiding, all smiles, which soon spread to their father as well.

"Permission to land, papa?" came a exited sounding question from one of their sons. Rest of the little ones just looked exited.

"Just one moment..." Hermes said quickly and proceeded to put some papers aside in a secure manner just in case, before visibly bracing himself. "Allrighty you little rascals, take a flight."

With permission given, all four little hybrids leapt off from their mothers mane and soon landed all over their griffin fathers front, drowning him in hugs. Hena could only smile warmly at the sight.

"Now now then little ones. I think your papa would like to breathe." she said in a calm, yet firm tone, with respectfully quick followup of her cubs letting go of Hermes. But not before getting one more hug done, and then proceeding to look at the research material he had out. Luckily they knew not to touch daddies work, under the threat of no dessert...
"So what is your research today dear? More specific things on golemancy?"

"Why yes indeed. From what we have gathered from the scriptures, there are at least one specific type of golem, that is far superior to anything we have managed to make. The wording includes many words that would translate to arcane, lightning or storm in modern tongue. Unfortunately some major sections of the tablet are too damaged to translate reliably or even read. And we can't exactly go on with complete guess work, which would lead to potentially bad results for messing things up with ancient knowledge..." Hermes went on, as he gestured at the giant stone tablet, which his sphinx mate now also watched over properly.

It had intricate carvings of numerous hieroglyphic text, along with lightly faded imagery seemingly building sized bipedal humanoid figures, all of them in various poses of either being constructed by smaller figures, or apparently shooting lightning or winds if the slightly cracked parts of the still visible carving was accurate. The rest was unfortunately either too faded or otherwise too damaged to understand clearly.

"Acceptable. And I guess there is not yet any need to go find aid in the Library?" she inquired, while keeping an eye on the cubs; three of them were in a little tournament of 'rock-paper'scissor', while the fourth, Antheia, had picked up an parchment and a piece of charcoal from the side table, far from research material luckily, and had started to draw something in a speedy pace.

Both parents thought it was an adorable sight, until Hena noticed Antheias eyes having an odd glow in them, and that she seemed to be drawing a copy of the tablet, something scholars had already done with the visible parts for the record keeping. Only the little ones version was starting look like a more complete version of the the old tablet. Soon enough Hermes too took notice of this.

"Look mama! I drew the rest of the pretty rock picture." little one exclaimed happily as she finished the picture and pushing it towards the mildly confused adults. As Hermes carefully picked up the freshly drawn picture, he almost instantly took notice of the sections missing from the real tablet, scriptures and all. And they actually made perfect sense in every way of safe creation of these extraodinarily large golems. Finally he even noticed the title used in the missing parts, half-whispering it aloud.

"Titan?... Antheia? How did you knew what to draw?"

"I... I just saw it all there. It glows prettily on and around the broken parts when i look at it relly, relly hard." little one answered, while looking at the tablet, with her eyes glowing again.

"Can your sister and brothers do it too?" Hena asked.

"Yeah. Adlar once said he saw the broken statue back home whole once, and we all tried it. Its fun." cub said with a smile, which was joined in by enthusiastic nodding from her sibling, who had heard the conversation. Even some passerby's had stopped to listen at the door out of curiosity, as Hermes turned to address Hena.

"Dear? Is this trait perhaps something brought by your sphinx blood?"

"Hmmm... It is very possible. While it does not seem to be a trait for me to use specifically, some truly powerful sphinx's can simply look at nearly any location, or in this case an item, and see how it once was. Like seeing an ancient ruin as pristine building, or in this case, a broken stone carving as a complete work, like it was freshly finished."

This information got many curious murmurs going among the extra listeners, finally one of them, a hippogriff, entering the study. Going by his clothing, a red shoulder-sash with white toga, he was from the higher ups of the organization.

"Did... Did I hear you right just now? Your cubs can actually see how things used to look like, no matter how old?" he asked politely, clearly being careful. Hena did have a certain reputation, even before her honorary membership to the Guardians of Knowledge. And it involved plenty of killing and occasionally eating those who really offended her or failed her test and/or riddles in the pass.

"So it would seem... And before you, or your colleagues, get any ideas, they are almost six. And I desire them to have a normal childhood, not forced employment. If they choose to aid in your work when they are old enough to decide, then that is fine by me. But if I hear even a hint of you trying to influence them, I might do something unpleasant in turn..."

