Etiamsi Omnes, Ego Non- The Avatars

The nations of the world had shuddered under the brutal assault of the fascist northmen. There had been no warning after the corrupted parasitization of the Crystal Empire, only a war of lightning-quickness. The northmen had called it a lyn-krig, and used the brutality and speed, as well as their new god-king's strange and unfathomable power, to overawe Equestria, in almost no time at all, which was strange to many.

From there the lyn-krig continued, in order to catch other nations as unawares as possible. The first to fall was the Diamond Dog nation, fracturing it in two, between collaborators and resistance fighters, with the bulk of professionals leaving with the exiled government. The next to fall was the Grand Veldt, the zebras not so much surrendering as passing an unenforceable resolution to remain free as the bulk of their ministers fled. Those who stayed behind became another puppet government, paying Danegeld to the northmen in the form of flesh and treasure.

The lightning speed blunted on two fronts after that. The Aegeman Sea to the south was overrun, if not strictly conquered. The queen lived, as did her mother-in-law, and led what remained of the government, but King Minos and the army of Concrete fell in a bloody slaughter that handed the northmen a Pyrrhic victory, which was compounded by the need to conquer each island and city-state in the sphere of Concretan influence. The capitulation came, but not easily, and the region never settled well into a conquered territory.

The other blunting force was the iron resolve of the Griffin Kingdom. Though faced with turncoat dukes that ceded their territory in theory, the High King asserted his ownership of all Kingdom land, emphasizing the ducal position as managers of holdings. Though an insurgency sprang up under the leadership of the crown Prince, who had been promised a viceregal position of the intended puppet state, the counterinsurgency was unbending. The Black-Verreaux Maquis held the mountains leading to the capital eyrie of Tara, while elite guard units whipped the combined northmen/traitor force into a halt, pushing them back to hardpoints when the bulk of the northmen's forces were pulled back. The fight remained a stalemate, and would until one side could get an unambiguous boost of hard support, or the situation changed drastically in terms of supply.

The outlier was the great prairie and badlands. Though some pony settlements like Dodge Junction and Appleoosa were near it the location was never an important site. The buffalo had been invaded, and those who were caught were brainwashed or enslaved, but they also fought back. Death was heavy on both sides. But there was no single nation to claim victory or defeat. When the caribou pulled out to deal with other issues, the tribes realized that they were not safe, only ignored.

The remaining heads of the tribal bands combined their numbers in a grand treaty of mutual support and protection. They called their organization the Federated Tribes, and, as much as possible, vanished into their homeland. Villages were hidden, trained warriors protected, professional buffalo sheltered and used to the fullest extent. They fully sided with the rebels, but concentrated mostly on hiding and keeping themselves safe.

The hidden settlements were often disguised as large mounds, joined stones covered in dirt and sod, like hidden versions of the ancient stone settlements long abandoned by the buffalo. They were worlds of twilight, the sun filtered and diffused to protect the openings from aerial patrols. They farmed carefully, focusing on fungi like the Diamond Dogs, and the wild gourds and legumes which could be harvested without notice.

Traditions like stampeding were reduced, or set aside, depending on freedom. The challenges of trying to maintain peace and the population left some areas poorly served. Limited resources were stretched very thin. One of the most important elements in high demand was doctors, either shaman healers or Equestrian-trained medical professionals from before the fall.

Inside one of the hidden mound-villages, three figures occupied a small, shadowy room. Cloth pads were on the floor, all of them unoccupied save for one. A chestnut-brown male buffalo calf lowed miserably, slowly writhing on the pad while grabbing at his stomach. Standing away from him, and sobbing, was his mother. The light brown cow looked on with concern and watched the third figure, who was kneeling beside the calf. She was another buffalo cow, milk white and wearing a torn, off-white lab coat over a set of dingy green scrubs.

“Shh, please, child. I am trying to listen...” The doctor said, softly but firmly. She ran a stethoscope over the calf's chest and belly.

“D-doctor Ironwood... can you help him? Does he... will he need surgery?” The mother asked, voice thick with concern.

“I will know shortly...” Dr. Ironwood said flatly, concentrating on what she was hearing. After a moment she pulled the stethoscope away and reached into a bag settled near her. “The shaman can do more for him later but for right now, I can give him this...” She pulled a small bottle from the bag and popped it open, pouring a pale blue liquid into the calf's mouth.

“Wh-what is it? What's wrong with him?” The mother asked.

