Chapters Sanguine walked the rest of the way, folding and stretching her long wings back along her flanks to obscure her cutie mark. That had been too close.
The walk to Fluttershy's cottage was a long one - Sanguine was soon reminded why she preferred to fly everywhere, zipping about here and there on the winds. Even when the journey took a while even while flying, one needed merely spread one's wings and hold them there, instead of picking up and putting back down each hoof, over and over again. But each time she thought to fly, she immediately considered what would happen if any pony saw her mark. Slow walking in peace was far superior, in her opinion, to being the target of a lynch mob. Still, at least her gut said she was heading the right direction.
Eventually she reached a short bridge over a river, and just beyond it, what at first glance looked like the largest shrub Sanguine had ever seen, atop a "hill" that was only slightly taller than she was. One with a front door at the end of the path leading to it. And windows. And...were those bird houses in its upper reaches? Those were definitely natural leaves - evergreen of some sort - covering it, preventing her from seeing the walls, unless somehow the leaves were the walls - unlikely. Looking close, she saw what might be small caves at the base of the hill - subterranean entrances? But too small for a pony. Regardless, the smooth stone path lead right to the front, so she followed it and-
Something caught her eye off to the side. Looking that way, she saw what was presumably the Everfree Forest. There was not much of a border: a few bushes, then a line of trees, then enough trees to quickly block line of sight further inside, though here and there along the tree wall she saw the beginnings of meandering paths. It was the kind of edge that left you either in or out of the forest, no middle ground. Far behind the forest, a ridge of mountains pushed up at the sky, tinged purple by what was undoubtedly many miles of sky between herself and them; even if not for the trees, Sanguine was fairly certain the mountains' bases would be below the horizon and not visible from here. Turning her eyes back to the forest, something...something was inside, she knew, though she saw no movement, no strange lights, nothing but the trees standing as they undoubtedly had for centuries. The trees seemed a bit chaotic - what some ponies would call "spooky"; a bit of observation suggested this was partly because many of the trees had short, withered lower limbs, perhaps eaten away by the forest's residents and not grown back after the current forest canopy had grown in. Her instincts called for her to go in - but that was not what she had been ordered to do. Strangling down her gut, she turned back to the door and knocked.
The door soon opened, but just a crack. Sanguine thought she smelled musk from inside. "Yes?" came a timid voice from somewhere beyond the door.
Sanguine frowned. Surely this could not be the bravest pony in Ponyville. "Are you Fluttershy?"
"I, err, y-yes?" she squeaked.
Sanguine looked behind her, trying to locate the source of Fluttershy's fear, but gave up after a quarter minute of fruitless searching. "A letter for you, from Princess Celestia." She offered the letter through the crack.
Fluttershy - or some pony inside, but Sanguine assumed it to be Fluttershy - took it and quickly read. "...sentence...one week...may return...I don't have a firewood problem."
Sanguine looked around, but did not immediately see where this cottage stored its firewood. "Maybe Princess Celestia was misinformed. May I come in?"
"Oh...w-well, if Celestia says I need to teach you something..." The door opened the rest of the way, admitting more of that musk scent. Inside was a cream-yellow pegasus with the pinkest mane Sanguine had yet seen. The building was indeed of wooden construction, with mostly pink and green furnishings...and a mousehole, Sanguine noted - no, two, but exactly shaped as if they were meant to be there. For a moment, she wondered if the owner of this place toyed with shrinking spells, but the bags of birdseed in one corner of the room quickly explained: whoever lived here tended to small animals, perhaps the town's veterinarian. Little chutes and conveniences for smaller creatures were here and there; this was a house shared with a small herd.
And it would apparently be her home for the next while. Sanguine walked through the doorway, looking about, but eyes finally resting on Fluttershy. "So...do I call you Master?"
Fluttershy twitched, backing away. "What?"
"You're not the first one she's had me 'tend to'." Sanguine looked over Fluttershy, eying her to try to discern what manner of torture the other pegasus was likely to put her through. "I'm yours for the week, and then until you release me."
"Uh...but..." Fluttershy stammered, "I don't need a servant. Youcangoifyouwant."
Sanguine shook her head. "Not for a week, if I want to live. That's the choice I've earned: do what Celestia says, or..."
"..." Fluttershy looked at the letter again. "O-okay. Then, just call me Fluttershy. What did you do?"
Sanguine's heart sank. She had been dreading this. On the way to Ponyville she had tried to think of many ways to segue into the topic, some way to introduce it gently...but none had come to mind, and the topic had now been broached. Best to just deal with it. "I killed ponies." She raised her wings, letting Fluttershy get a good look at her cutie mark: a pony head, severed at the neck to a bloody stump.
"..." Fluttershy's eyes went wide.
Sighing, Sanguine continued, "So, Celestia said-"
"Get out," Fluttershy interrupted.
"Uhh..." Sanguine blinked.
Fluttershy frowned and pointed at the door. "Get out. Now. I don't know who put you up to this but this joke is not funny."
"It's no-"
"OUT!" Fluttershy roared, seeming twice as large for a moment.
Logic faltered and survival instinct took over. Sanguine found herself scurrying out the door before she knew what was happening.
"AND STAY OUT!" Fluttershy chucked the crumpled letter at Sanguine before slamming the door.
Slowly, rationality seeped back into Sanguine's mind. She worked up courage, then knocked on the door.
"GO AWAY!"
Sanguine sighed. At least Fluttershy was not organizing a lynch mob - Sanguine hoped. Then again, perhaps she was organizing all her little critters to surround Sanguine and inflict a death of many cuts.
Which would be kinder than what Celestia would do if Sanguine ran away.
"I can't," Sanguine eventually replied.
"NOT! FUNNY!" Sanguine heard Fluttershy panting on the far side of the door - her anger must be cooling off. "The prank is over. You can leave now." But there was still steel in Fluttershy's voice.
"It's not a prank," Sanguine protested. "I wish it was."
"Who put you up to this?" Fluttershy demanded. "Forging Celestia's letters is a crime, you know!"
"It's not forged! And if I leave before the week's up..."
After a moment, Fluttershy prompted, "Yes?"
"Look, look," Sanguine offered. "If you don't want me inside I'll stay right here for the week and then we can tell Celestia I was here all week. Alright?"
"No, that is not alright." Fluttershy cracked the door a bit. "Do you have any other way to prove it?"
Sanguine hung her head. "...o-only one. And...and I really really don't want to...k-k...k-ill..." She squeezed her eyes shut.
Fluttershy frowned, but her resolve quickly melted when she saw tears beginning to form on Sanguine's eyelids. She opened the door, walked out, and hugged Sanguine. "Shh. It's okay. But even if you're telling the truth, why would she send you to me?"
"I don't know. All I know about you is what's on that letter. I...I figured you must have something, some special skill." Sanguine looked at Fluttershy's flank, examining her cutie mark: a trio of pink butterflies. She was a handler of small animals, alright.
"If Celestia sent you..." Fluttershy considered. "Oh! Maybe Twilight knows something! Let's go ask her!"
Sanguine blinked. "Twilight? I've heard that name before, but where..."
Fluttershy giggled. "Twilight Sparkle. She's only Celestia's favorite student! Her special talent is magic itself. She's saved Equestria many times!"
Sanguine nodded. "That's right! Bearer of the Elements of Harmony! And her friends - I saw this stained glass window once, showing all six-" She froze, jaw open mid-word, and stared at Fluttershy.
Fluttershy tilted her head. "What?"
"You," Sanguine gasped. "You were there too! That was you, right? Yellow pegasus, pink mane...ah, Kindness, wasn't it?"
"Yes, I suppose I was there t-" Fluttershy blinked. "Why are you bowing?"
Sanguine, eyes closed, rested her head on the ground at Fluttershy's feet. "It is an honor to meet you. You're, like, a super-duper knight or something, right?"
"No?" Fluttershy tilted her head the other way. "I'm just Fluttershy."
Sanguine took in a breath to steady herself. "I humbly request the honor of your tutelage, Just Fluttershy."
"..." Fluttershy smiled. "Alright, alright. I'm still not sure what I can teach you, but we'll figure it out. And just call me 'Fluttershy'."
"Alright. Fluttershy." Sanguine stood up. "Now, you said Twi-" She blinked. "Err...please don't be scared of me."
Fluttershy's eyes had suddenly gone wide, and her body set to shaking as she reared back. "N-not...you..."
Sanguine felt a shadow descend over her. She turned around and nearly had her wings blasted off by a titanic roar.
"Ohmyohmy." Fluttershy broke and ran for her cottage.
Sanguine looked up, and up, at three towering constructs of lumber in lupine shapes, with eyes glowing lime-green. One of them sniffed at her, with enough force to pull her mane toward the nose briefly, then looked to the cottage.
Panic told her to run in every direction; logic noted that the trio was apparently uninterested in her. So she stayed very still for the moment. "What are they?"
The yellow pegasus peeked out of her door. "Timberwolves. I'd heard a pack was forming but I thought they would stay in the forest. Why would they..." She looked around. "Angel, do you know something about this?"
A white rabbit off to the side of the door shrugged. Sanguine was ready to dismiss it as uninteresting when she noticed it had been whittling branches, smaller but of the same shade and grain as made up the timberwolves.
"Angel!" Fluttershy groused. "I am very cross with you right now!"
Sanguine looked at Angel's branches, then at the timberwolves to confirm the similarity. "What? What's going on?" Sure enough, the timberwolves seemed to be narrowing in on Angel.
"That was going to be their next of kin," Fluttershy explained. "It's about half the wood needed to make a new timberwolf. Angel probably mistook it for an unlit campfire, but he really should know better by now."
Angel continued whittling.
Sanguine sighed. "So now those timberwolves are bent on revenge, and are probably going to kill us and all the animals here?"
Fluttershy backed into the cottage. "Um. Probably. Get inside before they can-"
Fluttershy could not clearly make out Sanguine's mutter, but it was somewhere between angry and annoyed and ended with, "...again." The red pegasus stepped in front of Angel and glared at the giant wooden trio. "Hey! You three! I'll give you one chance to leave!"
Triple gouts of green flame converged on the location she had just been at, thoroughly immolating the air and scorching the ground but fortunately stopping just short of the cottage.
But Sanguine was already on the move. In one bound she leaped up to the neck of one timberwolf, bucked it in mid-air sending her over the neck of the second, which she stomped to gain enough airtime to reach can cannonball through the third neck. The timberwolves held stationary until she landed, at which point all three collapsed into kindling.
"FLUTTERSHY!" A paniced voice heralded the arrival of five more ponies. "Are you alright? We came as soon as we saw those three come out of...wait, they're already down?"
Sanguine recognized Rainbow Dash from before - and blinked as she pictured that window. There had been a cyan pegasus with a rainbow mane there too. An orange pony with a blonde mane and a cowpony hat, a pink earth pony with a dark pink mane, and a white unicorn with a purple mane accompanied Rainbow Dash. Leading them, and having called out to Fluttershy, was a purple unicorn - no, alicorn, Sanguine's mind corrected: she had a unicorn's horn and a pegasus's wings - with a dark blue mane with a red stripe. Sanguine's mind reeled as she registered that she was now in the presence of all six of Equestria's national heroes.
Rainbow Dash folded her forelegs. "Huh. Guess the newcomer can fight."
"You know her?" the violet one inquired.
Rainbow Dash nodded. "Met her earlier. She's on some sort of sentence from Celestia. Wouldn't let me see her cutie mark."
Sanguine self-consciously folded her wings to cover her cutie mark and backed toward Fluttershy.
"...sentence?" The orange pony trotted up to the timberwolves, inspecting carefully. "Twilight, Celestia warn you about this?"
Fluttershy was just staring at Sanguine, jaw open. "I...you...you've done this before, haven't you? To...not-timberwolves. This is your special talent."
Sanguine sighed, eyes downcast. "Got my cutie mark for it. This makes three timberwolves, twenty-five ponies, a griffon, and a..."
The lavender alicorn froze abruptly, staring at Sanguine, eyes wide. "Twenty-five...you mean...you actually...?"
Fluttershy ran up to her and hugged tight. "That is the most awful thing I have ever heard of! You poor dear!"
Rainbow Dash scratched her mane. "Uhh, what's going on?"
The orange pony studied Sanguine for a moment, then her expression darkened quickly as she looked to the alicorn and apparent leader - Twilight, Fluttershy had called her - for confirmation. "Ah think I get it," she drawled with an accent to match the look her cowpony hat gave, as she poked the timber that had recently been wolves, right where Sanguine had touched them. "That wasn't just fightin' she did just now, Rainbow Dash. But, Twilight, ain't those kind o' marks supposed to be impossible?"
Twilight nodded, her expression one of unmasked fear and surprise. "She told me, Applejack. B-but...I thought Celestia was speaking in metaphor, not...I didn't think she literally meant...e-excuse me..." She dashed to a nearby bush and noisily expelled her breakfast.
Applejack took off her hat and held it to her chest. "Rarity. This mare needs to hide her cutie mark somethin' fierce. If you could make her a dress, ah'll pay for it."
"Sure I can. But what cutie mark could be so terrible it needs hiding?"
Fluttershy looked at her friends, not breaking her hug. "One that needs to remain a secret. Promise me!"
The other three not-occupied ponies quickly agreed. "Ah swear!" "Pinkie promise!" "If the need is so dire, I do promise."
Rainbow Dash shrugged. "What's the big deal? Cutie marks are supposed to be aweso-"
Rainbow Dash had had nightmares - not that she admitted to them - about exactly what receiving The Stare might be like, but they had not prepared her for the real thing. When Fluttershy's face suddenly hardened and her unforgiving eyes turned to look straight at Rainbow Dash, the latter instinctively summoned a raging river of courage to wash away all fear, but it broke against the dam that was Fluttershy's eyes. Their fury burned away her courage-water-analogy, leaving her mental landscape to bake and crack like badlands in a drought, crumbling into desert, then melting away entirely leaving nothing to shield her from raw panic, fear, and guilt. Distantly, the back of her mind was aware of directing her body to cower behind Applejack, though it could not get her eyes to break contact with Fluttershy's.
"OkayokayIpromisesorry!"
"Good!" Fluttershy instantly replaced The Stare with smiling eyes.
The brave, courageous pegasus, whom many looked to as an icon of self-assurance, fainted.
Applejack winced upon seeing Rainbow Dash collapse. "Ah think that was a mite too much, sugar."
Fluttershy blinked. "Oops! Uh...I'll apologize when she's awake. Anyway. Yes, Rarity, the need is dire. Her special talent..." Fluttershy nudged one of Sanguine's wings up with her own, revealing her cutie mark. "...is killing. She is a murderer."
"I see." Rarity processed that for a moment, her expression the carefully controlled mask of a pony with long experience not showing when things disturbed her, then looked over to the bush and her still-indisposed friend. "Twilight, I have heard such unpleasant rumors of what happened to a certain twenty-four ponies just over a month ago. Would those be among the ones Sanguine referred to?"
Twilight nodded, looking like she wanted to speak before another load expelled itself.
"I see." At first it looked like Rarity was shivering subtly, but Sanguine had seen Rarity's expression and body language before: the carefully constructed mask of a pony doing all she could to hide her emotions. "Applejack, don't bother with the bits, her dress is on the house." Rarity's poker face dissolved into a grimace, her composure rapidly faltering. "N-now if you will excuse me dears, I'm afraid urgent business calls." She ran off to join Twilight at the bush.
Once Twilight and Rarity had recovered, the group minus one convened inside the cottage. Rainbow Dash had, upon waking, stammered an excuse and flew away.
Applejack looked out the window. "Ah never thought Rainbow Dash'd be spooked of anything."
"It is understandable." Sanguine had settled to the floor, wings up to let Rarity take measurements. "Reactions like that are among the reasons I hide." She looked around the group, reviewing the introductions that had just been made. Fluttershy was indeed the town vet; Rarity ran a fashion boutique; Twilight Sparkle had introduced herself as the town librarian - to amused reactions from her friends, there was probably a deeper story there; Applejack ran some sort of farm; Pinkie Pie was a "smile ambassador" whatever that meant; and the no-longer-present Rainbow Dash was some sort of athlete on top of making sure the skies were clear today. Sanguine's full name had gotten a darker look from Applejack the moment she had read it from Celestia's letter; only Fluttershy's request that the group reserve judgment until they heard Sanguine's full story prevented more than a look.
But Applejack's look had not gone away. "So let's hear it. How DOES a pony get that sort of cutie mark?"
"Some bandits smashed up my home town and were threatening to kill us foals if the adults didn't pay a huge ransom. So I took a shard of one of the windows they smashed and..." She shuddered.
"Celestia said it was more than 'some' bandits." Twilight evaluated Sanguine with a critical eye, mirroring Applejack's suspicion.
Sanguine continued in hushed tones, "It didn't matter how many. They were hurting my friends, a-and I saw how to make it stop. When, when it was finally over...the townsponies, everyone I'd grown up with, didn't know what to do with me. I still don't know what to do with me. So they sent for Princess Celestia." She examined the floor at her hooves, and continued in near-monotone. "She came in person to lay judgment, and I thank her for her mercy. So long as I live I am a danger to other ponies, but her first order to me was to forbid me to take my own life." A hint of energy returned to her voice. "My talent is actually killing by neck strikes. I've wondered why it's so specific."
"Well, that part makes sense, at least," Twilight rattled off. "There've been so many others, your cutie mark had to struggle to be unique."
Five pairs of eyes blinked.
Apparently Twilight could just whip up academic lectures at the drop of a hat: she did not even pause at her friends' and Sanguine's surprise. "It's been theorized, and all evidence to date supports the theory, that every cutie mark is different from every other cutie mark that is, has been, or will be. There haven't been any large studies on this, so it hasn't been formally proven - but if it is, well, Sanguine had a lot of competition back in the early days of Equestria."
Silence descended as the crowd processed this, until Applejack broke it. "Celestia told you about back then?"
Twilight shook her head. "She doesn't like to talk about it, but there are some historical accounts. When I asked, she just said she hoped those days were over for good, that nopony would ever again have to kill."
Applejack frowned. "How bad're we talkin'?"
"Well...that is..." Twilight sighed, looking down and pawing the floor. "A picture's worth a thousand words? Imagine rivers of blood, fields of pony flesh from I don't know how many bodies - and the survivors, LAUGHING about it as they went at one another. I'm glad the picture was silent; some of the bodies looked like they were still scream-"
"Twilight!" At Pinkie's shouted warning, Twilight looked up. Fluttershy was cowering, Rarity looked like she was on the verge of dry heaves, and Sanguine's expression was unreadable. Even Pinkie Pie's hair had lost some of its curl.
Twilight looked sheepish. "Err. Sorry. But you get the point."
Only Applejack seemed unaffected. "How'd you lose it out there if you'd seen it before?"
"W-well...it's one thing to see it in a book. It's another to run into it face to face, especially when you suddenly realize it."
"Fair 'nough." Applejack backed off. "Anyway. So y'say there've been a lot of killers in th' past?"
"When...they were needed. Which was ages ago." Twilight looked down, her voice quieting a bit. "Sanguine. Your cutie mark is fairly new, right? In the past year or two?"
Sanguine nodded. "Five weeks ago."
Twilight winced. "I think we may be partly to blame." At the gasps and looks of surprise, Twilight continued, "Think about it. All these adventures we've had? And it's not just us: ever since we came together, there've been more incidents all over Equestria. A lot of ponies have been blaming Luna's return, or King Sombra's defeat, or Discord being around - if somewhat on our side - or a bunch of other things we did. I'm not surprised that, somewhere, lethal measures were actually needed to protect everypony; I just hope it's just the one case."
Sanguine perked up. "I'd heard tales. So you really are the Bearers of the Elements of Harmony?"
"Were." Pinkie shrugged. "The Tree of Harmony wanted them back. It didn't even ask for a receipt for the returns!"
Sanguine giggled, then caught herself. She examined her chest and hooves, then broke out in laughter so hard Rarity backed away from measuring her.
Pinkie listened carefully - yes, that was indeed laughter, and not faked. "Wow! I didn't think I was THAT funny!"
"Ahaha, ha, heh." Sanguine finally recovered, but was unable to wipe the smile off her face. "Sorry. It's just...I haven't had anything to laugh ABOUT since my cutie mark showed up. I needed that. Thank you."
"No problemo! Five weeks without a laugh is unnn-healthy!" Pinkie smiled.
"Anyway," Sanguine continued, "I'd heard you ran across some kind of spell that can remove cutie marks. Is it possible...?"
Twilight shook her head. "It swaps cutie marks. Somepony else would get yours. I have to say, I can't imagine most ponies dealing with it as well as you have. And it isn't a complete transfer, it-"
Sanguine held up a hoof. "I get the point. Bad idea. Sorry for asking."
Twilight shrugged. "Don't apologize. If I were in your position I'd leap on any possible cure."
"A cure, for being me." Sanguine's head drooped.
Twilight mentally kicked herself. "...sorry. I could've worded that better."
"No. It's exactly what I have thought, more times than I want to count." Sanguine sighed. "Even my name."
"Yes, I've been meaning to ask." Rarity began packing her measuring tape and notes away. "Why did you keep it?"
Sanguine looked up, not comprehending. "Why wouldn't I?"
"Because it causes you misery, my dear. Oh! You need a makeover, and not just your coat." Rarity placed a hoof on Sanguine's chest. "In here, too."
Sanguine blinked. A moment later, she asked in utter seriousness, "You want to dress up my internal organs?"
Rarity grimaced. Sanguine had sounded a little too comfortable with the thought of ending her life in creative ways. "No, no! I refer to a makeover of the soul! Tch, Celestia sent you to Fluttershy to find inner peace - and maybe she knew about those timberwolves too, the timing is JUST like her - but if I may, I would like to take a crack at helping you gain peace with who and what you are."
"Sure, why not?" Sanguine offered in the same resigned voice. "Umm, I think I need to get your permission, Fluttershy."
Fluttershy grinned. "Permission granted! I would trust my soul to Rarity any day!"
"Splendid!" Rarity sidled up next to Sanguine. "Can somepony walk with us, hiding her other side until we get her to my boutique?"