"Perfectly understood ma'am. I was merely asking a confirmation. And if they indeed decide to pursue work here, then all the bette-"

"Out of our way you filthy animal!" came a sudden and loud, and especially rude sounding, exclamation from the hallway, drawing everyone's attention to it. Earlier hippogriff looked very exasperated, even making a frustrated 'face-claw', which in turn raised alarms for Hena. Even her cubs were quick to hide behind her legs.

"Oh no. I thought they had already left..."

"Who exactly are you talki-"

"Now now, my good Crimson Wing. There's no need to talk so rudely to lower beings, forsaken by the purest of magic. What they have here is an admirable effort in preservation of old knowledge." came another much more calmer voice. Something in it still raised more than few hairs on back of sphinxs neck.

Soon enough in the doorway stood a middle aged, fully pale grey, monocle-wearing unicorn scholar, clearly bearing Equestrias heraldry and some other mark; a pony holding a long lance, piercing dragons skull, circled by lengthy parchment, on his robes, followed by two more ponies; an annoyed looking dark red-black maned pegasus, and beyond stoic looking brown earth-pony with a shaved-off mane, both wearing an armor bearing same 'a lance-through-skull mark'.

"Ah, Councilor Selcor. I was wondering if you had changed your mind about my request to see your archived works? Since you and the rest of the Council keep stonewalling our nations benevolent offers of joining. We all could achieve so much more for everyponys benefit if your city and lands around it would be official part of Equestria."

"And I have no authority to overturn a unanimous council decision. Especially when it keeps our neutral organization truly neutral, and also safe from exploitation from less than moral groups and individuals. Latter of which you and your research seemingly falls into, sir Pure Line." Selcor answered, with a clear forced politeness in his voice. Some other scholars present also looked at the three ponies with a significant amount of contempt.

"Oh, I assure you, there is nothing wrong my research into how our bodies work, since your member, Vesalia I think, is not very keen on sharing her research material."

"Her research is focused on healing without magical means. Not on 'purity of bloodlines' and 'removing undesirable traits', or what ever it is your group is doing behind your citadel walls."

"Ah, you must mean those unfounded rumors some creatures like to spread. Due to our association being funded by the Equestrian crown, we only use donated cadavers on our research."

"Not that it is even you little clubs business. You even allow a fricking beastly animals right in you research areas!" the red pegasus, apparently one named Crimson Wing butted in to the conversation, pointing his wing at Hena, who merely adjusted her glasses a little bit.

"I have you know, this beastly animal has far more knowledge than you have length and width in your wings and genitals. Not that either of those would actually even help you in copulation. IF you ever actually have any." she commented, causing a short bout of snickering from the observers.

"Bah! I bet I could beat you in one of your dumb riddles! That's right, we have heard of you, sphinx, and your apparent body count." Crimson fired back, sounding overtly confident. This certainly got attention from everyone present, and even few just passing by the area.

"Very well then. If I win, you'll shut up for the rest of your stay in this town, magically enforced if needed. And if you win, I get to cut you open with absolutely no consequences. And you have an arbitrary time limit that I don't tell you."

"Deal!... Waitwhat?"

"Never resting, never still.
Moving silently from hill to hill.
It does not walk, run or trot.
All is cool where it is not."

With the riddle spoken, everyone present, even the other two equestrian ponies, visibly began to think it over, some murmuring to each other as if not to give help or other form of assistance. Only one not thinking it over was Crimson, who looked more baffled and potentially offended, while Hena mostly just watched him while tapping her claws against the floor. Even her cubs too were also whispering about mommy's riddle.

"What garbage did you just spout you freak?"

"Tick-tock, tick-tock Red..."

"HEY! ONLY MY MOM CAN CALL ME THAT!!"

"Oh, you actually have an older female of the same species who gave birth to you? Still together with the sperm donor?"

"LEAVE MY DEAD FATHER OUT OF THIS YOU MONSTER!"

"Aaand that's the arbitrary time limit over. You lost." Hena said with a light smirk on her face.

"You sonuv-" Crimson was about rant, only to be interrupted by a sharp snap of sphinxs clawed fingers, followed by a some manner of floating sand closing his mouth, silencing him.

"And there's your punishment. Hopefully silence will teach you some humility or something like that. By the way, did anyone else present solve the riddle?" she asked the gathered crowd. After some murmuring, a diamong dog in the crowd waved his paw.

"I think I got it lady Hena! Answer is Sun, right?"

