Heart of Darkness

Chapters

Prologue
Chapter 1 - Things Left Unanswered
Chapter 2 - An Unwelcome Houseguest
Chapter 3 - Biology, Chemistry, and Wizardry

Prologue

There was a moment, as Spike fell from the blackened crystal ledge and the Crystal Heart dropped out of his claws and King Sombra began rocketing towards him on a rapidly extending crystal of his own, that everything seemed lost. The Crystal Empire would be lost, and the smoky, shadowy tryant would once again take his throne and turn its residents into his slaves.

It was only by chance that Shining Armor came up with the idea and picked up Cadance on his back. It was enough; the tired mare looked up and saw the crystal floating to earth, wings extending with renewed determination as the Crystal Heart began to glow with a bright blue light. A giant purple explosion rocked the top of the Crystal Tower, pieces of black crystal raining down on the darkening landscape, as Shining Armor balanced himself on his back two legs, held Cadance in his front hooves, and launched the alicorn into the sky towards the Crystal Heart. The pink and blue blur shot forwards, catching Spike and grabbed the Crystal Heart with her magic just out of the grip of the shadowed unicorn. As Cadance regained strength, she glided down towards the Crystal Fair, soaring over the crystal ponies as they looked up in awe at the suddenly renewed and re-spirited alicorn.

But Sombra saw his chance and took it; he recovered from the shock of the Crystal Heart being taken out of his clutches and jumped down towards the crowds. Within seconds, pandemonium returned as King Sombra fired dark crystals left and right; the crystal ponies began screaming out in terror, running into and over each other, pushing others out of the way as they tried to get away from the black unicorn. The crowds separated and forced Cadance to retreat with the Crystal Heart. She had only enough time to make it to the ledge before collapsing again, the Crystal Heart falling over and losing the glow it had gained.

“Oh, what will we do now!?” Rarity whined. “Cadance, your beautiful empire has gone to ruin!”

“I’ll tell you what we do!” Rainbow Dash said. “We go in there and fight him!”

“How are we supposed to fight if he’s just gonna turn into some shadowy thing?” Applejack replied. “I don’t even think Pinkie could get the jump on him like that.”

“If only Twilight was here…” Fluttershy mumbled from a hiding place behind Rarity. “She would know what to do.”

But Twilight didn’t come. Shining Armor cradled Cadance and Spike went to clutch Rarity’s leg as they watched in horror as the Crystal Empire started to break apart. Ponies went wild through the streets, trying to take cover from the onslaught of black crystals.

As a group of ponies trying to take cover in a house saw a black crystal spike coming towards them, it was suddenly blown apart by a shining purple sphere. The crystal ruptured and fell to the ground in a pile of harmless black dust. From the base of the tower came more shots, breaking down and destroying the black crystals scattered across the landscape. A purple unicorn was suddenly darting down the streets, firing off magic at any new crystals and heading towards the shadowy mass of King Sombra.

“Twilight!” the Element Bearers called out.

“That’s my little sister!” Shining Armor called out. He turned to the other five Elements and Spike. “You go down and help Twilight. I’ll restore order and revive Cadance.”

The five ponies nodded and soon ran downwards to meet Twilight in the streets. The unicorn was firing blasts at King Sombra, but the old tyrant simply changed into shadow and let the blasts harmlessly pass through him. He laughed a deep, guttural laugh as Twilight fired blast after blast and he flew in circles around her, taunting her and trying to disorient her.

Twilight stopped following Sombra around. “Everypony! Get to the base of the Crystal Tower!”

Hearing the cries of the purple unicorn, the ponies took action immediately and all ran for the base of the Crystal Palace, where Shining Armor had recently emerged with Cadance. King Sombra, noticing Twilight’s distraction, raised a crystal under her. Twilight was smart enough to sidestep to prevent from being hurt, but the crystal still managed to lift and throw her down the street and right at the base of the other Element Bearers.

“Come on, girls!” Twilight said, regaining her feet. “It’s time we show Sombra a bit of his own medicine.”

“How are we supposed to do that?” Rainbow Dash asked. “The elements are still back in Canterlot!”

“What caused the Elements to appear the first time?” Twilight asked them. “Our friendship did it! I’m sure we can summon enough energy to use them from the friendship between us and our shared goal of protecting the Crystal Empire. Who’s with me?”

The other five Elements nodded, and stood in a line with Twilight Sparkle as they stared down King Sombra. The black unicorn once again took solid form and began charging at them, his horn black and purple with dark magic.

But the distance between them gave Twilight and her companions the time they needed; it wasn’t long before a rainbow wave began shooting towards King Sombra, who had just enough time to turn around and try to run before the wave swept over him. The magic in his horn was doused, and they could almost see shadowy flecks begin to break off his body and mane. The purple smoke that came from his eyes disappeared.

But without the Elements themselves, the attack was too weak. It went away before much else could happen, leaving a disoriented Sombra in the middle of the street, beginning to attempt to charge another attack.

“We’re not gonna make it!” Fluttershy said, cowering under her hooves. “We don’t have the energy!”

“I don’t think we have to,” Applejack said, motioning towards the base of the tower.

The Crystal Ponies were shouting. “Behold, the Crystal Princess has returned!” Cadance was standing upright, looking radiant as she held the Crystal Heart in her magic, now filled with a fiery blue glow. She took a hoof and smashed the fake Crystal Heart meant to pacify the citizens and spoke out in a loud voice.

“The Crystal Heart has returned. Use the light and love within you to ensure that King Sombra does not.”

The base of the tower began to glow as Cadance placed the Crystal Heart back in its rightful place. Shouts of joy went up from the crowds of crystal ponies as they regained their original crystalline forms and a bright blue wave began going through the Crystal Empire.

“What? …no. No! Stop!”

King Sombra’s guttural exclamations rang out across the Empire as the wave destroyed the remaining blackened crystal spikes and restored the ground. A wave blasted through the empire, blowing away the signs of destruction and ruin across the empire and clearing away the black smoke that surrounded the kingdom.

Twilight and the others watched as the wave crashed into King Sombra, causing massive cracks filled with a bright blue light ruptured all over his body. King Sombra let out a terrible growl of pain as he erupted into a blinding sphere of blue magic.

Twilight ran through the crowds of crystalline ponies as she went up to Princess Cadance and immediately wrapped her old foalsitter in a hug, which was almost immediately returned. “You did it, Twilight,” Cadance said happily into her ear.

“No, Cadance,” Twilight said, releasing Cadance and bowing down to her as the other Elements caught up. “You did.”

But when the last of the Element Bearers bowed down to the ground, Twilight saw Cadance’s mouth drop without a sound. Shining Armor soon followed suit. They were not staring at Twilight, nor the Crystal Ponies. They were looking beyond them, down the streets and into the green fields beyond, where a pile of black was sitting.

Twilight got up and turned around. Noticing the black pile, she immediately became curious. “Stay here, Cadance,” Twilight said quietly so that nopony else could hear her. “I’ll go and see what it is. You focus on getting your kingdom in order.”

Cadance smiled at Twilight and nodded. The Crystal Ponies broke out in song, rejoicing and gathering around Cadance and Spike as she galloped off down the avenue towards the black pile sitting at the end of the roadway.

But what Twilight saw made her stop.

No… it couldn’t have happened. She must be dreaming, still trapped in the spell of King Sombra’s door.

On the grass lay a young unicorn stallion probably no older than Shining Armor was. His coat was a dark grey and his mane and tail were an oily black. The horn was a straight black similar in shape to and slightly larger in size than Twilight’s, and on his flank rested the cutie mark of three black crystals.

Chapter 1 - Things Left Unanswered

Twilight rode the train in silence, her eyes focused on the stretcher that contained the black unicorn stallion. He was lying on his back with his head on a pillow and covered with a white sheet, through which Twilight could see the rise and fall of his belly as he slept. An IV slowly dripped a nutritional supplement into his front hooves.

She still couldn’t believe the events that happened. They had taken great pains to bring the unicorn into the Crystal Palace without a single Crystal pony noticing. Medics came around and checked his vital signs; he was knocked out from two waves of magic blasts. It wasn’t long before Celestia and Luna were contacted and a special delivery made with an item that could detect dark magic and an old photo. By the end of the day, it was confirmed that the unicorn was, in fact, King Sombra. Well… it wasn’t exactly right to describe him as “king”. But Twilight had difficulty calling him just “Sombra”.

As to how Sombra had been able to survive the magical blast… no one was entirely sure. Twilight had one theory: the Elements of Harmony hadn’t been enough to defeat him but managed to weaken the hold of dark magic on him. And when Cadence activated the Crystal Heart, it had purified him of it.

But, in the two days since the chaos at the Crystal Empire, Sombra had not been allowed to waken. He was kept knocked out with a powerful sedative once his vitals were confirmed and IVs had been hooked into his hooves, inserting bare nutritional needs and medicine for his wounds. This was to sustain him until he’d been placed into custody in Canterlot.

“Twilight, darling, are you still in here?”

Twilight turned around. Rarity was standing at the door of the train car as it made its way back south towards Canterlot. “I’m not sure if this was the right thing to do,” Twilight said. “I mean, he could still be dangerous. And what of his memories? What if… what if he reverts?”

Rarity hazarded a few steps closer to Twilight. “It’s better that he’s going to Canterlot,” she said. “I mean, there the Guard can keep him under control, Princess Celestia can see what went wrong, and he can’t mess with the Crystal Empire again.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Twilight sighed as she looked out the window at the sunset.

“And he can’t ruin the beauty of the place anymore.”

Twilight turned around and glared at Rarity. “Really?”

Rarity laughed nervously. “You get what I mean, though, don’t you? Those black crystals of his really tore things up around there.”

Twilight sighed. “I’m sorry. I’m just so confused about it.”

Rarity came over and placed a hoof on Twilight’s shoulder. “You need some rest, darling. We should be back in Canterlot by morning. Come on; eat with us and sleep for a while.”

Twilight, feeling her stomach rumble for the first time in a long time, followed Rarity out of the car but not before taking one last look at Sombra’s sleeping form. The others were already at a table in the adjacent dining car, eating vegetable soups, green salads, and sandwiches.

“Hey, Twilight!” Rainbow Dash called. “You nearly missed dinner.”

“And dessert!” Pinkie Pie chirped up through a mouthful of a cookie.

“I was doing some thinking, that’s all,” Twilight said as she sat down with the others. “I have to figure out what to tell Princess Celestia about what happened.”

“It’s not exactly gonna be easy to explain, that’s for sure,” Applejack said. “But I’m sure she’ll trust you. You’re her student. Just tell her what happened and I’m sure she’ll understand. She likes you a lot if she trusted you with this whole mission in the first place.”

“It’s not like it’s the first time this sort of thing happened,” Fluttershy commented. “The same thing happened when we freed Princess Luna from Nightmare Moon.”

“But we knew Luna was supposed to be good almost immediately after we freed her and she apologized,” Twilight said between sips of her soup. “We don’t know if Sombra will be different or the same.”

“That’s why we’re taking her to Celestia, darling,” Rarity said. “She was alive long enough to know of Sombra before his reign and his banishment.”

“And in this form,” Rainbow Dash put in, “I’m sure we could take him on if he becomes a problem, no sweat!”

Twilight smiled. “Thank you for the support. But… do you all think you could help me when time comes to speak with Celestia?”

“Of course, sugarcube,” Applejack said. “We all can confirm what we saw.”

Dinner was finished relatively pleasantly and the six headed to bed; Spike, worn out from the praise he received for retrieving the Crystal Heart, had fallen asleep long ago. One by one, the ponies drifted off to sleep.

Twilight fell asleep, too, but her mind was filled with terrible dreams. She had visions of Sombra somehow turning back into shadow and going back to the Crystal Empire to imprison Cadence and make Shining Armor his slave. She had dreams of Sombra using dark magic and corrupting or trying to kill Celestia. And she had dreams of herself becoming trapped in crystals, green and black, unable to move and her magic stripped away.

Eventually, Twilight woke up. It was still dark and the others were still asleep, Pinkie giving off some ridiculous-sounding snore. Twilight quietly left her bed and went through the dark cars to where Sombra was still lying on his stretcher. In the light of the moon, Twilight could see the IV bag was full again, likely changed by the medic from the guard onboard the train to keep Sombra sedated.

