“Come along, Ruby,” her mother called.
The filly came running with something in her mouth. “Look wah I foun in da bushesh!” she exclaimed.
Seeing the confused look her parents gave her, Ruby spit out her new treasure and repeated, “Look what I found in the bushes!”
“It’s lovely,” her father said, “but what is it?”
“Don’t know,” Ruby frowned. “Can I keep it?”
Her parents exchanged hesitant looks, but eventually nodded and turned to pick up their saddlebags. Ruby looked down at the thing she had found off the road. It gleamed in the sunlight that came through the forest leaves above. She focused on it, hard. Immediately a whitish-blue glow surrounded it, but the object wouldn’t move. With a surge of effort, Ruby managed to lift it and slide it into her saddlebag on her back. She puffed out her chest proudly. Her parents had said that she was getting much better at controling her magic, and she practiced it every chance she got.
Next Ruby found her baby armadillo and lifted him onto her back. He was a fairly new addition to the family, but Ruby had already become very attached to him.
She had been born in the south, though she couldn’t remember what city. Her parents travelled a lot, so it wasn’t that big of a deal to her where they were. But a few months ago her parents had decided it was time to settle down. Together with Ruby, they chose to go to a city on the east coast, Baltimare. Although the filly was excited to have a permanent home, she wanted to remember where she came from. It was then that they found the armadillo, wandering the desert without a mother. It was actually her father’s idea to take the little baby in and keep him as a companion, but he seemed to like Ruby the best. She still couldn’t think of a name for him. Everything they thought of just didn’t seem right.
As usual, the filly spent the day walking between her parents and blurting out names, trying to see if one would stick. By the time the moon replaced the sun in the sky, all three of the ponies were exhausted.
“At this rate, you might just get your cutie mark for thinking up names,” Ruby’s father commented.
The filly’s smile faded as she glanced back at her flank, still just a solid purple like the rest of her coat. What would a cutie mark for that even look like?
They set up a fire and settled down a short ways from the path they were traveling on. Ruby was thankful that they stopped at night. Because her legs were so much shorter than her parents’, she had a hard time keeping up. Sometimes she wished that they had just taken the train to Baltimare, but her parents thought that going their own way would be more fun. And they were right. Ruby knew that taking the train may have been less tiring, but it also would have been boring. Besides, if they had taken the train, they never would have found the little armadillo that cuddled into her side as she laid down next to the little fire.
After a dinner of nuts and wildflowers, the family said good night and put the fire out. While her parents went to sleep, though, Ruby stayed up. Once the two of them were in a deep slumber, she pulled that strange, shimmering object from her saddlebag. Using her magic as best she could, the filly turned the thing over and over in the air, looking for clues as to what it was she had found.
It reflected the moonlight brightly, even though very little of the light made it through the leaves above. It was also somewhat flat and felt…different. There was no other work Ruby could think of to describe it. The deep red color reminded her of roses. No, not roses…the thing looked like an opaque ruby. She giggled quietly at the irony, but she was almost certain it wasn’t a gem. The baby armadillo shifted next to her.
“What do you think?” she asked him softly.
She lowered the object to his level and he sniffed it curiously, then seemed to shrug and look up at her. Ruby sighed and decided to let the matter go for the night. She would need as much rest as she could get if she wanted to make it through this trip. Her treasure drifted down to the ground, and the world slowly faded to black as she felt the armadillo snuggle up next to her.
Finally they were nearly out of the forest. When they’d first entered, Ruby was ecstatic because she had never seen a real forest before. She had grown up in the desert, after all. But now, after days of walking along their little path, the trees felt overbearing. The filly wanted nothing more than to see the open sky again. Thankfully, her parents said they should be free of the forest by tomorrow afternoon.
During their time in the woods, Ruby had found even more little treasures and interesting things that her parents couldn’t explain. She found more of those shinny things and even several bones. Her father had said they looked like teeth, but they were so much bigger than her own. Ruby wondered what kind of creature could have teeth that size. Some of the things her parents didn’t want her to pick up, but she snuck them into her saddlebags while they weren’t looking. Every night she would pull out what she found and observe them with her armadillo, who still didn’t have a name.