“Your fungi are of good quality but some of them were mingled with a lichen that causes such cramps and bloating. This will calm the stomach and allow it to pass. The shaman will do after-care,” Ironwood said calmly, sealing the bottle and placing it back in her bag.

The calf lowed and trembled for a bit longer, calming down a short time later, still looking pained but not as much. “Doctor Ironwood...”

“Yes, child, are you still experiencing sharp pains or are they dull?” Ironwood asked, leaning down to peer closely at the calf.

The calf quickly wrapped Ironwood in a tight, powerful embrace. “Thank you! You saved me!”

“There was no danger,” Ironwood said, in a flat tone with a small note of surprise. “I merely accelerated the outcome.”

“You helped me. Thank you so much! I wish you were the tribe's doctor,” the calf said, happily.

“Yes, that would be good,” the mother added. “Maybe Standing Boulder would take better care of himself.”

Ironwood winced, just slightly, her mind casting back to her time with the tribe. The first day she had been there she had sewn up a nasty wound caused by a harvesting accident. Immediately after it was a fever she brought down. She had set three broken legs, two broken arms and poulticed a dozen broken horns. She'd treated five respiratory infections, six infected throats, an eye wound, an intestinal parasite, and performed one surgery to remove inflamed tonsils.

She had treated illnesses and injuries. Not patients. Illnesses and injuries. The bodies, faces, voices and names were unknown. She saw only the wounds and sickness. That was good. All her focus, skill, knowledge and power could go to them. She had never asked, and she had never bothered to hear.

But time had passed. She had been seeing the dim gray outlines around the sickness and injury. She had been taking note of details and personality. She could feel them growing 'selves' beyond the things she treated.

“Standing Boulder,” Ironwood repeated, looking down and seeing the smiling calf, really seeing him.

An hour later the whole tribe was gathered around at one of the entrances to the hidden village, the burly chief regarding Ironwood with a mix of sadness and confusion. “Doctor Ironwood... I don't understand...”

“What confusion is there, Chief Thunderhead?” Ironwood asked, standing proud and looking the chief in the eyes.

“You have been with my tribe for a long time, or so it seems,” Thunderhead said. “You have healed our hurts, and made us better. I thought... that you would stay and become part of this tribe.”

A small wince cracked Ironwood's rigid and serious features, and her body twitched, reacting like a small punch in the gut. “This is my lot, Chief Thunderhead. Surely you understand that.”

“I don't... what are you talking about?” Thunderhead asked.

“You have a shaman here, a healer who will sustain you in the main. I am a trained doctor, from the time before. I am needed in other tribes. So I must wander to another tribe, to give my skills to them,” Ironwood explained, turning away from the tribe. She could see their sadness. And their identities.

Thunderhead looked aside, and slowly nodded. “You're right, Doctor Ironwood. It was selfish to think you would stay here forever. Other tribes do need you. What you do is important.”

“I thank you for your understanding. And your hospitality,” Ironwood said, slowly setting forth on an ill-defined path from the village.

“Your bounteous and benevolent actions will never be forgotten!” Thunderhead bellowed cheerfully. “Everyone celebrate and honor her!”

Thunderous stomps, applause and cheers erupted from the gathered tribe. Ironwood turned to offer a smile to them as she walked. It was a tiny smile, strained across her stern and stoic features. She looked back and intended to see only healed hurts. She saw all that, and a shadow of the calf Standing Boulder.

She turned away with a moue of distaste and tried to measure her steps, to take her away steadily and rapidly.

In the time before the fall, the happy time, the blissful time, Equestria was more than welcoming. They accepted those from the nations and territories around them, as travelers, as immigrants, or as students. In educating others they increased the greatness of all, and made themselves look more wonderful, prestige growing with each graduate.

Equestrian institutions were well versed in the standards of education in other nations and had complex charts and formulae to calculate the exact equivalent between a foreign student and an Equestrian student, in terms of total knowledge and the 'quality' of the education. As different species had, necessarily, different traditions of working with the many kinds of magic, there was often a lot of calculating how to count such courses, where applicable.

Though medicine used a great deal of magic for many things, the anatomy and physiology were independent of any magical issues. The Royal Canterlot University College of Medicine, Dentistry and Chiurgery was the finest in the principality, and thus the world. They offered substantial subsidies for all classes of students, to ensure a ready supply of doctors trained in all the proper techniques.