"Correct my good hound. I think you deserve a little reward." Hena answered with a smile. She then proceeded to wave he claw around a little, conjuring a small puff of something that looked like pure golden powdery sand, and gently blew it towards him. In seconds the golden puff landed on his face, causing a light snout crunching reaction from him.

"There you go. You have been blessed with a small amount of good luck for the next two days. But don't get too carefree. Lady Luck is a rather fickle mistress."

"T-Thank you lady Hena." the dog said in a humble tone before bowing rather deep and took his leave. After that, Hena turned her gaze towards the three equestrians, now with one muted, angry looking pegasus.

"Now then, do you equines wish to try your luck, if only to try and prove your overblown and highly theoretical superiority towards a mystical being with vast knowledge?"

"Sure, I'll take a shot. I mostly just end the animals like you, but humiliation in just wits will work just fine for now." the stoic brown earth pony said while stepping forward.
"Name's Stone Leg. Just ask the riddle."

"What can bring back the dead.
Make you cry, make you laugh.
Is born in an instant, yet lasts a lifetime?"

Once again murmuring started among the scholars present. Stone Leg just stood there, being overtly stoic looking, just staring at Hena, who stared right back at him with an impassive look. Like a cat with one them 'watching and judging' expressions.

"Eh, nothing comes to mind. I'll be taking my leave, and taking Crimson with me too. He'll just try punching creatures if he can't slander them." Stone finally said and started to walk away, grabbing Crimson by the tail without even looking at him and dragged him along, simply ignoring any physical protest he tried. That left only Pure Line present.

"Well, now that they have left, what was the answer for that riddle, ma'am?" the grey unicorn asked in a polite tone. Yet Henas ears found a tiny condescending undertone in it.

"Wait for your turn sir. Anyone else got the answer?" she called out to everyone present once again, followed by light tucking on her front legs hair, making her look down on one of her sons, Hesperus to be exact.

"Um, mommy? I think I got it. The answer is Memory, yes?"

"Why yes, it is. I think this earned you a snack of your choice later."'

"Actually others helped me to figure it out. Can they get a snack too?"

"Hmmm... I guess they can. Just wait for the meal time proper."

After giving their mothers legs a big hug, the cubs ran to their father, possibly giving her room for the serious adult business. Maybe they saw the unicorn as more of a threat than the other two ponies.

"Such well behaved young hybrids. Seem to be very healthy ones too. Quite a rarity..." Pure Line thought out loud, clearly not caring that there was a top class predator creature, now very peeved, in front of him.

"I would appreciate if you would cease looking at my children. Makes one wonder if you're into younger ones in a very, very, VERY wrong way." Hena commented.

"Oh, I am nothing like that, ma'am. I merely study how the bloodlines affect the descendants from a potent or otherwise odd parentage."

"And that is even more of a reason to keep you and your ilk far, FAR away from my cubs."

"Oh, nothing to worry ma'am. My foremost interest for the moment is to hear a riddle from you for me to overcome. Should I answer correctly, I would like to have full access to the library you are rumored to have in your lair. And should I lose, me and my organization shall never return to this town. That is all."

After a moment of thinking and looking for any hooks, sphinx finally asked a riddle.

“I never was, am always to be.
No one ever saw me, nor ever will.
And yet, I am the confidence of all who live and breathe.
What am I?”

Pure Line began to think the riddle over for the next few stretched up minutes, until he just up and sighed.

"Pardon me, but it seems I can't quite figure it out. So if you don't mind, I'll be taking my leave. Have some new orders to pass along due to terms I gave here." he said, before giving a polite bow and left. No one really said anything until he, and his goons, had fully left the building.

"Well, even though he had more dignity than the other two, I still found him quite dislikable. By the way, who were they?" Hena asked.

"Sir Pure Line, Crimson Wing and Stone Leg? Visitors from Equestria, and members of 'Equines Concordiae', a group of pony scholars of sorts, that does indeed receive funding from Equestrian crown after their Queen disappeared that mostly researches anatomy and genealogy. They're also obsessed about improving ponykind by whatever means they can. Even if it means kidnapping civilians, pony or not, according to the rumors and several reports." Councilor Selcor explained.

"So from what I'm hearing, they're basically trying to create a 'master race' variant of ponies, by researching and doing... Very, VERY bad things to non-ponies. And most likely while keeping truth hidden from their financiers, hopefully." Hena inquired, while censoring her speech. After all her cubs were still present.

