The Lost Element

     “Hello?” The voice that came over the phone line was distorted by distance, but recognisable enough for Nightshade to know which of her squad she was talking to. Unfortunately the one that had answered the phone was practically insane and could never sit still besides, at least not when they were out of a ‘situation’.

     “Hi, Blueball,” Nightshade said, bracing herself for the inevitable.

     “Captain! Whathappened? Whereareyou? Whydidyouleaveusbehind? Didyoufindanythingcool? Starrywasmakingpancakesthismorningandyoumissedthemwhydidyougooutlastnight?”

     Nightshade and Spitfire shared a look and rolled their eyes as they heard the excitable pegasus rattling off questions and comments seemingly without even pausing to take a breath. “Blueball Blitz!” Nightshade snapped after several full minutes of none stop chatter, silencing the pegasus on the other end of the line. “Thank you, now, go get Starry Skies if she’s not already there with you, I need to talk to you both.”

     There was a few minutes where the sound of hushed voices and scrabbling hooves could be heard before the phone was picked up again. “Captain, is that really you? What happened to you?” A new voice asked this one sounding a lot posher and a lot more worried than Blueball’s.

     “It’s a long story, Starry,” Nightshade replied with a sigh. “The short version is I’m currently in Grey Marsh Village with Spitfire after running from that lab we heard rumours about… you two will need help clearing that place, from Star and his group along with whatever Wonderbolts are around.”

     That seemed to get the other pegasus’ attention. “What’s wrong, boss?” Starry Skies asked worriedly. “It’s not like you to want to get everypony together like this.”

     Nightshade swallowed thickly. “I went to that lab, the night before you woke to find me missing.” She explained, “I found that they were researching the supernatural there, earth ponies and pegasi with powers beyond the norm were the least of it. They had…” She trailed off, feeling Spitfire spread her wing across her back. “They had actually captured some ghosts. I-I saw one fill its tank with blood….” She shivered, grimacing, glad that it was Spitfire there and Blueball and Starry listening at the other end of the phone line. She could tolerate blood, if she knew it was coming, or at least likely, such as an injury from practicing or from getting into a fight, but she hated seeing it usually.

     “There’s no such thing as ghosts,” Starry Skies said, her voice sounding as if she were frowning at something, “Is there?” She asked, sounding a little unsure of herself.

     “There is such a thing as ghosts,” Spitfire cut in, shifting slightly to nudge Nightshade with a wing. “But normally you don’t see much of them. Starry, I’ve been ghost hunting for probably ten years or so now, and I’ve got plenty of evidence of ghosts or what people associate with them, but actually capturing them? That’s something else entirely, something well beyond what I want to do.” She frowned, looking over at the scattered group of ponies setting up deliveries or picking up packages. “I’m pretty sure the original Firefly and Medley haunt the Cloudseum somewhere, maybe the Wonderbolt quarters as well since people have seen things in both places… in fact one of my better pictures was a pink shape flying about, and that was back before I joined the Wonderbolts.”

     There was a pause before Starry Skies spoke up. “Pink shape that looks almost like a pegasus pony, blue streaks behind it, almost like the trails our manes and tails sometimes leave and maybe some lightning effect?”

     Spitfire nodded. “I take it that you took a picture or two of our shows over the years as well, Starry.”

     “I think most everypony has at some point or another, Spitfire,” Nightshade said dryly. “Though now that you mention it… I have a picture somewhere, not a pink shape, but a green one. I missed the lead’s performance one year, managed to get a picture later in of the second wing’s performance and I swear there was some green on green shape on the camera, and I know it wasn’t a double exposure or a faulty camera because I took several pictures in succession, but the shape was only on one of them….”

     “That was probably Medley, still with her friend, even after all the years… you know, maybe when we get back, I’ll see if I can head over to the cloudseum some night and see if I can convince one of them to show herself.” Spitfire commented, flexing her wings slightly. “For right now though, Nightshade and I were talking a bit last night, and if these ponies have managed to capture ghosts, or even if they haven’t, they’ve still got things that probably won’t be pleasant and they’re on alert now. That’s why we both think you should get Star and the Wonderbolts’ third squad; they should be in your area right now. The more ponies you’ve got on your side, the better off you’ll be and we probably won’t want them moving in a hurry so you’d best act fairly quickly.”