Foreign students waited eagerly, and gladly, on lists because they were never rejected, only made to wait. Once approved to attend they only had to await a spot. Even though they were intent on taking all their medical knowledge back to their nations, that was never a concern. The greater good was always in Equestria's thoughts.

Ironwood was one of the first buffalo to attend the University, for that purpose. Most had entered the College of Physical and Thaumatic Science, in botany, petrology, lithology, or geomorphology. Ironwood had been a natural healer, trained under the medicine-speaker of her tribe and also educated in nearby Dodge Junction. She had applied to the smaller Baltimare School of Medicine, but her application had been passed along to Royal Canterlot University, as her grades were excellent and she deserved the opportunity.

The culture shock had been tremendous, moving from the sparse prairie to the built-up metropolis of Canterlot. No wide-open stampeding grounds, just architectural order, a different sort of beauty but beauty nonetheless. The plant-lined boulevards and botanical gardens reminded her of the disordered beauty of her home. Intent and accident both produced the same things, just in different forms.

Given the distance from home her three years of medical school, the amount calculated by the Registrar's Office, was spent in Canterlot, and mostly in the dorm. She never pledged any of the sororities, but only because she was always engaged in the dormitory activities. Spirit contests, volunteer work, and helping others in the dorm with what she could.

She had friends. She had a few that might have been more than friends in those days. The memories tended to run together. Three years seemed like a lifetime then, sitting in classrooms and laboratories, spending long lunches and dinners in the dining hall. The library was amazing to her, filled with books older than the shaman's grandparents' grandparents.

For all she loved it, she still returned to her tribe. She went back to the tribal lands, and to a little practice in Dodge Junction. She wasn't there all the time, but she was there often. She had the training for things beyond the usual, including surgery. She supplemented her practice with her apothecary skills gleaned from the medicine-speaker's teachings.

She always thought about returning to Canterlot. For additional medical education, for a new degree, just to catch up with everyone she had left there. She considered and considered and considered, every day thinking about the possibility, every day falling back into her routine, with her tribe and the ponies, distracted from her intention. She had every new tomorrow to imagine her return.

Then tomorrow died...

Ironwood's stoic facade had not really cracked, so much as she radiated a certain sadness through her firm and hard-set face. She was wrapped securely in the memories she had held tight to her heart since that day. It was a suitable companion for her lonely journey through the prairie.

A slight sound from her side made Ironwood aware that she was no longer alone on her journey. She looked to the side and was shocked to find a pony stallion walking beside her. He was an earth pony with a caramel coat, and a black mane that was slicked back but still spiked somewhat. He wore a tattered black suit with a ribbon of black lace at his throat.

“What is this? Who are you?!” Ironwood asked, staggering away a short way.

“I have so many names. Had so many names. I have new appellations now, but still a thick cloth across my real one. For now it suffices to call me the Black Knight. I'm sure you know me, Doctor Ironwood,” the Black Knight said, reaching out his hand for a shake.

Ironwood looked down at the hand with some suspicion, but eventually took it and shook firmly. “You are the leader of the rebels? The Federation is in accord with you. So it is proper to be in communion. I do not see reason to disbelieve you are who you say.” She released the hand and began walking again, still followed by the Black Knight.

“I'm glad. I like to think I'm trustworthy... to the deserving,” the Black Knight said with a soft laugh. “And I'm glad to see that some things have not changed, even in this terrible time.”

“What things do you say have not changed?” Ironwood asked.

“Perhaps it is because the generation from before the fall are still in evidence and suffered no need to change, but buffalo cows still speak with such a wonderfully erudite formality. It always made such a nice contrast with buffalo bull casual colloquialism,” the Black Knight said, sauntering casually along.

Ironwood nodded, eyes front, watching the horizon in the flat distance. “It is still the same. The tribes have lost so many traditions. But they keep those they can. It is still the way, as I have seen, that mothers teach the cows the proper Equestrian tongue, while bulls are allowed to be less formal.”

“They were never less educated, of course. I knew my fair share of buffalo before, and met more after. They were simply more laid-back. Not that I ever knew a buffalo cow who had trouble with being casual and relaxed. They just spoke very well,” the Black Knight said.

“Much was expected of the cows. Of the bulls too, but so much more professionalism was expected. We were called to be strong and wise. Once...” Ironwood said, voice fading on the last word.

“And again someday,” the Black Knight asserted.

“We may hope. Until then, I go among the tribes, to help with all the knowledge and skill that would be denied to me in this dark and disgusting era of filth and madness,” Ironwood said, face and voice both devoid of expression despite the venomous words.

