"You look cold."
The pale stallion looked up, almost in surprise, his attention drawn from the space between his forehooves to the small, white filly with a thick, curled purple and pink mane standing in front of him, looking up at the taller pony, head poking out of the wrapping that was a knitted baby blue and white scarf around her neck.
Around them was an otherwise silent train station, devoid of all other life and covered in a dusting of snow from the clouds overhead, as the winds whipped around the train station, reducing the world beyond to nothing but a white backdrop. It was decidedly cold, but that was mid-winter for you.
"Well noticed," the stallion said eventually, finding his voice.
The filly reached up to her neck, and tugged the scarf free. Before the stallion could protest, she'd slung it over his neck, and flicked the ends around to dangle down his shoulders. He reached up to touch it with a hoof, and the filly nodded.
"Go on," she said. "Keep it."
"I couldn't," the stallion said, making to remove it.
"I have loads at home," the filly said. "And it's not that far away. Seriously, keep it."
"I-"
"I'll scream."
The pale stallion smiled, and finished wrapping the scarf around his neck. "Very well. You have twisted my fetlock. I don't think I caught your name."
"Sweetie Belle," the filly said.
"Sweetie Belle," the stallion repeated, nodding. "Thank you, Sweetie Belle. But didn't your mother tell you to never talk to strangers?"
"Yeah," Sweetie admitted. "But you looked cold. So..."
"A rebel," the stallion said. "What brings you to this cold, desolate train station all alone?"
"I got off the train from Canterlot, where I was visiting my grandparents," Sweetie jerked a hoof behind her. "I'm waiting for my sister to come and pick me up. She's taking her sweet time about it." A thought occurred to her. "Did you seriously not see the train?"
"I guess not," the stallion said. "Sometimes things just pass me by."
"Well, why are you here?" Sweetie craned her neck to look at the stallion's side. "Not going for a cutie mark in train-spotting, obviously."
"No, I'm... waiting, I suppose."
"Waiting for what?"
"A good question."
There was a heartbeat of silence that passed between them.
"Uh," Sweetie began, hesitating.
"What is it, little one?"
"You kind of just trailed off, and didn't really say what you were waiting for," Sweetie pointed out.
The stallion hummed thoughtfully. "I have a better idea. I will tell a story instead, that we might pass the time until we part."
Sweetie nodded. "I like stories!"
"That is good," the stallion said. "Listen, and I will tell you..."
* * *
Once upon a time, there was a war.
It divided a nation in twain, the people forced to take sides. The Lunar Princess, and her promises of change and liberty, and the Solar Princess, with her efforts to restore the status quo and return to the way things were.
And these Princesses had those who fought for them, believed in them. Mages, who greedily drank of the powers made available to them by the Lunar Princess, twisting the magic of life, bending it to their wills. Knights, who saw the corruption wrought by the Lunar Princess' mages, and sought to undo it with magic holy and swords imbued with purest sunlight.
And of those knights, few were more knightly than Sir Gallant Steel, more fierce than Dame Rose Thorn, two of the strongest among the Knights Solar. Together, they would enter the field of battle, and together they would weather whatever the Lunar Republic dared to field against them, by merit of their blades, or their faith and armour. It was said that there were never two more in harmony with one another in the land. In more peaceful times, they would have been wed long since.
In this time of war, however, duty contrived to keep them from one another, and one dark day, fate found a wedge that would finally divide them forever more.
It took the form of an arrow, simple and true, that flew through the air. Steel and Thorn were just two among a melee of bodies, sun and moon alike and equal. And yet the arrow sought them out, and Steel watched as it found Thorn's back unprotected.
It was enough. Thorn's defences faltered and her adversary took the opportunity. Steel returned the favour in an instant, but the deed was done, and the two were reduced to one.
Wracked by grief and fuelled by rage, Steel sent many to their fates in blind fury. Some friendly. Most foes. All found no refuge from him in the end, straying too close to the knight.
At the end, he stood alone, a spectre of blood and metal in a sea of the dead and dying. He held Thorn in his hooves, cold and still, and demanded the world return her to him.
The world did not answer, and so he wracked his mind. He searched his vast accumulation of experience, scoured his knowledge of magic, both holy and otherwise. Surely he had gleaned information that would be of use?
He cast spells with abandon, searching for one that would lay bare a secret of the universe to him, allow him to undo one death among hundreds. He found no such secrets, only one absolute.
Among the spells he had cast, Steel had created a reaction that revealed one mysterious stallion who had not been there prior. Mysterious, but no stranger to Steel, for he had sent many to him, destroyed iconography in his image, prayed that they would not meet before he was old.