"We're not certain about the latter. They could be receiving funds from private sources, but yes, that is what most of the town thinks they're trying to do. Unfortunately for us, they're also good at covering their tracks and gaslighting anypony trying to follow any of the given outside leads. At least now we should have some peace from them. That if they actually obey the terms from the riddle."

"Well I did not exactly enforce it magically, but he did have plenty of witnesses to the promise, so I guess we can hope they have some degree of honor to follow the said promise."

"I guess so... Oh and I think the answer to the riddle is Tomorrow."

"Why yes Selcor, it is. Should I grant you blessing of luck or something else perhaps?"

"Well, actually I'd like to make a request for you. Mainly to maybe find anything on barriers and wards that only target specifically minded creatures. I hope it is not too much to ask."

"So in short, you want a barrier to keep out or locate intruding xenophobic ponies, or other creatures, that want or wish to use, or rather abuse, the knowledge here to further their less than moral goals at the cost of others?"

"Something along those lines. Better if it can be modified if needed without being maliciously tampered."

"I'll look for something like that. But for now I think I'll try enjoying time with my family. Still owing my cubs a snack, and you might want to get my mates research crew together for the potential breakthrough in golemancy." Hena promised, as she looked at her family, with cubs being exited for the future snacks and Hermes already making copies of the whole picture of the carvings.
Hopefully the content in it would bring more security for the town as a whole. Fame and recognition would be pretty much given from such an extraordinary development.

But in the back of her mind she crew a bit wary about this group of pony scholars, and the way this Pure Line had commented on her cubs...

Chapter 13 Times enjoyed.

View Online

Chapter 13 Times enjoyed.

"And all of you have all you need with you?"

"Yes mother. Including the extra emergency snacks, all prepared in specific manner each of us personally likes."

"And you are sure their house is safe?"

"Yes mother, and half of them are already dating, while the rest know well the limits of what is okay and what is not. Sheesh mom, you can stop worrying. We're only going to a sleepover with friends, not to some debacherous party leading to a battle to the death or an blood orgy fueled ritual sacrifice to summon something. Or both." Antheia commented to her sphinx mother, after she had confirmed the now sixteen year old sibling quartets preparations for the fifth time.

"I know, but you know that worrying about their children's comings and goings is a full time job for many mothers. And I'm personally starting to think that allowing you to read all those books about the occult rites of old may have been a mistake. And I'm not just saying that because of that one time you four almost summoned something with a glass of raw lemon juice, a gram of... special grass and five packs of square crayons formed in a circle." Hena said back, remembering one mishap her cubs once did.

"Well, we said sorry afterwards. And the summoning was not finished, so whatever was coming did not cross over to this realm of existence. Though it was polite enough to say 'bye', after saying something about 'peek ing orr derr." Hesperus added to the conversation, probably not wanting his sister to be only one to be reminded of their 'little mishaps' by their mother.

"Yes. All of you did apologize. After causing your father several early grey feathers, when he found his then eight year old cubs doing a ritual, while chanting 'all these squares make a circle' over and over again."

Before the conversation could continue further down the mishap-lane, a specific sounding knock came from the lair-door, which Hena soon opened telekinetically, revealing her mate Hermes, who indeed did have a couple of grey feathers on his head.

"Hello everyone. I take you rascals have everything packed by now?"

"Yes father. Mother made us all check four and a half times within the last fifteen minutes." Adlar said, with Yulthi nodding in confirmation with her brothers answer to their father.

"Well then, get going then before she makes you check them fifteen more times, and you have to travel at night." Hermes said with a chuckle, before he and Hena received hug from each of their young, who then proceeded to fly off to Wissen, while they still had some daylight.

"I would not have made check their backs fifteen more times... Ten at most..." Hena admitted, while watching her kids fly with no problem.
"I don't know why, but despite them being already sixteen, sometimes I still feel like it was just yesterday they were just learning to flap their wings to try and jump off my back."

"Maybe it has something to do with your apparent longevity and prolonged youthful peak condition of your body?" Hermes suggested, while setting aside a bag he had brought with him.

"Was that a polite way of joking about my age dear?"

"Well... You did indirectly save me from a life of slavery, when I was still a hatchling sucking on my mamas teat."

"Oh... Right... Indeed you were. Only these days you occasionally suck on mine." Hena commented with a small grin.