Twilight looked over Sombra’s form in the moonlight. She was amazed how different he looked from the evil tyrant of lore in the Crystal Empire. His features were softer and less angular. His mane and tail were smooth and were soft to the touch. His dark-grey coat was neat and groomed and his cutie mark even seemed to hold a slight shimmer more like a diamond than a crystal.

What started Twilight the most was how much he looked like her brother. He looked about his age, probably a year or two younger. And yet… yet he’d been imprisoned for almost a thousand years. How many memories did he have of his time before he was a tyrant? How long had he been a tyrant before his imprisonment?

There came a low moan from the black form. Twilight gasped, not because Sombra had made a noise, but because it sounded so different from the growl she was used to hearing. It was smooth, more the sound of a pony who had bad dreams than anything else.

Twilight went and knocked on the door at the other end of the car. A white pegasus guard with a blue mane and tail and bright, sky blue eyes poked his head out the door. “Something wrong, Miss Twilight?”

Twilight pointed to Sombra. “He… just moaned.”

“Don’t worry about it,” the guard said. “I just gave him the sedative. He might be trying to poke through, but he’ll be back asleep from the medicine shortly.”

“You’re… not afraid of being in here with him?”

“Truthfully? Of course. No sane guard wouldn’t be. But, if it’s what needs to be done, then it’s my job to do it.”

Twilight looked back at Sombra’s sleeping form.

“I assure you every precaution has been taken,” the guard said. “He’s bound to the table, the sedative administered, and an anti-magic ring is on his horn. Have you been awake all night?”

“No,” Twilight said, looking back to the guard. “Only a few minutes. I’m having trouble sleeping.”

“Check the dining car. It might have some tea available. A cup of tea with milk helps me out when I’m having trouble. We should be at Canterlot by early morning.”

Twilight looked out the window. She guessed that dawn would be in two hours. She smiled at the guard. “Thank you. I’ll try that out.”

“You’re welcome. Take care, Miss Twilight.” And he shut the door.

Twilight did as the guard said and found the hot water and the tea bags. She mixed herself up a cup of green tea with lemon and honey and sat at a table close to the window, sipping the tea and letting it warm her. By the time she was finished, the sun was just coming over the horizon. The tea did make her feel better, and she managed to go back to sleep.

By the time Twilight woke up, the sun was above the horizon and the train had entered Canterlot. But instead of stopping at the station like normal, the train headed a little further towards a private station at the end of the line closer to Canterlot Castle. Twilight had enough time for some buttered toast with jam before the train stopped and the ponies stepped out into the early morning sun.

Hardly anyone was out in Canterlot; it was a day off and most of the ponies were sleeping in. The group used it to their advantage; the guard was hooked up to the stretcher containing Sombra, and Twilight and her friends walked around it, hiding the black unicorn from prying eyes, walking a few blocks to the entrance of Canterlot Castle.

Almost immediately upon seeing the guard and the six ponies following him, the castle guard moved out of their way. The guard went to the prison to drop off Sombra at the prison clinic before leaving the six ponies in a room and ordering them to wait while he went off to inform Princess Celestia of their arrival.

They were not kept long. The guard was soon back in the room and poking his head in. The six ponies started to get up before the guard shook his head.

“Princess Celestia requested she only speak with Twilight.”

“But why?” Rainbow Dash complained. “We went with her. We helped!” She tried to fly out of the room.

Rarity took a hold of Dash’s tail with her magic. “Calm down, Rainbow Dash,” she said, holding a now hanging Dash up by her tail. “If Princess Celestia wants to speak with Twilight personally, then it’s not our place to interfere.”

“We can always step in if she wants us to,” Fluttershy said. “I’m sure she wouldn’t mind. But… m-maybe it’s best that Twilight go first.”

Rainbow Dash flapped her wings again, but set herself on the floor, hooves crossed over her chest. “Oh, alright…”

Twilight smiled at her friends before leaving and following the guard along through the corridors to a familiar pair of double doors that lead to Celestia’s throne room. The guard opened the door and motioned for Twilight to come in, holding it open before her and closing it behind her before flying to the end of the hall and saluting to Celestia.

“Miss Twilight Sparkle, returning from the Crystal Empire,” the guard said.

Princess Celestia, sitting calmly on her throne with a pleasant expression, nodded. “Thank you, Iron Shield,” she said to the pegasus guard. “Please, wait here for a second.”

The guard nodded in return and set himself down next to Princess Celestia.

Twilight Sparkle nervously approached the throne. Celestia’s expression still seemed pleasant, so she decided it was safe to speak. “Princess Celestia,” she said. “I… I’m back.”

“And in one piece,” Princess Celestia said warmly. “The lights from the Crystal Empire were quite the show last night, and very relieving to know things were alright.”

“Well, yes,” Twilight said, feeling her cheeks get hot. “It wasn’t exactly easy, and Spike ended up finishing the mission instead of me.”

“But your actions were not unnoticed,” Princess Celestia said. “Twilight, I heard about what happened from Cadence. You were valiant and courageous in the face of adversity, something the ponies of the Crystal Empire needed.”

Twilight nodded.

“Something disturbs you?” Princess Celestia said. “You have saved Equestria yet again, and yet you are troubled?”

“Princess… there was something that happened that nopony expected.”

Princess Celestia closed her eyes. “Sombra survived the blast.”

“Did Princess Cadence tell you about that, too?”

“Yes. A very strange situation, indeed. First in that you were able to summon the powers of the Elements despite not having them with you. Secondly in that such a blast would normally have killed a pony from the darkness in their heart.”

“What happened, Princess? How come he wasn’t killed?”

“Why do you think, Twilight?”

“Well… perhaps the Elements were weak.”

“But why wasn’t he killed?”

“Because the dark magic was purged from him with the Elements?”

Celestia simply smiled.

“Do you have an answer, Princess?” Twilight asked. “Was I right?”

“Time will tell if you’re right,” Princess Celestia said.

“What do we do?”

“I’ll let him wake up. I have many questions of my own I wish to ask him.”

“…will you kill him?”

“Perhaps I won’t have to. Certainly, he was a threat, but who knows what the magic has done to him. Don’t worry, Twilight; every precaution will be taken for this meeting. For now, you and your friends can take a room here in the castle. I will make contact with you shortly.”

Twilight nodded and left the room. She headed along back through the halls until she came to the room where the others were waiting.

“So?” Applejack asked. “What did she say?”

“She believes us,” Twilight said. “Princess Cadence sent word ahead of what happened.”

“So what’s going to happen with Sombra?”

“Well, Princess Celestia is going to let him wake up, then she and Luna are going to go and ask him a few questions about what happened.”

“Wait, what!?” Rainbow Dash exclaimed. “All that – empire nearly taken over, ponies almost made slaves – and they’re just going to chat with him?”

“It’s been strange,” Twilight replied. “Princess Celestia said it’s different than what was expected and didn’t give me a straight answer as to what was happening. We… we just have to stay here a day or two and wait.”

“Whatever for?” Rarity asked.

“Probably so she can ask you what happened,” Twilight responded.

Rarity sighed and smiled. “Well, I’m not one to pass up a Canterlot vacation. Come on, girls! Let’s see what Celestia’s set up for our stay, shall we?”

* * *

Twilight found herself waking up the next morning after the first full night of sleep she’d had in days. The nights before the Crystal Empire were full of apprehension and anxiety, the nights after filled with confusion and unanswered questions. Maybe Luna had ensured her a peaceful sleep or she was simply back in a familiar place, but Twilight finally felt like things were returning back to normal.

Breakfast was brought to the room and the ponies gorged themselves on a hearty meal of a sourdough loaf with raisins and nuts, a couple of fried eggs, a bowl of fresh fruit, and glasses of orange juice and milk. Twilight felt like she hadn’t eaten in days and quickly filled herself with food until she simply felt lazy. It felt good to be receiving this treatment by Celestia’s generous order, though Twilight wondered why all of them were supposed to stay.

But later that afternoon, Luna began calling the other Elements one by one to her chambers to discuss what happened in the Crystal Empire, starting with Applejack. Twilight was not to be called in as she had already explained herself to Celestia, but she was going to be on-call in case Celestia needed her.

And, after Rarity was called in to speak with Luna, she was.

Iron Shield came around to the girls’ chambers. “Miss Twilight, Princess Celestia requests your presence in the dungeons.”

Twilight nodded. “Lead the way.”

Rainbow Dash and Applejack started to follow.

“I’m sorry,” Iron Shield said, blocking the exit with his spear. “I’m afraid Twilight alone is allowed in the dungeons.”

“But King Sombra’s down there, right?” Rainbow Dash asked.

“What if extra hoofpower’s needed to keep him restrained?” Applejack added.

“You forget that the Royal Guard are trained to respond in emergency situations,” Iron Shield said firmly. “There is already a troop down below, and with Celestia and Twilight both present, I’m sure we have enough. This session is private.”

Rainbow Dash glowered and Applejack frowned in disappointment as the doors closed and Twilight followed Iron Shield through the castle to a small, dark staircase at a corner that few others were allowed.

“Will I be able to tell them anything?” Twilight asked.

“If you desire,” Iron Shield said, voice calmer and more sympathetic as he stopped at the top of the stairs. “But the princess requested that this initial meeting have no one else present.”

“Does she not want the extra attention or distractions?”

“No. Sombra has woken up and, as it stands, is confused. Beg pardon, but Princess Celestia believes your friends to be a bit headstrong and doesn’t want them acting rashly.”

Twilight nodded and didn’t say another word as Iron Shield led her down the stairs and into the dungeons. The dungeons were unlike what Twilight had expected; they were brightly lit and smelled as though they’d recently been cleaned.

Princess Celestia was standing in front of a cell at one of the far reaches of the dungeon with a host of guards sprinkled throughout the hallways. Iron Shield beckoned Twilight to approach and took a spot a few cells away. Twilight walked forwards and found on the cell the black unicorn stallion, his mane and tail now appearing slightly disheveled and his formerly crimson eyes now brighter to the point where they were almost pink. The anti-magic ring was also off his horn, though it had left a small area lighter than its surroundings

“Ah, Twilight, you’ve arrived,” Celestia said as Twilight approached. “Sombra, this is Twilight Sparkle. She was the one that brought you here from the Crystal Empire.”

Twilight couldn’t help but stare in intrigue at the stallion. He looked back at her curiously, even fearfully.

‘Sombra’ carefully took a few attentive steps towards her. “You,” he said, his voice smooth but dry-sounding as though he hadn’t drank anything in days. “You… brought me here? But… what of my home?”

Twilight gulped. “Where was your home?” she ventured to ask.

“On the far reaches of the Crystal Empire,” the stallion said. “I had a home at the end of one of the avenues. My mother… my mother was a jeweler, and my father was a shopkeeper for her store.”

“…what did you do?”

“I was going to follow in my mother’s footsteps, but with my skill I eventually found myself under the tutelage of Starswirl the Bearded. I have been his pupil for almost seven years, I think.”

Twilight felt her own mouth go dry.

‘Sombra’ looked back to Celestia. “Where is my mentor? How is he? I… can’t remember anything from the past few days.”

Whereas Twilight gasped at the stallion’s inquiry, Celestia seemed unfazed. “I’m afraid your mentor attempted a rather risky spell and is no longer with us.”

That much was true, Twilight knew of her magical history lessons. Starswirl – once considered Equestria’s most powerful unicorn after the princesses, and rumored to be slightly mad – had been working with a rather strange device when he suddenly disappeared and never returned. But that in itself happened over nine hundred years ago; decades after ‘King’ Sombra had been banished and taken the Crystal Empire with him.

But while for Twilight it was an old lesson in the history books, this seemed to be a recent development for ‘Sombra’, who at once collapsed against the bars and began crying. It was pained, likely a result of his body weakened from the induced coma and his dry throat, and Twilight found herself disturbed by it.

Twilight went to ask another question, but Celestia put up a hoof to her chest. Twilight immediately swallowed her question and the two waited until the stallion had cried himself out. When he did, Celestia was the first to speak. “What do you remember last studying under Starswirl?”

Sombra collected himself and wiped away the tears from his eyes. “He… he was just teaching me about the powers of dark magic. How it was dangerous, how it could corrupt ponies. There was… there was a simple spell he was going to teach me with it, because he believed I could withstand its corruption.”

Which, in the end, turned out horribly, Twilight thought.

Celestia nodded. “And how old are you now?”