“Alright, little guy,” Ruby whispered when her parents were finally asleep. “Let’s see what we got.”
She took all her little artifacts and laid them out in front of her. The armadillo waddled to her side. One by one, Ruby picked up each object with her magic and turned it around, carefully inspecting it. She had found three more shiny things, one blue and two a dark green. All four of them shimmered and glistened, and she was sure that they weren’t gems. She noticed that the one she was looking at had a small crack in it. Immediately she pulled out her little notebook and updated the picture she’d drawn of it, then flipped to look at all the others to make sure they were still accurate. Definitely not gems or anything like that. Something…organic. Ruby remembered her father using the word a few times. She was pretty sure that was the right word for what she was thinking.
The armadillo jumped up and made a small gurgley noise.
“Wh-what is it?” Ruby asked him, startled by his sudden excitement.
He started jumping up and down, nose pointed at the sky. Before the filly could grab him, he ran off into the night, making small squeaking noises. Ruby quickly put the things in her saddlebag and ran after him, pushing through low branches and shrubs. Finally she found him, waiting for her to catch up. When she caught her breath, he led her up a small hill where the trees thinned out. She followed his eyes to the sky, and saw dozens of shooting stars flashing across the navy blue. The armadillo jumped onto her back and climbed into her blue and pink mane, watching the spectacle from her head.
“Wow!” Ruby gasped. The site was truly beautiful.
But then the filly noticed something out of place. A large, looming shadow blocking out parts of the sky. It got bigger and bigger, passing quickly overhead. As she watched it, the fur on her neck seemed to stand on end. The baby armadillo shrunk back, clinging to her mane. The shadow, now so big that it blocked out most of the sky, disappeared behind the trees. Then she felt the ground rumble beneath her.
Without thinking, she followed the shadow. She dashed through the trees after it, barely paying attention to where she was going. Something seemed strange. It was like static electricity was filling the air around her. The muscles in her legs ached to run even faster, but they were too short. Suddenly the trees broke and before her was an enormous cave. She skidded to a halt, unsure of what to do. The baby armadillo, still clinging to her mane, was shaking a little. He didn’t like this. But she had to know. Something was pushing her onward, into the cave, drawing her in. She couldn’t resist.
As she entered, the darkness of the cave engulfed Ruby and her armadillo. Barely any moonlight made it in more than a few feet, but she pressed on. Something caught the dim, fading light, and glinted in the filly’s eyes. She stepped forward, but ran into something. As she reached out her hoof to touch it, the thing seemed to move.
Then Ruby was staring straight into a giant eye. It blinked once, then the massive pupil narrowed into a black slit surrounded by gold. The filly backed away, mouth gaping open, emotions flashing through her. This was immensely dangerous, and yet she didn’t really want to run. But she did. As curious as she was, she was terrified. Her little legs carried her to the entrance of the cave, only to find that it was blocked.
A massive green lizard was sprawled out across the entrance, waiting for her with claws out and teeth bared. Behind it, she saw great bat-like wings open, making the thing seem even bigger. Behind her, the monster from the cave emerged, its skin shimmering a deep red. Yet another one appeared, looking down at her from on top of the cave entrance, only that one was as blue as the night sky beyond it. They all glared down at her, a deep rumble coming from each of them.
Ruby saw her armadillo drop to the ground and roll into a tight ball, protected by his armor. Shaking uncontrollably, the filly tried to do the same.
“YOU DARE TO TRY AND STEAL OUR GEMS!?” a deep, booming voice asked.
“N-n-no,” Ruby whimpered weakly. “I d-d-didn’t even know there were gems. I just wanted to see what that…that thing was.”
There was a long pause. The rumbling died down and eventually the only sound was that of the crickets in the distance. Ruby built up enough courage to lift her head to look at the monsters she had discovered. They didn’t look quite as scary now. They didn’t seem as angry and dangerous. Hesitating, the filly slowly stood up on her shaking legs and looked up at the three beasts in awe. They didn’t look like monsters now, but something completely different. Something amazing and mysterious.