"Oh! I will!" Pinkie Pie lined up on Sanguine's far side. "Leeet's go!" After guiding Sanguine out the door, Pinkie gestured at the fallen timberwolves and looked back over her shoulder. "By the way, who's going to clean up all this firewood?"
Fluttershy looked out the door, looked at the letter, and allowed herself a chuckle. "Sanguine, come back here after you're done at Rarity's. I'll leave it until then."
As the trio trotted off, Twilight tilted her head at Fluttershy, so she showed Twilight the letter. Twilight facehoofed. "'Firewood problem.' I need to remind her to be a little less mysterious, don't I?"
Applejack read over Twilight's shoulder. "Ayup. I'd've volunteered, but looks like princess's orders. Ah'm bettin' that week's just in case there're any others about."
Fluttershy shook her head. "I'm pretty sure it was just the one pack. Umm. I should go apologize to Rainbow Dash, but I need to make sure everyone's accounted for..."
"I'll fetch her. I have a feeling I know where she went off to." Twilight stretched her wings. "But first - Applejack, a word?" She trotted out the back door.
"Hmm? Sure." Applejack followed her, closing the door once they were outside. "What's up?"
Twilight furrowed her brow, trying to come up with the right words.
"...it's about there bein' a murderer about, ain't it?" Applejack ventured.
Twilight nodded.
Applejack sat against the wall of the cottage. "Look. Y'can't blame me fer bein' a mite worried, Twi'."
Twilight winced. "Applejack. This was clearly forced on her. Listen to her, she doesn't want to kill-"
"It ain't Sanguine ah'm worried about," Applejack interrupted.
Twilight's train of thought threw a gear, hopped the rails, and skidded to a glorious trainwreck. "Huh?" was the only way she had to sum it up.
"Th' six o' us know better," Applejack explained, "'specially since we got the full story, but if word got out? Y'all know how gossip spreads: removin' some details, exaggeratin' others. Twilight. Murder is THE worst thing a pony can DO, in many ponies' eyes, an' rightfully so. Mass murder 'specially. In all yer studies, ya ever see a picture o' a lynch mob?"
The wrecked train of thought sprang back to life, like a zombie. Twilight looked ill.
Applejack knew that look all too well. It was times like this that being Honesty helped: Twilight might sometimes doubt Applejack's facts or logic, but never that she believed what she said. "Ah'll take that as a yes. An' Sanguine there'd probably let it happen, 'less that cutie mark o' hers is on autopilot or somethin'. Either way, we'd have blood on th' streets."
"Good thing we all promised to keep it a secret." Twilight sighed.
"Technically ya didn't," Applejack pointed out. "Ya had somethin' other'n words in yer mouth at th' time."
Twilight gave Applejack an annoyed look.
Applejack ignored it. "But there's wantin' t' keep it an', well...look. Ah think Celestia might possibly be wantin' ya to think like a princess on this, not just as the same ol' Twilight Sparkle, 'master librarian'. Jus' promise me ya'll think about ways t' contain it if th' secret leaks, alright?"
Twilight nodded. "Alright. Anything else?"
Applejack put hoof to chin, thinking. "Yeah, actually. Speakin' o' autopilot, ya got any way t' defuse a cutie mark gone haywire in case endin' those bandits wasn't exactly somethin' she did of her own free will?"
Twilight boggled. "You're just full of cheerful thoughts today."
Applejack shrugged. "Best way t' make sure nothing goes wrong involves thinkin' o' what can, and plan against it."
Twilight smiled. She admired Applejack's ability to stay calm even when discussing potentially non-hypothetical apocalypses. "I'll see if my library has anything about it, though I really don't think her cutie mark can take control. But first, I've got a pegasus to calm down."
Height. Some ponies were afraid of it, for good reason. A long fall, unbuffered by wings or magic or anything, could be painful or fatal - or both, if you wound up bleeding out where none would find you in time. Even some young pegasi were afraid, before they gained enough confidence in their flight to know they were safe.
But Twilight knew it was just the opposite for Rainbow Dash. Ever since their first meeting, she would always see the master of the sky swooping about here and there. And since she got wings of her own - and flying lessons from Rainbow Dash - she had quickly come to appreciate why. Far from the ground, few things could bother a pony. Earthquakes, floods, stampedes, most traveling salesponies - those were all confined to the realm of dirt and stone and grass. Up where the only thing to stand on was clouds, there was safety.
So it was that Twilight found Rainbow Dash curled up on the only cloud in the sky, just big enough to accommodate the weatherpony. From far up here, the ponies on the ground started to look like ants, and even the sizable tree that housed her library and home could have been mistaken for a dollhouse. She hovered up behind her target and greeted, "Hey."
"'Sup, Twi?" Rainbow Dash made a show of looking for something.
Twilight had been waiting days for an excuse to use this line. "Us."
"..." Rainbow Dash may have been facing away, but Twilight thought she could hear the pegasus's eyes roll.
Twilight smiled. "Well I thought it was funny."
"Heh," Rainbow Dash chuckled. "Yeah, I guess that wasn't too lame."
Twilight rested her forehooves on the cloud. "Sooo, could you come back to Fluttershy's with me?"
"Can't." Rainbow Dash kept looking away. "It's supposed to be sunny this afternoon. Somepony's got to keep an eye out."
"You had the morning shift." Twilight tried looking over Rainbow Dash's shoulder. Something seemed off.
Possibly sensing it, Rainbow Dash rolled away a little bit, keeping her face out of Twilight's view. "Yeah, well, a certain Ms. Hooves has the afternoon. You know what she gets up to."
"Rainbow Dash. The sky is clear. I doubt she is capable of breaking it." Twilight put a hoof on her friend's shoulder. "Now come-"
Rainbow Dash convulsed at the touch, shrinking away from contact.
"...along?" Twilight blinked.
Rainbow Dash took two rapid breaths and shivered. "I..." Two deep breaths. "I can't, Twilight. I just can't."
"Err..." Twilight tried to figure out what the pegasus could be scared of - oh. Of course. "Sanguine's not there any more. She went to Rarity's. It's safe."
"Noitisn't." Twilight had never heard Rainbow Dash squeak before.
The alicorn dropped down silently, then hovered up on the far side. She caught a glimpse of Rainbow Dash's pupils dilated to tiny specks inside wide eyes, hooves curled up in a fetal position, before the pegasus flopped over, turning her back on Twilight.
"P-please...just, go," Rainbow Dash begged.
Twilight had no intention of abandoning her friend. "What are you so afraid of?"
"Me? I-i-i'm n-not af-f-fra-a-ai," Rainbow Dash stammered. "Okayit'sFluttershy!"
Twilight blinked.
"Those...eyes...the stare...sh-she w-wa-as..." Rainbow Dash put her forehooves over her head and trembled.
Twilight nodded. "Yes. She wants to apologize to you for that."
No response.
"...I guess it really was too much." Twilight began considering ways to comfort.
Rainbow Dash curled up. "Just go. Please, just go."
An idea occurred to Twilight. "Not gonna happen! Do you trust me?"
"Huh?" Rainbow Dash almost seemed to be starting to cower from Twilight.
Which Twilight would have none of. "I said, do you trust me?"
"W-well, yeah?" Rainbow Dash had not quite lost every speck of hope in her heart, but even the blank, open sky was beginning to look terrifying.
"Good." Twilight pulled and tugged at the cloud, stretching it until there was room for two, then set herself beside her friend and extended one wing over her.
Only the lack of any particular direction to flee in stopped Rainbow Dash from attempting to fly away. "I-if anypony saw us..."
"Nopony will, Rainbow Dash," Twilight assured. "We're up too high, and nopony else is flying up here. I'll keep a watch. Just let me protect you, for once."
Rainbow Dash thought about it, then backed further into Twilight's embrace, still shaking just enough that the alicorn could feel it.
"Good, that's a good start." Twilight winghugged just a touch tighter, keeping her voice gentle. "I've got you, and I won't let anypony hurt you."
A minute passed, then the pegasus spoke up. "S-so, uh, can we talk about something else? Like, what's with Sanguine? I kinda, err, well..."
"Wasn't conscious for that?" Twilight remembered hearing some noble in Celestia's court use that line to excuse his absence from an event.
"Yeah, let's go with that." Rainbow Dash, on the contrary, thought Twilight had come up with those words just for her.
Glad to have a reason to keep Rainbow Dash talking, Twilight explained, "Her cutie mark is one of the worst possible. It's about killing."
Rainbow Dash waited for the rest. When no more came, she prompted, "And?"
"What do you mean, 'and'? She's a murderer. That's her destiny." As her voice reiterated her previous statement, Twilight's mind caught up to what Rainbow Dash might not be seeing. "She killed a couple dozen bandits to earn her mark. That's what Celestia's punishing her for."
Unfortunately the explanation bounced off Rainbow Dash. "Those bandits were up to no good?"
Twilight decided to reel the line of conversation out, to see where it went. "They'd taken her and her friends hostage and were threatening them."
"W-well there you go," Rainbow Dash concluded. "Self-defense. That's not so bad."
The line having snapped, Twilight switched to another. "The point IS, she's only good at killing." She sighed. "Sometimes when I read about other cultures, I'm surprised Celestia's dedication to nonviolence when possible works so well, but then I just have to look out my window to see it really does."
"I lived in the griffon lands for a few years. I've seen violence, Twilight. It..." Rainbow Dash caught herself before she wound up giving a blanket endorsement. "...can work. It can even be awesome, if you do it for the right reasons." Memories of the wrong reasons played themselves out for the pegasus, but she dismissed them as irrelevant.
"Yeah, well. It is not the pony way. 'To buck a neighbor is to buck your neighborhood. The flank you hit becomes your own,'" Twilight quoted.
"I went to school, Twilight. I even paid attention, sometimes." Rainbow Dash knew the book Twilight was quoting, but refrained from admitting it lest she appear too academic. She had an image to maintain.
"She never lived in the griffon lands," Twilight explained. "Our way is the only way she's ever known. Every moral teaching we have says that what she is and does is just wrong. And that's what everypony around her feels too."
"...okay, that's fair. I can get why she's so down on herself." Rainbow Dash had stopped shivering by now, Twilight noted to herself with satisfaction. "And I guess that explains why she was so evasive when I first saw her. You say she went to Rarity's? Did Rarity offer one of those 'makeovers of the soul'?"
"You say that like she's offered you one." Twilight had witnessed more than one such offer, but she was pretty sure Rainbow Dash did not know she knew.
"She has. Sometimes..." Rainbow Dash sighed, carefully picking her words. "Sometimes when I get myself in trouble, when I'm being maaaybe just a bit too awesome for my own good, she wants to help. I've...thought about it, but I've turned her down. So far."
Twilight blinked. "I've never heard you speak this way."
"Heh. I guess this is what they call being drunk on fear?" Or just being honest, Rainbow Dash said to herself. Some days she was tired of having to keep up appearances just as much as Rarity.
Twilight seized on the segue. "Speaking of, how're you feeling? Think you can go see Flut-"
Rainbow Dash tensed up.
"...okay, not yet." Twilight pouted.
The pegasus relaxed. "Not...yet. Eventually." One breath in, one breath out. "You think...maybe I should apologize to her?"
"For what?"
"For being this scared of her. I'm not afraid of anything...but..." Actually there were a lot of things that scared Rainbow Dash. Losing her friends through her own poor judgment topped the list. But she could not - dared not - speak of such fears. Fluttershy's Stare, though, she could admit to.
"I'm sure it'll be fine," Twilight reassured.
"I hope so. She's been my friend since forever. Like, what'd you call him..." Rainbow Dash hunted for the words. "...your BBBFF?"
"That's my older brother. I've known him literally all my life." Twilight blinked. "You've known her that long?"
"Close enough." Rainbow Dash sometimes had trouble remembering their first meeting, it had been so long ago and they had been so young. She had read something once that memory wired itself as foals grew up, and that was why no pony could remember being born - despite a few claims to the contrary. "You can't imagine possibly losing a friend like that." The times she had almost lost Fluttershy, on the other hand, were quite clear, and they now played themselves for the cyan pegasus unbidden.
Painful images of changeling-induced misery, that had caused her brother to renounce her temporarily, lanced through Twilight's own awareness. She was grateful her friend could not see her face just then. "I can, Rainbow Dash. I really can."
Neither pony felt like speaking again for a while.
5: A Makeover of the Soul
Sanguine let her eyes roam Rarity's establishment - the Carousel Boutique, Rarity had called it on the way over - as Rarity and Pinkie Pie ushered her in. This was the house of an artist of fabric, no doubt. The large room the front door opened into was a proper studio, decked out in lavenders and purples such that Sanguine's first thought was whether this place had been set up for Twilight to hide in. Scattered around were what Sanguine could only describe to herself as "beauty stations": wide buckets flanked by drawers in front of a mirror, where a pony could be primed and primped. Velvet curtains obscured parts of the room; a bit of observation noted drawn curtains that could obscure the stations - it would be easy to host a little fashion show in here, and perhaps that was the point. Over here was a mannequin next to a platform in front of two mirrors and room for more, a setup to let a pony self-observe from multiple angles. Over there were racks of clothing and bolts of fabric. Stairs going up were in the back - roughly the building's center, Sanguine guessed. Doubtless this shop doubled as a home, with the bedroom and other places essential for living tucked on the second floor or even further back.
Belatedly, Sanguine realized the other two ponies had entered behind her and closed the door. "So this, ah, 'makeover of the soul'. I don't have to take my heart out and put it on a sacrificial platter or anything?"
"Oh, no, no, no my dear! That's not what I mean at all." Rarity put a smile in her voice even as she closed the window blinds, one after another. This darkened the interior, but not too much to see easily. "Besides, necromancy can be so..."
"Evil?" Pinkie offered. "Unclean? Corrupting? Icky?"
"Well yes," Rarity sighed, "but the word I was looking for is 'gauche'. Anyway. The functional word is 'makeover', as in a change of image. In this case, self-image." Privacy assured, Rarity now looked at Sanguine, measuring her reactions. "You believe yourself as destined to live a life of bloodshed and murder, but I see possibilities, options. For starters - you believe your talent is only useful for harming the living, am I right? As in, right now, you can see a dozen different ways to break Pinkie's and my necks?"
Pinkie stopped in her tracks and stared at Rarity. It was her habit to try to liven up any situation, to cheer up anyone in need of cheer - ponies, griffons, dragons, even changelings a few times. But despite years of practice in the festive arts, she could not think of any way to make happy the topic of her and her friend's quick and probably slightly messy demise.
Sanguine just blinked, thinking along similar but far more muted lines. "How can you ask that so calmly?"
Rarity grinned. "Just humor me, please."
"W-well, okay? I try to ignore it, but umm..." Sanguine looked at Rarity, then Pinkie, then around the botique. "Now that I think about it, I only see five ways, using what's on hand. Do you want me to list them?"
Rarity waved a hoof. "No, that is quite alright." She did not add that her stomach had been purged enough for one day. Keeping potential berserkers calm required careful management of the conversation topic. Although the consequences were perhaps a bit more personal and dire this time, it was not a situation she had not faced before. "And trust me, we appreciate your restraint in not demonstrating. Anyway. See that mannequin over there?"
Sanguine's eyes drifted toward the indicated object. "Yes?"
Rarity puffed a flash of anger into her voice. "KILL IT."
Without hesitation, Sanguine pounced upon the defenseless clay statue, extending one hoof to transfer all her momentum into her target's neck. The mannequin's head snapped off and sailed into the stairwell leading upstairs.
Rarity's eyes followed its flight. "Impressive. But consider what you didn't do just now."
The red pegasus drew in a shuddering breath, then another, then shot Rarity a look of mixed venom and pleading. "I killed it, like you said. D-don't, tell me to do that again."
Rarity blinked, danger flags raised. "Whatever do you mean?"
"Don't say that word, when giving me an order," Sanguine half-growled. "Please."
Rarity scrambled for a way to defuse the derailment. "What? But...you don't have to do everything I say, dear."
Sanguine just looked at her, as Pinkie warily stepped up to the mannequin and carefully felt the neck stump.
Rarity sighed in relief - inward only, this was not the time to let Sanguine see her sweat. The pause was enough to excuse a topic bridge. "But we digress. You killed 'it', yes. Was it alive?"
"Well no, of course not. It was just..." Sanguine blinked as realization dawned. "...an 'it'..."
Rarity nodded. "I think you start to get my point, but just to be sure." She levitated the detached head back into the room and placed it at the end of a sawhorse, then pulled off the legs at that end, resulting in two legs and a long wooden beam ending in a mannequin head. "Wouldn't you say this looks like a long neck?"
Without prompting, Sanguine charged the modified sawhorse and headbutted the beam, effortlessly snapping it.
Rarity allowed herself a victory grin. A stray thought considered that this would be the exact moment Rainbow Dash would have hoofpumped, or Pinkie if she was aware of Rarity's plan, but Rarity was by necessity more reserved - even if her friends sometimes thought otherwise. "Bravo! Now it'll take a lot more, ah, 'creative' exercises, but this is one option: stretch your talent into something less reprehensible. You'll always feel the pull back, but you have that handled. The life of a junkyard operator, smashing unwanted things into parts small enough to recycle, might seem unglamorous but wouldn't you agree it is a step up from what you thought for certain your life would be just a few minutes ago?"
"I...I..." Sanguine sat down next to the sawhorse wreckage and blinked back tears, looking at Rarity again but now with gratitude. "I don't have to...?"
"Psh." Rarity waved a hoof dismissively. She pictured herself grabbing Sanguine's regrettable line of thought that had her chained to a cruel fate, gently yanking it free, and tossing it in the refuse. But words could do the deed far more reliably than hooves, so words she employed. "Cutie marks may be 'destiny' but the only ponies truly in control of our fates are ourselves. And this isn't the only option available to you."
"There are MORE ways I don't have to kill?" Sanguine's eyes widened in amazement.
Rarity could think of three off the top of her head, but to focus on them would lose that an even broader perspective was possible. "Well...yes, but actually I was thinking of a way to embrace it but still put it to good use. Tell me, what do you know of griffon culture?"
"Err, noth...ing?" Sanguine racked her brain, but no relevant knowledge presented itself.
"Hrm. Do have a discussion with Rainbow Dash before you go if this option interests you; she spent some time in that place. They eat meat - supposedly only from non-thinking animals." Rarity could not keep a note of distaste from her voice - but she was a pony, some things were to be expected. As thoughts of griffons crossed her mind, she remembered to remind one customer who had wanted a gem-studded leather purse that she still needed to provide the latter material: the Carousel Boutique would not stock dried animal skin so long as Rarity was running it. "Therefore, they have employment for butchers. You would stretch away from just neck strikes, but I imagine that may feel, well, closer to your calling?"
"You mean I'd be exiled."
Rarity frowned. Sanguine could see the worst in anything, in her current mood. Rarity might not have the talents of Pinkie but this just would not do. "Oh, not at all! You could come back and visit at any time! Even if you might not want to."
"It...is a possibility..." The red pegasus smiled widely, tears now rolling freely down both cheeks. "I don't have to kill ponies. I don't have to kill ponies. I, I really don't."
Rarity could not help but smile too, as she noted that Sanguine's emotions were positively a roller coaster right now. Best to fixate her on the ups, and pay no attention to the downs. "No, dear, you don't."
"Ooh, ooh, I know," Pinkie interrupted, having just finished putting the mannequin's head back in place. She must have used epoxy or something, but Rarity smelled no adhesive nor had she seen Pinkie dip into her supplies - another mysterious Pinkie method, apparently. "You could be a wandering adventurer, like Daring Do! Take out any monsters that won't be reasoned with, like those timberwolves!"
Rarity had long since given up attempting to figure out how Pinkie's mind worked, a feat that apparently gave even Twilight headaches when she attempted it. "Now let's not get carried away." The unicorn walked over to her bolts of fabric and began examining them, looking for inspiration.
Pinkie's mind had, in fact, been following a similar track as Rarity's, just with more focus on making Sanguine happy. "Uhh, Rarity?"
"I'm sure our guest can see the practical difficulties with such an arrangement," Rarity continued, picking up bolt after bolt in her telekinesis and letting them orbit her, crossing one another to let her see how they went together.
"Raaarity!"
Rarity grimaced briefly. Pinkie would get more insistent until Rarity acknowledged the interruption, so she acknowledged it. "What is it?"
"I think she's thinking about it." Actually Pinkie was fairly certain it was the foremost thought on Sanguine's mind just then.
Rarity paused the bolts in their orbit and looked across the room, to find Sanguine staring wide-eyed at Pinkie. "Don't tell me you're seriously considering..."
"It, makes, sense," Sanguine gasped. "It makes sooo much sense. It feels right. Monster slaying."
"Whaaat? But, but..." Rarity's mind scrambled to actually cite the practical difficulties, which she had assumed would be evident and thus in no need of listing explicitly. It did not take long to find one. "How would you know when and where the monsters will be?"
Sanguine kept looking at Pinkie, but only because that was where her eyes were pointed when her mind began racing. "I had a feeling, coming into Ponyville, that NOW was when I needed to be here. I thought that was just because of Celestia's order and I shouldn't delay, but now...and she's had me go to a couple other places; it wasn't long after I arrived that trouble came. And then when I got to Fluttershy's, I kept feeling something from the forest."
Rarity considered the new course. She supposed there was no harm in indulging an exploration: even if it did not work out, Sanguine might seize upon a related but more practical endeavor. "...well. If you are seriously considering that then I will insist that you have long talks with Rainbow Dash, Twilight, and Zecora. They would know the most about that sort of life."
"Ooh, ooh, and Fluttershy too," Pinkie offered.
"What would Fluttershy know about monsters and strange animals and..." Rarity trailed off. She opened her mouth to speak, closed it, opened it again, closed it again, then finally continued, "Well played as always, Celestia." One did not rule for a mostly peaceful and prosperous thousand years without much talent, Rarity had long since accepted. She wondered once again if those rumors were true, of Celestia having grown bored of chess after repeatedly winning despite starting with just king and queen.
"I'll talk with them. I promise!" Sanguine grinned. "You two have given me hope! How can I ever repay you?"