“Well… I had been working at the shop for two years… tutored under Starswirl for seven… about twenty three.”

He was only two years younger than Shining Armor… Twilight thought.

Sombra looked around. “What happened to me? …how come I can’t remember anything from the past few days?”

“You were knocked out,” Celestia said. “Your body was wracked by a magical blast. I’d wager you probably can’t perform any spells from the severity.”

Sombra tried performing magic. He barely managed to get a dark pink, close to red aura around his horn, but nothing moved or happened and it seemed he was straining and exerting himself to even get that. He stopped trying and gasped for air, panting for a few seconds before returning to normal breathing. “It feels like I have no magic in me. It’s small, but I can’t hardly reach it…”

Sombra started growling and threw himself at the bars of the cage, causing Twilight to jump backwards, Celestia to take a step backwards, and a guard to bring over the anti-magic ring. “What’s happening to me!?” Sombra shouted, his hooves grasping for anyone and anything. “What happened to my magic? Why am I here instead of the Crystal Empire!? Answer me!”

Twilight tried to take a step closer to Celestia, but it put her in range of Sombra’s hooves. He grabbed onto her shoulders and pulled her to the bars. “Explain!” he shouted, voice almost returning to the dark guttural noise she had heard in the Crystal Empire, hot breath spewing over Twilight and making her too dizzy to do anything. “Tell me why I’m trapped in here like a prisoner! I have done nothing wrong!”

Suddenly, Iron Shield was positioned between Sombra and Twilight. Twilight was against the cages at the other side of the hall and Iron Shield had placed the point of his spear to Sombra’s chest. Immediately upon feeling the sharp point, Sombra stopped flailing. His eyes were wide with panic and still flaring with anger, but he didn’t move an inch.

“You would do well to mind yourself,” Iron Shield said. “I won’t hesitate to act if necessary.”

“Do not pressure him, Iron Shield,” Celestia said calmly. “He has only recently awoken. It is natural he would like to know what happened. Lower your spear.”

Iron Shield looked from Celestia to Sombra then back to Celestia. Slowly, he lowered his spear, but he still kept it pointed in Sombra’s direction and backed up so that he was next to Twilight as though ready to defend her yet again if need be.

Celestia walked over to Sombra. “Part of the fallout from Starswirl’s spell destroyed some of the surrounding area, including your home. You were found in the wreckage, alive but unconscious. We had to place you into an induced coma in order to make sure you healed fully and that the magic hadn’t caused any other adverse effects.”

“That does not explain why I’m trapped like a criminal,” Sombra said, still growling but not in the terrible way that made Twilight want to plug her ears.

“Admittedly a poor choice,” Celestia said. “I will have you transferred to a room up above where you can get some sunlight.”

Sombra bowed slightly. “Thank you. I would appreciate that. I’m sorry for lashing out.”

“It is alright. It may take some time for you to reorient yourself and for your magic to return. Please be patient.”

Sombra nodded.

Celestia turned to Twilight. “Do you have any questions you wish to ask?”

Twilight carefully approached Sombra, looking into the stallion’s eyes. He looked so strange. When his anger had flared, Twilight almost saw the old tyrant. But now, he looked like a defenseless, even weak stallion. If he hadn’t attacked the Crystal Empire, Twilight would have almost thought of him like her brother. “What is the last thing you can remember?”

Sombra closed his eyes and was silent for a while. “I was looking through a book of spells. There was a group of Changelings coming towards the Crystal Empire. I found a spell and thought it might be useful.”

“Do you remember the details of the spell?”

Sombra shook his head and his eyes opened to face her again. “No.”

“How did the magic feel when you tried casting it just now?”

“Resilient, weak, cold… angry. As though abused or neglected, even damaged.”

“If you were to leave… what would you like to do?”

“I would have liked to go back to Starswirl. But now that he’s dead and my home destroyed… I have no idea what to do.”

There was a certain pain in those words that stunned Twilight. She stepped back a little bit and stood there almost in shock. Everything seemed dulled for a while, but she remembered Iron Shield slowly nudging her forward and back along the corridors and up the stairs to the main castle, where the sun was beginning to set. She was sat down somewhere and Iron Shield disappeared for a few minutes before returning to her with a glass of water, which she drank eagerly.

“What now?” Twilight asked.

“Princess Celestia requested you wait here,” Iron Shield responded. “She should be up in a few minutes.”

Just like Iron Shield said, it wasn’t long before Princess Celestia climbed the staircase and appeared out in the hall. She went over to Twilight and brought the unicorn’s head to face her own. “You seem to have a lot of thoughts going through your head right now,” Celestia said. “What are you thinking about?”

“Why didn’t you tell him the truth?” Twilight asked. “About what happened?”

“Did you see his reaction to the death of Starswirl? No, now is not the right time. Let him come to, and perhaps the memories of what happened will come back to him in time. And perhaps he will be ready to move on and begin anew.”

“But what of the magic?”

“Our devices and spells have confirmed that Sombra has been purified of the dark magic inside him. I have no worries.”

“But… when he grabbed me, didn’t you hear it? The growling?”

“Yes. But that is no more than a frustrated, scared, fearful pony would do in that situation.”

“But what about the memories of those spells? Wouldn’t those come back to him?”

Celestia fell silent. “Perhaps,” she said after a long while. “We’ll have to keep a close eye on him, perhaps even keep the anti-magic ring on him.”

Princess Celestia looked out the window. “I have to lower the sun. But keep in mind what you’ve seen the powers of friendship and love do. They’ve taken down mad ponies, kept this world from falling into chaos, and even repelled armies. Certainly they can afford to give even a pony like Sombra another chance.”

Twilight walked back to the room alone. She felt drained of energy. She buried herself under the covers and quickly fell asleep.

* * *

The next morning at breakfast, Iron Shield came in with a different sort of message.

“Princess Celestia has paid for your tickets back to Ponyville.”

“What, today?” Rarity said. “I thought she would have needed us for something else.”

“All the information she wanted has been compiled,” Iron Shield says. “Your train leaves at one this afternoon.”

“But what about Sombra?” Twilight asked. “What’s going on?”

“As of this moment, I’ve not been updated since we left the prison,” Iron Shield said with a shake of his head. “Princess Celestia has said she’ll update you when the time comes, but for now, there’s nothing more.”

There was nothing more to do, so the ponies spent the rest of the morning in Canterlot before heading on the train that went back to Ponyville. But Twilight couldn’t help but think of what could happen to Sombra. Something about the fear of him possibly not being fully reformed, or as fully as Celestia had thought he might be, led her to have horrible thoughts of him going out of control much as he had in the prisons.

Luckily, Celestia had listened to her warnings this time. She swore that Sombra would not only have members of the guard on him at all times but also would have the anti-magic ring on his horn at all times.

Twilight’s dreams on the night of her return to Ponyville were filled with visions of being trapped in green and red crystals, but this time she could hear a faint sobbing sound somewhere within.

A week passed. Twilight slowly forgot about Sombra. The library was full of foals checking out books for their spring reports; she and Spike spent the days keeping things under control and their evenings resorting the shelves. She had no time to think about the black unicorn currently in Canterlot Castle amongst her library work and her continuing experiments.

Finally the end of the week came. A party for Twilight and Spike had been arranged at Sugarcube Corner for their return from the Crystal Empire. Pinkie Pie was leading the affair as usual, and Twilight found herself surrounded by foals and grown mares and stallions alike eager to hear the tales of what happened; for most of them, the Crystal Empire was a myth, something only heard of in history books but none knew what it was.

“…and so Princess Cadence rallied together the Crystal Ponies, and the power of their love and friendship was enough to blast away the evil unicorn and restore the Empire to its former glory.” Twilight bowed her head and finished her tale.

Pinkie Pie came bounding up and put a hoof around Twilight’s shoulders. “Hey, everypony! Let’s give a hoof for Twilight’s defeat of King Sombra! Hip hip hooray!”

“Hip hip hooray!” the crowd shouted in turn, and there was soon the stamping of hooves in celebration.

Once the crowds had lessened, Twilight snuck off to a corner. The event was not something she would forget easily, but she had not thought about what might happen to Sombra for a while. She wondered what Celestia was doing as she lazily ate her way through a cupcake.

“Hey, Twilight!”

Pinkie Pie with her poofy mane came dropping down from above Twilight, her face upside-down.

“Hey, Pinkie,” Twilight said unenthusiastically.

“What’s the matter?” Pinkie asked. “This party’s for you! Go ahead and turn your frown” – she hopped over Twilight and set herself down right-side up – “upside down!”

“I’m still thinking about Sombra.”

“Yeah,” Pinkie admitted. “We never did give him a ‘Yay! You’re reformed!’ party, did we? ‘Course, I forgot to bring my party cannon and neither Celestia nor Luna seemed to like the idea of having him meet a bunch of ponies and making friends right off the bat. Hey! He kinda sounds like you when you first came here!”

“Not like that! I mean what he could do now that he’s back here and not in the Crystal Empire.”

“Oh… yeah, he was a big meanie-pants wasn’t he? Oh, well. I’ll still stick by my comparison: he’s kinda like you when you first arrived.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, you were all by yourself and didn’t have any friends, and when you got friends around you, you lightened up and were a lot more fun even if our ideas of fun aren’t exactly the same. I mean, I like wild, large parties and you like small gatherings more, but you still were having fun with friends.”

“Okay… and what does that have to do with Sombra?”

“Maybe… maybe he didn’t have a lot of friends before. Maybe now we can show him to have fun and he’ll get past being a big meanie-pants and be kinda nice underneath, you know?”

Twilight smiled. “Sometimes, I wish I could be as optimistic as you are.”

“Well, optimism’s my middle name! Pinkie ‘Optimism’ Pie! Or… was it ‘Fun’?”

Twilight soon lost Pinkie’s train of thought as she finished her cupcake. It wasn’t until late that night that Twilight left, tired and happy, and fell asleep in her bed almost immediately.

The next morning, Twilight awoke to the sound of someone knocking at the door. Almost immediately, Twilight was irritated. This was the day off for her; the time when she resorted the library in the morning then had the whole day to herself. But when the knocking came again, Twilight forced herself out of bed and down the stairs.

The knock came again, this time somewhat more forceful. “Alright, alright, I’m coming!” Twilight shouted as she crossed the floor to the door. She opened the top of the door and found a royal guard standing outside her door in the sunlight of early morning.

“…Iron Shield?” Twilight asked, groggy and unbelieving of what she was seeing.

“Yes, Miss Twilight,” Iron Shield said, bowing. Twilight saw another guard standing slightly back and off to the side, one she didn’t recognize before. “I’ve come with a message from Princess Celestia.” He reached over to a small saddlebag on his back and pulled out a scroll emblazoned with the royal seal.

Twilight opened the letter and read it.

My faithful student Twilight:

By now, you should know how much trust and faith I have in you. And that is why I have to make a very special request of you. I have been thinking this over for a while and think this is the best way; as of right now, both Luna and myself have too many duties and cannot add anything more into our schedules, and neither do we wish to pull you out of Ponyville and replace you here in Canterlot away from your friends.

To help him return to some semblance of normality, we ask that you house Sombra and slowly help him regain strength. Show him around town. Help him make friends. Teach him magic that can be of use to the ponies, and perhaps try and enter him in a profession of sorts when he’s stronger. He has passed psychological, intellectual, and medical tests, and we think placing him in a nurturing environment similar to what he had before might prevent him from going down the path of darkness once again.

I know this is a hard task and how much you were hesitant when you were in Canterlot. You will have two guards – Iron Shield and Stout Blade, two of the strongest I can afford to send – to help watch Sombra. But do not dispirit him; try to teach him, and make him feel welcomed. And don’t forget: I am available whenever you need me.

Princess Celestia.

Twilight looked up from the letter. Iron Shield moved out of the way to reveal the black stallion; strong and sturdy with a full mane and tail, his deep pink eyes staring intently at her with a small smile on his face that Twilight did not like at all.

“It seems we’ll be getting to know each other rather well, Miss Twilight,” Sombra said.

Author's Note

Surprisingly, out of all the things in this chapter I'm proud of, Pinkie's dialogue takes top spot.

Chapter 2 - An Unwelcome Houseguest

“I hope you don’t mind this little arrangement,” Sombra continued. “When I asked Princess Celestia if there was a tutor that might be at least comparable to Starswirl, she directed me to you.”