Death.
Steel was a proud stallion, but even he begged before Death. All ponies do, eventually. Everypony wants something. Time, a kindness, a legacy. Some would call it greed, some would call it the only thing worth begging for. Steel begged for all three, he begged for all that a pony could ask of Death, begged the return of Thorn to the world of the living.
And Death answered him, standing there amongst the recently dead, clad in robes of the very stuff between moments. He could, he said, and in the same instance, could not. It lay both within and without his power.
Steel demanded an answer that did not defy his understanding, and Death merely repeated himself, in a voice hoarse and dry with disuse. Steel was dissatisfied with Death's recourse, and demanded satisfaction.
Death challenged him to take it if he would, and see the truth of things. Steel met the challenge with grim determination, and a firm grip on his blade. He stepped forth, and Death watched him with eyes devoid of light and hairless skin pale as the snow of winter.
Steel was an accomplished swords-pony - the bodies around him and behind him on countless battlefields would attest to that. His speed was superb, his power impressive, and his precision without peer. And his blade - silver alloy, one of great providence, forged by Celestia herself and imbued with her blessing and a mere fragment of the sun's power. More than powerful enough to undo anything that fell before it, be it flesh, armour or magic, the stuff of life itself.
But Death was without life, and as the blade connected with Death's cloak, it passed through as if it were merely air. The blade was chilled, and Steel felt Death's eyes upon him as tendrils of biting cold crept into his forelegs. He retreated from Death, and Death was not amused, nor was he disappointed. Death simply drew forth a weapon of his own.
It was a longsword just like the one Steel held. The hilt was simple, unassuming, grey steel. The blade itself was a radiant silver, and the edge seemed a blur, as if it existed in more than three dimensions. When it moved, the blade left a gentle wave of blue light behind it, glittering colour in a world decidedly grey.
Steel clutched his blade tighter, and this time sought to attack Death directly, in the place where Death was most exposed; the face. He was swift and fierce, yet his attack was subtle and laden with misdirection. Were it a lesser foe, the duel would be decided.
Death is not so easily fooled, and with a lazy, almost careless wave, Death parried the attack with his own blade. The attack had no power, and little speed. It merely fell sideways through the air and touched the side of the blade.
There was a fearsome crackling sound as frost formed along the metal, and Steel felt the blade's balance suddenly change, becoming lighter as there was a quiet slither of metal. His attack suddenly went far wider than it should have, and he brought his blade up to guard against a response that never came.
Steel readied his sword once more, and paused as he realized something was missing. On the ground before him, a significant length of his blade lay, a slanted, smooth cut where it had been severed. All he held now was a hilt with a pointed piece of metal to show where a blade had been.
Death regarded the severed metal with disinterest, and looked to Steel, readying his blade once more, emotionless and calm, his own blade intact. Steel paused, but readied himself nonetheless, and asked a question of Death.
He asked how he might win.
Death's pale face shifted, and became a small smile, as Death answered: He could not ever win. Not really.
Steel found himself tiring of Death's evasive, cryptic and dissatisfying responses, and with courage and daring in his heart, charged once more. Death responded as he had before, slowly and carefully trying to parry. But in vain, for Steel's attack sought not Death, but his weapon.
Steel felt the cold bite at him once more as he stepped inside Death's range. As he threw his shoulder into Death, grabbing Death's blade by the hilt and trying to wrest it out of Death's control, he saw tendrils of frost and ice spiral across his armoured pauldron and horseshoes with a speed that would shame an ice mage.
Death was easily shoved, and Steel found Death's grip on the blade was easily broken; he had sparred with foals who had more of a hold on their weapon. It was of no consequence. Once separated from its master, he grabbed it, discarding the hilt of his old blade, and felt the chill of Death fade somewhat.
He held the blade ready, shimmering slightly, and levelled it at Death, asking if Death would yield.
Death shook his head, and unarmed, approached Steel. Steel suspected trickery, deception, and kept his distance. And Death did not stop, or protest, merely continue to advance.
Eventually, Steel chanced an attack. Death's own blade hummed through the air, perfectly balanced, and Steel felt the barest of resistance as it cleaved through Death's cloak and the entity within, visibly causing damage to spectre and garment alike.
Death fell sideways, landing on the ground like so many that Steel had sent before him. Feeling the warm glow of triumph bolster him, Steel approached Death and held the sword to its own master's neck, and once again demanded an answer to his questions.
Death shook his head once more, and repeated his prior answers. Death could not, although he could. If Steel was willing to take Death's mantle, he could certainly try, although he would soon understand the truth.