Makeover accomplished, Rarity adjusted her mind for her next task. "Don't fret it. This and your dress are on the house. Speaking of which, somewhere back here I have a bolt of special fabric: water, mud, grease, and I imagine blood just slide right off it. Unfortunately it is a simply dreadful shade of yellow that simply doesn't go with anything, but as I doubt you'll be accessorizing much, that shouldn't be a problem in your case." The bolts around her resumed their flight but now in course from one pile to the next, as she searched for that specific bolt.
Sanguine tilted her head, looking over the fabric bolts. "That seems like an awfully specific thing to have."
"When you've been in business as long as I have, dear, you pick up odds and ends here and there," Rarity reassured her. "I have made garments for everypony from the homeless right up to Princess Cadance, and of course Princess Twilight."
Sanguine blinked. "Twilight's a what?" she whispered, danger flags suddenly waving in her mind.
Pinkie grinned. Anticipating that Rarity would soon have Sanguine's new clothes ready, she began nudging Sanguine over to the Mirror-Enabled Multi-Angle Mane-Mark-And-Everything-Else Measurement Mezzanine, as she referred to it, or "that platform with a couple of mirrors" as Applejack and Rainbow Dash had jointly named it in response. "Aaand you're hoping our new adventurer friend will one day team up with Daring Do and then your dress will be on the cover of her latest book."
Rarity let out a single chuckle, contemplating that while Pinkie might have seemed an idiot at times, she was quite perceptive and, Rarity had to admit, brilliant in her own way. "The thought had crossed my mind, yes."
If the others were willing to let the topic of Twilight's status pass, Sanguine was too - for the moment. She wiped her still-wet cheeks after stepping onto the platform. "You mean A. K. Yearling will want to write me into one of her books?"
"We-ell, only after you meet Daring Do." Pinkie smiled at Sanguine.
Sanguine paused mid-wipe. "I don't get it."
"She means," Rarity explained as she finally found the bolt and carefully levitated it out from the others, "that Daring Do is a real pony. We've met her. The books are...edited, shall we say, but true enough."
"No WAY!" Sanguine gasped.
"Yes way," Pinkie replied. "Buuut she's the kind of pony you're going to have to meet yourself."
"Indeed." Rarity moved the bolt to a counter and began getting out tools. "She likes her privacy - despite allowing publication of her adventures - and we respect that. You'll just have to meet her on the job, assuming you do take up an adventuring lifestyle."
"Hmm." Sanguine let her thoughts whirl for a moment, looking at Pinkie's reflection in one of the mirrors. "Do you...always do this?"
Pinkie tilted her head. "Do what?"
"Greet even the most loathsome, revolting situation with a smile, and just..." Sanguine fished for the right words. "Blow it away with good cheer?"
Rarity began overlaying patterns on the cloth. "Well I can't honestly say that I do."
"But I sure do," Pinkie counterparted, standing behind Sanguine so as to seem on one side of her in one mirror and the other side in the other, so it would be like two Pinkies cheering Sanguine on. "It doesn't matter what sort of pony you are, you need to smile. So many ponies get silly about that, so I remind them. And Rarity's just being a grouch: she wouldn't be in business if she wasn't making her customers happy."
"I suppose." Rarity discarded one pattern and set down another. "So Sanguine, have you thought of a new name?"
The customer of the moment blinked, turning her head to watch Rarity work. "Huh?"
"'Sanguine Spray' caused you grief." Rarity rejected the second pattern, considered a third, and nodded in satisfaction. "We were going to change it, remember?"
"Oh, yeah. U-umm..." Sanguine felt into her heart. Her heart's answer reached her voice at the same time it reached her mind. "Actually, I'd like to keep it for now."
"You still want it?" Rarity looked up momentarily. "Don't keep it just as a chain to who you used to be."
"No, that's not it," Sanguine explained. "You've offered me new visions, new mes I can be. I'd like to see if my name can be part of it."
Rarity smiled and returned to her work, getting scissors in position to begin cutting. "I suppose. 'Sanguine Spray' does bring up a number of possible visions, not just blood."
"Yeah!" Pinkie nodded, walking over to pick up and put away the broken sawhorse. "Like being at the shore of a sea full of pomegranate juice, getting ready to take as biiig a sip as you want! Or maybe cranberry juice."
Sanguine ducked her head and muttered, "Is she always like this?"
"Not at all," Rarity muttered back, guiding the scissors around the forms.
Sanguine winced. "I just set her off?"
"No, she can get MUCH worse," Rarity commented, as if noting how a gentle shower was less than a blizzard. "Especially when her Pinkie Sense goes off."
"I can heaaar you," Pinkie called out, task complete. "And my Pinkie Sense was going off all the way over here!"
"Oh, bother. Do I need to shelter the boutique against a rain of frogs again?" Rarity was only half joking.
"Not this time! My heart's warm, and I felt all tingly inside in the good way!" Pinkie smiled so brightly, it was almost as if the window blinds were open.
Rarity and Sanguine looked at each other and simultaneously asked, "And that means...?"
"I'm about to make a new friend!"
Rarity cocked one eye as she put the scissors down and examined the cut fabric. "You must feel that a lot."
"Well, not EVERY day, but yeah. It's a good feeling!" Pinkie looked directly at Sanguine, walking back over to her.
"A new..." Sanguine blinked, composure beginning to collapse. "You barely know me. You know what I've done. And you'd still call me..."
Pinkie grinned. "Yuuup! You're trying to do good; you just didn't know how. And now you do! That's a kind of pony I like to call 'friend'!"
Sanguine hugged Pinkie as if clinging to a life preserver. An equal mix of laughter and sobs came from her as she buried her face in Pinkie's mane. Pinkie just hugged back, holding her as Rarity began putting Sanguine's new garb on her, pinning and sewing to make adjustments.
It was twilight when Twilight and Rainbow Dash finally made their return. The first thing they noticed was Sanguine - now in a suit reminiscent of Daring Do's shirt but beige-gold, lined with pockets, and extending over the flanks to the rear legs - whistling a merry tune as she smashed the timberwolf corpses into manageable chunks and stacked the resulting firewood next to Fluttershy's cottage. The second thing was Pinkie poinging out Fluttershy's door, shortly followed by Rarity at a more dainty pace.
Rainbow Dash looked at Sanguine, then at Rarity. "...alright, how?"
"How, what?" Rarity looked over Rainbow Dash, relieved to see her friend no longer in the grip of raw terror. Twilight could work more than one sort of magic, it seemed.
Rainbow Dash gestured in Sanguine's direction. "I could practically smell the angst dripping off her, and now she's HAPPY? What'd you do, put her heart on a plate and offer all her inner darkness to...er...who would you offer it to?"
Rarity shook her head. "Nothing of the sort. We simply had a nice talk. Pinkie and I showed her new opportunities, which she has chosen to embrace. That's all. And it would seem she simply loves her new outfit. She liked it so much, I made her spares."
Pinkie giggled. "You were just trying to use up that fabric! That's why you made it long, too!"
"Err...aheh, yes, well, one must be practical and frugal," Rarity covered. "Hers was likely to be the only use I would have for that particular roll for quite a while. As to the length, now ponies will just think she likes to carry a lot of things - not unreasonable, given her new profession - so its real purpose won't even occur to them. And I've stitched in a few folds she can undo as she finishes growing - I'd say she's got another hoof-length or two to go - so it will fit her for years." And, yes, she admitted to herself, now that dreadful bolt was used up and gone.
Twilight smiled. "Wow, good work, you two! So does that mean she's done here?"
"Not at all. She needs to have talks with you, Zecora, Fluttershy, and Rainbow Dash regarding the particular opportunity she wishes to pursue." Rarity favored Twilight with a half-lidded serious look. "A life of fighting monsters is quite dangerous work, and she lacks practical knowledge. Oh, but first - Rainbow Dash, do please be a dear and speak with Fluttershy, she puts on a brave face but I could tell she was torn up by your absence."
Rainbow Dash shivered briefly, taking a step back - into Twilight's waiting wing. Twilight nuzzled her friend. "Go on. We're right here."
Pinkie smiled. Rarity gave Rainbow Dash a concerned look.
The cyan pegasus gulped, closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and marched forward - only to be glomped by Fluttershy the instant she crossed the doorway. "You came back!"
"C...c-ca..." Rainbow Dash stammered.
Fluttershy squeezed. "I was so worried I'd lost you I'm so sorry seeing you scared was so awful!"
"A...a-ack...can't..."
Fluttershy hugged a bit tighter, then looked at Rainbow Dash. "Is something wrong? You seem bluer than usual."
"Can't...breathe..." Rainbow Dash finally got out.
"Oh! Sorry!" Fluttershy let her go.
Rainbow Dash panted for a bit. "I...I just wanna ask..."
"Yes?" Worry was all over Fluttershy's voice and face.
So Rainbow Dash took the simplest course: she raised a hoof to her long time friend and smiled. "We cool?"
Fluttershy smiled back and hoofbumped. "We're cool."
Rarity observed the exchange and turned a confused look upon Twilight. "They're...'cool'?"
Twilight nodded. "They're cool." She turned around to head back to town. "C'mon, I want to hear what you talked our visitor into that will need my advice."
"If you say so." Rarity made a note to herself that the particulars of Rainbow Dash's and Fluttershy's friendship were likely just a grade less bizarre than Pinkie's mind, and as such not to be explored unless she wanted a migraine.
Morning came too early for Twilight. Since her stay in Ponyville, free from Celestia's schedule that included waking with the dawn, she had allowed herself to stay up later and later, often engrossed in some book or mapping how the stars had changed since Luna's freedom. This meant sleeping in to compensate.
This did not, in general, lead to being thrilled when woken up by somepony knocking at her door shortly. "Spiiike, can you get that?" She pulled a pillow over her head.
"Sure, sure." The young dragon - smaller even than a pony, still, colored to compliment Twilight if not for his green eyes and crest, and off-white belly - yawned as he trotted downstairs and opened the door. His claw-tipped hands had proven remarkably versatile at making use of things built for ponies. One familiar face and one unfamiliar face greeted him outside. "Oh, hey, g'morning Fluttershy. And...are you the newcomer Twilight mentioned?"
Sanguine nodded absently as her eyes wandered over the structure. While she had seen the tree library on the flight in - there were other trees around town, but this was easily the largest with any buildings nearby - seeing it up close was something else. The windows and balconies scattered about, not to mention the prominent, brick-red front door, made it obvious this was a structure for pony use. One balcony, just too high up to be convenient to jump to, almost seemed designed for pegasus entry, or perhaps for waiting for visitors. A healthy canopy of dark green confirmed this tree was at the same time alive; Sanguine wondered what sort of maintenance that entailed. Patches of lighter green formed a roof over each window, balcony, or door, suggesting transplanted foliage grafted on to the main tree. Up on top was a telescope - good condition, probably recently used, Sanguine decided from the lack of fallen leaves or detritus.
Looking inside - yes, this was a library, alright. The wood was colored pink, and shelves carved into the walls, stuffed with books. The shelves went nearly to the ceiling; a rickety-looking ladder in one corner was probably the main means of access - that, and telekinesis from the "librarian". Dominating the center was a reading table ringed around a bust of some mohawk-maned pony, the table supplemented by a couple auxiliary lecterns serving as bookstands near the walls between shelves, while the bust was supplemented by a large sun crest dominating the ceiling, suggesting this was a building with some history - if being built into a massive tree with grafted extensions had not been clue enough. A staircase with three pink hearts on the front of every other step lead somewhere out of sight. In some ways it was a library version of the boutique. Sanguine wondered if most residents of Ponyville resided in combined shop-and-home buildings, but surely there could not be enough establishments for that to be true, even if Pinkie had mentioned living in a bakery.
While Sanguine studied all this, Fluttershy spoke. "Good morning. Umm, I need a little favor, if you don't mind."
"Sure. Just so long as it doesn't involve waking Twilight." Spike had had too many unpleasant encounters with the consequences of that.
"Too late," came from upstairs, "but I'm going back to sleep if you don't need me."
"Oh! Uh! S-sorry to wake you," Fluttershy called - at least, what passed for raising her soft voice. Rainbow Dash still occasionally joked about the "yay training" incident, which Fluttershy was still a little embarrassed about. "I just wanted Spike to feed my animals at lunchtime."
"I can do that." Spike had planned on categorizing and shelving Celestia's recent letters to Twilight, which he had gotten a bit behind on, but that could wait until tomorrow. "Are you going on a trip?" He eyed Sanguine's suit, nodding to himself: that was unmistakably Rarity's work.
"We're going into Everfree Forest for the day, to look for monsters," Fluttershy replied, in the same tone one would announce a trip to the grocery store. "We'll be back by dark."
"Oh, that's ni-WHAAAAAT?!?" Spike was joined mid-way through his exclamation by Twilight teleporting to his side, wings raised and mane a prime display of bedhead.
Twilight's eyes met Fluttershy's. "Are. You. CRAZ-Sanguine what are you doing?" But only until distracted.
Sanguine bowed, her chin on the ground. "I sincerely apologize for not recognizing your status yesterday, Your Highness. With all that was going on I did not realiz-"
Twilight rolled her eyes. "Get up."
Sanguine stood. "Yes your majesty."
"And don't call me that!" A fleck of genuine irritation crept into Twilight's voice.
"Yes your maje-err..." Sanguine fished for another title.
Spike stage-whispered, "Twilight's new to this whole Princess thing. Don't play it up."
Despite herself, Twilight had to smile at that. "Yes, please. It's a little embarrassing. Just call me Twilight."
Sanguine nodded. "Alright."
"Ahem. Anyway." Interruption resolved, Twilight looked at Fluttershy again. "Are. You. CRAZY?!?"
Even having been afforded time to prepare for it, Fluttershy still found herself taking a step back. "I think she needs to learn how to talk to them, and how to listen, so she won't you-know-what more than she has to."
Twilight blinked. "Fluttershy. This is the Everfree Forest we're talking about. You know better than I how dangerous it is. You live there!"
"I do. But it is the type of place she will be going a lot. And I don't want her to..." Fluttershy glanced at Spike, uncertain if Twilight had told him yet. "...you-know-what if it isn't needed."
"I get that, but I'm worried THEY will you-know-what YOU just for being there." Visions of Fluttershy and Sanguine in pieces offered themselves up to Twilight unbidden.
"Oh, w-well, it shouldn't be too bad? I mean the two of us will be together." Fluttershy knew it would be insufficient, but it was all she had to fall back on.
"She's practically still a filly. You're stronger than she is." Twilight was not entirely certain: Fluttershy was very much not known for her brawn, and it sounded like Sanguine had had some experience with rough and tumble.
"Actually, we hoof-wrestled last night to see how strong she was. It was a tie." Fluttershy did not explain how Angel had goaded her into it. Sometimes she wondered whether her bunny or herself was the true master of her cottage.
As the two argued, Spike leaned around them to ask Sanguine, "Do you know what this you-know-what is?"
"Yep." Sanguine had taken a step away from the mares, to give them space.
"Wanna share?" Spike had a suspicion, having read Celestia's letter to himself and Twilight on the subject, but it was another matter to hear it from the pony's mouth.
"Nope." Sanguine tilted her head at the sound of her own voice. Just then, she had sounded a bit like... "Say, umm, Twilight? What if we got that orange pony from yesterday? Applejack, was it? Would you be okay with it if she was protecting us?"
Twilight blinked as a strand of bedhead neared one eye. "Well..."
"Would we have your permission?" Sanguine pressed.
"..." The way Sanguine had asked that disturbed Twilight, and it took her a moment to figure out why. "Sanguine. Fluttershy is a grown pony, and I don't do that kind of royal authority unless I really have to. I am not ordering anypony to do or not to do anything. I'm just really worried for the safety of both of you, as a friend. Even with Applejack along it wouldn't be entirely safe, but I suppose it would be safer. Though she's busy running Sweet Apple Acres all day."
"If it will make you feel better, we'll go ask her," Fluttershy offered.
"Thanks." Twilight stepped back from the door as her friends turned to leave, then debated whether to comb her mane or let the coming adrenaline crash drive her back to sleep. In the end she did both, winding up with dreams of wandering amidst a sea of her own hair and through it trying to be there for everypony at the same time as they engaged in a series of increasingly dangerous ventures.
Sanguine's eyes wandered in unabashed amazement as she and Fluttershy trotted along the path to the barn. "These trees go on FOREVER. There's just no end to them!"
From the ground, that seemed like the case. A forest like the Everfree, but in many ways the complete opposite. Every tree in sight was dotted with apples - the ones over here just beginning to grow, the ones over there big and red and ready for harvest - and there were hints of a pattern to their placement. Not a single withered branch was to be seen. A leg-high, three-barred white fence set path apart from tree, leading to an arch decorated in leaves and apples through which the two passed. The orchard was to their right; to their left, large patches of rows of plants stretched into the distance. Sanguine wondered if there was any being on the planet, pony or otherwise, who could look at this and not immediately recognize a farm.
And then there was the barn itself. Wooden, of course, like most of the buildings in Ponyville. Possibly one of the oldest, but if so it was well-maintained, not a hint of rot or disrepair. Reds and whites with a purple roof, it was two stories in most places with a third story sticking up at one point like a castle tower, topped by a weather vane with a fake flat apple - even painted red and green; Sanguine could not see a fleck of the black iron that made it up, judging by the blackness of the rest of the vane, peeking through the paint. Smaller, similar structures were off to the side. Two large lofts dominated the front, likely having been placed where they could be expanded as needed, and putting business in front of the living spaces just like Rarity's boutique and Twilight's library did. This was clearly a lived in and well-loved home.
"Well, there is, but the orchard is quite large, yes." Fluttershy's eyes tracked Sanguine's, and she walked slowly to let her companion take it all in. "I still don't know how she and her family find time to harvest them all."
"An' sometimes neither do ah," Applejack greeted from a door on the barn's right. "Morning, Fluttershy, Sanguine. What brings you on by?"
"Oh! Good morning, Applejack." Fluttershy approached, sparing a quick glance back to make sure Sanguine did as well. "Um, Twilight wanted us to ask a little favor, if that's alright." Her stomach grumbled. "Err..."
Applejack smiled. "We're just putting on breakfast now, if you'd like."
"Oh that would be lovely. Thank you!" Fluttershy walked inside.
Sanguine followed, only to stop just short of Applejack's suddenly outstretched hoof.
Applejack's smile was gone, as she leaned in close to Sanguine. "Mah young sister's in there, an' some other sensitive ears. You won't mention what you did to get in your mess, or anythin' of th' sort, right?"
Sanguine nodded. "Rarity did say I should try not to dwell on it. This'll be practice for me not talking about it."
Applejack retracted her hoof. "Good enough." Raising her voice, she called inside, "Apple Bloom, set two more places, we got company!"
"Thanks." Sanguine entered, following Applejack inside. "Err, if you don't mind me asking, I've never seen a farm this large before. How DO you harvest it all?"
"Hard work, good technique, an' knowin' which parts to harvest when. An acre now an' an acre tomorrow'll getcha more an' better apples than tryin' t' do both acres now an' neither tomorrow." Applejack never tired of boasting of - or "sharing", when she wanted to seem humble about it - her family's extensive lore on farming.
"I se-" Sanguine sniffed. "What...IS that..."
Applejack smiled weakly. "Uhh, thing is, mah sis' tried her hand at apple fritters this mornin'. If it's not to yer taste-"
Applejack found herself speaking to thin air. As she entered the dining area, she found Sanguine, sitting down and eyes attentive, having rushed past Fluttershy to the table.
The farmer grinned. "Heh. Hey sis, ah think you may have a fan here!"
"A fan?" A small yellow filly with red mane emerged from the kitchen, carrying a tray almost as large as she was, barely visible under a mound of dark golden balls of fried batter filled with apple slices, wafting steam announcing how recently they had been on the grill. Carefully, she set the tray on the table as Sanguine's eyes tracked them like a predator. "Pleased to meetcha. Mah name's Apple Bloom."
Sanguine's eyes did not stray from the fritters. "Call me Sanguine are these 'apple fritters' when can we eat err!" She collected herself, finally turning a sheepish smile toward Apple Bloom. "I'm sorry. What are the rules here?"
"Rules? Heh," a wizened green pony, withered from old age, mused from behind Apple Bloom. "Sure, we got a rule here. If you leave that there table hungry, it ain't our fault. Now dig in, just lookin' atcha's makin' me hungry."
"YES MA'AM!" Sanguine stuffed a fritter in her mouth and was immediately halfway to fruity, savory heaven.
"Heh heh. Applejack, a word?" The elder pony retreated into the kitchen.
Applejack followed her in and lowered her voice. "What's up?"
"That the newcomer what had you unsettled th' other day?"
Applejack blinked, but in moments remembered she had given up trying to outguess Granny Smith. "I'm not even gonna ask how yah knew. Yeah, she's th' one. She's done some bad things, bad enough Celestia had t' get involved."
"Mmm." Granny Smith inspected the kitchen, noting a few flour spills she would have Apple Bloom clean up...later, after the foal had had a chance to enjoy the fruits of her labor. "Can you say what?"
Applejack spotted the spills, and was surprised her sister had not made far more of a mess. "Sorry. I swore not to."
"Mmm." Granny Smith nodded. "You don't make promises like that lightly, an' you let her in here, so I'll trust your judgement."
"Ah'm keepin' my eye on her, nonetheless." Applejack leaned back far enough to glimpse the dining table, and saw Sanguine and Apple Bloom chatting happily.
"You do that." Granny Smith gestured toward the others. "Now let's get back there b'fore th' food's all gone."
"...so we formed the Cutie Mark Crusaders to try to find out what our cutie marks will be," Apple Bloom finished as the pair returned. "Say, d'you got your cutie mark yet?"
Fluttershy coughed as apple juice abruptly went down the wrong pipe.
Sanguine smiled a nervous smile. "Hmm...sort of."
"'Sort of'? C'mon, Miss Sanguine, either ya do or ya don't!" Apple Bloom pressed.
"Well." Sanguine noted Applejack's warning glare. "Technically I do, BUT it's not entirely clear how exactly I am to do it. Fluttershy's going to show me some of what I'm missing today."
"Whoa." Apple Bloom looked at Fluttershy with amazement. "You can grant a pony part o' their cutie marks?"
"U-umm, well, that is..." Fluttershy began backing away from the table.
That only got Apple Bloom to lean forward. "Can you give us our cutie marks?"