"Only when you allow it. Like when kids are asleep or visiting friends."

"Speaking of which, did you bring that set of ropes I asked?"

""Yes. Are you going to give me another 'thorough cleaning'?"

"Actually I was thinking of letting you have a 'free reign' on me, withing reason of course."

"Oh? Feeling extra frisky or just wanting to make most of the time our kids are away?"

"... A bit of both."

Meanwhile at Wissen housing district...

"Full house!" Yulthi called out happily while smacking a set of cards on the table at the friends room, followed by few mild groans of loss. A simple card game with friends, with matches instead of coins to avoid any bad blood. And parents ire...

"Darn, that's like the third win for you in a row. And you did not even use your magic eyes to see things."

"Mother made us all learn to keep it in control after we started seeing odder things. I'm still haunted by the visions of rice rising up in a global rice-revolution and ruling over the world after a blood soaked conflict..."

"Yulthi, calm down. Mom told you seventeen times that it is something that will not come to pass in this reality, after apparently 'making a call to her superiors for the sake of good nights sleep'." Hesperus comforted his now lightly shaking sister. The trauma caused by the visions must have cut deep...

"I know brother, I know... But it still scares me to think how many other weird things are happening in some other realities or dimensions..." Yulthi started to think aloud, but was interrupted by a light smack up her beak by Antheia.

"Don't go down that line of thought sister. You'll just end up puking few buckets worth of vomit, and then all four of us have to hear it from mother again."

"Speaking of you respected mother, what do you think she and your father Hermes are up to right now?" came a question from a griffin youth present at the card game.

"Markus, is this an attempt to get us all in this room on some bet?" Adlar asked with a raised brow.

"Uuhm... Well, yes. Yes it is. Sorry, but my fathers habit seems to have caught on."

"You'r family's weird. And that's coming from us, who has a mom who is a literal guardian beast of sorts."

"Well at least you are only the first generation of so called 'oddness'. 'Aetherwings', right? Dad said his full first name is technically 'Mark XIX', and that the name is taken by the next similarly named descendant down the line when the previous name holder passes on."

"While your full name is 'Markus XV'. But if you want to talk about what is happening back our home... Well I think they're using our absence to have some 'adult-fun'."

"What level of fun?"

"Nooot thinking of that."

Back at the Sphinxs lair...

"HOLY-*********************************!!!"

That was all Hena could scream out as she squirmed on her bed, after nearly fifteen minutes of being teased by Hermes, while being tied up; front legs behind her neck, back legs tied together, followed by the remaining rope tied in a pattern on her body. Meanwhile her griffin mate looked quite satisfied with his work as he licked his beak clean of any sphinx fluids.

"I assume you enjoyed that dear?" Hermes asked as Henas squirming began to slow down and her breathing steadied enough to answer.

"Oh heck yeah I did... And you seem to be quite nice and ready to proceed to the main course. So how about you untie some of these ropes and fricking mount me like you own me? Unless you want me to break out of this bondage and proceed to potentially break your waist..."

"I think I'll just start opening some of the knots. The rope is a loaner."

Back at Wissen again...

"How about we don't think what our parents are doing when we are away, and try another game?" Hesperus suggested, desperately trying to steer the conversation away from their parents potentially having 'adult fun'.

"Sure thing. In fact I have this little idea for a card game that could use some testing." Markus said, sounding excited.

"Oh? Do you have any material of it with you?"

With a big smile, Markus proceeded to dig around his personal bag, finally pulling out sealed box. Inside of it were to sizeable stacks of cards, with a picture of a wooden door in one, and a pile of treasure in the other.

"Now then, allow me go over the rules. They might sound confusing, but hey, all card game-rule have confusing ones at some level. Now to start with..."

"PULL HARDER HONEY!!!"

"You got it dear!... Almost there too! Where do you-?"

"IF YOU EVEN THINK OF PULLING AWAY, YOU'LL SLEEP OUTSIDE!!!"

"Okay, an excellent point... Allrighty honey, I'll-"

"Kick down the door!"

"Okay, draw a card from the door pile again. And no need to yell. Some in the neighborhood might hear you."

"Sorry... Yes! I got and play right away a 'Plant Pot'. With it's defeat I'll reach the winning level, right?"

"Yeah you do. Unless someone has a card to play to mix the encounter up?"

"No..."

"Nah..."

"Nothing useful."

"Actually I have two I'd like to play."

"Okay then, hit it."