     “With speed, but without haste,” Starry said solemnly. “We’ll do what we can, just… be careful, okay, Boss?” She asked quietly.

     Nightshade nodded. “We should be okay, Starry, just watch yourself, okay?” Getting an affirmative from her friend, she hung up the phone with a sigh. They had already sent off copies of the documents she had managed to steal, thanks to a unicorn that actually had a dragon around, so now all they needed to do was get in touch with the others, and that was mostly Spitfire’s area. All she could do right now was wait.

*****

     Dropping the case near on the floor by the stairs, Spitfire groaned as she stretched out her back. She had forgotten just how heavy this thing was at times, particularly with everything in it for her ghost hunting, amongst other things. At least it was here now, and that meant she had everything that she was likely to need to show Nightshade just what ghost hunting should be like, along with a few extra bits just to be safe. “Finally…” She muttered, moving to flop onto one of the couches in the room with a sigh, only to feel something really cold in the same area. Frowning as her fur stood on end, she pulled herself out of the spot and unlocked her case, pulling out a camera.

     “Spitfire?” Nightshade started, seeing Spitfire grab a camera from her however-many-gallon suitcase. “What are you doing?”

     Raising the camera and pointing it at the couch she had been lying on, Spitfire took several pictures in quick succession before turning back to Nightshade. “There’s a cold spot right on the couch, I’m warm here, but it’s freezing just on there,” She explained. “So I figured take some pictures while I was there, since cold in certain areas can be an indication of ghosts, providing there are no other possibilities around.” She had been caught out once or twice before by that little ‘trick’.

     Nightshade blinked, looking up at her friend. “You mean this place could be haunted?” She asked, sounding a bit unsure of herself.

     Digging out a small photo printer to the camera, Spitfire frowned as she printed the pictures off and set them on the table in front of Nightshade, each one showing a vague image of a mare sprawled on the couch in various stages of discernible. “I’d say so, Nightshade.” She replied before grunting. “Huh, I never thought to check this place out before, every time I’ve been here, it’s been locked up tight. I guess that’s why.”

     Picking up one of the pictures, Nightshade looked at it before frowning at the couch opposite her. It was certainly odd to think that there might be a ghost sitting less than two pony-lengths from her without doing anything more than making the air cold. “So what do we do now?”

     “Well… I think a full investigation will wait a little while, but when we go to get food, we’ll have to swing by the library and see what they’ve got in terms of history for this place, and I need to check my camera, I don’t want to find that the ‘ghost’ is some sort of double exposure or something.” Spitfire replied, frowning as she looked towards the couch. “If I was doing a full investigation, I’d find out who owns the place and talk to them about permission, then ensure people knew where I was and spend at least a couple of days in the place focusing on the areas we know things have happened—.”

“I… died….”

     “…Here…?” Spitfire trailed off at the sound of a voice. That was two phenomena they had encountered in this building so far, and they had been here less than a day. On a normal night, she was lucky if she got something that sounded remotely like a voice after six hours of taping from three different microphones in different areas of the room she was trying a voice session in. She flicked an ear, scowling at the other couched as Nightshade cringed. “Well, since somepony’s talkative, do you have a name?” She asked, twitching her tail, maybe they would get lucky and the name would point them in the direction of something that would reveal some of this ‘ghost’s’ story, if it was a ghost and not overactive imagination or voices off the street, which was something else she would have to check later.

     Nightshade looked over at Spitfire, the pictures on the table again, this time a lot less neatly. “A-are you sure you should be talking to g-ghosts?” She asked nervously. After her last encounter with a ghost, she wasn’t particularly sure about dealing with more, even though Spitfire seemed pretty calm about the fact there was a possible ghost sitting right opposite them.

     Spitfire shrugged her wings, shifting a little. “So far none of the ones I’ve tried talking to has said anything reasonable, but then they’ve not really been evident either, I’m hoping this is the real thing rather than somepony playing games or us just getting something from nearby, if it responds intelligently, then there’s the possibility that there’s an actual ghost over there and I’m not just jumping at shadows.” Considering how many ponies didn’t believe in spirits, the last thing she wanted was a bunch of sceptics jumping on her for what she was doing. Then again, she had seen a few things over the course of her career, so maybe there would be somepony that would believe things, particularly given the sonic rainboom Rainbow Dash could pull off or Twilight being able to give an Earth Pony or Unicorn the ability to walk on clouds or even wings.