"Apple Bloom!" Applejack put a hoof on her sister's shoulder. "Enough. You know Fluttershy is, err, shy. Ya're gonna intimidate her if you keep pesterin' her like that."
"Oh. Right." Apple Bloom sat back. "Sorry, Fluttershy."
Fluttershy scooted back to the table from having tried - unsuccessfully - to hide behind Sanguine, only to find Sanguine a size too small to conceal even Fluttershy's slender build. "Thanks, Applejack. Apple Bloom, I know you are eager to find yours but I'm afraid I can only help Sanguine like this. But if you want, come by my place around lunchtime. I'll be out all day, so Spike will be feeding my animals. You're welcome to help him. U-umm..." She smiled weakly. "Cutie Mark Crusader Animal Caretaker?"
Apple Bloom folded her forelegs and frowned.
"Now don't be like that," Applejack retorted. "She's just tryin' t' help. Speakin' o' which, it's a good thing y' came by. Saves me a trip t' ask. Jus' how much firewood did you get off those timberwolves?"
"Each one was a pile about as big as your trees," Sanguine replied. "I put it in three piles, one per timberwolf, because if I'd put them all together it'd have been taller than her house."
Applejack whistled. "Uh. Well. I'll jus' say it: Fluttershy, how much o' that can I getcha to part with? We're gettin' toward bakin' season, an' our trees won't be dropping kindlin' for months. We need to fuel the ovens somehow."
Fluttershy blinked. "Oh, well if it'll help you you're welcome to it."
Applejack cocked an eye. "Are y' sure? That's a mighty big load o' firewood."
Fluttershy nodded. "Sure I'm sure. Actually, we came by to ask you for something. Um, Twilight wanted us to ask you to come with us today, for safety."
"Oh? What're you doin' today?" Applejack finally got around to munching a fritter.
"Wandering Everfree Forest looking for monsters." Fluttershy was fairly certain the Apple family did not include any unicorns who would teleport in in surprise.
Applejack had just enough presence of mind to turn her head to point at empty space, and to avoid attempting to inhale, before she spit-took the bite of fritter that was in her mouth. That done, she looked at Fluttershy again. "Are. You. CRAZY?!?"
Fluttershy blinked. "That's what Twilight said."
Sanguine nodded. "You almost got the tone right, but her voice was a bit higher, kind of shrill, when she said 'crazy'."
Applejack let her jaw hang open for just a moment before recovering, completely unprepared for that conversation tack. "This ain't about vocal impressions. Fluttershy, WHY would you want to go jus' wanderin' around the forest for?"
"So that Sanguine can learn when monsters are simply hurt," Fluttershy replied. "Remember that manticore? The one who had a thorn in his paw?"
"Yeah, I remember nearly gettin' eaten alive." Applejack took another bite.
"Well, Rarity and Pinkie Pie talked Sanguine into looking for those kinds of situations, to help protect everypony." Fluttershy was no Rarity-grade wordsmith, but she figured she was doing a good enough job keeping a certain detail hidden.
Applejack chewed thoughtfully, then swallowed. "...uh huh. Rarity and Pinkie Pie, two of the gentlest ponies I know besides you, talked somepony with more reason than most to avoid violence into..." She facehoofed. "...Pinkie used the word 'adventurer', didn't she?"
Apple Bloom looked up at Sanguine, wondering. "Your cutie mark's about adventuring?"
Sanguine smiled. "It's going to draw me into adventures. Close enough."
"Awesome!" Immediately her mind began dreaming up ways to imitate Sanguine's adventures to get a similar cutie mark - but kept sailing off in directions so vague, for want of further information, even Apple Bloom recognized it. She resigned herself to pestering Applejack for details later.
Applejack sighed. "So yer gonna go wanderin' th' forest, and you want me to guard ya."
Fluttershy nodded. "Just for today. We should be done by dark."
"Y'all'd BETTER be done by dark." Applejack shot Fluttershy a look briefly. "An', well, ah dunno, ah WAS gonna-"
"Applejack, dear," Granny Smith interrupted, "she's already payin' ya."
Applejack looked at her. "Come again?"
"Th' firewood. Seriously, ah KNOW you've got more sense than that. We get a lot o' firewood, you go off and traipse about with yer friends fer th' day." Granny Smith shrugged. "Seems fair t' me."
"...oh. Yeah." Applejack resumed consuming her fritter.
"So, Fluttershy." Granny Smith pantomimed three objects. "Three piles, each about as big as our trees? They're at your cottage, so th' firewood's yours, right? Hmm...how about, one pile fer Applejack's services today, an' fer a second one we'll give ya some a' the pies you made possible."
Fluttershy nodded. "That sounds fair."
Granny Smith smiled. "It's ah deal! Ah'll have Big Mac come by with th' wagon today t' pick up, an' we'll get those pies t' ya tomorrow. Applejack leaves wit' ya right from here, along with a good lunch fer th' three o' ya, an' she comes back t' us in one piece. Agreed?" She stuck a hoof out to shake.
Fluttershy put her hoof to Granny Smith's and shook. "Agreed, especially with returning Applejack intact!"
Sanguine wrinkled her nose. "It's a bit disturbing that you have to add that clause."
"This's the Everfree Forest we're talkin' about, missy," Granny Smith warned. "Y' don't mess with that."
"Why not?" Sanguine wondered. "I mean, alright, giant timberwolves came out of it but I don't-"
"Wild weather an' everythin'." Granny Smith had given this lecture before, and it showed. "Us ponies don't control the clouds, the trees, nothin' in there. Y'got any idea the kinds o' things that spawn in there?"
Sanguine blinked. "We had something like that near where I grew up. We called it a Wild Zone. I...I suppose there's only one thing to say to that."
Granny Smith nodded in approval at the youngster's quick acceptance of reality. "An' that is?"
Sanguine looked at Fluttershy. "Are. You. CRAZY?!?"
"So Fluttershy," Applejack drawled as they neared the tree line that marked the edge of Everfree Forest, having first taken a look around to confirm the three of them were the only ones in earshot. "Ah'm surprised yer goin' along with this."
The direct path from barn to forest did not pass near Fluttershy's cottage, but she glanced in that direction anyway. "W-well...it is Princess Celestia's orders, and..."
Applejack closed her eyes momentarily. "Trainin' a monster slayer."
Both pegasi looked at her in surprise.
At the silent response, Applejack's eyes opened and rolled. "Oh come ON. Cutie mark in killin'. Havin' a reason to make nice with monsters. Somethin' Pinkie Pie'd call 'adventurer'. Ah may not be as smart as Twilight but ah can DO the math."
Sanguine took a step away from Applejack as they trotted on. "Err...that's a bit scary how you can do that..."
Applejack glanced at her. "Is it now? Somethin' else ya hidin'?"
Fluttershy stepped between the two. "Applejack, please don't interrogate her. Sanguine, Applejack's Element is Honesty. It can take a bit of getting used to sometimes."
"Yes'm," Sanguine squeaked, measuring her pace to keep as much of Fluttershy between herself and Applejack as possible. Sanguine hiding behind Fluttershy worked far more successfully than the reverse.
Fluttershy looked at Applejack. "There, see? You were scaring her."
Applejack looked away for a moment, noticing they had passed through the edge of the forest. She had not approached it from this direction often, but if memory served there was a path up ahead. "Sorry, but when somepony's scared of somepony just for figurin' things out..." She sighed, looked back, and stopped. "Uh, Fluttershy?"
Fluttershy stopped too. "Yes?"
Applejack pointed across Fluttershy. "She's gone."
Fluttershy looked to her side. Sanguine was indeed absent.
Applejack began looking around. "Ah didn' think ah scared her THAT bad."
"Up here," came Sanguine's whisper.
Applejack and Fluttershy looked up. Sanguine was shadowing them from above, moving along a tree branch with feline grace.
Applejack walked underneath Sanguine and looked straight up. How her hat stayed on, despite the lack of visible ties, even when her head was tilted straight up was another prized piece of Apple family lore. "What are ya doin'?"
Sanguine motioned upward. "We don't want to be seen, right? So stay off the open ground! And keep your voices down!"
Fluttershy was a master of speaking softly. "Oh! Good idea!" She hovered up behind Sanguine.
Sanguine waved her off. "Get another branch. This one'll snap with the two of us."
In contrast to Sanguine and Fluttershy, Applejack continued speaking normally and stayed on the ground. "Now where'd ya learn to walk like that?"
Sanguine pointed Fluttershy to another branch as she answered, "Following the Royal Guard around."
Applejack cocked her head. "Jus' fer fun?"
Sanguine blinked and forgot to keep whispering. "Nooo? Celestia asked me to."
Applejack frowned and sat down. "Ah KNEW it. Ah think it's high time y'all told us what ELSE Celestia had ya up to."
Fluttershy, reluctant to disturb the centipedes that lived on the branch Sanguine had pointed her to - though she suspected Sanguine had simply not seen them - fluttered down. "You knew what?"
Applejack held up a hoof. "Ssh, let 'er talk."
Sanguine had been perching on the branch. Now she clung to it, fear setting in, mind racing to figure out what offense she might have given. "What? B-but...I did everything Celestia told me to!"
Applejack nodded. "Ah know. An' that's th' problem. Please tell Fluttershy here exactly what all you did - th' rest of it, th' part that was under Celestia's order, during yer sentence."
"I kept killing ponies," Sanguine replied as if it was the most obvious fact in the universe.
Fortunately for the trio, Fluttershy's "WHAT?!?" was muffled by the forest, and only set a flock of birds to flight.
"Well, a pony," Sanguine corrected. "And a griffon. A dragon too." She noticed that Fluttershy's pose exactly matched Twilight's back at the library, save for the lack of bedhead. A stray strand of thought tried momentarily to figure out why that might be, then ascribed it to something about their adventures together.
Applejack's tail twitched. "Details, Sanguine."
"Okay, okay, so...when Celestia came to my town, she asked me a lot of questions. Umm...I think she was more focused on why I did it than what I did. Then she thought about it, talking to other ponies, then she asked if my parents would say goodbye because they'd probably never see me again." Sanguine's eye glimmered. "They...they wouldn't..."
Applejack, suspecting this might not be the worst of the tale, stepped out from directly under Sanguine to avoid potential tears. "Y'all can skip ahead a bit. Celestia took ya to Canterlot, right?"
Sanguine exhaled, happy to move the story along. "Yes, she did. She locked me in a room and gave me some books to read. History, some guard instruction manuals...I thought she was just trying to make me think I wasn't alone, but now I'm not so sure."
Applejack frowned. "Pretty sure she wasn't. Anyway, she had ya study. Then she asked ya to sneak aroun', followin' the guard without bein' seen?"
Sanguine blinked. "How do you know all this?"
"Ah'm followin' a trail," Applejack growled, "an' ah do NOT like where it leads. But go on, what happened next?"
Satisfied that Applejack was not in fact a disguised unicorn with mind reading magic, Sanguine continued, "Oh, w-well, it was three weeks after I'd arrived at Canterlot that Celestia said she had a mission for me. She needed me to check in on an old friend. She gave me an address, and a letter saying I was there to collect some old books. I went off to Appleloosa by train. Once I was there, I went straight to the address - it was an old unicorn stallion. He looked at my letter and let me in. He said I was just to go to the library and get them then leave, but Celestia said he might be forgetful so I really should look around. I d-did, and..."
Applejack's voice softened. "Go on."
"I'm no unicorn, but when a spellbook's open to a page that talks about making a fog that'll steal days of life from other ponies and give them to the unicorn making the fog...and I saw him d-doing the kinds of things I saw described in there..." Sanguine squeezed her eyes shut. "I pinned him to the wall and held a hoof to his neck. He didn't even struggle much. Afterward, I put him in bed and called for the sheriff, told him I was there on royal authority to pick up books but when I went to say goodbye to the unicorn he'd gone to sleep and wasn't waking up. I showed him the letter and said Princess Celestia wanted me to return as soon as possible, so he let me go. That necromancy book was on the list Celestia wanted me to bring back."
Fluttershy's jaw was wide open. A fly buzzed into and out of her mouth.
Applejack's expression was neutral. "An' the griffon?"
"That was a week later. Celestia asked me to work with a cop in Manehattan, tracking down a missing colt. I...kind of had a feeling where we'd find him, and my hunch was right: an old, abandoned factory. The-the griffon had, haaad..." Sanguine gulped. "She was eating him, said she was up to a leg and wanted to build up to being able to swallow a pony whole. So I...so I..."
Applejack waved a hoof. "...ended the problem in a furious rage? Ah think we can skip those details."
"Yes. Thank you." Sanguine sighed. "I heard they'd be able to regenerate his injuries, and they were going to edit his memories so he'd think he'd fallen down a well or something. Celestia was in town, so she came by to pick me up. She and the cop went into a room and there was shouting but I was so scared I couldn't make it out and I..." Sanguine sniffed, a tiny mild hot rainstorm now under her chin.
Applejack watched the tears come down and refrained from noting out loud that she had called it. "Alright, alright, we get it. An' that's when Celestia had a change of heart?"
"Ehh?" Confusion layered over Sanguine's regret.
Applejack steeled herself to get that part of the tale out of Twilight, or Celestia herself. "Forget it. Butcha didn' do any more killin' after that?"
"W-well...Celestia's chariot wasn't available, so we were flying back, when a dragon came out of nowhere and tried to eat us. Actually I think it was aiming for Celestia but it got me instead - just, snap..." Sanguine brought two hooves together to demonstrate. "...and I was in its maw. I bucked out through its neck. But THAT'S the last I killed, until those timberwolves."
"Uh-huh." Applejack considered just a moment, picturing how the events fit together. "Probably sabotaged the chariot so's she wouldn't have guards around, but the dragon wasn't countin' on you. Ah doubt she'll let that happen again anytime soon."
"Anyway, that's about all that happened. I spent most of my time in Canterlot in my room. I had a lot to think about. And then I came here." Sanguine fought back her tears. The story was done; she wouldn't have to think about that aga-
"Ah bet you did," Applejack's voice interrupted Sanguine's relief. "Equestria ain't had an assassin in th' royal service since...ever, or at least a long time."
Sanguine's eyes widened. She finally lost her grip, sliding over the branch and recovering mid-air to make a belly flop on the ground instead of landing on her back. "ASSASSIN?!?"
Applejack nodded. "That's what she was trainin' ya for, sounds like. Good thing she came to her senses."
"B-b-b-b-but that's IMPOSSIBLE!" Sanguine protested. "We're talking about PRINCESS CELESTIA! She would NEVER-"
Applejack cut Sanguine off with a wave of her hoof. "She DID, but it was temporary. Ah'm gonna ask Twilight to have a little talk with Celestia about it - this's her territory, an' I do not envy her." Sighing, she continued, "But there's a good side."
Sanguine just stared. "How can there be a good side to all that?"
"Well." Applejack smiled and tipped up her hat. "From whatcha said, ya've been slayin' monsters. Even if some of 'em were ponies."
Sanguine's gaze fell to the ground. "So...I...may have to kill ponies?"
Applejack faltered, her attempt to cheer up having tripped into nearly unleashing another tear storm. "Naw. It's yer choice who ta - it'll always be yer choice. An' that's why we're here now, so Fluttershy can show you how NOT to kill. Ain't that right, Fluttershy?"
No response. Fluttershy stood stock still, jaw still open, mind attempting to process what she just heard.
"Ah SAID, ain't that right, Fluttershy?" Applejack tapped her on the shoulder.
Physical contact broke Fluttershy's shock. "O-oh umm yes whatever you just said yes that's right can we please stop talking about this?"
"Yes PLEASE," Sanguine added.
"Sure thing." Applejack nodded, then pointed into the forest. "So Fluttershy, ya wanted us to meet a manticore? Which way?"
"This way." Fluttershy trotted off, leading the other two toward what she felt was an infinitely less scary subject.
"While normally it is not good to see a friend so sad, today I confess relief that things are not far more bad."
Sanguine cocked an eye at Zecora's greeting. "Rhyming? Really?"
"It's how she talks." Applejack was relieved the walk to Zecora's had been short, and that Zecora was in. She had nearly had to carry Fluttershy, even once the tears stopped; now Applejack set her in a corner.
Zecora, it turned out, was a zebra. This was not terribly unusual: Equestria's population was not all ponies, even if Sanguine had never seen a zebra outside of books before. Her coloration was a monochrome mix of dark grays, light grays, and whites, with something like a cutie mark: a spiral surrounded by tiny triangles pointing outward. As if to offset this, she wore giant bronze earrings and rings around her neck, tighter than a necklace - almost neck armor, with the same on her forelegs. Her mane was in a mohawk; Sanguine wondered if the bust in Twilight's library was of Zecora, or an ancestor, without the jewelry.
On the other hand, Zecora's house could certainly be described "unusual". For starters, it was well inside the Everfree Forest. Sanguine had tried to lighten the mood with jokes about how long it must take for Zecora to walk to the store; Applejack had had none of that, and just said the zebra was a live off the land type. The house was built into one of the larger trees; the roots formed gaps that could be mistaken for teeth, and two misaligned "eyes" were actually windows placed in convenient thin spots, with the only visible door forming a nose - it seemed like a grotesque parody of Twilight's library, though there was no apparent second story nor any apparent transplants. As at the library, the continued presence of foliage above suggested this tree was still alive.
Inside continued the parody: a large main room ringed with shelves, though only two levels high and stocking things larger than books, mainly bottles and flasks. A few more were hung from ropes near a hollow flanked by giant masks. Sanguine thought she glimpsed a bed through a doorway in the back. The interior was roughly the same brown as outside, and instead of a sun crest, the ceiling sported a depression where the tree just resumed growing, though a dark stain lead from there to the top of the front door. But the main feature of the front room was the cauldron.
There was no better word for it. A black metal bowl large enough to fit a tied-up pony in, sitting on firewood inside a stone circle - Sanguine had to take a moment to reassure herself that zebras were not known for cooking and eating ponies. Right now the cauldron sat empty, the firewood unlit. Doubtless it was where all these bottles' contents got mixed together. Sanguine had heard of zebra alchemy, capable of creating potions to do all manner of wonders and horrors, yet the pegasus could not help but think that if Zecora did indeed live off the land, she probably subsisted largely on soups and stews.
Once Applejack had set her burden down and slowly backed away, watching Fluttershy for signs that she still needed to cling to a friend and relieved to see no such reaction, Applejack looked at Zecora. "What do you mean, 'far more bad'?"
Zecora looked over Fluttershy from a distance, noting the blood covering much of Fluttershy's front - and Applejack, where she had been carrying Fluttershy. Fortunately the blood had dried enough that they had not tracked any inside. "I heard the wails from here. I knew it was loss of one held dear. Had it been one of you as I had worried, then to the hospital in town you would have hurried. In these most dangerous times, as you know well, if the six become five, it might be Equestria's death knell."
Applejack looked away, uneasy with Zecora's assertion. "We found Manty. He's not hurtin' now."
"Oh." Zecora blinked, letting that sink in. "Oh. So she named the beast, which upon her tried to feast. How it came to an end, I know not how or why. With all the dangers of the forest, sometimes things just die."
"Yeah, don'tcha worry. Fluttershy an' I know better than to seek revenge. An' Sanguine here's busy dismissin' any such thoughts." Applejack shot Sanguine a look. "Right?"
"R-right!" Sanguine nodded. "No revenge!"
Zecora smiled and walked up to the youngest present. "So Sanguine is your name. How do you do?" As she neared, she sniffed. "Huh?" She frowned, looking Sanguine over. "What the-" Her eyes widened and she took four steps back. "-a killer are you!"
Sanguine facehoofed. "Is it obvious to EVERYPONY?"
"Well ya DO have all that blood on ya," Applejack explained, "even if it's difficult to see 'gainst that coat o' yours. Might wanna wipe that off. Zecora, you got a towel?"
Zecora pointed one hoof at Sanguine accusingly. "Before I lift one hoof to help her, I need to know. She pays for what she has done? If not, then go!"
Applejack nodded. "Ohhh, yeah, she's payin'. Officially convicted by Celestia an' everythin'. Bein' here's part o' her sentence. Trus' me, when she first got here her worst jailor was her own self."
"Celestia is not here today!" Zecora pointed at the blood on Sanguine's legs. "So for that, how does she pay?"
Sanguine sighed, eyes on the floor. "It was Manty."
Fluttershy whimpered. Applejack gave her another hug.
Zecora blinked, taking a moment to fit the pieces together. "An act of mercy. I do apologize." She grabbed a rag, walked up to Sanguine, and began cleaning her off, starting with her forelegs. "When dealing with death, caution is advised."
Sanguine snorted. "You can say that again."
Legs soon finished, Zecora noted the blood just stopped once it got to the shirt. She brushed a hoof across the garment - it felt a bit slick, likely some sort of enchantment for working ponies, though a spot of blood had gotten past it up to Sanguine's neck, so Zecora wiped that off. "You were convicted for killing. It was more than just a fine. I hesitate to ask: have you done it for a long time?"
Sanguine closed her eyes. "Five weeks. Even got my cutie mark for it."
Zecora inspected her work as if polishing a statue. "Proud of it you do not sound. On that we have common ground. I came to Equestria to get away from my native lands. Even in the forest, much violence is effectively banned." Satisfied, she tossed the rag to Applejack, who began cleaning off Fluttershy, then herself.
Sanguine leveled a look at Zecora. "And yet things just die?"
Zecora gave her a stern look and nearly hissed, "May you never see war. Of it I would see no more."
Sanguine blinked. "Whoa. War? As in...'war', war? You've seen it?"
"Zebras dying left and right. Survivors feel like Tartarus at night. War is a worse ravage than any murder spree. Cutie marks for killing?" Zecora snorted. "Give them to the artillery."
Sanguine tried to put on her best pleading expression. "I need to know what you can teach me."
Judging by Zecora frowning, pushing her face into Sanguine's, and yelling, Zecora was apparently the opposite of persuaded. "TEACH you?!? Are you out of your mind? Recant, dismiss such thoughts, or I'll tear your mark from your behind!"
"She don't mean 'how to kill'," Applejack interrupted. "Her mark's got that covered. Other stuff - like, Fluttershy brought her into the forest so she could listen to monsters so she wouldn't have to kill so many."