“Yes indeed!” The Black Knight shouted suddenly. “You wander from a tribe to a tribe. And from a tribe and to a tribe. Wander. Wander. Wander. All around the tribes, forever and ever. I only knew one creature that wandered as much as you, and I tried to have a little variety.”

“I have responsibilities,” Ironwood said, tersely. “I must do my utmost to use the skill I possess to help those who need my healing arts. I did a lot of work at the College of Medicine, became a surgeon and general practitioner, all with the encouragement of my tribe at the largess of the generous Equestrian welfare state. So long as I have the capacity, I will share it, freely and abundantly, with all.”

“I will not argue with that position. It's the wonder of the old world, the one we wish to see again,” The Black Knight said with a nod.

“I do so much, have done so much, to ensure I have paid this seemingly endless debt I owe to the lands which nurtured me,” Ironwood stated. “I've gone to far reaches, worked my fingers to the bone, given of myself so much there is almost nothing left in me, but still I give.”

“I know. Your reputation precedes you. I've heard tales from the hidden tribes, and, well... wasn't there something of your doing in Dodge Junction?” The Black Knight asked, looking aside.

Those last two words cracked across Ironwood's mind like peals of thunder in a summer storm. She stopped cold in her tracks, eyes staring sightlessly into the flat prairie expanse. Her mind was no longer there with the Black Knight; she was cast back to that day. The day 'tomorrow' died.

Blood.

Blood and screaming.

She was drowning in an ocean of blood, her head ringing with the pounding echoes of soul-tearing shrieks.

Screams poured from a thousand throats and blood oozed from a million wounds. Or so it seemed to her. For all she could tell the world had been stolen, reduced to terrified screams and a crimson flood.

The small town of Dodge Junction was on the periphery of the then-present stage of the caribou lyn-krig, the last Equestrian frontier following the savage breaking of Appleoosa. The crippling mental sickness of the ice-hearted barbarians was slow to spread after the initial infection and seemed to be spread only in special cases.

But there was no time for fine-toothed examinations of the etiology and epidemiology of the mental infection. There were more practical medical concerns. Dodge Junction had the last functioning train line, and was the last place where coaches could go from. Both led out of the caribou sphere of influence. They were going to wastes and wilds, but better to chance the wilds than the horrors of the caribou.

Her bloody hands moved between wounds freely, having no time nor equipment to clean between each one. She was making due with supplies that could be scrounged up. As everything had fallen almost entirely apart she was forced to make do. Every first aid kit in town had been poured out at her hooves, as had every last medical object from the clinic, along with everything the refugees had on them that could even partially suffice.

She was doing stitches with boiled sewing thread, pouring salt water mixed with moonshine over deep wounds and tying torn clothes over the most deserving wounds. 'Triage' stopped meaning a careful sifting of clear instances of stratified medical cases. She was practically measuring out drops of blood on a dosage scale to decide what was most deserving of the fresh-boiled rags.

She noted so many of the same wounds that they made a deep impression on her. Hastily executed horn removals or incomplete removals. Cracked horns, sawn-into horns, jagged remnants, cracks in the cornutation between horn and skull, as well as cuts and gouges from the procedure. Wings violently broken while being plucked, or hacked to bleeding ribbons by attempted knife-shaving, or simply hastily chopped off, a few of the 'lucky' ones with the muscles hacked but the bones still in place. The Cutie marks fared the worst. She had run through her burn salve and her own mixture of plants early. She was reduced to using mud poultices made with liquor to cover the clumsy branding that attempted to obliterate the marks, or the violent slashes that gouged deep into the flanks, looking to be made by those in a rage, the ignorant anger of an immature monster.

She stitched and poulticed and wrapped, treating screaming patient after screaming patient, her hands in motion seemingly every second, drenched in watery blood. She was still working on a pregnant mare when she was pulled onto the last wagon leaving Dodge Junction. Her final patient was wedged uncomfortably into the conveyance. But a sea of desperate eyes watched her go.

The screaming and pleading faded through distance, but in her own mind no amount of distance ever made it one bit quieter.

“You know...” The Black Knight's sudden words cut through Ironwood's fugue. “It is very nice of you to do this thing that you do. Giving so freely of your time, wandering from place to place, even if it's inconvenient, all in the service of medicine and the free gifting of your time and skill to the needy.”