“Patch…” The voice responded, softly enough that both mares had to strain to hear it. “H-lp… m-.” It continued before fading out of existence, leaving both mares blinking, the cold spot fading with the voice.

     “Ooo…kay… I guess we are being haunted here, unless there someone watching something on a TV somewhere that’s leaking through.” Spitfire muttered, sighing. Now she wished she had taken the chance at recording that, maybe with that, there would be enough to pick out where the voice was coming from, and the ability to eliminate some things.

     Nightshade frowned, looking over at her friend. “Why do you keep muttering about things like TVs and mucky cameras, Spitfire?” She asked, raising one eyebrow.

     “Huh? Oh, right, it’s because with ghost investigations there’s so many things that can explain things that you encounter.” Spitfire replied, sitting up and waving at the photographs. “Like those, I know I took them just, but what if there was dirt on the lens, or some dust or my mane in the way? I’ve seen pictures people claimed were ghosts being proven as someone’s hoof or mane, or just plain bad camera work. Voices as well, normally you have to go through hours of tape to find a half-way decent voice clip, and usually they need a lot of clearing up. What we heard here was almost too clear… and cold spots can be caused by a number of things as well, like an open window.” She flicked her tail, taking a moment to resettle her wings. “That’s why when we go to investigate anywhere; we’re going to spend at least two days on a room, full days at that. Getting things both light and dark will help eliminate potentials, plus we need to know where things are… there’s a reason we don’t follow you when you pull off that darkness trick.”

     Nodding, Nightshade lowered her head to look at the pictures again. “You can’t see me through it, and the night always scares ponies, because of what might be hiding in the dark. Princess Luna told me, despite everything she did; it was that fear that made ponies huddle close during her nights.”

     Spitfire nodded, nudging Nightshade with a wing. “True, but it was the beauty of them that gave us the dreams that get us to places we go, even today.” She pointed out, nudging the other mare again. “And right now, we probably ought to see what we can do for food.”

*****

     Libraries weren’t her, at least that was always the image she tried to make everypony believe, but walking down the aisles between shelves full of books, most sets reaching all the way up to the ceiling; she had to admit that there was something overwhelming about being in the presence of so much knowledge and so many tales. Granted this place was absolutely tiny compared to some libraries, such as the one in Canterlot or those in Fillydelphia or Manehatten, or even Ponyville, but it was still huge.

     “So what are we looking for here?” Nightshade asked as they walked through the library, her golden eyes scanning the titles of the books nearest the two Pegasi.

     Spitfire shifted her saddlebags slightly, frowning as several things bounced together. “Hopefully something that’ll tell us a bit about the harbour cottage or about ‘Patch’, if that is a ghost and that is its name; I’d like to know more about what we’re sharing the place with and what happened in her life that might have ended up with her stuck there.” She flicked her tail against Nightshade’s side as they turned into an area that seemed to be about the town’s history rather than the area’s. “One of the rules of ghost hunting, make good friends with librarians or museum curators, since they’re likely to be your first port of call if you find something interesting on a hunt, particularly as you’ll probably end up visiting them a lot to find out bits about the places you go or the ponies that lived or more appropriately died in them.”

     Nightshade arched an eyebrow at her companion. “That’s an actual rule?” She asked, not entirely sure why anypony would want to research ponies that had died somewhere, it sounded more than a little gruesome to her. Of course, she still had the occasional nightmare about the accident that had ended her first performance, though fortunately the family had made a full recovery.

     “Uh huh,” Spitfire nodded, looking through the books before pulling one out with a hoof and carrying it over to a table in her mouth. Setting it down, she turned to look at Nightshade again. “Well, it is if you work with me anyway.” She said, running a hoof through her mane. “There aren’t any real official rules for ghost hunting that I know of, but then it’s considered pseudo-science at best by most ponies,” It annoyed her sometimes that there wasn’t more official study into the phenomena related to ghostly encounters, but then, how would somepony really measure or test something that relied all too much on luck? “For myself, if I’m doing an investigation, I always try to have access to as much as I can get in terms of information on the place, its history, its ponies and particularly its ghosts. Witnesses to things certainly help a lot as well, since they can give you a run down on things that they’ve experienced.”

     Frowning as she moved to sit next to Spitfire, Nightshade grunted. “Huh, I didn’t realise there was so much to something like this.”