Zecora backed off. "Listen to monsters?" she wondered. "Ah, part of Fluttershy's skill! I was unaware that could be taught, but I also thought no pony would kill." She gave Sanguine a wary look.
"Just because Fluttershy's great at takin' care of animals don't mean nopony else can be good. Though I'll admit I'm not entirely sure of the plan." Cleaning complete, Applejack looked around for where to put the rag. "Fluttershy wanted us to wander the forest all day, t' find monsters t' listen to."
"Just wander the forest, seeking out monsters until night?" Zecora blinked as she took the rag from Applejack, then tossed it in the apparently-empty cauldron behind her. Somehow, the rag caught fire the moment it passed the cauldron's lip, quickly being consumed until not even ash remained. "Is, she, quite alright?"
Applejack shook her head to clear the spots from the unexpected pyrotechnics. "Ah'm pretty sure she ain't crazy. Pretty sure."
"So, uhh, Miss Zecora," Sanguine prompted.
Zecora shot her a withering look. "What do you seek to learn? How to make Equestria burn? War has nothing of use. For violence it's just an excuse!"
"No, no, of course not. I, err..." Sanguine searched for the right words. "I don't know what I need to know, but Rarity thought you could help me."
"Ah think," Applejack suggested, "maybe she needs to know what to prevent. 'Them who stare into the void', and all that. She's already saved Celestia from one dragon. What if another one went on a rampage, an' neither we nor the Princesses were there to stop it?"
"Then ponies would gather, and besiege the beast to its core. One might even call it a small..." Zecora blinked, and finished softly, "...war. That designer pony is sharp and bright. I told her what scared me one Nightmare Night."
Sanguine smiled. "So you'll teach me?"
Zecora pondered. "I will teach you what I can, but of this topic I am not a fan. I came here with hooves unbloodied, but it was a near thing..."
Sanguine waited three seconds before noting, "Those don't rhyme."
Zecora smiled. "...indeed."
Sanguine facehoofed again. "You did that on purpose!"
"Forgive my levity when talking of things dour. It keeps the conversation from getting too sour." Zecora trotted over to the still-silent Fluttershy, pulled up one of the pegasus's eyelids, and examined the exposed eye. "You wish to learn, so I shall teach you with haste. This topic I dislike, so time I would rather not waste."
Sanguine nodded. "I'm listening."
Releasing Fluttershy, Zecora considered. "Perhaps the most essential lesson to learn, is why such horrors are not Equestria's concern. Monsters come in all shapes and size. The darkness in ponies' hearts can surprise." She looked at Sanguine.
Sanguine winced.
Zecora nodded. "I see you have seen this. I suspected as much. Your first kill was a pony, or a bunch?"
"Ones that had it comin'," Applejack interrupted. "Sore subject. Please don' press her on it."
"As you wish; the point has been made. For many years Celestia kept that darkness mostly at bay." Zecora wandered along a shelf, examining the bottles. "Why there is more trouble now, I do not know. So many things have happened in a row. But even in these days, the basic defense remains: keep ponies in harmony, and joy and peace show gains." She fetched one, opened it, and stuffed it under Fluttershy's nose briefly.
Sanguine looked on, eyes rapt as if her life depended on memorizing the speech. Applejack made a mental note to ask Twilight about Celestia's training techniques. Fluttershy sneezed, and all signs that she had been crying vanished in an instant.
Zecora resealed the bottle and put it back. Just seeing Fluttershy that miserable had not been helping her mood; enough tears had been shed to achieve catharsis, and now her friend could skip the post-crying depression. "You have slain a dragon, that feat is quite rare. But did you know you were preceeded by that mare?" She gestured toward Fluttershy. "Kill she did not; she defeated it far worse. With just a stare and words, she made it traverse. I heard reports it left Equestria entirely, nightmares plagued by this gentle defender of society."
Fluttershy blushed.
"From my vantage point here, I have seen her be quite a dear. In many ways her Element is the key, if you wish a war not to be. Even the residents of this forest sometimes respect, treat them well and you won't get wrecked." Zecora turned her attention from Fluttershy to Sanguine. "But you are a pony: the forest life is not for you. At most you'll visit, much like Daring Do. So please tell me, what do you seek to be?"
Sanguine stood, radiating determination. "A monster slayer. I can tell when and where they are, and I can kill them."
"A useful ability, but is it true?" Zecora thought for a moment. "This forest is full of beasts; sense them can you?"
"..." Sanguine considered it, then closed her eyes. "I...I'm not sensing anything. Wait, a...no, it's gone. It felt...weak? Minor? Another one, over that way, but it's so small."
Zecora smiled. "Applejack, a favor if you please. Of us four, with Equestrian law you are the most at ease. If it were to be enforced on all within Everfree Forest-"
"-in minutes, y'all'd have enough criminals to fill a chorus," Applejack finished.
Zecora gestured at the orange pony and winked. "Law, justice, and morality are not the same, but they roughly measure one another when the world is sane. Tiny monstrosities you feel Sanguine, but these are not what you are meant to clean."
Sanguine nodded. "Right. So I'm feeling monsters, not just animals. I guess any Wild Zone will feel like this."
Zecora tilted her head. "That is not a term I have heard, but I can guess the meaning of those words. If I am right, you are wrong: you have not listened to your sense in town for long."
"What, you mean..." Sanguine took a second to puzzle it out. "...in Ponyville?"
Zecoda nodded. "Monsters you sense, and ponies can be the biggest of them all. It was not by accident your cutie mark came by making some fall."
Sanguine's eyes widened. "But...I don't want to kill ponies..."
Zecora walked over to her. "And since that is the case, my earlier words I will replace. I will show you a way, that these monsters you may slay."
Sanguine looked ill. "I...I think I'm fine with never using artillery to crater a whole town just to get rid of some bad ponies, thanks."
Zecora frowned. "Only a monster would be fine with doing it! But that is not what I mean, not a bit. You say 'kill' and 'slay' as if they are the same, but words can also these monsters tame."
"...what?" Sanguine blinked.
"Do you remember Fluttershy's dragon feat? Her standard, you should try to meet. You sense monsters, so you see into ponies' hearts. You know when they mean evil..." Zecora tapped her on the chest. "...so tell them not to start."
Sanguine just looked at Zecora, comprehension dawning - as did Applejack and Fluttershy.
"If a monstrous plan you cancel before it sees the light of day, then tell me, Sanguine." Zecora grinned. "Did you not just another monster slay?"
"...without...killing...a pony," Sanguine gasped in amazement.
Expression darkening a touch, Zecora continued, "Be prepared to, all the same. Some ponies will not let you explain. Their deaths you can, and I'm sure will, try to minimize. But your goal should be the lives that go on, you realize."
Sanguine nodded.
"And that is how you stop a war. I hope my explanation did not bore." Zecora fished out a pair of large jars with condensation on them; Applejack recognized enchanted coolers, designed to keep food from spoiling. "Let us take a break now and munch. If my nose tells true, you brought apple fritters for lunch. I have vegetables that should add some crunch, in quantity to share: I picked a large bunch."
12: What Darkness Lies In Ponies' Hearts
The trio said goodbye to Zecora in far higher spirits than they had greeted her in. Subconsciously, mutually, they headed in the exact opposite direction from the manticore, which placed them close enough to the path out of the forest that Applejack and Fluttershy adjusted course to follow it without realizing.
Sanguine had gotten turned around and would have been lost without her companions, but she noticed them following a definite path. "So, where are we off to next?"
Applejack, so far as she knew, was still just wandering. "Ah dunno. Fluttershy?"
"Umm." Fluttershy's head drooped. "I'm...not really in the mood to keep exploring. I guess my idea was kind of crazy, huh?"
"A little," Applejack and Sanguine echoed.
Fluttershy winced. "Sorry."
"Aww, it's okay, sugar." Applejack patted her. "Some good came outta it."
Fluttershy sighed. "I guess."
Sanguine nodded. "Yeah! I'm a bit pumped to see if I really can see into ponies' hearts. I never really paid attention, the few times I was out of my room."
Applejack had long since developed a flag for impending danger, well practiced from her little sister's antics with the Cutie Mark Crusaders: a club consisting of said sister and her two friends, mainly, infamous for attempting all manner of dangerous and/or poorly-thought-through schemes to get their cutie marks. That flag raised now, recognizing a similar pattern in Sanguine's words and tone. "Y'think Celestia knew about this?"
"Well...thinking back, she did only send me to Manehattan after she found me staring in its direction. And I felt hungry..." Sanguine blanched.
Applejack was quite okay with cutting off that line of conversation. "Oh yeah, she figured it out. Ah once heard she can figure th' endin' to mystery novels jus' bah readin' the first page, but that's probably an exaggeration."
"Actually it's not. At the end of my stealth training I snuck up on her in the library, and I saw her doing exactly that. When I asked, she said she was familiar with the author's works, and he'd fallen into a pattern that put enough clues on the first page if you knew what to look for. Just that one author, though." Sanguine blushed. "Then she chided me for giving myself away."
"How far away do you need to be to sense?" Fluttershy took note of exiting the forest this time. She glanced at her cottage - it was not a shambles, and it was after noon, so Spike must have fed her charges. She steered the trio away, lest Angel see them and get upset that she was away for the day when she could stop by and say hello but then she might not get the courage to go out again and "Yer frettin', sugar." Applejack's reminder broke her out of her reverie.
Sanguine looked at the two and smirked. From what she had seen of Fluttershy so far, she could readily believe the not-so-brave one did that enough that Applejack had learned the tells. "I don't know. Until an hour ago I didn't know I could do this."
"Welp, only one way t' find out." Applejack lead them over the bridge leading toward town.
"I guess." Sanguine looked ahead. "How close should I try?"
"Let's get over near town hall. There's a big, wide openin' there," Applejack explained. "Ya dunno if ya can sense more'n that there is bad intent about, right? It might help ya if ya can see who ya sense, jus' in case there's any flavor to it - somethin' that'll let you tell a bully from a thief, say."
Sanguine nodded, then took the opportunity to look around. So far, she had only really gone into town with Rarity and Pinkie Pie, and for different reasons she was in no mood to take in the sights on either leg of the journey. Ponyville was certainly a colorful place, with sights and sounds and a rhythm all its own. Most of the buildings differed only in the color and pattern of their support beams; Sanguine dismissed her earlier concern over all the buildings being shops: open-air markets with stalls and carts - and deployable coverings for when it rained, currently stowed for summer - seemed to be the preferred method of commerce. Putting the main library in a tree was certainly unique; idly, she wondered what the town would do hundreds of years later when the tree was dying. But that was a problem for the future, for now, she had to "STOP!"
Applejack gave Sanguine a worried look as she pressed a leg across the red chest. "Ya were spacin' out there mighty hard. Are ya okay?"
"Oh! S-sorry," Sanguine apologized. "I guess I just got a little carried away."
Applejack continued to examine her. "Yer not sensin' now, right?"
Sanguine shook her head. "Not paying much attention to it. Is this where you wanted me to try?"
Applejack looked around briefly, noting that they were now in the main plaza surrounding town hall, before her eyes returned to Sanguine. "As good a place as any. Do it."
Sanguine nodded and closed her eyes, sinking into her mind.
The first pulse came from above: a fast-moving blip, then two, three, four minor echoes in the blip's wake. Moments later, faint curses came to her ears from the direction of those curses. Probably some fast-moving pegasus, full of herself, and the pegasi she annoyed with her passage.
Looking more groundward, she noticed a perfectly pegasus-shaped void right next to her. Cracking one eye, she saw the void corresponded to Fluttershy. Slowly she walked around the pegasus sitting next to her: sure enough, from all angles it was as if the ground and open air had an ambient level and Fluttershy was less than that.
Then the rest of the town pinged.
It was only later that she would figure out that she had been looking extremely close to notice Fluttershy's void, which amplified the slight wisp of moral imperfection most ponies carried in their hearts. At the time, bad intent seemed scattered everywhere and there was scant goodness to be found and the merest mote of selfishness seemed to flare into diabolical intent and the entire town seemed plagued with malice and hostility and hatred and an overwhelming flood of "STOP!"
Applejack forcibly peeled open Sanguine's eyes, unsurprised to see the pupils shrunk to tiny dots. "Sanguine! Sanguine! Snap outta it!"
Sanguine's eyes looked left, looked right, looked up, then she bolted.
"GET BACK HERE!" Applejack gave chase, soon followed by Fluttershy.
They did not slow down until they heard the low, almost subsonic growl. Rounding a corner, they saw Sanguine, hunched low on all fours with wings spread, giving an animalistic glare at a pair of familiar cream-yellow unicorns, just a shade brighter than Fluttershy, in matching dapper outfits and hauling a wagon.
"Uh-oh. Umm. Flim an' Flam?" Applejack greeted.
"Yes indeed, with goods to amaze!" "If we could get to the market." The obviously-related stallions seemed perplexed by the growling pegasus in front of them, but had enough sense not to approach or attempt to go around.
"Jus' turn aroun', nice an' easy, an' get outta here," Applejack advised.
They frowned at Applejack in unison. "How rude! I know we've had our differences," "but this time what we have to offer is the real deal."
Sanguine growled a bit louder.
Applejack slowly and gently walked forward as quietly as she could, and whispered, "Get. Out. Of. Here. Now. Ah ain't talkin' about whatever yer passin' off, ah'm talkin' about defusin' a situation."
"Well I never!" "And we never will! Hmph, judged guilty before we had a chance to-"
Sanguine's growl suddenly rose in intensity, her tail swishing. Her rear rose, her entire form coiling up to pounce-
Fluttershy stepped in front of her.
Sanguine froze.
Fluttershy smiled, keeping confident eye contact with Sanguine. "There, there, you wouldn't harm me."
Sanguine leaned to her left; Fluttershy leaned right to be in Sanguine's way. Sanguine leaned to the right, getting the same reaction.
"Gentleponies," Fluttershy advised as sweetly as if discussing a rainbow's beauty, not breaking eye contact with Sanguine for a second despite addressing the two behind her. "You have until she gets past me. I suggest running. Umm, in this case it really will be for your lives. Sorry."
The brothers blinked. "Well. What do you say we come back to Ponyville another time?" "I think that is an excellent idea, brother mine! Let us be off!" They walked around the wagon to turn it around, then galloped away as fast as their hooves would take them.
Sanguine stretched her wings up, getting ready for a wing-assisted pounce over Fluttershy's head at her targets, when suddenly they would not move and her legs gave out from under her. She had just enough time to look back at her flank and see Applejack tying her up - where did the earth pony keep that much rope? - before her muzzle was tied from both sides too, pulling her head forward.
"That was too close." Fluttershy resumed eye contact the moment Sanguine was looking forward again. "Um, Sanguine, can you hear me?"
Sanguine's growl faded, but she struggled against the ropes.
"Too close is right." Applejack examined her handiwork as if the lives of two unicorns she was not particularly keen on but, she felt, did not deserve an abrupt end depended on it. "Back to your place until she snaps out of it?"
Fluttershy maintained eye contact with Sanguine as if the well-being of her friend depended on making sure Sanguine did not thrash too violently. "That would probably be for the best."
Applejack thought for a moment. "Haulin' her through town's gonna be a problem if she struggles. Wait here, ah'm gonna go see if Twilight's free to help."
In a white flash, Fluttershy, Applejack, Twilight Sparkle, and a still-tied-up Sanguine appeared inside Fluttershy's cottage.
"Uh, thanks." Applejack blinked away the afterimage of the flash. "Ah just thought y'all'd levitate her back here, not..."
"Tell me what happened," Twilight interrupted, "and make it quick. Flim and Flam are due any minute."
"Uh...Flim an' Flam happened," Applejack quickly explained.
Twilight gasped. "Are they..."
Applejack shook her head. "Alive, but scared an' running for th' hills. Close thing, though. Fluttershy body blocked Sanguine an' gave 'em time t' run."
"Phew." Twilight exhaled, then giggled. "Fluttershy saves the day again! Rainbow Dash might be getting jealous."
Fluttershy looked over her shoulder from where she had begun cleaning up the little messes - out of place pillows, a lamp knocked over - her charges, especially Angel, often made when she was away for long. "Do you really think so? I can stop."
Twilight's giggled died mid-gig. "I was kidding, and please don't stop, Fluttershy."
"Alright." Fluttershy resumed cleaning.
"So anyway," Applejack continued, "turns out Sanguine can sense when people an' things bode ill intent. That's how she knew when t' show up t' stop those timberwolves. Zecora pointed it out, so we went into town so she could practice, and...please tell me it's temporary?"
"Hmm." Twilight paced around Sanguine, examining. "How was she acting when she started practice?"
"Weird. She kept studyin' Fluttershy at first. Then she got all scared - then angry, an' headed right for those two. No doubt she sensed 'em. By the time we caught up, she was downright feral." Images of what had been narrowly averted played in Applejack's mind. She could think of more deserving ponies - then chided herself for thinking that.
Twilight smiled. "It's temporary. Hypersensitivity to a new or newly discovered sense is quite common. One of the first things you learn to do is to tone it down. Actually, I think she's coming out of it now. Could you untie her mouth?"
Applejack did so. Sanguine stammered, "A-Applejack? Did...did I kill...?"
"No, sugar." Applejack smiled reassuringly. "We caught you in time. Well, Fluttershy caught you in time."
"Thank Celestia! It was just like with that griffon!" Similar images played in Sanguine's imagination.
Twilight cocked an eye. "Griffon?"
"Yeah, uh, Twi'?" Applejack sighed. "Celestia was trainin' her t' be an assassin."
"WHAT?!?"
"It's true." Despite being on the verge of tears again, part of Sanguine's mind noticed that Twilight had struck the exact same pose as Fluttershy had when she found out. "She had me kill a unicorn and a griffon. And a dragon."
"Now, now, sugar." Applejack patted Sanguine while removing the rest of the rope. "That dragon was just there. You saved Celestia's life. Well...maybe she coulda handled it, but she didn't have to."
Twilight frowned. "How many know about this?"
"Right now? You, me, her, an' Fluttershy." Applejack looked around to confirm there were no visitors she had just spilled the beans to. "Zecora might suspect. That's all."
"Keep it that way. If word got out..." Twilight sighed. "I am not looking forward to asking Celestia about this."
Applejack nodded. "No problem. It's in the past, anyhow. Pretty sure that's the real reason Celestia sent her t' us."
Having put everything back in order, Fluttershy nuzzled Sanguine. "Are you okay now?"
"Y-yeah. I can...still feel them, but if I don't look really hard..." Sanguine looked up at her. "What ARE you?"
Fluttershy blinked.
"You, you were like this, void," Sanguine explained. "Less than nothing."
Fluttershy pouted and looked away. "Oh, um..."
Sanguine winced. "Not like that! I meant when I was looking for selfishness and anger and...all that. You had less of it than the rocks."
Fluttershy looked back. "Really?"
Applejack chuckled. "Well, hers IS th' Element o' Kindness. Kinda figures."
Sanguine had yet to stand up, but now moved her legs so she was on her knees in front of Fluttershy. "I wish I could be like you. Never have to...be like THAT again."
Fluttershy sat down and folded her legs, mirroring Sanguine's pose back at her. "Might I ask what's it like?"
Sanguine rested her head on Fluttershy's chest. "What what's like?"
"Being angry."
Sanguine blinked. "You've never...?"
Fluttershy began stroking Sanguine's mane. "Well, umm...a few times kind of? But it was always with a purpose. Like, Zecora told you about that dragon? I was protecting my friends. What did you feel from Flim and Flam?"
"Those two unicorns? I..." Sanguine's breathing accelerated.
Fluttershy gently hooked both hooves behind Sanguine's neck and tugged, sliding the two of them together so Fluttershy could properly hug.
"Th-thanks." Sanguine leaned into it. "I, well, almost everypony around me felt WRONG, you know? Like, like they were all changelings looking to feed on each other, or something. And then I felt two REALLY bad things at the edge of town, far worse than anypony else. I just knew I had to get rid of them. At the same time I didn't want to kill another pony, but it was like I was just watching myself, not even in control, and what I wanted didn't matter in the face of elimin-nating..."
Fluttershy squeezed as Sanguine's words choked off in a sob. "There, there. It's alright, they ran away and you're here with us now, nothing's going to hurt you."
Twilight nodded to the door. "Applejack, a word?" And trotted outside.
Applejack hung her head and muttered, "I hate havin' a word," but followed.
Once outside with the door closed, Twilight took a moment to make sure none others were around before summarizing, "So. Anger management issues, she can kill easily, and any pony who's just running a con can set her off." She began trotting a slow circle around Fluttershy's cottage.
Applejack continued walking behind Twilight. "Ah think that's only 'cause she was concentratin' on it. That griffon she mentioned was eatin' a colt piece by piece, still alive."
Twilight blanched.
"Ah figure that'll be what sets her off normally," Applejack finished as if discussing train schedules.
"That...uh..." Twilight swallowed, fending off her stomach's attempt to rebel at the imagery. "Y-yeah, okay, I don't think she needs to worry about running into that most of the time. But still, you were right about her cutie mark taking control."
Applejack nearly stumbled. "Come again?!"
Twilight looked back at her. "Cutie marks don't do obvious mind control. They're a part of you. They're who you are. Remember when your cutie marks were mixed up, and you kept doing what they said because you thought that was what you were? It's you, but at the same time it's the cutie mark expressing itself."
"Uhh..." Applejack blinked. "In short?"
Twilight looked ahead, if only so she could roll her eyes without Applejack seeing - and so she could hop the short fence around the yard in back. She smiled, though. "In short, she needs a lot more than anger management classes. But that might be a start."
Applejack nodded. "Y'thinkin' teachin' her t' meditate or somethin'? 'Cause the last thing she needs is a preventable death toll."
"Actually - and this may sound silly, but hear me out." Twilight looked to the sky. "I was thinking she needs to learn courage."
"Come again?"
"How to stand up for herself," Twilight explained. "How to will herself to be the pony she wants to be, and not get swept up by her emotions to do things she'll regret."
"Ah see. Hmm..." Applejack considered Twilight's words for a few seconds. "Makes sense. You got a plan for that?"
Twilight nodded. "Yep! Have her shadow Rainbow Dash."
Applejack blinked. "That...that's the complete opposite o' what you just said!"