All Steel had to do was don Death's cloak and slay Death, to become the one who walked between moments, the arbiter of the rich and poor alike, the one whom all beings will one day answer to, for whom both everything and nothing is within reach and power.
Steel did not hesitate, and the tip of Death's sword quickly freed Death from his cloak. He was a thin, gaunt being, sinew and bone under tightly stretched white skin. Where a cutie mark would have been, there was none.
Steel donned the cloak with a sweeping motion, and it fastened itself around his neck with a fresh clasp, the not-fabric flowing around him automatically, once again intact for a new master.
Steel looked at Death and wondered. Was this all a trick? Was Death so easily cheated? His instincts screamed no, but the sword in his grip and cloak around his shoulders said yes.
Death did not resist as his own blade was used to penetrate his chest, and ceased to move. Steel watched as Death withered before his eyes, crumbling to mouldering bones and then dust in an instant, blowing away in a mysterious breeze.
And at that moment, Steel was enlightened. His mind suddenly filled with knowledge that felt as if he had known it for an age. The inner workings of the universe were laid open to him, the secrets of life and death understood.
And as he opened his eyes to a world steeped in shadows he now knew to be permanent, he realized his folly.
He had beaten Death, and yet he had lost to Death. He had slain Death, and in turn, become Death. He had the power to grant life, but he would remain Death, forever unseen until the last. It would be a life where the only true desire would be a return to where they belonged. No life at all.
And so Death swung his sword, and wordlessly watched as former allies and foes alike were sent on to their reward, whatever it might be. He hesitated at Thorn, wishing he could have just one more minute. He had ten, and none of it served him any good, before she, too, went to her reward.
Death looked around at the world, and felt a shiver run across him. He returned his blade to the folds of the cloak, and slowly removed his armour, letting it fall to the ground and lie there in the middle of the field.
Death felt the shiver again, and broke into a gallop across the land, missing the familiar warmth of exercise. He wondered how long the previous Death had held his mantle for. He hadn't cared to ask at the time. He wondered how long it would be before he finally found someone capable of ending his own existence.
He would have time enough to ask himself those questions over and over again; for now, he had a duty to fulfil, a responsibility to the world that he could not neglect. And if he kept his faith... maybe one day there would be another fool like him.
The sound of running hooves faded away into nowhere, and the battlefield became still once more.
* * *
"That's sad," Sweetie said quietly.
"True enough," the stallion said.
"But it's not true, right?" Sweetie asked. "Just an old legend."
"Quite," the stallion said, nodding.
"Sweetie Belle?" a mare's voice called out. "Sweetie Belle!"
"Oh!" Sweetie smiled. "That's my sister!"
"Then you had best go to her," the stallion said.
"Yeah," Sweetie said, nodding. "Thank you for the story!"
"And thank you for the scarf," the stallion said. "Are you sure you would not like it back?"
"Nah, it's okay," Sweetie said. "You keep warm, now."
Sweetie Belle turned to scamper away, and as she started to gallop towards the stairs, the stallion lifted his head.
"Sweetie Belle!" he called out.
Sweetie skidded to a halt at the top of the steps. "Yes?"
"Mind your step," the stallion said warningly. "The steps are icy. You might slip."
Sweetie looked down, and saw that it was true, the wooden planks covered in a thin sheen of slippery ice.
"There you are!" Sweetie Belle looked up, just as Rarity stepped around the corner, wrapped in a puffer jacket that matched her coat, and shivering. "I thought I said to wait out the front in the foyer, I've been looking for you!"
"Oh, right," Sweetie Belle said slowly, recalling a discussion had two days prior, and about ten minutes too late. She hopped down the steps – carefully – and shivered as she touched down on the earth. Her spine tingled, and she felt like something had just happened.
Rarity noticed, and frowned. "Sweetie, what are you doing? Where's the scarf I gave you for your birthday? Weren't you wearing it when you left?"
Sweetie nodded. "Yeah. I gave it to somepony though, he looked like he really needed it."
Rarity frowned. "Really? When was this?"
"Just now, back there?" Sweetie turned around.
Rarity's frown didn't let up. "There's nopony there, Sweetie. You lost it, didn't you?"
Sweetie's brow knitted in confusion. There was indeed nobody on the platform. "But, I totally..."
Rarity sighed. "Sweetie, what will I do with you? Come on," Rarity ushered Sweetie Belle away from the platform. "Let's get you home before you freeze to death, you silly filly."
Author's Note
And in case you didn't get it, spoilers:
Sweetie was supposed to slip and fall to her death.