Twilight was aware her mouth was wide open and quickly closed it. “Well, I’ve been a student of Princess Celestia herself. I mean, I have a couple of books on things, but… I’m not exactly a ‘teacher’.”

“I’m sure something could be worked out,” Sombra purred. “Perhaps we could see what books you have and the extent of your knowledge and we’ll work from there.”

“You give me too much credit,” Twilight said. “I’m just a librarian here. I still report to Celestia.” I might have to report this to Celestia.

“And, starting today, I am to report to you. I was told you might be a little… difficult, at first, but I’m willing to be patient.”

There was something in the smooth voice of the black unicorn that Twilight did not like. Sure, he was sounding quite pleasant about the issue, but there was a touch of – what was it? –haughtiness, perhaps, that hid under the surface. The only solace Twilight had was the little gold anti-magic ring at the base of his horn. Twilight’s cheeks went from purple red. “You’ll have to give me a day or two—”

“…to come to grips with it?” Sombra said. When Twilight’s eyes widened, he laughed heartily. “Your emotion’s as plain as the look on your face.”

“Well, that’s certainly part of it, but a schedule must be arranged. I should teach you a little basic biology, chemistry, mathematics, physics, and literature while we’re at it, as your magic still might be taking time to recover.”

“So I was told,” Sombra said. “Now, where am I staying?”

“I have a spare room and bed,” Twilight said, turning around to reenter the library, “but I’m afraid I have to wash the sheets.”

“Do you need any help with that?”

The question took Twilight off guard about as much as the letter explaining his stay had. She turned around to see Sombra not with an eager look but an inquisitive one. “If you don’t mind using your hooves,” she said.

“It’s an inconvenience,” Sombra said with a slight shade of indifference, “but if it helps, fine.”

“Alright. I’ll get my assistant to get a bucket of water. We’ll strip the bed in the meantime. Wait here.”

“I suppose I’ve got no choice, do I? Not with these guards” – he pointed to Iron Shield and the other guard that Twilight assumed to be Stout Blade, sitting on either side with their spears pointed towards him – “around me all the time.”

Twilight looked at Sombra guardedly before ascending the staircase back to her personal library and her bedroom. Spike was still asleep curled up in his basket as she approached and she poked him a few times to get him to turn over.

“Re-shelving day?” Spike asked. “You let me sleep in a little bit.”

“It’s not re-shelving day today. Spike, we have a visitor.”

“Who’s coming around to visit?”

“A guest. I need you to take the bucket and go to the well to get me some water to wash the sheets with.”

“Alright, alright. Do I have to stick around?”

Twilight thought about it. “Do it without one complaint and I’ll let you go over to Rarity’s for the rest of the day.”

Immediately, a large grin appeared on Spike’s face. He got up and started running out of the room, when Twilight remembered that Sombra was still sitting downstairs and was even more afraid of Spike realizing he was there.

“Spike, wait!” Twilight shouted, galloping after him.

It was too late. Spike was already not only at the base of the stairs, but staring at Sombra. The black unicorn had taken a spot close to the edge of the library on a pillow and was sitting down. Spike was looking up at him, and Sombra was looking down at the dragon. For a moment, Sombra and Spike just stared at each other while the guard’s held their spears at the ready.

“You… you are…” Spike mumbled.

Sombra leaned down so that his mouth was just above Spike’s head. He parted his lips in a sort of demented smile, his eyes appearing crimson as he showed Spike two rows of white teeth, including two small fangs on the top.

Twilight thought Spike would faint with how pale he turned. Instead, the dragon gave a yelp and ran off, grabbing the bucket by the door and scurrying down the roads through Ponyville so fast he left a trail of dust in his wake.

Sombra started rolling around on the ground laughing. “Ba ha ha! Such a little dragon afraid of a pony! Did you see the way he turned pale and shivered? I couldn’t even put a dent in his scales and he ran off like he saw a ghost! Ah ha ha!”

Twilight nodded to Iron Shield, who seemed all too eager. “AAGH!” It was a tiny poke. Not enough to draw blood, but with such precision that a definite scratch had appeared on Sombra’s side. The small wound soon turned a bright red.

“I would appreciate it if you left him alone,” Twilight said firmly. “Spike is my friend as well as my assistant, and I won’t tolerate you messing with him.”

“Certainly mean business, don’t you?” Sombra said, inspecting the red mark. “Alright. I’ll give my word not to torment him like that again, lest these two cause even worse damage.”

“Very good.” Even so, Twilight didn’t trust him alone. “Come on, let’s get the sheets off and I’ll get the washing supplies.”

Unable to use his magic, Sombra was forced to use his teeth in stripping the bed, which caused to little pinprick holes to appear in the sheets and blanket put on the bed; Twilight ended up switching out the pillows herself. Twilight carried the sheets down in her magic and they went to the library’s ground floor, where Spike was returning with the bucket of water.

“Thank you, Spike,” Twilight said. “May I speak with you for a minute?”

Spike looked over to Sombra. “O-okay….”

Twilight and Spike went up to the top of the stairs. Once she was sure that they were in private and Sombra had been secured in his position by the two guards, Twilight closed the door and Spike broke out.

“What is he doing here, Twilight? Sombra tried to kill us!”

“Celestia thinks he can be reformed,” Twilight said. “I’m not so sure about it either.”

“But what are you gonna do about it? He can’t stay here.”

“He has to for now, at least. Before you go over to Rarity’s, I want you to write a letter to Celestia saying we’re uncomfortable with the idea of him staying and send it.”

“That’s it? That we’re uncomfortable? Twilight, I don’t know about you, but ‘uncomfortable’ doesn’t even begin to describe it!”

“I have a bright blue tourmaline…”

Spike sighed. “‘Uncomfortable’, it is.” He grabbed a piece of parchment and quill, quickly scribbled off the letter, and handed it to Twilight. Once she had double-checked it and handed it back to him, he quickly flamed the letter and let it fly out the nearby window before accepting the bright blue gemstone from Twilight and running out the door.

Twilight returned to the bottom and grabbed a washboard, some soap, and a clean bucket from a nearby closet. She handed them over to Sombra. “Take the soap in your hooves and carefully kneed the sheets on the washboard after soaking them in the bucket. Rinse and place them in the clean bucket once you’ve hit both sides with the soap.”

Sombra nodded and got to work. Twilight, meanwhile, started taking out stacks of books from the shelves and dusting them before placing the books back in. The two worked in silence for a while, the guards not even making any noise though their focus was kept on Sombra.

“I apologize about Spike,” Twilight said. “He’s a little excitable at times.”

“It’s fine.” The haughty tone was gone from Sombra’s voice. “I had a lot of ponies back at home that would do the same thing. Black is an uncommon coat color, even moreso among the crystal ponies.”

“Were you teased for it?”

“Avoided, mostly. I was going to be a shopkeeper like my father, but I worked with gemstones with mom, in part because cutting gemstones for jewelry kept me out of sight of the others. I particularly liked working with darker crystals and onyx, which is how I got my mark.”

“But you got noticed by Starswirl the Bearded, one of Equestria’s greatest magicians. You must have done something.”

“I tested for it. I went and took a test that was calling all unicorns available in the Crystal Empire. Since among crystal ponies we’re rare, they generally took it to mean high magic talent. Not so. Starswirl’s class was expected to have fifteen; I ended up being the only one.”

Twilight allowed herself a small smile. “I wish I could have trained under Starswirl. You must have been his pride and joy.”

“Not at first. He was somewhat leery of me in the beginning because darker colors were not common among crystal ponies. See, had I been a regular pony born in a little town like this, I’d be fine. But crystal ponies… the brighter the better, in some views.”

“That’s not true. The Crystal Empire is supposed to be the source of love in Equestria and what’s supposed to allow friendship to exist everywhere else.”

“So they all say. They’re not all alicorns though. They’re as mortal as you and I.”

He really must think everything happened only two weeks ago, Twilight thought. He still speaks of Starswirl as though he was recently dead.

“Anyways, Starswirl did eventually come to take pride in me. But it was only because of my quick learning. I was studious, did everything he said, and never stepped out of line, but I got a lingering feeling he hated me. Common knowledge was he was slightly mad, so I never blamed him for it.”

“Did he say he hated you?”

“Never directly. It was always in subtle ways. Like when I was the one who passed his test, he told me ‘Never expected it to be you’. Or, when we were a little ways along in training, he said ‘Sometimes I worry about where you’ll go’.”

“That’s horrible. Why would Starswirl say things like that?”

“I ignored it. So did most everyone, since we all believed it was just part of him being mad. If he really hated me, he wouldn’t have taken me on in the first place.”

“Did you ever tell him about it?”

“Planned to. But then that explosion happened and I got knocked out and I never got the chance to tell him.”

Twilight felt herself almost feeling sorry for Sombra. How much of this does Celestia know, and how much of it is really the truth? Twilight forced herself to harden and simply nodded at Sombra’s statement. “Are you done washing those?”

“Nearly.”

Once that was done, the two ponies went to a clothesline Twilight had set up outside and draped the sheets and blanket over the metal wire to dry in the warm sunlight. Once that was done, Twilight and Sombra went back into the library and Twilight looked through the kitchens.

“You just live in here?” Sombra said, looking around at the kitchen as much as the guard allowed him to. “Fascinating… certainly quite roomy and warm for being inside a tree.”

“It’s an old oak tree,” Twilight said. “Their limbs and trunk can get wide if grown correctly. You probably had mostly pine trees up in the Crystal Empire.”

“Pine. Yew. Yellow on occasion. But no oak.” Sombra placed a hoof against the walls and pushed. “Quite sturdy…”

“If you don’t mind me asking, how come you answered our questions so easily at Canterlot?”

“I have nothing to hide,” Sombra said, putting his hoof down and turning to face Twilight, currently pulling things out of her cupboards and an icebox. “A pony with nothing to hide has nothing to fear.”

Twilight pulled a knife out and began cutting through a head of lettuce. “Guards, can you please leave the room? I’ll call you if I have to.”

Iron Shield and Stout Blade nodded and left. The door to the kitchen closed and, presumably, the guards took their places outside the door, ready to enter if need be. Twilight sighed and watched Sombra for a minute, looking curiously at the door as though wondering why the guards had left him so quickly and easily.

“What do you remember before the explosion?” Twilight asked.

Sombra whirled back around to face her, his dark pink eyes slightly shrunk so that she could see the whites of his eyes. “I remember… I was flipping through a book that Starswirl had given me to study. It was old. Older than even him. I assume it was destroyed. And then… then I remember black crystals.”

The whites of Sombra’s eyes suddenly turned a very bright green and his eyes became crimson. Twilight stopped cutting the lettuce as he continued, his voice deeper. “I remember being angry. Then I remember the shouts of ponies. I remember the sky was dark and stormy, and shards of crystal rained down all around me…”

Twilight cautiously pulled the knife out of the head of lettuce and pointed it towards Sombra.

But before Twilight could do anything, Sombra’s eyes went back to white and his pupils became deep pink again. “Then… it was like someone knocked the wind out of me and I wasn’t angry anymore. I assume that was the explosion. Then I saw this wave coming towards me, but I don’t remember being hit. I must have been knocked out, then.”

Twilight cut through the lettuce with an unusually loud ‘thud’ against the cutting board, enough that she had to wrench it from the groove she made. “Forgive my curiosity,” she said, attempting to remain calm as possible even though her hooves were shaking and she felt like she just wanted to run.

“It’s fine,” Sombra said with an apathetic shrug. “You asked because you were curious. Princesses Celestia and Luna grilled me for hours on everything I knew. I prefer curiosity.”

Twilight nodded. “Another reason you thought you were being treated like a prisoner?”

“Actually, that happened after the whole incident in the cell, when they moved me to a room overlooking Canterlot.”

Twilight finished making lunch and asked the guards if they wanted anything.

“While we thank you for the hospitality,” Iron Shield said, “we’ll decline.”

“It’s not part of our code to force it on you, Miss Twilight,” Stout Blade said.

“No, not at all. We’ll be switching with another pair for an hour so we have a reprieve.”

“Technically we’re supposed to be working in shifts with two more, but they’re not here yet.”

“They should be here sometime this afternoon, though.”

“Ditto for a place to rest this evening. The other two—”

“Garnet Heart and Revenant Wings, I believe.”

“—are supposed to be taking over for the night shift, though we’re the main two.”