"No, no, think about it," Twilight protested. "Sure Rainbow Dash can be egotistical, and brash, and competitive, and-"
"Y' ain't helpin' yer case, Twi'."
"Alright, alright." Twilight stopped and sat, having come all the way around to the front door again. "Point is, when has Rainbow Dash ever done something she did not mean to do?"
"..." Applejack thought about it.
"I'm not counting accidents, like when those rocks fell on her. She stands by her actions, more than most ponies. So I figure she's got to be able to teach some of that to Sanguine." Twilight held up her hooves and spread them in a hopeful gesture.
"Hmm. Possible."
Twilight smiled. "Besides, if there's any of us who envies Sanguine, even a bit..."
Applejack eyerolled. "Tch, yeah. If Rainbow Dash knew what we knew, ah could almost see her fanfillyin' Sanguine - an' tryin' t' hide it."
"I, kind of, told her a bit." Twilight looked away.
"And?"
Twilight nodded. "...aaand you're right. I almost wonder if I should go with them just so she doesn't try to get Sanguine to think killing is a good thing."
Applejack put a hoof on Twilight's shoulder. "Ah hate t' say it, but that might be for th' best, Twi'."
"Alright. It's a plan." Twilight opened the door and called inside, "Hey, Sanguine? Tomorrow I'll spend the day with you, and I'm pretty sure she's free so I'll ask Rainbow Dash to join us. Is that alright?"
Sanguine was by now cuddled up with Fluttershy. "Yes, your maje-"
Twilight frowned.
"Err!" Sanguine feigned surprise, but the shadow of a smile snuck in - and Fluttershy trying to suppress a laugh only robbed further credibility from Sanguine's attempt at innocence. "Umm. Yes, Twilight. When should I report in?"
"Not as early as today, please. Two hours later."
Already lying down, Sanguine nodded in a makeshift bow. "By your royal comman-" She paused, then snickered. "The LOOK on your FACE right now! You really don't do 'Princess'."
"It is a little silly," Fluttershy agreed, still holding in her own laughter but not staving off a smile.
"Guuuh!" Twilight stormed off, only allowing herself to smile too once none of them could see.
The next morning, Sanguine was leisurely strolling through Ponyville, again taking in the sights, sounds, and scents but keeping a tight lid on her extra sense, when suddenly she was abducted. She felt the ground leave her hooves before her eyes processed a sudden gain in altitude. "Hey!" She tried to struggle but it was no use: judging by the position of hooves and legs on her, whoever had picked her up had had practice lifting potentially-recalcitrant ponies.
"Hey," Rainbow Dash's voice came from just behind her. "I got the story from Rarity, and Twilight asked me to help her train you today. So I just wanted to get something clear before we go see the egghead."
"Put! Me! Down!" Sanguine continued to struggle in vain.
They continued to ascend, presumably propelled by Rainbow Dash's wings. "Nuh-uh! See, you've got something cool. Something you should take pride in. Bein' a monster slayer is awesome. So I will NOT put you down."
Sanguine was suddenly dropped - planted, more like - on a cloud.
"I'm gonna put you UP. 'Cause you've got no business being down on yourself," Rainbow Dash finished.
"..."
Rainbow Dash hovered around until she was in view, then sat down in front of her. "Well?"
"That...is the cheesiest...I have ever..." Sanguine found herself unable to banish a smile from her face. "Thank you."
"You're welcome! But anyway, listen. I know most ponies hate what you do, but that's just because hating it's all they know. When there's a bad guy, you can beat him up!" Rainbow Dash punched the air.
Sanguine blinked. "No I can't."
"Sure you can. You're good at fighting and stuff." Rainbow Dash punched again, then gestured for Sanguine to do the same.
Sanguine refused. "Nope! Just killing."
Rainbow Dash blinked. "That includes fighting, right?"
Sanguine shook her head. "I've never actually been in any fights. When I want to kill, I just..." She drew a hoof across her neck.
"Oh." Rainbow Dash sat down. "Well, you can stop the bad guys, right?"
Sanguine narrowed her eyes at Rainbow Dash, who apparently would not take a hint. She gestured to the ground as she felt her gratitude of just moments ago beginning to sour. "So, who should I kill?"
Rainbow Dash tilted her head. "Huh?"
"There are bad ponies down there." Sanguine pointed at one pony below them, then another, then another. "Ponyville is not a perfect paragon of pure pony principles. Some of its residents are bad, no doubt. So, who should I kill?"
"How should I know?"
"Well, let's say..." She jabbed a hoof toward a random pony. "That one. Oooh, he gives me the creeps. He's..." Sanguine dropped to a whisper as if speaking of scandal. "...JAYWALKING!"
Rainbow Dash frowned. "Uhh. Well, first, there's nothing against jaywalking in Ponyville. Second..."
Sanguine grinned, clapping her forehooves together.
"...you're creeping me out." Rainbow Dash leaned away, expression mirroring her words.
"Good!" Sanguine relaxed. Pretending to be happy about killing had been an effort, but it appeared to have accomplished her goal. "Do you want to know the last time I wanted to kill just about every pony in Ponyville?"
Rainbow Dash scooted a bit away so she could sit upright again. "When?"
Sanguine checked the direction and length of the shadow she cast on her cloud, confirming that it was still morning. "Yesterday afternoon."
"You're bluffing."
Sanguine shook her head. "Nope! Applejack and Fluttershy were right there next to me; they saw my reaction. You heard that I DID almost end those two salesponies' careers permanently, right?"
Rainbow Dash smiled. "Heh. I heard you gave Flim and Flam a good scare. Like you really would have ripped their heads off if Fluttershy hadn't been there."
"I would have," Sanguine stated matter-of-factly.
"..." Rainbow Dash blinked. "Okay, kid, the joke's over. Ha, ha, good one. But they're gone now, you don't need to keep-"
"No joke. I would have." Sanguine put on her best neutral face.
Rainbow Dash's eyes widened. "...you're serious."
"Yep." Sanguine frowned. "So please don't make light of my ability. I really don't want to flip out at you."
Rainbow Dash stumbled backward.
"I slay monsters, Rainbow Dash." Sanguine leaned over the bowled-over pegasus, her anger at Rainbow Dash's suggestions and attitude finally breaking through into her voice. "I do NOT kill for fun or entertainment. I regret every pony I have killed, even if Applejack says they had it coming." She breathed in and out once, attempting to relax, but her fury just seemed to build as she stared into Rainbow Dash's eyes. "Is. That. Absolutely. Clear?!?"
Rainbow Dash, though she would be loath to admit it, cowered on her back. "Err. Uh, y-yes ma'am! Sorry ma'am!"
Appeased for the moment, Sanguine went back to sitting normally. "'Ma'am'? I'm younger than you are!" For a moment she wondered why it had been so easy to get angry at Rainbow Dash just then. She considered opening up her extra sense, then dismissed the notion: surely it was too early for anyone to have been up to mischief or worse.
"Err. Aheh." Rainbow Dash sat up, then hopped off her cloud. "Uhh, let's, let's go find Twilight, I'm sure she's up by now." Without waiting for Sanguine, she dove away. By the time Sanguine looked over the side of the cloud, Rainbow Dash was nowhere to be seen.
15: From Dreams To Reality
Twilight liked her friends.
Kindness. Generosity. Laughter. Honesty. Loyalty. Yes, those were their defining traits - but each one had so much more. Inner tenacity. A way with words. Stubborn, rock-solid cheer. An uncommonly large helping of common sense. And...style.
While she would never say it out loud, especially where it might reach Rarity's ears, in some ways Twilight considered Rainbow Dash to be the most beautiful of her friends. Or perhaps handsome. Attractive, either way. It flavored her dreams sometimes - though she had had similar about all five, and certain other mares and stallions, enough that she was satisfied they did not indicate any actual preference. She was content to let them comfort her, a secret shared only with Celestia's sister Luna, and then only because Luna's domain over the night included dreams. It was nearly impossible to keep her out, but thankfully for all of Equestria's sake, Luna was not prone to gossip about what she saw. Even better, she sometimes gave advice, though she was still adjusting to modern society, her attitudes and opinions informed by the violent, barbaric age a thousand years ago. She had informed Twilight that Celestia had forbidden Luna from interfering in the current situation, much as she would relish the opportunity to take an assassin under her wing, so long as Sanguine was under Celestia's judgement.
Twilight's mind refocused from its slumbering drift, returning to worries and fantasies of the moment. Even now, she could feel Rainbow Dash's hot breath on her face after their exertions, Twilight on her back and her friend standing proud above her. Their eyes met; Twilight could see the worry, the longing, and the need in the pegasus's face. Without further delay, Twilight craned her neck up and kissed-
"MMMP!" Rainbow Dash struggled free and threw herself back. "GYAH! TWILIGHT!"
"Mmmm?" Twilight smiled as she leaned over, eyes half-open. Rainbow Dash was staring at her, a body length from her bed.
Rainbow Dash stared at her, eyes wide. "What was THAT?"
Was her friend scared? No, the dream had been...
...a dream...
Twilight bolted upright. She was in her bedroom - a library annex, really, with a platform atop one of the shelf stacks that was originally there just to let the adjoining window let in light, on which she had set up her bed, dresser, and other living arrangements. Dreams could make it hard to read - the same part of the brain used in understanding the written word was busy generating and processing the dreamscape - but she had no problem parsing the titles of two books lying next to her bed. No doubt, then: this was the waking world. Rainbow Dash was still there in front of her, at the edge of the platform - any further back and she would be hovering in mid-air - stubbornly refusing to have been merely a figment of Twilight's dream. "What..."
"You kissed me!" Rainbow Dash explained.
"I did?" Twilight blinked.
"Yeah!"
"I, err..." Twilight took a moment to confirm she was still where she had gone to sleep. "What were you doing in my bed?"
"Trying to wake you up!"
"Well you succeeded." Part of Twilight's mind compared this morning to the previous, and deemed the previous one slightly more exciting. Which made this wakeup better.
The two looked at each other.
Rainbow Dash had considered the possibility of romantic relationships with each of her friends. The answer generally boiled down to, "Yes if asked," with a major asterisk in Twilight's case. Twilight was power: magic power, more political power than she realized even before she became a princess, but most importantly raw intellectual power, the kind that could wrap Rainbow Dash around her fetlock with the pegasus deliriously loving every step of it. She had fantasized about Twilight dressing up as Nightmare Moon and...but that was just a fantasy, there was no way the egghead was actually attracted to somepony like her, right?
In the time it took Rainbow Dash to reflect on that, Twilight mostly finished waking up. "Sooo," she eventually ventured, "what's up?"
Rainbow Dash needed a couple more seconds to lock down her reeling mind. "Sanguine. What did you sign me up for?"
"Sanguine..." The day's schedule clicked into her quickly activating mind. "Oh, Sanguine, yes! She needs to learn about courage, and you're the pony to teach her."
Rainbow Dash cocked an eye. "You want me to teach courage to a pony who does nothing but kill? She doesn't even fight, just kill."
Twilight finally got out of bed. "She does more than just kill, Rainbow Dash."
"Nuh-uh! I asked her!"
Trotting over to a mirror, Twilight levitated a brush and began taming her unruly mane. "You heard she scared off Flim and Flam yesterday."
"Yeah, by trying to kill them for real!"
Twilight did not seem to react. "Where did you hear that?"
"I asked her!" Rainbow Dash looked at the brush, then Twilight's expression in the mirror. "...you're still waking up, aren't you?"
Twilight blinked, then sheepishly set her brush down and turned to face Rainbow Dash. "Yeah, sorry. Umm, where is she now?"
"She'll be here soon. I zipped right over."
Twilight looked to the open window. "And came in through the window again."
"Well yeah." Rainbow Dash did not understand what Twilight's problem with that method of entry was. It was not like Rainbow Dash broke the window, or opened it despite it being locked. Landing and using the door was just so inefficient when there was an easily accessible upper story window like this.
Twilight sighed. "Alright, alright. Go help Spike get breakfast set up while I make myself presentable, please?" Her bowels began reporting in. Apparently she really needed to use the bathroom.
"But Sanguine's going to be here soon."
"Yes she is. And we will finish this conversation in front of her." Twilight stamped the floor gently, proverbially as well as literally putting her hoof down.
Rainbow Dash weighed alarm, anger, and annoyance, before settling on acceptance - only because it would be temporary, and Sanguine herself might give more ammunition - and trudging downstairs.
View Online
16: Princess Twilight Sparkle's Breakfast Court
Spike opened the front door as Twilight began descending down the stairs to the main room. A table with four settings had been set up in the main room - not how Spike and Twilight usually did breakfast, but then, having company over for breakfast was itself unusual, and Spike had been in a mood to break out a bit of formality. Rainbow Dash was already seated, mind too preoccupied to care much about the food in front of her, though she had begun placing portions of food on three of the plates in order to have something to do besides fidget. Spike's plate was covered in tiny sapphires: while a dragon did not eat the same foods that ponies did - a large reason for the usual extreme informality of Spike's and Twilight's food service to one another - Spike felt it best for this occasion that he at least be at the same table.
Once the door was open, Sanguine bowed at the entrance, twirling both forelegs in her best imitation of Canterlot court entrance protocol. "If it please Her Royal Highness, may I be permitted the honor of enTRYYY!" Sanguine found herself telekinetically flung through the doorway, halted in midair, and dropped in front of the table opposite Rainbow Dash.
Twilight did not break stride but she did yawn. "G'morning. Still a little early, but I'm up."
Having finished serving portions, Rainbow Dash gave Sanguine a worried look. "Uh, little hint: don't lay it on thick with Twilight. Actually, just don't lay it on at all."
Sanguine giggled. "But she's so silly about it!"
"I'm glad one of us finds it funny." Twilight tried to sound annoyed, but a smile had stubbornly crept onto her face and into her voice as she made her way to the head of the table.
"So," Sanguine asked as she examined her plate's helpings of hay bacon and some sort of yellow and red concoction she did not recognized but smelled delicious, "what's the plan for today?" Taking a tentative bite of the concoction, she judged it almost as tasty as apple fritters.
"Rainbow Dash teaches," Twilight replied as she levitated a water pitcher to pour into each of four glasses, "I chaperone. Some of Rainbow Dash's methods can be a little...extreme, and I'd like to avoid accidents."
Rainbow Dash frowned.
"Do you have an objection?" Twilight inquired.
Rainbow Dash only needed a moment to build her courage. "Yeah. Yeah. Sorry, Sanguine, but I need to say it. 'Extreme' isn't 'ripping heads off'!"
The table went silent for a moment.
"...sorry." Rainbow Dash hung her head. "But...it's just..."
"Tell her what else you do," Twilight interrupted.
"I find them," Sanguine offered quietly, eyes on her plate.
Rainbow Dash blinked.
Sanguine looked at her. "I was teasing you, earlier. You can't find the bad ponies, but I can." Then back at her plate. "That's why I wanted to kill most everypony around yesterday: I was practicing sensing and it got out of control. That's also why I nearly did kill those two." She took a bite of hay bacon, chewed, and swallowed. "They ARE bad ponies, right? I didn't mess that up?"
Twilight nodded. "They lie, cheat, swindle, sell stolen goods, and that's just what I know about. I don't know what their scam is this time but I got a letter that they were chased out of Las Pegasus and headed here."
Rainbow Dash speared a slice of the yellow-red delectable with more force than necessary. "They nearly cheated Applejack's family out of their farm."
Sanguine looked at Rainbow Dash wide eyed.
"So yeah, they're bad ponies." Rainbow Dash chewed angrily, or so it appeared to Sanguine.
"Mm-hmm." Sanguine nibbled thoughtfully. "Yesterday afternoon, did you buzz four pegasi?"
Rainbow Dash swallowed. "Nah. Three pegasi an' a griffon. The sky's supposed to be clear but they were buildin' a cloud. Why?"
Sanguine smiled.
Rainbow Dash gulped, forgetting she had just cleared her mouth. "You FELT them get ticked off? That's how sensitive you were?"
Sanguine nodded. "And I felt YOU a lot more. Are you suuure that was your only reason?"
"Err...I, I..."
Sanguine grinned at Rainbow Dash as she chopped off another bit of hay bacon, knife clinking on plate.
Rainbow Dash frowned. "Okay now you're REALLY creeping me out!"
Sanguine continued to smile as she picked up her bacon-laden fork, only for it to suddenly float out of her grip surrounded by a purple aura.
Twilight looked at her. "Apologize, Sanguine."
Sanguine reached for her fork, grabbing it but it would not budge from mid-air. "What? But-"
"NOW!"
Sanguine sat back and sighed. "Sorry, Rainbow Dash. I felt a LOT lot worse ponies than you yesterday, even not counting those two." She pulled at her fork until Twilight let it go.
"And you wanted to kill us all," Rainbow Dash concluded.
"W-well..." Sanguine looked down. "...yeah, kinda. Not Fluttershy, though! She was less than nothing!"
That got a chuckle out of Rainbow Dash. "Yeah, I bet."
Twilight telekinetically flicked a tiny drop of water from Rainbow Dash's glass directly between her eyes.
"Hey!" Rainbow Dash glowered at Twilight. "Obviously Sanguine meant on her evilometer. Fluttershy's the kindest pony we know; of COURSE she's less than zero on the opposite of that."
Sanguine furrowed her brow in thought. "I'm not sure I'd call it an 'evilometer', exactly? But yes, that is what I meant."
Rainbow Dash looked at Sanguine. "Well, what does it pick up?"
"I'm...not sure?" Sanguine shrugged. "Con artists, obviously. Murderers. Bandits who threatened foals. A necromancer who wanted to siphon life from everypony. A dragon, but I didn't pick it up in time. And timberwolves on a rampage."
"..." Rainbow Dash's fork clattered to her plate from a suddenly nerveless hoof.
"What?" Sanguine looked at the fork, then at Rainbow Dash.
Rainbow Dash looked off to the side, as if reading briefly, then looked at Sanguine intently. "How long have you had that sense?"
Sanguine was not about to admit it, but now Rainbow Dash was starting to creep her out. "Five weeks, but I only really knew about it yesterday when Zecora-"
"And you've run into all that in five weeks?" Rainbow Dash interrupted.
"Well, yes?" Sanguine tried to figure out where this was headed. "Celestia-"
"O-KAY," Twilight interrupted. "So! Rainbow Dash! Maybe you can show her some stunts after breakfast?"
"Don't change the subject, Twilight," Rainbow Dash quipped without looking. "Sanguine, Celestia what?"
Sanguine pushed her fork around on her plate, driving a concoction crumb onto a sliver of hay bacon. "Celestia ordered me to-"
Twilight cleared her throat noisily.
Rainbow Dash finally gave her a look. "Knock it off, Twilight."
Twilight sighed and looked at Sanguine. "Sanguine, there are some things you REALLY shouldn't tell everypony."
Sanguine looked back. "I know, I know. But I trust Rainbow Dash. Don't you?"
"Of course I do," Twilight explained. "But I don't bother all my friends with every little deta-"
"Assassin," Rainbow Dash interrupted again.
Twilight gaped, looking at Rainbow Dash.
"That's it, isn't it? You were Celestia's little assassin, until she couldn't handle it any more and sent you to us to learn how to make friends 'cause you really really didn't like killing ponies and she was worried you'd break." Rainbow Dash looked at her plate. "I wonder how she kept Luna away from you. Luna wouldn't flinch about using assassins."
Twilight's mouth worked in silence as Sanguine nodded.
Rainbow Dash looked at Twilight. "Aaand this is all a state secret so I do not DARE breathe one word of it to anypony who doesn't already know. Right?"
Twilight blinked. "...HOW?"
"Well...I could say a lucky guess which you just confirmed. I mean, why else would she have sensed all that in just five weeks?" Rainbow Dash grinned, letting the implication hang for just a second. "But naw, I had more than that. All cards on the table. Spike, how often do you not read Celestia's letters in full to Twilight?"
"..." Twilight looked at the young dragon at the foot of the table.
Said dragon gulped down another handful of sapphires, eyes pleading. "W-when the letter specifically orders me not to, saying she thought it'd be better for Twilight to find out from Sanguine herself? Twilight, I'm so sorry, but-"
Twilight raised a hoof. "Celestia's order is Celestia's order. You're forgiven."
Spike wiped his brow with a paw. "Phew, thanks Twilight."
Twilight looked at Rainbow Dash. "So how do YOU know about this?"
"Spike, you might want to do a better job of putting letters with sensitive info like that away." Rainbow Dash gestured to an open door in the back. "Pegasus eyesight. I can read it from here. Enough of it, anyway."
Spike looked where the pegasus was pointing, then facepawed, remembering the task he had rescheduled to today. "I'll clean them up right after breakfast." Which, he noticed, was basically done, with all plates at the table now empty.
Twilight nodded. "WELL, now. Spike might have been ordered not to read it to me but apparently you weren't. Is there anything else I should know?"
"Yeah." Rainbow Dash smiled. "Sanguine deserves a chance to learn how to be awesome!"
Twilight tried to fit that incongruous puzzle piece into her mental picture of her mentor. "That...doesn't sound like something Celestia would write."
"'Course not. It's more like something I'd say. But it IS something you needed to know." Rainbow Dash smirked.
Twilight smiled. "Of course it is."
"So yeah. Stunts." Rainbow Dash studied Sanguine's wings from across the table for a moment. "Sanguine, how about we start with some follow-the-leader? I'll keep to the simple stuff."
"THIS is the SIMPLE stuff?" Sanguine's stomach wanted to trade places with her lungs, but she pressed on through the triple loop and roll.
"Yeah! There aren't any trees or rocks to dodge out here." Rainbow Dash took a brief look back. "You're doing great, keep it up!"
A mile out of town, and technically over the edge of the Everfree Forest, the pair of pegasi had put on a performance that would have been the envy of any Junior Wonderbolt squad, except for the lack of special smoke and lights. Part of Twilight's mind could not help but appreciate the spectacle as she watched from a cloud perch. But another part...
Rainbow Dash waved to Sanguine. "Alright, take five, Twilight's being a grump."
Yet another part noted that Rainbow Dash had undoubtedly learned that phrase from Pinkie Pie. It fit how they thought.
As Sanguine leveled out and fought to keep her breakfast down, Rainbow Dash pulled up another small cloud and sat in front of Twilight. "'Sup?"