“What are you?” she asked quietly.
“WE ARE DRAGONS,” the green one boomed. The sound was deep and loud to Ruby, but it seemed like the thing…the dragon…was talking normally.
“But why are you here?” she asked.
“THIS IS OUR CAVE,” the red one answered behind her. “WE COME HERE TO REST AND STORE OUR TREASURES. WHY ARE YOU HERE?”
“I…I’m exploring!” Ruby declared, puffing out her chest proudly.
“A BRAVE LITTLE PONY TO EXPLORE WHERE DRAGONS ROAM,” the green one observed. “AND THIS ONE HAS ONLY JUST GOTTEN ITS MARK.”
He seemed to be talking to the other dragons. Then Ruby realized what it had said.
“Mark…?” she breathed.
Wheeling around to look at her flank, the filly found something new. Something she had been waiting a long time to see. Her cutie mark had finally appeared! She couldn’t get a clear view of what it was, but it was there! She started bouncing up and down, giggling happily. Then she remembered the dragons and stopped herself. The three of them were looking down at her, as if amused by her excitement. Suddenly the armadillo came out of his ball and made an angry sound at the dragons around them.
The blue dragon let out a laugh that rumbled through the earth. “PROTECTIVE, THAT LITTLE THING IS,” he said. “SHARP AS A DRAGON’S FANG, I’M SURE.”
“It’s okay,” Ruby told the armadillo, picking him up and putting him on her back. “They’re nice dragons.”
He stopped growling, but remained tense on her back.
“Well, we should be going,” the filly told the dragons. “My parents will be worried if they wake up and I’m not there. Sorry if it seemed like I wanted to steal from you guys. I would never do something like that.”
“A WORD OF WARNING,” the red dragon said. He got down on all fours, coming close to Ruby and lowering his voice a little. For a second, he seemed to glance at her cutie mark. “NOT ALL DRAGONS ARE ‘NICE’ LIKE US. MANY DO NOT TOLERATE PONIES. MANY WOULD RATHER SIMPLY ATTACK THAN LEARN YOUR MOTIVES. YOU MUST BE CAUTIOUS AROUND OUR KIND, LITTLE PONY.”
Ruby nodded in understanding, then thanked the dragons and ran off to find her parents. It took a while, but she managed to get to their small campsite before dawn. Just as she was about to settle down and get a little rest, her parents stirred and started to wake up. With a tired sigh, the filly instead got up herself, deciding there was no point in trying to sleep now.
Once her parents were fully awake, her mother let out a loud gasp. The sound startled Ruby and made her jump.
“Your cutie mark! It’s here!” her mother squealed.
“Oh…yeah,” she said, a little embarrassed by her mother’s enthusiasm.
“And it’s quite an interesting one,” her father said as he looked at it. He searched through their bags for a second, then stepped up to Ruby with a mirror.
She stared at him blankly for a second, a little confused. Then she saw it. Her cutie mark reflected in the mirror so she could see it clearly. A small image of a magnifying glass with some black shape in it, a silhouette of some kind. A silhouette of a dragon.
Later on, a ways down the path, Ruby pulled out several of the things she’d found in the forest. One was blue and one was red, but they both shimmered in the morning light. They were scales, she realized. Great big dragon scales. When her parents asked her how she’d gotten her mark, she told them what happened, but tried to leave out some of the scarier parts. They scolded her a little for going off by herself, but didn’t seem all that mad. Talking about what she’d seen made her think about what the dragons had said. The warning made a little more sense now that she knew what her cutie mark actually was. Then she remembered something else.
“Fang!” she exclaimed.
Her parents looked back at her, confused by her sudden outburst.
“That’s what I’ll call him!” she said, glancing back at the baby armadillo.
He climbed up onto her head and seemed happy by his new name.
“Fang,” her mother repeated softly. “Somehow, it seems fitting.”
Her father chuckled as, finally, the trees thinned out and ceased. They emerged on a tall hill that reminded Ruby of the shooting stars she’d seen the night before. Down below they had a clear view of a sprawling city. Baltimare.