“If you insist…,” Twilight said. “Just one more question: does Sombra have any magic?”

“Mild telekinesis,” Stout Blade said. “He can lift small items so long as they’re light. About the size of a pencil at most, maybe a little heavier.”

“What about a fork?”

“I wouldn’t unless you have one made of plastic or polished wood.”

“I can use my hooves,” Sombra said, apparently listening to the conversation. “It’s how I ate in Canterlot. A bit tricky with silverware, but I’d prefer it being tricky to not eating or being uncivilized.”

Twilight gulped. The thought of Sombra with a fork for some reason was not a very good idea to her. “Very well,” she said, and pulled out two forks.

The guards stood patiently by the kitchen while Twilight served up two salads and a warm loaf of pre-sliced sourdough bread, leaving approximately two more servings of salad in a bowl. Sombra ate slowly but near constantly; while Twilight had been intending to save extras for a second meal, Sombra easily ate three servings of the salad and half a loaf on his own.

“You eat like you’re starved,” Twilight commented.

“I went five days without,” he said, still eating his third plate of salad. “Apparently I was hooked up to an IV, which gave me basic nutrition but no pounds. Then I ended up eating sparingly in Canterlot due to rationing and difficulty of ordering. I actually lost weight for a while. I’ll be back to normal tomorrow.”

He did seem healthier to Twilight now than when she saw him awake in Canterlot. “How much education did you go through while you were in the Crystal Empire?”

“I finished the basics,” Sombra said. “Reading, writing, math, history, sciences and such.”

“So I could start you on the advanced things right away?”

“Wouldn’t mind a refresher.”

“I’d do mostly the sciences and math.”

“Good. I hated history. It was boring.”

Another thought struck Twilight, one that was somewhat disconcerting. Almost all history books Twilight had were much more modern. The date in any one of them at minimum might be enough to set him off in confusion. And then there was the fact that if he bothered to read a single one of them, he might find out something about his reign as a tyrant, which at the moment seemed to be in the back of his mind at the time being.

A knock sounded at the door. “I’ll be right back, Sombra. Guards, please make sure Sombra doesn’t leave the kitchen.” The guards saluted the order and Twilight walked out of the kitchen and to the front door of the library.

Spike was present with a scroll in his claws. “I have a message from Celestia,” he said, pointing at the seal. “It came when I was over at Rarity’s.”

Twilight broke through the seal and read it.

Dear Twilight,

While I understand your concerns, I do believe this is the best option. I’ll be sending more guards down to help out, but I don’t want Sombra to feel pressured, nor do I want him to be placed in an environment that will be more detrimental than helpful.

But if he steps out of line, inform me immediately.

Princess Celestia.

P.S.: Tell Spike that, if he sticks it out, I’ll have a branch of a mine set aside for him.

“Well…?” Spike asked.

“We have to keep Sombra with us, though more guards will be on their way to help us.”

“I don’t have a good feeling about this, Twilight. I mean, what if he regains his memories?”

“I want you to write another letter on that fact, Spike. Tell Celestia I’m concerned about the books in the library being modern and that I risk him finding out about what happened.”

Spike retrieved another parchment and the quill. “Do you think it might be enough to send him away?”

“I don’t think Celestia will give in that easily,” Twilight said. “We’re gonna have to put up with him, but it is a legitimate concern.”

“…can I stay at Rarity’s?”

“No! Spike, I still need you as my assistant. I need you around…” Twilight’s voiced hushed. “…in case I have to send an emergency report.”

“Alright, Twilight.” Spike finished the letter and sent it off in another burst of flame. “It’s on its way. Do you need me to do anything?”

“No. You can still have your day off today. Head over to Rarity’s, but please don’t tell her about this yet. And come back before dark!” Twilight called as Spike started running away.

Twilight went back to the kitchen where Sombra was finishing up his plate. A smile crossed his face, but Twilight had trouble figuring out if it was genuine. “Thank you, Miss Twilight, for the excellent meal.”

“Is there anything you want to do?”

“I feel drained. Do you mind if I just take a nap for a little bit?”

“I suppose a little rest wouldn’t hurt. But let’s make sure your sheets are dry.”

They were, so Twilight brought them down from the clothesline and quickly made up Sombra’s bed in his room in addition to casting a spell on the window. Twilight allowed Sombra to take three books with him – he ended up taking two rather large high-fantasy novels and a book on gemstones – and the black unicorn was placed in his room with Iron Shield and Stout Blade on guard.

“I’m going to go to the market and see if they have things for dinner this evening,” Twilight said. “I should be back in an hour.”

Sombra nodded and laid himself down on the bed as they closed the door.

Then Twilight spoke privately to the guards. “Sombra’s not to leave his room until I return,” she said. “I’ve created a small barrier on the window so he can’t open it, but keep an open ear.”

The guards saluted and took up positions, standing stiffly on either side of the door though with an ear on the door at all times. Twilight thanked the guards, grabbed her saddlebags and a small pouch of bits, and left the library.

The sunlight was particularly invigorating, and Twilight found herself rather pleased that she was finally out of the house and not with Sombra. She just felt so uneasy around him, that feeling that he wasn’t as reformed as Celestia believed; there was his remembrance of his defeat by the Elements of Harmony and Cadence’s healing wave, not to mention the fact that he kept his fangs.

But it was strange how they came about. Because besides the knowledge of the event, Sombra didn’t seem to associate it with Twilight or Cadence, but the explosion caused by Starswirl that had to have happened at least two decades after Sombra had become a tyrant. And the remembrance came and went without Sombra even noticing it.

“Hey, Twi!”

Twilight was shocked out of her reverie. Applejack was waving to her from her stand in the market.

“Hey, Applejack!” Twilight called back, trying to push the thoughts of Sombra to the back of her mind as she approached the stand. “I thought Big Macintosh usually was the one monitoring the stand.”

“Granny Smith’s run out of meds,” Applejack said. “He’s helpin’ her with chores around the house until more comes in. Anyway, needin’ to buy anythin’?”

“Yeah… I’m thinking I need eight apples.”

“Alright, what ki— hey, ain’t that double what ya usually get?”

“Oh! Yeah, I got visitors coming in to stay for a while.”

“Oh… what sort of visitors?”

“Someone Celestia wants to show. She directed them to me because I’m her student and had large magic talent.”

Applejack raised her eyebrow. “Interestin’… anyways, what kind do ya want?”

“Oh… let’s get four of the red delicious, two of the red gala, and two of the braeburn.”

“Let’s see… we’re doin’ a sale, so that’ll be eight bits. Thanks for doin’ business, Twi.”

“No problem, Applejack. See you around!”

It was interesting. Despite the lie that Twilight had made, Applejack, the Element of Honesty, hadn’t even commented on it. Then Twilight realized something: Celestia did refer Sombra to Twilight because of her magic ability. It ended up being a white lie instead of a full lie.

But that couldn’t last for long.

Twilight managed to complete her shopping like normal. While a few other ponies noticed that Twilight was buying double her normal, no one really questioned it; who wouldn’t with a few extra bits going their way? Her final stop ended up being Sugarcube Corner, where she decided to get a small cake.

Mrs. Cake said that she would have a small cake ready, but it needed to be frosted and would take a minute or two to cool down and frost. Twilight said it was fine, ordered a buttercream frosting, and sat back to wait. Twilight was waiting when Rainbow Dash came in.

“Hey, egghead,” Rainbow Dash said. “What are you doing here?”

“I was just getting my shopping done,” Twilight said. “Had to restock on a few things and decided to pick up a cake. What about you?”

“I’m getting lunch in the middle of weather duties. Supposed to be a small rainstorm tonight; no thunder, but decent rainfall and we have to get the clouds in order. Hey, I was placing some clouds around the library when I noticed two guards standing around at the door.”

“About how long ago was that?”

“I just passed on my way here and saw them. How come guards are coming to your house?”

“Oh, Princess Celestia was going to show someone to me. Probably wanted to show off my talent.”

“Heh, wish I could say that. I’ve been itching for a chance to show off my Sonic Rainboom, and I perfected the Buccaneer Blaze; I’ll probably be using them to clear out the clouds tomorrow.”

Mrs. Cake came out from the back with the cooled and frosted cake; Twilight paid and said farewell to Rainbow Dash, left Sugarcube Corner and went to meet the two guards at her house.

Indeed, two more stallion guards were standing outside; one normal white with brown mane and blue eyes, but another with a longer blonde mane. It was the blonde one who spoke up as she approached. “Miss Twilight Sparkle, I presume. I’m Garnet Heart and this here’s my partner, Revenant Wings.”

Revenant Wings nodded.

“Forgive him; he’s a little shy,” Garnet Heart said. “We’re the replacements sent by the princesses to cover Iron Shield and Stout Blade.

“Oh, yes. Iron Shield mentioned you. Come on in. Are you the ones taking over tonight?”

“Yeah. We’ll cover for an hour now and from nightfall until you wake up in the morning, at which point Iron and Stout will change back. Shouldn’t have too many problems with scheduling.”

Twilight and the two guards went inside. Twilight dropped the saddlebags in the kitchen before heading upstairs where the two guards were positioned around the door leading into Sombra’s room. Both Iron Shield and Stout Blade were wearing nervous looks on their faces.

“Is something wrong?” Twilight asked.

“Sombra’s been having fits for the past few minutes,” Iron Shield spoke up.

“Is the anti-magic ring still on him?”

“Yes. No errant spells have been fired, but he’s still asleep and seems to be restless.”

“And the noises he’s making are terrible,” Stout Blade added. “He’s been growling in his sleep. Deep, guttural growls.”

Twilight flung open the door to find that Sombra was still lying down and still asleep. He seemed to be twitching every once in a while, jerking his head or his hooves around. Every once in a while he let out an almost feral growl and there were faint trails of purple smoke coming from the edges of his eyes.

Twilight quickly approached Sombra and started shaking him. She shook him and shook him. “Sombra! Wake up!” she shouted.

Sombra stopped jerking around and his eyes shot open. Twilight saw a faint trace of green in his eyes before it changed back to white and the purple trails left him. He got up and looked at Twilight.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, looking startled by the appearance of Twilight and the four guards and his sudden awakening. “What’s going on?”

“Are you alright?” Twilight asked. “You were having fits.”

“Fits?”

“You were jerking around and growling in your sleep.”

Sombra propped himself up and shook his head around. “I… I don’t know. Must have been a nightmare. I can’t remember any of it, though. It’s strange; nothing like this happened in Canterlot.”

Twilight nodded, but the look of concern on her face did not leave.

“Do you mind if I go back to sleep for a while longer?”

“If you think you can.”

Sombra nodded. He laid himself back down and quickly fell asleep. Twilight walked back out and closed the door. The guards looked at each other and nodded assent.

“We’ll take a few extra hours overtime each,” Garnet Heart said. “As a precaution.”

Twilight sighed. “Thank you.”

* * *

Later that evening, after Sombra had woken up, Twilight created a stew and a new salad. Sombra still ate heartily, but she accounted for that this time and he ate less than before, though it still took him a while due to navigating a soup spoon. After dinner, Sombra was allowed to go into the library. Iron Shield and Stout Blade left, leaving Garnet Heart and Revenant Wings to take over for the night shift; Twilight posted one on either side of the room.

Celestia had responded to Twilight’s next letter. Not with a letter, but with a package sent via speedy delivery and another guard, who left as soon as Twilight picked up the package. Inside were four old books: one on magic, one on chemistry (which seemed to barely change from the ones Twilight had), one on biology (which also hadn’t changed much), and one on sociology. Sombra had liked the gift of the books, and was now reading through the one on magic, facing away from Twilight.

But Twilight was still relatively angry. Celestia had responded to Twilight’s concern about culture shock with yet another way to hide it from Sombra. It had gotten to the point where Twilight was concerned with what would happen when Sombra did find out, and wished that he had been briefed beforehoof.

Twilight eventually decided to vent via a letter.

Dear Princess Celestia:

I thank you for the books. Sombra is enjoying looking through them, and it’s the most interest and enthusiasm he’s shown all day. It will also help me create lessons for him to help return him to a well-educated and well-informed state of mind. I plan to create a mixture of lessons that include biology, chemistry, psychology, sociology, mathematics, and magic.

“What are you doing?” Sombra asked without looking up from his book.

“Does it matter?” Twilight asked in response.