“It is necessary and right,” Ironwood huffed, pulling her features into a look of stony pride. “I was given the opportunity to learn. Not to use that knowledge would be a travesty. I have treated tribe after tribe, band after band. I have set bones, closed wounds, treated infections, and performed surgery where I could. And just now I prevented that. A simple lichen contamination that a lesser medic may have exacerbated with unnecessary surgery. I must go as far as the horizon's end to treat these wounds and woes. It is my duty as a buffalo and an Equestrian-trained doctor.”

“And what was the name?” The Black Knight queried.

Ironwood snapped her eyes aside, looking shocked by the question. “What was that?”

“The name,” The Black Knight repeated. “The name of the patient you saved from unnecessary surgery. Surely they had a name. Buffalo have names, the same as ponies do.”

Ironwood scoffed and turned her hard eyes to the horizon. “Of course they had a name. They all had names. Every disease and wound I treated was upon those with names.”

“You mentioned the diseases and wounds first...” The Black Knight said, sotto voce.

“The diseases and wounds were pressing. Important. They had to be treated, to be seen. It was necessary that I act and give them the attention they required,” Ironwood insisted.

“The patients needed that tending,” The Black Knight corrected. “And they all had names.”

Ironwood was quiet for a long, uncomfortable moment, her gaze drifting from the horizon to the stallion at her side. “I could not avoid learning a name or two. And I wandered on, to seek another tribe to help and heal. A tribe with no names.”

“But they all have names. Sooner or later you have to know them. As isolated as you try to be, tucked away with your quiet thoughts you have to learn the names that surround you, and then you walk away,” The Black Knight stated.

“You know who did not have names? The screaming faces of the folk in D-” Ironwood winced, gritting her teeth and clearing her throat. “In the last Equestrian town I was in. They had no names. Only screaming and groans. Wounds, hideous and raw. I treated wounds so fast that I could not be sure if I had moved to another or if I was treating the same broken body. No names. Only wounds. And still the screaming haunts my days and plagues my nightmares. If the nameless can cling to me, echoes and shadows that drift through my days and nights, what does that mean? It means that those with faces and names I know will cut deeper, linger more strongly and clearly. Their wounds become my wounds, for I would know them to that level.”

“And so you move on. You walk away to save yourself,” The Black Knight stated, with an accusatory edge to his tone. “You give something but you don't accept the responsibility of what you're doing. You don't really give, you lend. And lend stingily. You're being very selfish.”

“With compound interest of pain for pain, lent and returned, to twist the knife in my guts and mind, to torment me. But you know what, Black Knight? Do you want to know the truth?” Ironwood looked aside, tears locked tight in her sad, bloodshot eyes, hidden behind the walls of her resolve. “The pain is blinding and cuts deeper than any scalpel ever could. But that nameless, faceless pain of interest paid for lending my skill fades. It is utter agony but it fades and I may soon actually live again, breathe again. Repeat the cycle of lending and hurt. But it is my cycle.”

“But is it the only cycle? Need it even be a cycle?” The Black Knight asked, contemplatively stroking his chin. “When you lend and repay, you see these diseases and wounds, you see only rot and hurt, you lend some skill and take it back, remembering nothing, save for a world of pain. You return to that over and over. But consider learning their names, their faces, not only wounds and sickness. You would learn the whole being, not a mere symptom. A being with a life and joy beyond the pain, a being grateful to you for your skill. One happy to know you, to take away the sorrow and pain, because you would remember you helped them, you healed them. Give, and not lend, and you get back more than pain. You are enriched by the experience. Your ghosts don't haunt you because you see more than their pain, you see their smile.”

Ironwood didn't speak for a long, long while, stoically contemplating the vast flatness before her. She made no sound as she slowly cracked. She barely even twitched her facial muscles as the tears started to softly slip from her eyes and spatter on the scrubby ground. “Smiles are a rare commodity. You know it most keenly of all. You must have more ghosts than any other being in the world.”

“And I dance with them to let them know there is still joy, a joy they wanted more than anything else,” He replied, with a small lilt in his voice.

The words slowly clicked into place. Rumors, modern legend, whispers from the superstitious passing legends from Appleoosa and the region of the former Thunderhooves tribe. The Ghost Dancer. A stone stood and grew for him but he walked like any being. He went by the light of the moon to save the innocent and punish the guilty. A sardonic smile spread on Ironwood's face as she continued to weep. “What do you do when you find the evil and selfish? Do you drag them personally to Tartarus or let them burn in the pure light of the moon?”