     Flipping the book open and scanning the pages, Spitfire nodded. “I’ve talked to some others when I was starting up my own investigations, most of them just work at night and tend to focus on the history of a place, or only use one voice recorder or camera in a room. I’ve found I get better results with looking at not just the history but also the ponies and the haunting patterns. Knowing what happens where and what sort of ponies were around when can help you narrow down likely reasons for things happening and having multiple cameras and recorders means you can sort of figure out where things came from since a lot of the time if you do get a voice, it’s not something you hear without mucking with the recording to dig it out. Not like the one we got earlier, that was one hay of a class A EVP… I’ve never had one that clear before, which, as I said earlier, bugs me because it might not be a ghost’s voice.” Granted she couldn’t say for certain that any of her however many hundred recorded voices were actually from ghosts or were something seeping into things from elsewhere, but that one at the cottage took the cake.

     “What’s a ‘class A EVP’ when it’s at home?” Nightshade asked, shifting slightly. She was beginning to feel like she had been swept up in a hurricane without even a warning that one was around. Things were coming at her too fast to process and they were coming from every which way, she really wanted to get things back to normal or at least as close to normal as her life ever got, as soon as possible.

     “It’s… not easy to explain things to do with ghost hunting, but the most common things that attract attention and make ponies believe a place is haunted are strange smells, strange sights, strange feelings and strange noises.” Spitfire explained, finally finding a page on the cottage the pair of them were staying at. “From what I’ve found, smells tend to be dodgy plumbing or trapped gases from somewhere… maybe even the pony’s own body.” She looked over at Nightshade. “Remember Greyfeather, the rookie that joined around the same time you did?” She asked, bringing up memories of Nightshade’s own time in the Wonderbolts.

     Nightshade nodded, shifting slightly. “Yeah, he was the colt that always smelled as if he had just been burned, despite how much he washed.”

     Spitfire snorted softly. “He hadn’t been burned, it was his cooking. He spent so much time around open fires that the scent of wood smoke got ingrained into his skin, but that wasn’t the thing I was talking about. A few times he would complain about smelling something spicy, even when there was nothing there, but it was always in the same place and at the same time.” She flicked her tail and grinned. “I tracked it down one day, got him to show me where he was when he caught the smell an hour before he would normally smell it, then I got some building plans and… well, it turned out to be the chefs across the street always had a spicy meal for their special on that day every week, it drifted in through some pipe work and came out where Greyfeather liked to lounge while he was studying things.”

     “You’re serious?” Nightshade asked, her eyes widening slightly for a moment before she clamped her mouth shut, trying to stem the laughter that threatened. Greyfeather had always been so spooked by that strange smell, but to learn — several years after he had flown off somewhere — that it had been something as mundane as cooking had her wanting to crack up right there in the library. When Spitfire nodded, she snorted in laughter before falling over onto her back, trying to keep from laughing out loud.

     Grinning, Spitfire read through the information on the cottage, frowning at the fact that somepony named Patch had apparently been the second owner. It was a link, though to what was up for debate since there was little mention of whom or what Patch had been to the community. “Well,” She said as Nightshade got herself under control, “It looks like ‘Patch’ might be somepony to investigate further given she was supposed to have been an owner of the place we’re staying.”

     Rolling back to her hooves, Nightshade arched an eyebrow, “Oh?” She asked, looking over. “And what about those other things you mentioned?”

     Nodding, Spitfire shifted the book around and pointed out the section to Nightshade. “Read from there, Night,” She said, smiling slightly. “And as for the rest… well, feelings would be things like I felt in the cottage, cold in only one area, or being watched, stuff like that. Those can be natural as well, just like the smells it’s no guarantee of something out of the ordinary happening. Sights… well, far too many see things at night, I prefer moving around in the day when I can see better, and it means most of my pictures are more readily identifiable as something. The last one is sounds, usually creaking floors,” She rolled her eyes and spread her wings. “You would not believe how many creaks some older buildings have, particularly those built out of wood. Plumbing is also a good source of odd noises, then there’s voices, usually below pony hearing, but sometimes they’re right there where you can hear it, like ‘Patch’s’ earlier. Usually though, you have to dig them out of background noise or really hunt for them so there’s classes depending on how easy they are to find when they’re recorded, A being the easiest to find, C being the hardest.”