“You seem to have a rather full grip on your quill,” Sombra said lazily. “It sounds like you’re trying to scratch out whatever it is on your desk.”

Twilight lifted the paper. The words could easily be seen in the face of the wood. “I’ve always been told I’m a bit heavy on the quill.”

“I’ve heard it’s more a problem with control than experience,” Sombra said with a rather curious tone. “Emotions cloud the mind and reflect themselves in quill-handling.”

It began to rain outside, the droplets creating a soft pitter patter on the window and an easy shower on the leaves of the giant oak.

“Release the emotions,” Sombra purred, “and the quill will lighten in response to lightened mood.”

“Is that what Starswirl always told you?”

“He always insisted my scratching of the quill was worse than a hoof across a chalkboard,” Sombra spat.

“Do you still?”

“It’s been two weeks since I’ve written anything, at least, so I don’t know.”

Twilight sighed and resumed her letter.

But there have been some problems with Sombra: earlier today, he was having a nap. He suddenly had a case of the fits and purple smoke came from his eyes as though he was using dark magic. He also shows varying levels of awareness regarding what actually happened.

Princess… I don’t know how long we can keep up this ruse. Eventually he’s going to figure it out, find something that will tell him how long he’s actually been out. I have too many books in this library that could reveal the date, and there are those who could accidentally let slip what happened. What am I supposed to do?

Twilight signed the letter and called Spike over. He came down from his position upstairs, taking odd glances at Sombra as he took the letter without question and flamed it, sending it off to Princess Celestia. Almost as soon as he did so, he scampered back up the stairs and disappeared into the upper levels.

“Still afraid of me?” Sombra said.

“It wasn’t exactly a good introduction,” Twilight said, half angrily.

“I meant nothing by it,” Sombra shrugged.

Twilight pulled over the old biology book that Celestia had sent her and started looking through it. It was neatly divided, though there were a few things that she might switch around for her teaching of Sombra. Twilight started to read through the chapters and make note of the order she wished to go through them.

“You didn’t answer me,” Sombra spoke up.

“Didn’t answer what?” Twilight asked.

“I asked you what you were doing.”

“I’m arranging a schedule,” Twilight said. “I’m trying to think what is the best order to go through them; these textbooks have a different order than I’m used to.”

Sombra nodded. “Standard issue Crystal Empire books. A little more wear and tear than what I’d thought, but it’s a relief to have something familiar again.”

Twilight sighed and continued making notes on the biology textbook. She was able to go through the biology and chemistry books by the time the storm had picked up and thought she should go to bed.

“I might be able to start teaching you tomorrow,” Twilight said.

“Good, good,” Sombra said, getting up and stretching. “It’d be a relief as opposed to sitting around and doing nothing.” He yawned, showing his two fangs and causing a shiver to go up and down the guards’ spine.

“We’re not doing magic right away.”

“I figured as much.”

“But we’ll try some basics at the end of the week.”

Sombra turned around to face Twilight. “Does that mean this thing is off permanently?” he asked, pointing to the anti-magic ring at the base of his horn.

“No,” Twilight said. “Just for an hour or two while we go through magic retraining.”

“Oh, pooh. You’re not going to let me have any fun.”

Twilight looked up from her work. Sombra was giving a rather large frown. It took a while of staring at it before Sombra bust out laughing again.

“You should see the look on your face!”

Twilight, aware of the look of frustration and irritation on her face, nodded to the guards. Revenant Wings came over and bonked Sombra on the head with the shaft of his spear. Garnet Heart headed closer to Twilight.

“Do you happen to know where I can get a mild sedative for him?”

“I can get clearance through the guard to get some from the hospital to administer in case of emergency,” Garnet Heart said.

Twilight said. “Get that clearance tomorrow morning.”

Garnet saluted and resumed his position.

After a little while longer, Twilight decided to go to bed. Sombra insisted that he wasn’t tired and wanted to stay awake, so Twilight let him into his room with a lamp and told him to read for fifteen or twenty minutes before falling asleep. Sombra pouted again but this time didn’t antagonize Twilight and went to his room. Garnet Heart and Revenant Wings were allowed a lamp in the hall, as well, and use of the bathroom if necessary before Twilight headed into her own room and blew out the lights except for one above her own bed.

As Twilight approached the bed, she could see Spike already asleep, sprawled out in his basket and snoring softly. Next to him was a sealed letter; he must have been asleep when it arrived. Twilight, smiling warmly at Spike, opened up the letter and read it.

Twilight’s expression changed from warm to anxious if not fearful. It was written in a rather boldface font and made grooves in the paper.

Whatever you do, prevent him from finding out at all cost.

Chapter 3 - Biology, Chemistry, and Wizardry

Celestia’s letter first stunned Twilight. Before even reading it, the boldface font and the slight grooves made by pressing hard with a quill had cued her to something of obvious importance and firm instruction. But it was so rarely used by the princess that to Twilight it ended up meaning something else: Celestia was obviously panicked. But why?

There was one thing that seemed obvious. Celestia could be under duress; revealing Sombra’s true origins to him might mean the black unicorn would go into a frenzy and become violent. This presented a whole host of problems within itself, but Twilight suspected a deeper reasoning. Years of listening to and watching her mentor told her that Celestia never did anything without deeper reasoning and understanding of the consequences. Something else must have come across to Celestia when Twilight had sent her letter.

But what?

Twilight looked quickly around the dark room and went to the candle above her bed and lit the note on fire, placing it into the empty stone fireplace built into the trunk of the giant oak so that it could burn out naturally. Twilight went to the hallway to find Garnet Heart and Revenant Wings located just outside the door to Sombra’s room.

“Is he asleep?” Twilight asked.

“Last I checked, he was snoring,” Garnet Heart answered.

“Can you unlock the door?”

Garnet Heart nodded and unlocked the door. He and Revenant Wings held their spears at the ready and pointed it into the room. In the dim light of the single lamp in the hall, Twilight could see Sombra’s eyes were closed and his chest was rising and falling slowly. His mouth was open slightly and a very quiet snore came from it every couple of breaths.

Twilight quickly sneaked into the room and scanned the bookshelf where Sombra kept the books that Twilight let him and the old textbooks that Celestia had sent. Twilight scanned and searched for the book of magic: a thick purple book with silver markings. Twilight carefully pulled it out with her own magic, listening for movement from Sombra. The black unicorn yawned once and turned over though otherwise remained asleep as Twilight crept out of the room. Garnet Heart shut the door and locked it again as Twilight returned to her own room and the guards returned to their posts.

Twilight took the candle above her bed and lit the small lamp above her desk in the room. Very quickly, she began to write.

These are my observations regarding the rehabilitation of the black unicorn Sombra, former tyrant of the Crystal Empire who was corrupted by dark magic. After strange events in the Crystal Empire upon its return after one thousand years, here is what is currently known about the situation.

Fact 1: The Elements of Harmony were used on Sombra. Sombra was rendered dizzy and unable to summon magic. Two weeks after said incident, Sombra’s magic is weak and still recovering. Inference 1: without their original power, the Elements were weak and caused significant though not their usual damage.

Fact 2: Replacing the Crystal Heart caused a magical wave to sweep over the Crystal Empire. The wave destroyed the crystals created by Sombra’s dark magic and eventually engulfed Sombra. Sombra was later found outside the Crystal Empire with his former magic gone and in a coma; how he survived both the Elements of Harmony and the Crystal Heart still unknown.

Fact 3: Sombra appears to be suffering from a case of amnesia. He still acts as though he’s never been corrupted by dark magic, and remembers the events of a thousand years ago as though it happened not long ago. Incident occurred in Canterlot Castle dungeon wherein the mention of Starswirl the Bearded being dead seemed to cause great stress and shock; Sombra broke down crying at the mention. At all cost must avoid things that could cause culture shock.

Fact 4: If angered, Sombra tends to show traces of his corrupted form. Such changes include his cornea turning from white to green, his eyes turning from a deep pink to crimson, and purple smoke appearing from the corners of his eyes. Inference 2: such findings suggest that despite previous thoughts of the Elements of Harmony having cured him that in reality traces of the dark magic might remain…

The thought struck Twilight so suddenly it took her off-guard though she admitted to herself a few seconds later she should have seen it coming. But how did Celestia not notice it? How come the dark magic locator she sent to the Crystal Empire didn’t find the small traces of dark magic in Sombra?

There would be answers somewhere. Dark magic was an almost forbidden knowledge and the fact that no book in her library would have answers wasn’t lost on Twilight. She gingerly pulled the magic book over towards her and opened it towards the final section: a small introduction to dark magic.

Twilight had long since learned the art of scanning; she searched for key words and phrases that might stick out, relating to her interest. It took her a long time of scanning through nearly fifty pages of rather small text and very detailed diagrams before something stood out that she wasn’t looking for.

“‘Dark Magic and Anatomy’?” Twilight murmured quietly upon seeing the large heading.

Twilight began to see things that scared her. Things that should only happen in the rare diseases came with usage of dark magic in large amounts. Things like white blood cell counts decreasing, lung damage, blood pressure spikes, severe arrhythmia, seizures, irreversible iris damage, damage to the amygdala and cortex. All described in a manner that made Twilight want to vomit.

It was in the section on blood, which came last in the book’s organization, that Twilight found a passage.

It is for various reasons that dark magic is sometimes known as ‘blood magic’. But the various blood-based diseases that come with using dark magic are not how it got this name. Rather, dark magic does not reside in the usual centers of a pony where magic is stored – commonly in vesicles at the base of the horn or wings – but in the bloodstream of a pony. Those with extensive usage of dark magic in their system may have traces still lingering among their possibly diseased or damaged blood even years after their last usage.

Following this passage were three methods commonly used to check if dark magic was still lingering in the bloodstream after extensive usage. All three were extremely complicated and sometimes took days to complete, and the results were often considered hazardous; dark magic appeared to be volatile even in small amounts. Twilight returned to the parchment she had been working on.

Experiment 1: Old book on magic suggests dark magic may be present in bloodstream. Will attempt to assess Sombra’s blood using simple sample. Intend to begin procedure tomorrow afternoon. Inference 3: perhaps traces of dark magic existing in Sombra’s bloodstream may account for occasional relapses.

But, as Twilight went back to the book and continued reading, another passage disturbed her.

The lingering traces of dark magic are almost impossible to remove completely without a transfusion lasting for weeks. If left untreated, the dark magic may have strong effects on the amygdala, hippocampus, and cortical regions, creating increased affinity for various psychological disorders, the most common of which is a dark magic withdrawal – not using dark magic for a long time may cause the traces to hijack various areas until it has been used.

Twilight wanted to scream. As much as she frequently trusted Celestia’s judgment and her reasoning was usually right, she had to question the decision to send her what was a chemical, biological, and magical time bomb.

Twilight looked over to a glass case nearby. In it lay the Elements of Harmony, safely protected and easily reachable in case of emergency ever since the Changelings had invaded Canterlot. Almost immediately, Twilight realized why Celestia had sent Sombra to her instead of keeping him in Canterlot: it was a simple matter of grouping the Elements together and using them to their fullest extent if necessary to diffuse the bomb.

Twilight, who had intended to give the book back to Sombra, decided to keep it. She couldn’t leave this around for him to discover. But, for some reason, it wasn’t because of the dark magic spells that were contained within. It was because she feared him discovering the possible side effects.

Besides, she would need it to look out for those signs.

By the time Twilight decided she probably needed to sleep, the moon had disappeared. It would soon be time for the sun to begin to rise. Twilight hid the magic book and her parchment with notes. She opened the door and moved her head out to look at the guards in the hall. Both turned to look towards her.

“I’ve been up kind of late tonight,” Twilight said. “If I’m not up, wake me when you’re about to get off your shift.”

“Of course, Miss Twilight,” Garnet Heart replied softly. “Get some sleep. Sombra’s not had any problems tonight.”

Twilight thanked them again and collapsed in her bed, soon falling into a deep sleep.

* * *

Twilight was jolted awake by three sharp knocks at her door.

“Miss Twilight!” came a rough voice from outside that wasn’t Garnet Heart. “It’s Iron Shield. Garnet said you wanted to be woken up when they were getting off their shift. It’s about seven.”

Twilight lifted herself slowly from the bed and yawned, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes with a hoof. The early morning air was still crisp, cool, and fresh, revitalizing her from what was originally a later night than she’d had in a while. Furthermore, it made her mission somewhat less daunting as it filled her with renewed verve.