"I am not being a..." Twilight began to protest.
Rainbow Dash patted Twilight's cheek, specifically the muscles that could either form a smile or a frown - doubtless another thing she had learned from Pinkie.
"Okay, alright, fine." Twilight sighed and looked down. "I've got...a lot to think about."
Rainbow Dash gave Twilight a concerned look. "It's a little harder to be awesome when your friends are hurting. So share, so we can make things cooler."
Despite herself, Twilight had to briefly flash a smile at that display of Rainbow Dash's logic and priorities. "It's Celestia. I...well..."
"Go on." Rainbow Dash looked over at Sanguine, then inclined her head toward Twilight, signalling the now-recovered flight student to pull up her own cloud and listen.
Twilight sighed. "You know she was my mentor growing up. I saw her in action almost every day. I lost count of the number of times I watched her raise the sun. I even tried to duplicate that spell, just in theory, and I think I might actually have a backup in case...well, let's just say I never want to have to find out if it works. Anyway. Point is, she was perfect. No, I thought she was PERFECTION, the very definition of what every pony should aspire to be, defined by her existence and everything she was and did."
Rainbow Dash nodded as she noticed Sanguine settle in next to her out of the corner of her eye. She knew where this was going, but she also knew Twilight had to say it - to herself, mainly - in order to face it.
And indeed, Twilight continued, face falling as she confronted the truth. "I think that image started to crack after she sent me to Ponyville. At the time I was hoping, in my heart, that I was somehow wrong - that Nightmare Moon wasn't about to return. And then when she did, the back of my mind kept screaming that surely Celestia had some master plan and I just needed to pretend to be trying to save the day...until...I did." A single tear slipped from Twilight's muzzle. "Celestia had gambled. She gambled her life, and all of Equestria, on my ability to make friends. Me, who had literally been living in an ivory tower until then."
"Oooh, I've heard this story," Sanguine offered. "But you DID make friends, and together you wielded Elements of Harmony."
"That's not the point," Rainbow Dash countered, giving Sanguine a mild frown. "Let her finish."
Twilight continued to look at the cloud at her hooves. "Yes, I did. But...I don't know, maybe that was some sort of threshold? After that I started noticing cracks, slips. Minor things of no consequence. I told myself they were nothing, or maybe deliberate - signs of some master plan I could not see, dealing with threats or contingencies totally out of my league. That...that lasted until the Grand Galloping Gala."
"The one that was-" Sanguine cut herself off at Rainbow Dash's glare. "Sorry, go on."
"Yes, that one." Twilight managed a brief smirk. "'Crashed', 'ruined', 'made memorable'...I've heard all sorts of words for it, bad and good. Mostly good from those who knew or thought it was Celestia's plan. She did it to liven things up. Not to foil intrigue or because some creature there needed a truly festive party to be appeased or anything. Just, for fun. My nightmares that night were so loud Luna came by to quell them, and then we talked in my dream. She did something to make sure I would remember it. Since then, I have had to accept that Celestia is, i-is..." She sniffed. "...a pony, like us."
"Wait, what?" Sanguine blinked. "We're talking about Princess Celestia, right? The immortal perfect ruler of Equest-"
"Yes," Twilight interrupted. "That is exactly how I used to think of her. It's an image she cultivates, for good reason. But that isn't her. She's very strong, very bright, very kind...but underneath all that, she's like you and me. It...HURT, it hurt sooo much to realize that, I still have trouble with it sometimes. And now..." She shuddered.
Rainbow Dash reached forward and began gently stroking Twlight's mane. "And now you've got to chew her out. This's the first time?"
Twilight nodded. A gentle whine was all her voice would form for a moment.
"Chew her out?" Sanguine was uncertain if she should join in, so stayed back from physical contact for the moment. "For what?"
After a few seconds' contemplation, Twilight finally responded, "Can...I ask a favor?"
Rainbow Dash continued to stroke, as if she could gently pull Twilight's worries away. She had heard Rarity boast of this technique, but so far she had been unable to understand when Rarity explained it. Seeing the pain on Twilight's face, Rainbow Dash made a mental note to ask again. "Sure. Anything."
"I need you to tell me what you think of the letter I am going to write to her." When silence greeted her request, Twilight continued.
"Dear Princess Celestia,
"Spike is like my little brother. The bond he and I share..."
Twilight frowned. "No, let me try again." Unfortunately there was no physical paper to crumple up into a ball, throw, and ignite mid-toss so that only the ashes of unworthy words - that dared insult her friendship with Celestia by their mere existence - would touch so much as a waste basket. Banishing the failed draft from her mind, replacing it with the next draft, would have to suffice.
"Dear Princess Celestia,
"The bond that Spike and I have built up is as thick as blood. He's like my little brother - and now it seems both of us will share a long life. I would hope we can share it together, so it pains me when things happen to erode our trust.
"In short, please don't ever again ask him to keep secrets from me.
"Please, never again, no matter how justified it seems.
"Your fellow Princess,
Twilight Sparkle'"
Rainbow Dash's mane brushing evolved into a hug. "That seems alri-"
"'Your fellow Princess'?" Sanguine interrupted, eyes wide. "U-um. Just a guess, but, that's not what you normally use, is it?"
Twilight shook her head. "Never. It...that may be what hurts the most, that I have to put it that way and not, 'Your faithful student'."
Sanguine's earlier reservations about physical contact evaporated like a puddle on the receiving end of a fireball. She launched into a hug of her own, around the alicorn's torso to compliment Rainbow Dash hugging her neck. "It'll be alright. I'm sure she'll understand, Twilight."
Twilight leaned into the twin hugs gratefully. "Thank you. I hope she will."
They continued in silence for a short while, until Rainbow Dash released the reluctant Princess. "Alright, feeling better?"
Twilight nodded. "Yeah, thanks."
"Good!" Rainbow Dash smiled and grabbed Twilight's hoof. "Because this next stunt's going to take all three of us!"
Ten seconds later, there was no longer any room in Twilight's active mind for worries or doubts or anything but sheer physical action - and trying to keep her breakfast down.
"Woohoo!" Rainbow Dash triumphantly hoofpumped as she landed on a cloud next to her partners. "Great session, you two!"
"Can't...feel...my wings," Twilight moaned, flat on her back, wings splayed.
"Me...neither," Sanguine moaned in an identical pose, right wingtip touching Twilight's left wingtip.
"Oh, come on." Rainbow Dash crossed her forelegs. "You can't be THAT tired. I've barely broken a sweat!"
"Twilight." Sanguine reached out a shaking hoof toward the alicorn and turned her head in that direction. "Take, my strength. You must live on, for all Equestria."
"It doesn't, work that way," Twilight replied.
"Really?" Sanguine's hoof collapsed to the cloud as her gaze returned to the blank blue sky above. "Too, bad. Was looking forward, to living inside you, being your spirit adviser."
"Sorry, to disappoint." Despite her exhaustion, Twilight allowed herself a shadow of a smile at Sanguine's effort. "And anyway, aren't you here, so we can advise, YOUR spirit?"
"Oh yeah."
Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes. "Alright, fine, fine, maybe I DID push you a little hard."
Twilight and Sanguine responded in unison, "A 'little'?"
"...fine, a lot." Rainbow Dash threw up her hooves. "But it was for a good reason! Two, even! Getting the weepies out of Twilight - and Sanguine, if you are going to be a monster slayer there are going to be times when you're this tired." She looked at Sanguine. "If the monster's still after you, what do you do? Or rather, why isn't giving up and letting the monster eat you an option?"
"Seems, a good option." Despite what little levity she could get into her voice, Sanguine closed her eyes and appeared to be thinking about it.
"Well it's not." Rainbow Dash glanced to the side for a moment, as Sanguine and Twilight thought they heard a rumbling from the forest below. "Why are you slaying the monster in the first place?"
"Because...because..." Sanguine's voice trailed off.
"Weeell?" Rainbow Dash pressed.
Sanguine abruptly rolled along her spine, getting upright, all signs of fatigue suddenly gone. "Because you aren't speaking hypothetically." She dove off the side of the cloud.
Just as she reached the ground, a giant, slightly translucent blue, ursine form, studded with white suggestive of the night sky, burst out of the forest, trampling trees as if they were merely toothpicks slightly taller than itself. Red on orange eyes as big as a pony took in the surroundings with a malevolent gaze, while proportionately sized claws gouged the ground where its massive paws tread. An eight-pointed star crest lay on its forehead.
Its roar finally spurred Twilight to roll sideways and poke her head over the side of the cloud. "An Ursa Minor? Sanguine, stay b-"
Rainbow Dash smiled and held a hoof out, signalling Twilight to back off. "She won't hear you. And she's got this."
Sanguine was low on all fours, growling at the ursine. The Ursa Minor growled back, opening a cavernous mouth and roaring loud enough to blow Sanguine's mane back, but the pegasus held her ground.
"Sanguine," Rainbow Dash called, "remember Rarity's training! Slay the claws!"
Sanguine looked at the giant paws, concentrated, then leaped at the Ursa Minor's front right. That paw rose to swipe at her, but Sanguine moved like a blur, striking repeatedly before the paw was fully in position to strike. Hoof after hoof smacked each claw in sequence, cracking then snapping them off. As her foe retracted that paw in pain, she whirled midair and dove across its chest, heading for the front left paw
"Drive it back!" Rainbow Dash pointed into the forest. "Half a mile straight back and you've got it!"
Sanguine adjusted her flight, pulling up to hover eye level with the ursine and confidently stare into it. The Ursa Minor stared back, but slowly began to shrink away - then broke and ran back into the forest.
"Way to go!" Rainbow Dash cheered. "It'll probably keep running until it meets its mom, but you might-"
Still smiling, Sanguine looked up at Rainbow Dash.
"-want...to...uhoh." Rainbow Dash scampered backward on the cloud, but this just blocked her view of Sanguine until the red one punched through the cloud behind her. She rose her hooves to defend her neck, but Sanguine effortlessly bashed the defense to one side with one forehoof as her other descended upon Rainbow Dash's carotid artery...
...and tapped it gently, not breaking the skin. "Boop."
Three rapid heartbeats later, Rainbow Dash managed to reply, "'Boop'?"
"I don't like to kill ponies." Sanguine leaned over her, looking her in the eyes. "You set that up. That's what I was feeling when we met this morning, wasn't it?"
Rainbow Dash averted her gaze, looking instead at the hole in the forest's tree line border the Ursa Minor had made. "I...maaay have done some early morning scouting...and maaaybe I kinda planted some honey?"
"The answer to your question is, I slay monsters because I want to protect ponies. From themselves, if I have to." Sanguine panted. "Is this what they call the 'second wind'?"
Rainbow Dash smiled, slowly getting out from under Sanguine and getting upright. "Yeah! How's it feel?"
Sanguine smiled back. "I'm going to collapse now." And so she did, on her side.
Twilight was sitting up by now, directly behind Rainbow Dash. "You set." Rainbow Dash could feel a mild coating of frost in Twilight's voice. "That up."
"W-well, err, yeah." Instinct yelled for Rainbow Dash not to turn around and meet Twilight's gaze just then. She listened to her instinct. It had proven quite handy over the years, in many survival situations. "We're a mile from Ponyville, and it was just an Ursa Minor. Even if things went wrong, you OR I could've handled it before anypony got hurt."
"That's not the point!" Twilight objected.
"Princess," Sanguine mumbled, eyes closed, "it's my job to yell at her for it. Lemme do it, K?" She yawned. "After a nap."
Twilight looked at Sanguine. "How is it your job?"
Sanguine curled up, smiling. Her chest began rising and falling in slow rhythm.
Twilight eyerolled. "Alright, fine. I've got a letter to write. Rainbow Dash, tell me you didn't set up anything ELSE that foolish?"
"Err..." A long list of things that Rainbow Dash had set up that might be described 'foolish' suggested themselves to her.
As well as to Twilight. "Today? I don't mean in the past."
"Oh! No, no, that's the only extreme training exercise I had in mind for today." Which was technically true: Rainbow Dash had planned to come up with the rest of the day's plan based on the results of that "exercise".
"Good. Watch over her; I'll be back once I've sent that letter." Twilight leaped off the cloud and winged her way back to town.
19: Wherein Rainbow Dash Speaks
Consciousness slowly returned to Sanguine. Dimly she felt the world before she dared open her eyes. The minor bubbling fizz off to her right - that was the Everfree Forest. An expanse of nothing to her left - the plains, where small animals roamed but nothing big enough to cause or mean trouble was allowed. She knew from geography that rail tracks ran through it, the "spine of civilization", but given the layout of Equestria's rail network she personally felt that "rib bone" would be more accurate.
And then there was one solid ping right in front of her, though faded from before.
Finally opening her eyes, she saw Rainbow Dash sitting on the edge of the cloud, looking bored, forelegs hanging over the side and swinging freely.
Mischief suggested itself. Sanguine silently stood up and snuck-
"Can we just say you yelled at me and move on?" Rainbow Dash interrupted.
Sanguine sat down.
"Clouds can vibrate," Rainbow Dash continued, "but you need your whole body pressed to 'em like this to pick it up."
The younger pegasus nodded to herself, before realizing she had not actually voiced a question.
"And no I'm not going to apologize to the ursas, but only because it wouldn't do any good." Rainbow Dash idly wondered how long that hole in the tree wall would take to repair itself. The Everfree Forest may not have been actively managed by ponykind, but she found it hard to believe that the forest did not have magic of its own for this kind of situation. "They don't speak our language."
Sanguine continued to listen.
"I've been kicking myself since Twilight left. I figured that's what you'd want to ask about," Rainbow Dash explained.
Sanguine walked up next to Rainbow Dash.
"And now...I don't know what to do." Rainbow Dash shrugged. "I wanted to teach you courage, but you've got that. I wanted to teach you how to be brave, but it looks like the others already did that. I wanted to make you awesome, but you already are."
The red pegasus lay down and copied the cyan pegasus's pose, looking somewhat like a smaller inverted-color copy, aside from the rainbow mane on the one and the yellowish shirt on the other.
"I get it, I get it." Rainbow Dash waved a hoof in an irritated small circle. "I'm the dumb jock. I'm the only one who finds violence even a bit fun. What do I know about teaching anypony anything?"
Sanguine extended a wing around her companion of the moment.
"Thanks." Rainbow Dash sighed. "I guess...mind if I tell you a story?"
No objection came.
"So, this is back when I was up in the griffon lands. I was wandering a bit, not sure of myself. I...haven't told many ponies, but Fluttershy and I had had a fight so I went to try to find my own path. It's the longest I've spent away from my friend and I didn't realize until afterward that that was what really made me miserable. It felt like years, but it was actually only a few months.
"I was angry. I was angry a lot. I don't even remember what we fought about now, but whatever it was I remember going over the argument in my head, over and over again. I tried a lot of things to stop thinking about it. At one point I decided to try eating meat - it had something to do with the argument. So there I was, looking at a bit of chicken, trying not to chicken out.
"It actually didn't taste that bad. But when it hit my stomach...they tell you ponies can't digest meat. They're wrong - least, I think it digested, I remember checking my stool afterward and I didn't recognize anything like what I'd put in my mouth. Doesn't mean it's comfortable if you're not used to it, and I don't know how nutritious it was.
"Anyway, some of the griffons had a betting pool on whether I'd be able to keep it down. One of the tougher ones had bet against, so he decided to 'help' me throw it up. Between the meat and my mood, I wasn't at my best - he managed to get in a few good hits to my belly.
"Now, I could've thrown up. Nearly did, before he started pounding on me. But the moment he started, I knew I wasn't going to. Nuh-uh. Just because someone else wanted to force how I lived. Well...also 'cause meat was cheaper than hay where I was and wandering doesn't give you much of a food budget, but that's beside the point.
"So I buckled down. Braced myself for the next hit - didn't let it faze me. Gulped back down what he forced up the pipe. Finally I managed to get in his face and spit." Rainbow Dash blushed. "It's...one thing when it's saliva. It's another when you've got enough of your own blood in your mouth to spit in his eye. He'd hit my face a couple times, hard enough to open a cut. That's when the others pulled him off me. They said the bet was off if I died before I had a chance to digest.
"Point is, I kept it down, just to spite someone else who wanted to control me. And, well, you can do it too. When you get angry like that, it's always AT somepony or something else, right? So don't let them decide that you need to kill them."
Sanguine nodded. "I'll try. So...err, what does chicken taste like?"
Rainbow Dash shrugged. "Like chicken. I don't think I can put it in terms of any food around here."
"Maybe I'll try it some day."
"If you do, I can recommend one diner to avoid." Rainbow Dash smiled at her own joke. "Or if you do go there, don't bet on yourself even if you really do need the money."
"I'll keep that in mind." Sanguine began looking around. "Where's Twilight?"
"Right here," came from behind them.
Both pegasi jumped a bit at Twilight's voice. In unison, they scrambled to their feet and turned around to see a spooked Twilight.
Rainbow Dash cocked her head. "What's with the wide eyes? How much of that story did you overhear?"
"It's not that. Celestia wrote back. Sanguine, I...think you need to see this for yourself." Twilight jumped off the cloud and winged back to town, looking back to make sure Sanguine and only Sanguine followed her.
Spike had laid out the letter on one of the library's podiums in preparation for Twilight's return. It was still there when Sanguine read it.
"Dear Twlight Sparkle,
"Sometimes things come along which are so useful they seem necessary, even if they are wrong. When this happens, silly fillies may need friends to rescue them from themselves. Even thousand year old silly fillies are not immune.
"Were she to remain in my service, I have no doubt that it would only be a matter of time before I was tempted again, so I remand judgment on the remainder of Sanguine Spray's sentence to you.
"Your humbled mentor,
Princess Celestia"
Sanguine scowled at the letter, as if it were capable of reaction. "'NECESSARY'?"
Twilight blinked. "...that's what sets you off? Not her handing you to me?" And not her brushing aside the Spike secrecy problem, Twilight noted, though that did not directly involve Sanguine.
Sanguine shrugged. "I was a royal servant, and now I am a royal servant. And I like working for you a lot more than I liked working for Celestia."
The lavender alicorn rolled her eyes. "I am not making you my handmaiden. Besides, I've already got Spike."
Said dragon poked his head into the main room of the library from the back room. "It's time to get dinner started. Is she staying?"
Twilight shook her head. "No. I'm going to need to think about this."
"Got it." Spike ducked back into the back.
"Uh, Spike?" Sanguine followed him. "Mind if I help?"
Spike looked up, momentarily unprepared for not-Twilight company but his mind soon spooling up how to deal with other ponies. Caught by the dissonance, he reflected for a moment how he had lived with Twilight for so long, she felt almost like an extension of himself in some ways - then he remembered there was another pony who had just asked him a question. "I dunno, Twilight likes her food juuust-"
"MindifIwatch?"
Spike had heard that tone before, usually from Twilight when she wanted an excuse to escape Celestia's surveillance. "...suuure, sure, you can watch. C'mon," He waved her to follow as he returned to the small kitchen.
Twilight returned to studying the letter as Spike and Sanguine left her line of sight, wondering if it contained any hidden, encoded messages.
Spike closed the door behind himself and Sanguine, then set to work getting ingredients out. "So, what's up?"
Sanguine sat by the door, recognizing food preparation just enough to know to stay out of the way. "What's it like to be Twilight's brother?"
To his credit, Spike barely fumbled the lettuce. "Brother? You'd have to ask Shining Armor."
Sanguine blinked. "Who's he?"
"Former captain of the guard, now married to Princess Cadance in the Crystal Empire. Twilight's Big Brother Best Friend Forever," Spike explained.
"...oh, so you mean he's related by blood." Sanguine nodded.
Spike nodded. "Well, yeah. That's what 'brother' usually means."
Sanguine shook her head. "I meant the other sort of brother."
Spike looked back over his shoulder at her as he dumped the produce in the sink and began washing. "I don't think 'brother' is the word you mean. I'm...actually, I'm not sure what the word is for what Twilight and I are to one another. But whatever it is, I wouldn't give it up for the world."
Sanguine smiled. "So tell me."
"She's always there for me, and I'm always there for her. Well...lately I'm kinda there for Rarity sometimes, but. Like, Twilight said 'she' needs to think about that problem?" Spike shrugged. "What she means is, she'll voice thoughts out loud and I'll bounce the good ones back to her, and I'll do the same so she can bounce my good ones back. Even the bad ones, we know it's just the thoughts that are bad, we're not trying to insult each other. Or maybe one of us doesn't understand some aspect, so the other will explain - but you'd be surprised how often that turns out the one of us who thought we understood, didn't. Finding out what you don't know can be handy."
Sanguine bit her lip gently. "So you'll be discussing my fate."
"Well...yeah, I guess." Vegetables washed, Spike moved them to a cutting board. "That's the way it is."
"Oh, no, no, I'm not blaming you. I just..." Sanguine hunted for the right words for a moment. "...wanted to know, that's all."
Spike began chopping the vegetables as the discussion paused.
Eventually Sanguine asked, "Are you necessary to her?"
The dragon nearly clipped a claw.
Sanguine tilted her head.
"...no. I'm her friend," Spike eventually replied. "Companion. Not-brother. But I wouldn't call it 'necessary'. We can operate apart when we have to. Someday I'll be too big to live in the same place she lives. I am not looking forward to it. But it won't be the end of the world - just, time to move on. When it comes. I will say I am so happy I won't have to attend her funeral...well, that there'll be time for things like moving out and growing old together before that happens."
A few more chops passed in what was otherwise silence.
Spike began sweeping the sliced vegetables into a bowl. "It's that letter, isn't it? What Celestia called you."
Sanguine nodded. "Yes."
"I think 'necessary' isn't the best word for you either. More...hmm...'royal temptation'?" Sometimes Spike wondered if his egg had been used as a political pawn, to be prepared for an easy hatching by some well-connected unicorn after many common unicorns failed the "impossible" test of hatching an unprepared egg. Not that it mattered: after Twilight had hatched him, Celestia declared that he had enough of Twilight's magic in him that there was nothing for it but to have the two of them live together from then on. Compared to most dragons, Spike had had a good life at Twilight's side - and was it not Celestia herself who once said, "Living well is the best revenge"?
"'Royal temptation'?"