     Flicking her ear, Nightshade frowned at the book in front of her. It really sounded like Spitfire knew her stuff on this… just like she had known her stuff on stunt flying in a group and leading, maybe she should have listened to her earlier where that was concerned, maybe then she wouldn’t have ended up being stuck in a cage for days with a collar around her neck. She shivered absently at the memory, shifting her wings briefly as she read what little there was on Patch, a yellow Earth pony with a pink mane, a mare that had bought the cottage some twenty years ago and died there, nothing about how or why. Her scowl deepened, all too often now in what she ended up mixed up in something like that left a bad taste in her mouth because somepony was covering something up. “Well, I don’t know about the voice at the moment, Fire, but I don’t like the fact there’s virtually nothing about this mare here and it was only twenty years ago… something doesn’t feel right about it.” Nightshade said, looking up at her friend, “Somepony ought to have written something.”

     “They probably have,” Spitfire agreed, flicking her tail out as she stood up and stretched her wings carefully. “But they probably haven’t put them in an area we are supposed to go. It’s something we’ll have to investigate when we get to that point.”

*****

     Back in the cottage, Nightshade flapped up to a high shelf, carefully placing a sack of grain on it, hopefully well out of the reach of any rodents that might have taken up residence in the building. After the time in the library, they had found little enough about the cottage they were living in for the next few weeks, though they had managed to get enough food to last the pair of them a week, and with the documents in the Princesses’ hooves, she felt a lot better about what was likely to happen in Manehatten.

     Even so, she couldn’t help wondering what was going to happen to her team, she had met Stratus first of the eight of them, after being released from prison on the Princess’ orders, then the group had been called together and both they and the Wonderbolts had been put through some serious exercises, ones even more intense than when she had originally joined the Wonderbolts. Even so, their first mission had been a near disaster… she had lost three of her ponies and the rest had been injured to one degree or another. Starry Skies had been lucky they had managed to get her and her wing to a hospital with a unicorn doctor while Shadow had lost a leg, damn good thing that had been magic’d back into place as well.

     Hovering back down, Nightshade settled on the floor, folding her wings against her sides as she looked up at the shelves. Here she was in somepony else’s home, where they had lived and possibly died… it felt strange now, thinking about things, even if death was no longer a stranger to her. Of course there was still the issue about what happened after death.

     Making her way back to the main room, she blinked, finding a small computer — smaller than the ones she was used to seeing at least, but then she had never been a big fan of technology before becoming a Shadowbolt — on the table along with several strange looking boxes of different types, “Spitfire?” She called, looking around for a moment before looking up to see the other Pegasus hovering near a corner, adjusting another box in it. “What are you doing now?”

     “Setting up,” Spitfire replied over her shoulder before hovering down and tapping a few commands into the machine with her hooves — good thing buttons were made big in Equestria. “Basically, this is what I tend to do when I’m investigating things, I’ll take a day or two to set up cameras that can see at night and in the day where they have good views…” She trailed off, sticking her tongue out the corner of her mouth as she adjusted a few things. “Then I spend at least the same time both day and night just seeing what goes on, preferably when things are just being normal so I can get a sense of what ‘normal’ for a given location is.” She pointed out, waving a wing at Nightshade. “Since we’re living here and we might have a ghost as well, I figured set up one set of cameras and recorders here to see what happens while we’re around and while we’re out,” She grinned at Nightshade. “And I’ve got another set we can use to check out anywhere we think might be interesting.” She continued before flopping in a chair and closing the program.

     Moving to take a seat next to Spitfire, Nightshade looked at the computer. “How’d you get one of those that size, Spitfire?”

     “This?” Spitfire asked, nodding to the machine. “It’s actually one of maybe half a dozen prototypes, the scientists love using computers, but the ones they use are too big for too little power, so this is one of the first run of machines designed to take that load on a smaller rig… I still couldn’t carry it around with me all day though since it’s small, but it’s still pretty heavy for its size.” She flicked her tail. “On the other hand, everything is included in its frame and it’s got some of the best tech we’ve got… along with a few custom bits,” Spitfire smirked at the last. “They’re still debating what to call it, since cabinet and desktop are already taken and this thing still takes a good amount of a table.”

     Nightshade frowned, shifting slightly as she looked at the machine in front of her. “I think I’ll ask Starry and Charger about getting hold of one when we get back, or Stratus since he’s still got guard contacts and they’re likely to want a test machine.” She shifted slightly. “It’d make a few things much easier and considering how much we move around it’d be better than one of those desktop machines.”