“Evil and selfish? You? I'm sorry, Doctor Ironwood, but you don't even merit the tiniest bit of notice. You tried to protect yourself, but you bore unnecessary pain while helping. Even if you lent but didn't give, at least you offered something. Don't think too lowly of yourself. I'm not here to punish you. I'm here to help you see that sometimes, you have to bear up that pain, as I told you, in order to reap the smiles and joy of those you know.”

“All those wounds, the screaming, the nameless victims clawing at me, begging for help, while I could do only so much. I used anything that could come to hand to just barely treat the injuries. So many needed me, so many more than I could help. Am I judged by those that could not reach me?”

“I would think so. That cannot be helped. You tried better than your best. It was more than most could manage, more than most would do. And remember all the ones you helped. Even with makeshift supplies, you still helped them to the best of your capacity. They must have been delighted.”

“I am a doctor, I cannot show partiality,” Ironwood insisted, speaking through her thick throat. “I help all I can but how can it ever be enough? My two hands reach so very little space before me. I cannot heal the whole world, and every last failure is my own doing...”

“The world's doing,” The Black Knight said firmly. “You did not build the world so much bigger than your arms, pile problems bigger than your hands. Others forced this enormity onto you, bigger than your skill, bigger than an army of you. With every success you prove any failure was the fault of The Heartless Hind, not your own.”

“I failed still,” Ironwood sighed. “I cannot relish my success because every failure cuts so deeply. It is the Hind's doing but my patients pay that bill over and over. They pay, I hurt and he cares nothing for the agony he spreads.”

“He never will, and perhaps he never can,” The Black Knight said. “But that is not your fault, once more. Those like the Heartless Hind make the messes, we clean them up. And in doing so we show them up, show them to be the selfish beasts they are, our toil is our incorruptible sign of an honor that can never be stolen away. We can only ever dishonor ourselves, but those like us, we would never.”

“Those like us?” Ironwood asked, noting that, by the simple action of gentle approach and slight changes in pace and hand motions, she had been directed to a different path than she had been going at first. “What?”

“There is a great path to stampede upon, a thundering across history that needs a buffalo like you. You in particular. Walk with me a way, and you will see where your place lies,” The Black Knight said with a smile.

o o o

The hexagonal chamber that housed the elements of harmony glowed with gem lights, illuminating the august scene of carved stone and painted reproductions of the old stained glass long destroyed in the original location. The three grand statues of Princess Luna, Princess Celestia and the Arch-Magus continued a stoic and stony vigil, gazing at three corners, eyes overseeing two walls each with their niches holding the inactive spheres of the elements, save the two already claimed.

Down the gaze of Princess Luna, one alcove, Loyalty, laid empty, while the other, Generosity, still had the stone sphere that was being regarded by the Black Knight and Doctor Ironwood. “So... this lump of stone carries the hopes and dreams of billions...”

“You are dedicated to that cynicism, aren't you?” The Black Knight asked with a grin.

“It is a bit detached of me. But really, seeing it from the extreme outside... I will not ask about the logistics and possibility, I know a zebra and a Diamond Dog already have done this. Surely a buffalo can but... Generosity? Me? You came because I was being a miser with my emotions.”

“But never your talents,” The Black Knight added. “And really, it takes a miser to know what it is to be such, and what to avoid on the road to true giving. You've been stingy, and now you are resolved to be something more. It's the ones who strive the hardest who can do their best. It takes no effort to breeze through without temptation. It's a more difficult road to have a skill and drive and learning in the art of something, but make the constant choice to be more refined.”

“I feel there is perhaps more truth in that than you mean to say,” Doctor Ironwood said with a small grin. She reached out and placed her hand on the sphere. Instantly it exploded in a flash of magic, light and color streaming out, the stone itself transformed into a whirl of small gemstones that leaped to the buffalo. On contact, a more brilliant flash emerged, and in the wake of the light, left her with new accoutrements. A golden necklace with decorative filigree, terminating in a medicine wheel made of smooth, black-veined turquoise.

“The eyes of Her Majesty of the Night have now witnessed the fulfillment of a rebirth,” the Black Knight said with a nod of satisfaction. “A welcome addition. A most welcome addition.”

“Fascinating...” Doctor Ironwood stroked her fingers across the stony surface, tracing the veins and caressing the mineral slowly. “A medicine wheel. How appropriate. And now?”

“Now, we show true generosity. Your hands could not reach to the top of a problem. Now you have support. You can reach for the stars if enough will lift you high...”