"I'll play 'Surprise behind the corner', which allows me to add a monster to any ongoing encounter. Which iiis... 'Irradiated Wyrm'."

"Seriously brother?! Did you hold onto the strongest monster, just to mess my win up?"

"Consider it as payback for ruining my class-species combo during the last round of this game."

"Ugh, point taken. No way I can take that down..."

"That... Was really an amazing effort of endurance from you Hermes darling... And you did not even ask for a recovery spell." Hena said, clearly being more than little out of breath, while petting her mate lovingly as he laid on top of her belly, snuggling against her chest fluff.

"Just wanted to give an extra juicy treatment. And I might have been motivated by your scent. It was quite similar to one that filled my nostrils back when you first got a bit more... Receptive.." Hermes commented back with a smile.

"Oh, is it now?... Think it will take dear? Did you perhaps hope to make me pregnant again? A little wish to see me bearing your cubs once more?"

"Weeell... A bit of all of the above. You had such a nice and kind aura about you during your last pregnancy, that it was easy to forget that your 'job' is to kill and occasionally eat unlucky trespassers failing at your test. Sometimes when they're begging for their lives."

"D'aaaww, how sweet of you to think that. Do you think this one will be multiple or maybe a single birth?"

"I don't care Hena. Even if you pop out half a dozen, I'd love them all no matter what. Even if you would threaten to tear my balls off, and do something violent to them, during delivery for 'doing this to you'."

"Please honey. After pushing out our four mischief making aetherwings, and some hunting injuries, I think I can handle the potential delivery. Perhaps even without threatening to do harm to my darling fluffball."

Six months, give or take day or two, later...

"YOU DID THIS TO ME!!!! I WILL F*CKING CLAW YOUR TESTICLES OFF, AND COOK THEM WITH ROTTEN ONIONS AND CARROTS, AND THEN MAKE YOU EAT THEM!!!! AND THEN MAKE YOU EAT THE RESULTING SH*T!!!!"

"Wow dad... You where not kidding... Mom sure curses a lot when given a reason..." Antheia commented, sounding surprised at the foul language coming from their otherwise properly behaving mother. All of them were currently sitting outside of the sphinxs lair, waiting confirmation from Vesalia that it was safe to enter. Rest of her siblings were still stunned from the sheer volume of the sphinx in labor.
"Was she this loud of threatening when we were born?"

"Oh yes. Only she was using even more directly violent threats in a more colorful language. Some of which still think was not from this dimension." Hermes answered, successfully hiding his nervousness.

"So how did you know they were threats dad?"

"It's all about the tone and intent of words. It's like saying someone 'wants to step, or, sit on you'. Some find it weird, some find it adorable, and some find it arousing."

"Please don't say stuff like that... Its just icky hearing it from a parent..."

Almost half an hour or so later...

"Oi! Hermes! Jobs done, and a mess cleaned. Its safe to go see the result of your fun time. Oh, and hearty congratulations." Vesalia called out to the waiting family, as she exited from the lair doors, carrying a heavy looking bag, filled with various doctor instruments.
"Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to my work-room to check how much damage your wife did to my ears this time."

"I thought you had ear-plugs on, right auntie Vesalia?" Hesperus asked with a tilted head.

"Well kid, apparently your mothers vocal cords become extra, EXTRA potent when pushing out a little one. Plugs just barely made the swearing sound like loud conversation, instead of ear-murder." griffin doctor said back, before taking flight.

With a permission given, all five family members entered to see the new addition to the family, quietly. They noticed Hena laying on her side, very much out of breath, but looking very happily at something. With a glance, she noticed her family approaching.

"Hush now. Our new baby boy just went to sleep after finding a calming spot." sphinx whispered when her family came close enough to see their new family member. A healthy aetherwing cub, tiredly snoozing under its mamas warm chest fluff, hearing her calming heartbeat.

"He looks just so adorable..." Hermes choked out happily, while receiving a little snuggle from Hena. Their kids took their own look their youngest sibling with equally happy smiles.

"I think hes gonna be really potent in magics mom. Somehow I can just see it." Antheia whispered to her parents, as her eyes glowed lightly. Some manner of magical sensing of sort.

"I see. But don't fear that he is going to be a favorite of our family. I will always love all of you, no matter what..." Hena said with a motherly smile.

"Thanks, mother."

"And if anyone tries to hurt any of you, I'll bReAk them..."

"... Thanks?..."