     “Don’t tell me if you’re planning anything illegal, I’m supposed to be trying to capture you, remember?” Spitfire asked, nudging Nightshade with her wing. “I can’t get involved if your group do illegal things.”

     Snorting, Nightshade looked over at her friend. “Like you weren’t involved in that bank job a month ago, Fire?” She asked dryly. “I seem to remember you being the one to ‘kill’ that one pony in the guard… who was it playing the guard anyway? Soarin’? Oakleaf? One of the others?”

     Spitfire rolled her eyes. “You know as well as I do that it was ‘Foehn’ that killed the guard, not Spitfire.” She replied, referring to the leader of the third trio of Shadowbolts. Though it was Soarin’ that played him,” She admitted, looking over at Nightshade. ”Though… why did you rob that bank anyway? I wasn’t there for most of that case, I just happened to be around when the heist was happening.”

     “Mostly because we needed to, not for money, Starry has plenty and I’ve no idea how much the guys have put away over their careers, particularly Shadow. Of course that’s without what we get paid by Luna and by our ‘employers’.” Nightshade replied, sighing. “We needed to prove we could get away with a big heist in order to get in with this crime lord in Filly, fortunately you and Soarin’ were there, though I didn’t know you two would do that.” She said, poking Spitfire. “You were always insistent on keeping your colleagues in the loop when you planned something and you didn’t inform me.”

     “It was rather spur of the moment for us as well, Soarin’ was there for another reason and I didn’t know until he caught me.” Spitfire responded, “It wasn’t even supposed to be a scuffle, but one of the guards nearly caught me while we were involved in the heist itself, so Soarin’ switched places with him to avoid him doing anything stupid and we ended up in a firefight….” She shrugged her wings as Nightshade nodded. “Once we were out and safe, I went to find him and found out he was playing up his wound a lot more than it was.”

     Nightshade nodded, flicking her tail. “I’m glad he was safe, I hate getting into fights like that, where everypony else starts trying to kill ponies.”

     Nodding, Spitfire nosed her gently. “I know, Night, I know. C’mon, let’s take our minds off the past, I’ll show you what Spectre Master is about,” She grinned at her friend as she reached over to load the game. “Maybe you’ll enjoy things being the one to set up the scares rather than the one scared.” She added as the haunting music came on.

*****

     Spitfire watched as Nightshade ran through the second level of Spectre Master on her own. The other pony still flinched every time one of the spectres activated one of their abilities to scare the ponies in the game, but she was at least watching what was happening now that she knew it wasn’t real. The yellow Pegasus frowned slightly, shifting a little on the couch. Had Nightshade always been this easy to scare? No, not that she could remember… which meant she was probably still a bit jumpy from when she had gone into that lab a couple of days ago.

     Shifting in her seat, she rolled slightly to lean against Nightshade, who grunted in surprise, getting distracted for a moment and letting the spectres use their powers for a little longer than necessary to send a required character fleeing from the map. Hearing the sound of the mission failing, Spitfire chuckled and yelped as Nightshade nipped her ear. “Ow! What was that for?” She muttered, sitting up to rub her ear.

     “Distracting me right when I needed to concentrate,” Nightshade replied, looking over at Spitfire. “You just cost me that mission, Spitfire.”

     Spitfire snorted softly, shaking her head. “It’s a game, Nightshade, you can go back and redo things as often as you want, heck you’re supposed to go back and retry to get better scores or free spectres you didn’t manage to get before.” She pointed out, leaning back into Nightshade. “Besides, this way I can see what’s going on a bit better.” She added, flicking her tail. “I’ve played this game a lot, so I know most of the pitfalls you’re likely to encounter and this’ll let me keep an eye on the monitors a bit better.”

     Nightshade shifted, trying to adjust herself to the feel of Spitfire’s weight against her side. “This is to pay me back for last night as well, isn’t it?” She asked, sighing as she restarted the mission she had just lost. She felt more than heard Spitfire’s chuckle as she listened to the briefing again. It probably wasn’t healthy, particularly given how well most of the night and day guard got along with their opposite numbers, but she couldn’t help feeling a little warmer than normal with Spitfire leaning against her as opposed to one of the mares in her own unit.

     Maybe this forced vacation wouldn’t be a waste after all.