If Sombra’s tutoring was to be not only taken seriously but effectively carried out, it would need to start right. Twilight got herself out of bed and walked over to open the door. Iron Shield was still standing outside and saluted as Twilight came into his view.

“How is Sombra?” Twilight asked seriously. “How did he sleep?”

“No fits last night, according to Garnet,” Iron Shield said.

“How long ago did the other two guards leave?”

“Five minutes ago,” Iron Shield said. “Stout Blade is already at his post.”

Twilight nodded. “Wake Sombra up in forty minutes,” she said, “and bring him to the kitchen.”

Iron Shield nodded and cleared out of the way as Twilight maneuvered through the tree before reaching the kitchen. She quickly made up some dough and arranged it in a large bread pan before putting it in a small wood fire-based oven in her kitchen. Once the dough was cooking, she began to take a few oranges and juiced them before moving to cooking other things.

By the time Sombra appeared escorted by the guards, Twilight had cooked up a feast. Four settings were up with freshly-baked and toasted bread and jam, freshly-squeezed orange juice, a helping of scrambled eggs with thinly-sliced tomato and a fruit medley and few very small sausage links. Sombra’s mouth dropped at the sight.

“Good morning,” Twilight said.

“Good… morning?” Sombra replied, still stunned.

“Today’s the first day of your tutoring,” Twilight said. “Starting with some biology.”

Sombra nodded. “So it is…”

“Come over here and sit down,” Twilight said. “You too, guards.”

The guards nodded and directed Sombra to a seat across from Twilight. One guard placed themselves beside each unicorn and all four set down to eat, Sombra a little slower to start than the others. Iron Shield and Stout Blade both had their eyes trained on Sombra, who had his eyes trained on Twilight, who kept eating quite happily as though ignorant of the intense stares of the guards and the confused but wary gaze of Sombra.

Once breakfast was finished, Twilight had them all go down to the library’s base floor, where the bottom had been cleared out and a large clean area made. Twilight asked one of the guard to lead her and Sombra in some basic leg stretches they learned from training. Stout Blade volunteered, and began to lead Twilight and Sombra, who was constantly groaning and rolling his eyes.

“What is the point of this?” Sombra said. “What is this going to have to do with my training and tutoring? Shouldn’t we be pouring over books?”

“I’ve done a little of that part already,” Twilight said. “And trust me, this part will be crucial.”

After nearly fifteen minutes, Twilight told Stout Blade to stop.

“How are you feeling?” Twilight asked Sombra.

Sombra groaned, but not out of annoyance.

“We’ll take it easy today,” Twilight said. “Just to the edge of Ponyville and back.”

“Doing what?” Sombra nearly growled.

“Jogging,” Twilight said, unusually perky. “We’re just going to have a short bit of exercise every morning before training.”

“What are you? A drill sergeant?”

Stout Blade nervously itched the back of his head with a hoof. He was soon stopped by Iron Shield, who lightly bonked him on the head with the shaft of his spear.

“No,” Twilight responded. “But if we get you awake and focused with a good breakfast and some exercise, you’ll be able to absorb more information.”

Sombra gave off a “harrumph” and snorted angrily.

“It might also get your magic back quicker…” Twilight said in a sort of sing-song voice.

Sombra shook his head and his eyes widened. “…you mean that?”

“It’ll give us someplace to start,” Twilight said.

Sombra steeled himself, then nodded. “Alright. Whenever you’re ready.”

Twilight opened the door of the library. From there, it was a straight shot down a somewhat long, wide road to the entrance of Sweet Apple Acres. “From here, we’ll keep an easy but constant pace to the end of the road. Then, if you’re up to it, we could have a little competition.”

Sombra smirked. “A competition, eh? Ha ha, it’s been a while since I’ve had a little sport.”

“Pace yourself,” Twilight said.

With a few deep breaths, Twiliight started trotting off down the road. Sombra soon took off shortly behind Twilight, while the two guards took to the air and flew alongside Sombra. The odd arrangement coupled by the presence of the oily-black unicorn began to draw a few looks from the ponies that were coming out and about for their daily business.

“I quite like this place,” Sombra said. “Fresh air, clear skies, wonderful temperature. How come they never said anything about this back home?”

“Ponyville was still in its early stages,” Twilight said, noticing the occasional groups looking at the cavalcade and murmuring to one another as though either surprised or anxious. But she continued talking as though it was normal. “Its development is recent enough news probably hadn’t gotten to the Crystal Empire yet.”

“Certainly embiggens the spirit, doesn’t it?” Sombra said.

Twilight kept walking, but turned around and looked at Sombra with confusion. “…what?”

“Embiggens,” Sombra said again. “Starswirl used it often. He said it meant ‘to make bigger’ or ‘to cause to grow’.”

“Well, I’ve never heard of it,” Twilight said. “Much less from Starswirl.”

“Oh, he was often mad,” Sombra said. “Used strange words like that if he didn’t want anyone to know what he was talking about. But he was absolutely brilliant and most found it quite cromulent.”

“…and what’s that word supposed to mean?”

“Starswirl said it was ‘acceptable’.”

“Why don’t you use the terms that ponies will actually know instead of Starswirl’s mad talk?” Despite trying to sound serious, Twilight was finding it hard to stifle the laughter coming up.

“I was around him for seven years,” Sombra said with a wink. “It’s hard to break the habit.”

Twilight giggled yet again.

Sombra did, however, manage to keep pace until the end of the street and even a little further outside of Ponyville. There, they stopped by a stream where a panting Sombra bent down and drank thirstily for a minute or so before stretching.

“This place is quite large for something that looks like a small town,” Sombra said.

“It seems we need to embiggen your lungs,” Twilight said.

Sombra growled at Twilight for a moment before busting out laughing. “Hey! You used ‘embiggen’!” And he rolled around on the ground laughing.

“It’s only because you used it not long ago,” Twilight said indignantly. “And since you provided me with a definition, my mind automatically made sense of it.”

“Shouldn’t trust your mind so much, you know,” Sombra said as he got up. “Otherwise you’ll be using foreign words without knowing what they mean.”

“Ooh… you keep using those, you’re going to get me into a ha—I’ve got an idea.”

“What sort of an idea?”

“The return trek can be a sort of competition. Whoever gets to the library faster and touches the door wins.”

“Alright. But it isn’t a true competition unless you place some sort of wager.”

“Oh, I have that figured out. If I win, you have to stop using those weird words.”

“And what about if I win?”

“I do some mild research on the side. In my next report, I have to use both of those words: ‘embiggen’ and ‘cromulent’.”

Sombra considered those options for a moment. “To whom do you send the report to?”

“Princess Celestia.”

Sombra smiled. “Make it the next two reports. It’ll be hard to get rid of that habit…”

Twilight nodded. “Deal.”

Iron Shield drew a line in the dirt and Twilight and Sombra approached it. Iron Shield flew over Twilight, while Stout Blade flew alongside Sombra. Iron Shield raised his hoof to begin their race.

“On my count. Three… two… one… go!”

Sombra bolted off the starting line with a fast gallop, leaving a cantering Twilight behind. But Twilight kept her easy pace and watched with amusement as Sombra darted ahead, leaving a trail of dust in his wake. Ponies flew to the sides to keep away from the black unicorn roaring down the street, weaving through them like flags in a skiing competition.

Twilight kept up her moderate pace, gently sidestepping the ponies around who occasionally waved to her like it was nothing. A small crowd gathered up ahead, and Twilight passed by with mild confidence to see that Sombra had tripped over a lone cauliflower head that had fallen from a farmer’s cart; Stout Blade was overhead, looking on as Sombra picked himself up and shook the dirt off himself, but by then Twilight was far ahead.

The library’s features were now getting clearer. Twilight figured it was time to start breaking into a gallop. With a gently practiced ease, she gradually gained speed until she was running at a full gallop, hooves pounding the earthen road beneath her.

“RRRAAAAAAAAAGH!”

Twilight barely had time to turn around before Sombra crashed into her hooves first. Twilight found herself rolling head over hoof, face crushed into the black hair on Sombra’s chest as they rolled and bumped their way down the street, eventually slamming into the door. The purple unicorn shook her head around to clear it before examining what happened.

Both Twilight and Sombra were flat on their backs, their rear legs and hooves leaning on the door and their front hooves splayed out to the sides. Sombra lifted his head up and started laughing. “So, who wins?” he asked.

Twilight found herself smiling. “I think that’s a draw.”

“Ha ha! I can keep using the word!”

Twilight lightly punched Sombra’s shoulder. “That’s not what that means.”

“What does it mean, then? It’s no fun if it just nulls it.”

“Alright, then. I’ll use either ‘embiggen’ or ‘cromulent’ in one report, and you have to stop using them for a month.”

Sombra laughed, but it wasn’t his riotous or belittling laughter. It was almost a good-natured laugh that sounded warm from his deeper voice. What surprised Twilight more was that, when Sombra looked over to her, his eyes were a brighter pink than normal. “Alright. I’d say that seems fair.” He rolled over on his side and easily picked himself back up. “Need any help?” Sombra asked as he held out a hoof towards Twilight.

Twilight nodded. Sombra gently rolled Twilight over and helped her back on her feet. “Thank you,” Twilight said, still stunned.

Sombra smiled and opened the door.

Twilight looked around and saw the guards standing with spears at the ready not far away. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’m okay. It was… actually quite fun.”

“All the same,” Iron Shield said as he lowered his weapon. “I would rather not get the idea in his head that it’s fun.”

Twilight had to somewhat agree with the guard. The roar was mildly violent and Sombra’s somewhat larger stature and more muscle and weight had hurt running into her. But the pain soon vanished as Twilight set Sombra up with a hoof attachment to hold a quill and a few sheets of parchment and began going through the biology book.

The rest of the day was rather quiet. Sombra was very attentive and took such a large amount of notes it almost made Twilight proud of herself and admittedly a little giddy to see that he was almost as detailed as she was. After the introductory section, they stopped for a short lunch of sandwiches with chips before returning and going over the first chapter of the biology textbook. Sombra continued making notes and Twilight worked through the chapter until evening came. Twilight gave Sombra the textbook to read as she cooked dinner and once more allowed the guards to dine with them.

By the time night fell and the guards were being changed, Sombra was tired enough he was asking to go to bed.

“Alright. But let me get a small blood sample.”

Sombra sat down patiently as Twilight applied a small amount of rubbing alcohol onto his skin. “What for?”

Twilight gently pricked the needle of a small syringe into Sombra’s foreleg and drew out a small amount of blood, mostly colored a normal red but with strange black and green blobs. “The Ponyville Hospital needs a small blood sample, but they’re not doing house calls yet.”

“How come you don’t just take me there?”

“You recently had a physical assessment at Canterlot. This is all they need.”

“Fair enough,” Sombra said through a yawn.

Twilight cleaned the wound and placed a small bandage over the hole. “That will hold overnight. We’ll pull it off and clean it again tomorrow.”

Sombra nodded. “What’s tomorrow’s lesson?”

“Chemistry. Nothing too much, just some fundamentals and basic math for it.”

“Sounds good. You’re actually quite brilliant, you know. Almost as much as Starswirl.”

Twilight found herself blushing. “Well, I don’t claim to know as much as he does…”

“I know. I didn’t say I thought you could surpass him as a teacher.”

Twilight went even redder, but Sombra’s laugh was once again good-natured.

“Alright, gentlemen,” Sombra said to the guards, “lead on!” And the two guards took Sombra up to his bedroom.

When Twilight was sure that Sombra was in his room, Twilight took the book on magic from her main study and the syringe of blood and went down to the basement. The syringe was gently placed on the counter and Twilight opened up to the magic book’s segment on testing for amount of dark magic.

Step one, Twilight read, place the contents of the syringe in a glass vial. Stopper immediately with a rubber top and be careful as the the solution may be volatile.

Twilight took the syringe, emptied the contents into a small vial and pulled out a black rubber cap, which she plugged into the top of the vial immediately. The magic-infused blood began resisting its confinement, pushing against the stopper and almost pushing it off, but Twilight clamped her hooves around the vial and squished it shut. So, instead, it pushed her and slammed into Twilight’s chest with the vial, knocking the wind out of her for a second. It took placing the vial into a small metallic chest and locking it shut for the vial to stop squirming around.

Step two Twilight read quickly, dilute 50 milliliters of a .1 molar solution of sulfuric acid.

Twilight scanned the contents of her shelves and found a bottle labled “H2SO4”. Calculations were done on a separate paper and the correct amounts of purified water and the sulfuric acid were placed into a vial and filled to a combined total of 50 millileters.

Step three: set up your equipment to accommodate both a titration and a distillation, with a burner under the titration flask set for medium heat.

Twilight pulled out two stands and numerous clamps, setting up a long metal tube that poured into a strange flask with two openings, one straight up and another off to the side, suspended over a small orange flame with a blue inner flame. The opening on top went up to the metal tube, and the opening to the side had a plastic tube attached to it that led up to another, large round flask on the opposite stand.

Step four: place 50 milliliters of the blood of the pony in question into the flask below the glass tube and place the diluted sulfuric acid into the glass tube.

Twilight carefully transferred the sulfuric acid into the glass tube and unlocked the chest, quickly grabbing and unstopping the vial above the glass tube. The blood tainted with dark magic rocketed out of the vial and dropped almost immediately into the bottom of the flask under the glass tube. Seizing the small moment of reprieve, Twilight quickly clamped the glass tube of sulfuric acid onto the flask so that the blood was trapped in the flask.

Step five: slowly drip the sulfuric acid into the blood. The low acidity of the solution will balance out the small basic pH of the blood and render it neutral. This will cause the dark magic remnants to slowly be released out the side opening, through the distillation tube, and into a separate flask without the blood.

Using a special lever, Twilight opened the passage between the glass tube and the flask and let it slowly drip into the blood, causing it to allow one good-sized drop every ten seconds. After five drops, the first glob of dark magic – a little black sphere with a dark green shine around it. It travelled up the plastic tube and deposited like molasses into the bottom of the distillation flask. After that, every little drop released another small, similar blob that went up the tube and into the flask in much the same way.

Step six: once all the dark magic has been deposited into the flask (in most cases, five minutes after the last drop of sulfuric acid), stopper it and let it sit in a dark space for half an hour. It will slowly lose its volatile nature and can be used for further research. Be careful when handling the pure dark magic; much like mercury, it can be slowly absorbed through the skin and will enter your bloodstream.

Twilight quickly unhooked the bottle once the process was over and capped it with another rubber stopper before placing it in the locked chest. Carefully as she could manage, Twilight unassembled the setup and cleaned the materials with water and set them under a small heat lamp to dry before going back to reading the book.

As dark magic can infuse itself with the blood, it is nearly impossible to tell how much dark magic is actually in the blood as the dark magic will slowly reduce the volume immediately apparent in the blood. Titrating the blood with a weak acid will cause it to separate from the blood and return to its original volume, and distilling it will take the dark magic out of the blood into a separate container.

For interpreting the results: magic in the volume of zero to 10 milliliters per 50 milliliters of blood is generally considered safe enough for mild use and won’t cause lasting damage. Magic in the volume of 10 milliliters to 20 milliliters can cause minor damage, but it can be healed though the longer the magic has been in the blood, the more severe it is. Magic above 20 milliliter mark can cause lasting damage that in some cases may never be healed, and amounts above 45 millileters can cause corruption in an individual. Cases involving corruption are rare and for the most part unstudied, as most don’t survive the damage long enough to reach that stage and most who do are killed. It is recommended by all medical institutions that users of dark magic frequently report to a physician to have the levels of magic in the blood checked to make sure it stays in the safe zone of zero to 10 milliliters.

Twilight examined the amount of blood in the vial. It had by now settled down and created a small amount of approximately 1.2 milliliters of dark magic. With the results analyzed, Twilight replaced the vial into the locked chest and returned to her parchment paper with the notes in her study.

Fact 5: Experiment to extract dark magic completed. Fifty milliliters of Sombra’s blood were used and extraction revealed 1.2 milliliters of dark magic; defined by the procedure in the magic book as being of a “low” level. Will be testing again at the end of the week to see if the amount embiggens increases to higher, more dangerous levels.

With the experiment completed and observations recorded, Twilight checked the time. Nearly three hours had passed since she had taken the sample of blood from Sombra. She let out a yawn as she went out to find Garnet Heart and Revenant Wings in the hall.

“I’m going to bed,” Twilight said. “Will you wake me up again tomorrow?”

“Of course, Twilight,” Garnet Heart said softly. “Sombra’s sleeping peacefully. Go ahead and get some rest. We’ll try and let you know before we leave tomorrow.”

“Thank you,” Twilight said, and once again collapsed on the bed and fell asleep.

* * *

The rest of the week ended up continuing in much the same way.

Every morning Garnet Heart would wake Twilight up as he and Revenant Wings were about to leave. Twilight would then make breakfast and prepare it for herself, Sombra, Iron Shield and Stout Blade. Once breakfast was finished, Stout Blade would lead Twilight and Sombra in exercise, after which they would trot to the outskirts of Ponyville and canter back.

Once they had returned, Twilight would get into the lesson for the day, only stopping for a half-hour lunch break around noon. Afterwards the lesson would continue for another few hours and Sombra would be allowed to read while Twilight cooked dinner. Sombra, having spent nearly two weeks doing nearly nothing, would be quickly worn out and would often go to bed within an hour or two after dinner had finished and the guards had once again switched positions.

The final lesson of the week was the magic lesson. Twilight spent the entire morning going over the basics of magical theory and explanation before going into a short anatomy lesson so that by lunch Sombra knew all the basic theories and locations of magic storage and usage in earth ponies, pegasi, and unicorns and could recite them all back by memory.

At lunch of toast, small sardines, and a vegetable mixture, Twilight decided to break the news. “Today we’ll be trying to do some basic levitation.”

Sombra’s eyes opened wide and he grinned, revealing his two fangs. Twilight did her best to ignore the sharp points. “About time!” Sombra said. “I’ve been waiting for this.”

“Now, now, you’ll have to be careful,” Twilight chided gently. “Just because you can use magic doesn’t mean it’s going to be easy. You’ve been two weeks with that ring on your head, so you probably don’t have a lot readily available. We can work your way back up, though.”

Sombra nodded. “Starswirl said that the longer magic was not used, the harder it would be to take back.”

“Do you know why? Think back to our magic theory lesson.”

“Because magic stored in the various vesicles around the heart and brain must first be taken out of storage and brought to the horn, then allowed time to return. Repeated use will allow for faster recovery and stronger re-use the next time it is present.”

“Exactly. Now, we’re just going to do a short lesson on the principles of levitation before going into actually using it. Knowledge of how the process works will be as important as actually being able to perform it.”

Twilight’s afternoon lesson was, by comparison, short. After an hour simply going over the basics of levitation and connection to magical theory, Sombra was about ready to try and use magic again.

As Twilight set up a few simple objects for Sombra to try, she felt nervous. Doing the practice session meant that Sombra would be relieved of his anti-magic ring. There was a sneaking suspicion that the anti-magic ring was the only thing holding Sombra back from accessing his dark magic, and that it would quickly spring to the surface given first chance. The guards seemed to sense this, too, as they were holding their spears closer and tighter and were both pointing them at Sombra.

Twilight sighed and went over to Sombra. She looked up at him.

“You’re hesitant,” Sombra observed.

“Admittedly,” Twilight said. “There is possible worry of magical backlash; it’s been cooped up for so long it could release itself in a blast.”

Sombra nodded.

“Alright, let me just move it slowly off…”

Twilight stood on her back legs and grabbed the anti-magic ring with her hooves. Very slowly, she moved it up from the base of Sombra’s horn and began to slide it up to the tip. Sombra sat patiently as Twilight removed the ring.

“Is it going to be off permanently?” Sombra asked.

Twilight nearly dropped the ring, but steadied her grip and continued on. “Not yet.”

“Figures,” Sombra said, part irritated and part… something else Twilight couldn’t understand.

“It’ll only be that way for a few more weeks,” Twilight said. “After a few weeks, we’ll take it off for good.”

Twilight carefully slid the anti-magic ring off the tip of Sombra’s horn. Twilight flinched as though expecting a rush of magic or for Sombra to suddenly change back into his tyrant form. But when nothing happened, Twilight opened her eyes to see Sombra having flinched himself and daring to open one eye to see if anything was going on.

“You’re in the clear,” Twilight said.

Sombra took a hoof and rubbed the horn as Twilight went over to the first item.

“First, try lifting this quarter-sheet of paper,” Twilight said. “It will be both light and not very dense, so it shouldn’t take as much energy.”

Sombra closed his eyes and started tensing. A weak field began to appear around his horn, but it was clear and didn’t have a definitive color.

“Remember your magical theory lesson,” Twilight said. “Focus on the areas where magic is stored. Often times, magic from the vesicle close to the heart is the easiest to retrieve.”

Sombra tensed up even further. The magic slowly started to change to a bright blue, but for a moment flashed a pure, oily black. A magical field started to form around the quarter-sheet of paper, though when it flashed black Sombra lost his grip. But he continued onwards and Twilight started cheering him on.

“Yes, yes! Sombra, you’re getting it!”

Sombra was heaving and tensing, and barely managed to open one eye to see his progress. The quarter sheet was surrounded in a steady blue glow and lifted a few inches off the table. Sombra smiled, but quickly dropped the quarter sheet and collapsed on the floor, panting and sweating from the exertion.

“You did it, Sombra!” Twilight said. “You successfully levitated the paper!”

“I didn’t think… it’d be so hard…” Sombra said through his panting.

Twilight motioned to Stout Blade, who nodded and ran off. It wasn’t long before he came back with a bottle of apple juice and a straw. Twilight gave it to Sombra, who drank from it greedily.

“Your magic is coming back to you,” Twilight said, “but slowly.”

“I can feel it now,” Sombra said. “It’s there, but low.”

“How do you feel it?”

“It feels like it’s coursing through my blood, but… some of it feels warm and some of it is fiery hot.”

“Give it time,” Twilight said. “It will stabilize the more you use it. Do you want to try again?”

“Yes. Something harder.”

Twilight directed Sombra’s attention to a pencil. “Same as before.”

Sombra tensed and soon began heaving and panting again as the pencil was covered in a light shade of blue. The pencil went up quicker than the sheet of paper and jerked around a bit, but Sombra was already sweating profusely.

Twilight was about to tell Sombra to back off when the aura both around Sombra’s horn and the pencil went black and the pencil pointed straight towards Twilight, the recently-sharpened lead pointing right to the lavender unicorn’s heart. Sombra gave off a roar and his eyes opened wide, revealing the entire eye was coated in green and the small lines of purple smoke had appeared yet again.

Twilight was afraid about where it would go when Sombra collapsed from the exhaustion. The black aura went back to blue and faded away, causing the pencil to clatter around on the table and fall off onto the floor, rolling harmlessly away. Sombra soon curled himself into a ball and Twilight could hear what she thought sounded like the black unicorn was choking.

“Sombra…?” Twilight asked tentatively, taking a few slow steps towards him. “Sombra, are you okay?”

“No!” Sombra screamed. He pushed Twilight’s hoof away and went back to being curled in a ball, sniffing and sobbing. “Twilight, why… why do I feel so… angry?”

“You’re probably just irritated your magic isn’t coming back as fast.”

“It’s not like that!” Sombra cried. “I feel so angry. It’s like… it’s like I want to hurt something.”

Twilight thought of how the pencil had pointed right towards her chest. Had it been any longer, it probably would have been lodged in her.

“What’s going on?” Sombra sobbed. “Why am I like this? What happened to me!?”

“It was a magical explosion,” Twilight tried to reason. “That’s all it—”

“Magical explosions don’t just cause ponies to become angry!” Sombra tried to growl, but it got stuck in his throat and became a cough mixed with a sob. He lay there on the floor in a ball for a long while. “I’m sorry,” he finally sputtered out once the majority of it had passed. “I… I want to go to bed.”

Twilight replaced the anti-magic ring and nodded to the guards, but followed behind Sombra herself as the black unicorn made his way up and into his room.

“Do you want a book?” Twilight asked. “Or something to drink?”

“No,” Sombra said. He sniffed as a tear rolled down his nose. “I just… I just want to think.”

And so Twilight stood by as Sombra went into his room, slammed the door, and began once more crying loudly, trying to come up with even a single idea of what she could do to convince him it wasn’t his fault. But she couldn’t come up with one.