"Yeah!" Spike finished getting vegetables into bowl, then began mixing it with a wooden spoon. "The point of her letter is she was viewing you like an essential tool, something that could do what she couldn't otherwise do. And that was a problem. For one, 'cause you're not a tool, you're a pony! For another, 'cause the way she was using you, she thought you might snap. And a bunch of other reasons."
Sanguine blinked. "I...kind of get that? But if I can make life better for everypony then why shouldn't-"
That finally got Spike to swing around and face her, glaring. In the same motion, he stuffed the wooden spoon in her mouth. "Don't. Don't you DARE. Finish that sentence. You deserve better than that." His voice had gone from calm to on edge in a split second.
"Mmm mm, mm mm mmm m mph," Sanguine responded, somewhat less than articulately.
"No. Nuh-uh. No way, Sanguine." Spike looked into Sanguine's eyes as if attempting to drill through her skull with his stare. "Every pony's happiness matters, and that means yours too. Besides, if you went crazy then you wouldn't actually wind up helping anypony."
"Ptoo!" Sanguine spit the spoon out. "I'm not the first pony you've said that to."
"Darn right." Spike fished another wooden spoon out and finished mixing the salad, pouring on carefully measured amounts of dressing. "You know how many times Twilight's tried to go down that same path?"
"No...?" Sanguine blinked.
"Way too many." The anger - no...annoyance? Sanguine had trouble placing exactly the quality in Spike's voice that was fading; the best she could come up with was "self defense". She puzzled on this as Spike continued, "I'm not letting her go that way, and I won't let you either. Not right here, where I can stop it."
Sanguine had nothing to say to that.
"I'm serious. You matter. Every pony matters, and you're a pony, so you matter too." Salad finished, Spike turned around to make sure Sanguine was not offended at the prospect that she might matter - as Twilight had been a few times after she had messed up in some big way.
"Thanks." Sanguine looked around the kitchen. "U-umm. What are you going to make her for breakfast?"
Spike shrugged. "Dunno. Haven't decided yet. She's not as picky when she's still waking up."
"Ooh!" Sanguine smiled. "Mind if I come by tomorrow morning and help?"
"Err, well..."
Sanguine recalled Apple Bloom advising that a certain look - "puppy eyes", apparently because Apple Bloom had learned it from Rarity's younger sister, who had learned it from a young diamond dog while Rarity was conducting business - often helped convince the adults in town, so she tried it. "Pleeease?"
Sure enough, Spike found his resistance faltering. "Eh, I suppose it can't hurt. I mean, how bad can you possibly-"
Spike knew at the time the words would curse him, even if he had technically stopped himself before he could utter the full phrase. He had merely failed to imagine the magnitude.
It would not go in the record books, because it was technically confined to a single floor of a single building: the ground floor of the library. Further, none of those involved would consider submitting it for public, official records, each for their own reasons: Twilight did not want to gain a reputation for a messy home; Spike was embarrassed that it had happened under his watch; Sanguine had made worse messes though not specifically in the category of food; and the food had not been enchanted with any means of communication - and would all be eaten within the day, anyway.
In the interest of a full accounting, strong assisting credit must be given to Twilight's experiments in animate, self-cooking food. Sanguine herself, however energetic and untalented at cooking she was, was only one pony, and Spike was a more than capable assistant. It was not until the ingredients - having awoken incorrectly as a consequence of Sanguine's curiosity, a magical talent as low as most non-unicorn ponies', and the complete lack of security Twilight had placed on enchantments she thought none but herself and Spike would ever encounter, simply because no one else ever visited the library kitchen that she knew of - began their mass exodus of the kitchen that the disaster spread beyond a single room. The food, like most animate things with even the merest semblance of a mind, had a desire not to be consumed. That they knocked down books and scrolls and generally made the library into a paper snowstorm was almost incidental, especially as Twilight's and Spike's own labors had resulted in the same often enough that they knew how to navigate and clean up.
The primary driver, however, was Sanguine's desire to impress. This was not born out of any rational consideration of her impending fate. Indeed, such consideration would have strongly urged a far more humble approach, staying away until Twilight was ready to receive her - or perhaps to attempt escape. Twilight did not at the time possess a country-wide network of agents personally loyal to her and sworn to uphold her law, so Sanguine would probably have been safe once she left the vicinity of Ponyville so long as she did not stop for long until outside Equestria altogether. Instead, Sanguine unwisely decided to attempt to be as helpful to Twilight as she had attempted to be to Celestia.
Failing to recognize that Twilight was not Celestia, and thus had different needs and different measurements of "helpful", was perhaps the most fundamental of Sanguine's errors that morning. The difference between "helping" and "bribing" was often one of perception.
Just as Sanguine had finally recaptured the runaway cabbage - the last escaped ingredient, to her knowledge - Twilight's voice called, "Spike, what is going ON down there? It's just past dawn!"
"Err! Sanguine came over and wanted to help with breakfast," Spike called back.
"San-" Twilight teleported down, looking at the pegasus. "What. Are. You. Doing. Here?"
As any who live in arctic climes can relate, there are different calibers of ice. There is soft, fluffy ice in small flakes usually known as "snow". There is ice in the process of melting, or which has not had a chance to freeze too solidly. And then there is the hardest of ice, found only in the coldest of places, which some say can replace steel when it is too cold for steel to retain its strength. It was this that Sanguine felt in Twilight's voice, as if Twilight had had practice as a sword mare using words alone. Even Twilight was not immediately aware of her anger or its source, being whispered into her half-awake mind as it was.
"U-umm..." Sanguine scooted the cabbage container in Spike's direction, across the knee-deep collection of books and scrolls coating the floor. "Like he said, I wanted to help with breakfast."
"Get out," Twilight snarled. Why was it a good idea to snarl? Something in her mind said Sanguine's presence was in violation of all protocol, but since when did Twilight care about that?
"But-"
"GET OUT!" Twilight's horn glowed menacingly, but she did not pick up Sanguine yet. "Tell the others to be here with you at noon. I shall deal with you then."
Sanguine cowered. "I..."
"GO! AND RETURN AT NOON!" There was a faint echo to Twilight's voice.
The red pegasus bolted out the open front door, screaming for her life. Twilight slammed the door shut behind her.
Spike rapped the cabbage twice, ending its enchantment. "Don't you think that was a little much?"
Twilight turned a withering glare on him, eyes blazing sun-white as she bared her teeth.
Spike shielded his eyes. "Twilight?"
Her eyes faded to normal. "...kiiinda? Umm. Yeah, it's just me now. I was still daydreaming a little? Luna suggested..." She blinked, then silently mouthed a curse.
"Uh." Spike had been around Twilight enough to follow the chain to its logical conclusion. "D-does that mean Luna knows about...?"
"She does now." Twilight winced. "She was looking through my eyes. She'd been asking where Sanguine was, since Sanguine's not under Celestia's protection any more, and I guess I came down while she was still in my head." She reflected on the past few minutes. "Apparently trying to bribe judges used to be a more serious problem. Luna said she used to have a whole guild of ponies like Sanguine - in part to deal with ponies who tried to buy off the law, and officers who accepted bribes - and offered to set that back up. I told her no, but I don't think she liked that answer." After a moment's further reflection, she frowned. "No...she really didn't like that answer."
"Hrm. Celestia wasn't kidding about seeing Sangine as 'necessary'," Spike prompted.
"And Luna will be far worse." Twilight sighed. "Good thing she sleeps during the day, but I've no doubt she'll visit tonight. I can argue law with her if she shows up here in person, but she's probably got some argument overriding the change in custody. If she goes and talks to Fluttershy and Sanguine, or if she speaks in Sanguine's dreams, she'll probably convince Sanguine to just go with her. You think Celestia's tempted; for this Luna might just break out the hypnosis. We're lucky Luna was falling asleep when she and I saw Sanguine; if she'd been thinking clearly, she'd have tried to trick me into stalling until night." She shook her head and summarized, "We've got until Luna wakes up at sunset to take care of this."
"What are you going to do?" Spike wondered. "The law clearly says the punishment for murder is either death or a life of service, and I know you don't want to kill her."
"But if she's still serving tonight then Luna's going to..." Twilight stopped as she reflected on the morning's events.
"Uhh, Twilight? Why are you smiling?"
"Because I think Luna inadvertently showed me how to fix it. I was going to ask our friends for suggestions, but now I just need them as witnesses." Twilight looked around the library floor. "I'll need this cleaned up by the time they get here. Can you do that?"
"Sure!" Spike flung the cabbage container toward the kitchen and flexed his claws, preparing for another round of Reshelve Everything As Fast As You Can, a chore he had performed often enough he now made a game of it. "What are you going to do?"
Twilight's eye gleamed, complimenting her smile. "I need to practice being Luna."
Just after dusk, Twilight stood on the balcony of her library, watching the train to Appleloosa depart in the far distance. Although she had not gone with her friends to see Sanguine off, she knew the pegasus was on board, with a note from Applejack to the sheriff and saddlebags full of bits.
Twilight felt the magic beside her and did not have to look. "Hello Luna."
"Does thou know what thou hast wrought?" Anger and disapproval flecked the dark alicorn's voice. Standing next to Twilight, the black and celestial blue ruler of Equestria's night could have been mistaken for an older sister, though the mistake would have been more than a thousand years off - and yet only a single generation, in so far as Luna's sister Celestia had been Twilight's mentor.
"I've set a pony free from her own cutie mark." Twilight glanced at her own cutie mark: sparkles, still the same as they had always been. There was no crown or other alteration to denote her promotion to Princess.
Luna noted Twilight's examination and smiled. Some night, she would have to tell Twilight where her mark truly came from. But not tonight. "Not...entirely. She will still kill, you know."
"I know." Twilight looked up at Luna in mild defiance. "But it will not be by Celestia's order, or yours. It will be by her heart's alone."
"Indeed. But by the same token, she is now unguided." Much as you yourself are, Luna did not say. Twilight might hope for guidance, and might even still receive some from Celestia, but the only way to truly learn to be a Princess was to be one.
"Not true," Twilight retorted. "She's got a better guide than we would have been." She looked at the town again. It seemed awfully quiet: even just after dark, there were usually still some ponies finishing the day's labors and heading home. But now the streets were completely empty.
"'We'." Luna smiled. "So mine sister's plan worked after all."
Twilight looked at Luna.
"Thou hast...erm," Luna caught herself. She was still getting used to the linguistic drift that had occurred during her thousand years away from society. "You have leagues to go, but know this: friend you may be, student even - but you are necessary, too."
Purple alicorn gave dark alicorn a flat, "What."
"We have noticed the reluctance with which you approach the art of governance, save when we specifically requested your aid. While it is commendable to resist the corruption of power, to shun what power you have is to let the evils of this world arise unchecked." Luna looked up at the stars. "How did mine sister phrase it? 'Silly fillies may need friends to rescue them from themselves'?" She smiled at Twlight. "And you have made a new friend from all this."
"Then...this was all...a test?" Twilight wondered where her anger was coming from. She looked forward to tests - nervously, sometimes, and sure she could get a bit obsessive about preparing for them, but evaluations were...were...they were what she did, right? Everything in preparation for the next test, the next grade?
"More like a remedial class, as you were failing your test."
"..." Twilight's skin crawled at that description.
"Not that mine sister was entirely acting," Luna continued. "The ability to just make problematic ponies go away would quickly solve so many issues." She sighed. "Long lives are not ours just to fix a never ending series of today's crises, though it may oft seem that way. Always to the future must we keep one eye, to make sure we will have a future. I...worry that controlling power such as your new friend represents might tempt me into once more becoming the vile Nightmare Moon that you freed me from, but I would not hesitate if I thought it would prove more boon than bane to fair Equestria. It is why mine sister forbade me any contact with the prisoner while she was under mine sister's direction. Even now it would be so easy to slide into her dreams, to comfort and mold her until she eagerly embraced being my little dispenser of justice - but you have placed her beyond my limits. To use the condemned is one thing; to sacrifice a free pony, innocent of further wrongdoing, is another."
Twilight sighed. "Well. Anyway. She's just going to be hunting down monsters now. She'll probably roam all of Equestria...well, except for her home town."
Luna gave her a look.
"What?"
Luna tilted her head. "Did she not say where she was from?"
Twilight blinked. "No. I just figured, if her parents wouldn't come see her, she'll never want to go home again."
Luna smiled. "And yet you have sent her there."
"WHAT?!?" Unfortunately, neither Fluttershy nor Sanguine were present to comment on the consistency of Twilight's pose of surprise.
"Did you not wonder how a single filly, even guided by her cutie mark, could slay so many? Her parents lead the bandit raid on Appleloosa five weeks ago. She was trusted, and she betrayed their trust that justice might be served. Mine sister was quite surprised to find the filly had become without family," Luna explained.
Twilight's eyes searched for the train, but it was already out of sight. "Then the sheriff..."
"...knows exactly who he is dealing with," Luna confirmed. "It was no mistake that mine sister sent her new servant home for her first mission. The mistakes did not happen until Manehattan; mine sister was so rattled by them that she allowed a hungry dragon to get near."
"But why didn't the sheriff mention it? Applejack said she's been talking to him." Twilight felt a gentle breeze rustle her mane.
"Two dozen ponies murdered. Mine sister asked him not to spread word, pointing out that calling attention to it would only cause grief." Luna stifled a chuckle. A thousand years and some political truths remained ever present.
"But we would have heard rumors by now."
"Indeed, I was surprised so many followed the sheriff's lead. Of everypony in Ponyville, only Rarity had learned of it before mine sister's letter reached you, and it apparently failed to inform you where the massacre took place. At mine sister's request I have been advising ponies who knew not to relay the news further, even assisting them in sealing their disquiet unless and until confronted with it. But it is a crumbling dam: I can not only examine so many dreams per night, and bloodshed is not so nightmarish to everypony as to always stands out. You have blessed Sanguine with anonymity, which she will need when word goes public - which it will, and soon." Luna considered. "Today, perhaps."
Twilight looked up at the still-rising moon. "You mean tomorrow?"
The moon swam, becoming Luna's grin. "Where did you think we were speaking?" Luna, and the world around Twilight, began to dissolve. "Mine sister sends her concern over your late hours, both of waking and of achieving slumber."
Twilight grimaced as true light - that of dawn - thrust into her eyes, washing away the dreamtime environment. She allowed herself a look around - no ponies with pressing, dire emergencies; no sounds of catastrophe from downstairs or outside; nothing that couldn't wait. "She can stop with the bloody wakeup calls." Telekinetically tugging shut a window blind to thwart the sun just now cresting the horizon, she turned over, facing away from it, and went back to sleep.
A deep red pegasus, mottled so her fur seemed to flow like liquid as the wind blew over it, took note of the "Welcome to Ponyville" signpost on the hill underneath as she flew over it. Her shadow was the only shade the signpost would see on this clear day. Looking ahead, she took in the town. It seemed nice and peaceful, with a mild hum of activity as its residents - mostly a mix of the three pony types, but she could see an occasional griffon, donkey, or bull - went about their lives. Town hall over there with a large space around it, probably for gatherings and festivals; the large tree that served as town library over there; and houses and shops and more than a few tents scattered around. Most of the buildings proper seemed to be wooden with straw roofs, and white walls where the red-brown support beams were not visible. As in most towns, the majority of the buildings seemed to be residential in nature, with most of the few recognizably commercial buildings loosely gathered near the center. Food smells - mostly hay and spices - came from every direction; she had apparently arrived just in time for lunch, a conclusion reinforced by the sun being directly overhead. But food could wait: she had a pony to find.
And so a pony found her, dropping from higher in the sky to coast next to her. A pegasus like herself, but a couple hoofs larger: clearly an adult, instead of still losing the "filly" title as she was, and colored to nearly match the sky if not for a rainbow-hued mane and tail. "Hey! Newcomer?" The other pegasus's voice spoke of boundless energy.
She regarded the other flier. "I just arrived, yes," she answered in a bored voice - actually resigned to her fate, not that she felt a need to broadcast it. "I'm under orders from Princess Celestia. She says I need to find the bravest pony in town - the one who can handle anything."
"Well you found her!" The cyan pegasus indicated herself with one hoof. "What's your name?"
She blinked. Having been prepared to spend hours searching the entire town, for the object of her quest to just greet her as soon as she arrived was quite convenient. "Just call me Sanguine. Pleasure to meet you, Fluttershy."
Rainbow Dash came to a stop.
Sanguine did as well. "Is something wrong?"
"That's not funny!" Rainbow Dash frowned.
"Huh?" Sanguine took out a sheet of parchment. "But Princess Celestia said..."
"Let me see that." Rainbow Dash snatched up the letter and read aloud, clearly annoyed.
"Sanguine Spray,"
Rainbow Dash gave Sanguine a quick look over, and decided she must have been named for her coat.
"For the next part of your sentence you are to report to Fluttershy in Ponyville and tend to her for at least one week. She will let you know when you may return.
"Fluttershy, ask her in private what she did and you will know what I need you to teach her. My apologies for the short notice. Feel free to have her help with your firewood problem, and send her back once you think she's safe.
"With regards,
Princess Celestia."
Rainbow Dash shook her head. "That's Celestia's hornwriting and seal, alright. Guh. I take it you don't know anything about Fluttershy?"
Sanguine stammered, "Well...err...I'm sure if she can help me then she must be-"
Rainbow Dash held up a hoof. "Alright, alright, I get it." She handed the letter back and pointed. "Fluttershy's cabin is over there, next to the Everfree Forest." She tried to get a look at Sanguine's cutie mark, but could only make out something about a pony head before Sanguine swiveled to face Rainbow Dash head on, making cutie mark observation difficult. "Did Celestia sentence you to community service?"
"Something like that, yes." Sanguine put her letter away.
Rainbow Dash soon gave up on spotting Sanguine's mark. "Fine, be mysterious. But I'm pretty sure Fluttershy doesn't have a firewood problem. It's mid-summer."
"Maybe it's for a cooking fire?" Sanguine offered.
"Maybe. Anyway, go on, I've got to get back to cloud patrol." Not waiting for a reply, Rainbow Dash zipped back up, aiming straight for a cloud and ramming it so it dissipated. Sanguine watched the seek-and-destroy for about a minute before heading off in the direction indicated.
It was the mewling that caught Fluttershy's ear.
At Applejack's insistence, Sanguine had proceeded on the ground, but she continued to move so quietly - keeping to soft ground when possible, stepping gently otherwise, and avoiding terrain that could easily rustle or snap - that only Applejack's and Fluttershy's steps could be heard. There had been little conversation, and that confined to suggestions of places to search. So when Fluttershy straightened up and began moving with purpose, the others fell in flank formation immediately, a three-pony chevron that would have impressed many drill instructors.
But unlike the world in which drill instructors existed, places like the Everfree Forest made no pretense of being fair or just.
As they rounded a bush, Fluttershy saw her friend lazing in a sunbeam. A lion, proud as any of his kin, with bat-like wings colored to match his fur and a scorpion's tail. Something seemed wrong about that long, red tail - it seemed a bit melted, drooping in puddles of itself on the ground - but she paid it no mind. For some reason her two companions stopped to gasp in unison, so she took a step back to whisper at them quietly, "There he is. He knows me; try not to surprise him. Let's move around where he can see us."
"I didn't touch him," Sanguine protested. "I swear I've never seem him before in my life!"
"Of course you haven't." Fluttershy lead the trio around the clearing and cleared her throat. "Oooh Manty!"
Applejack cocked an eye. "You...named 'im."
"Of course I did! It's not my most creative name, but I only see him once in a while." The cream-and-pink pegasus stepped closer. "Maaanty, I brought a treat, just for you!" She reached into a saddlebag and pulled out a large strip of jerky. Applejack had a source, less expensive than Fluttershy thought importing from the griffon lands should have been; Fluttershy did not care how Applejack got it or what type it was, though she suspected it was pork jerky based on the color and scent. What mattered was that some creatures, like Manty, could only digest meat.
Manty looked in her direction, sniffing. Surely he should have been able to see her by now. Why wasn't he standing up?
Fluttershy dismissed her nagging worries and stepped closer still, carefully watching Manty for signs of reaction. Carefully she laid the strip at his feet - not that she could see them. They must have been hidden under his red mane, which had gotten a bit large and spread out on the ground but surely that was just due to his age.
"I...I can't watch." Sanguine was clearly choked up about something; Fluttershy wondered what it could be.
"Y'all 'ave to," Applejack advised. "Ah reckon you're gonna see much worse than this."
Sanguine gulped and breathed audibly. "You're right. I can do this. I have to do this."
Manty perked up and licked the treat right off the ground, chewing it.
Fluttershy peeked at his gums in the moments his mouth was open. "Manty? Where are your teeth? What happened to them?"
"The same thing that-" Sanguine answered, before being cut off by what Fluttershy recognized as the sound of a knee gently to the ribs, often enough applied by Rarity to various ponies. But Rarity was not here, so it must have been Applejack.
"There, there." Fluttershy stroked a hoof over his mane and neck - a bit sticky, he must have been sweating. Her hoof came away red. "Eat it right up, there's a good Manty, can I get a purr, yeah, there's a purr!" She smiled as the manticore did indeed begin to purr, nuzzling and licking her.
"A-Applejack." Sanguine steadied herself. "I think I need to..."
"Yeah, ah think you do." Now even Applejack's voice seemed a bit upset. "Once she's done, sugar."
The back of Fluttershy's mind tugged, as a knot formed in the back of her throat for some reason. "Now you say hello, Sanguine." She wandered back to the others.
"Right." Sanguine exhaled. "'Hello'." Trembling, she walked past Fluttershy up to the manticore.
As Fluttershy returned to Applejack's side, the insistent prodding at the back of her mind broke through. In seconds she found herself bawling into her friend's mane.
She cried, to drown out the purr.
She cried, to wash away the memories.
She cried, until her voice was the only sound left.
Sanguine examined her work to make sure, but the purr's abrupt termination had been signal enough. "It's done. I made it as painless as I could."
"Ya did good." Applejack held Fluttershy. "But ah think we need a break. There's a zebra, livin' not too far from here. Zecora."
"Oh! Rarity said I should talk with her too." Sanguine examined her forelegs, grateful that their new coating was hard to see against her fur. She was mildly surprised that the manticore had survived this long with severe wounds all over its body, leaving it to bleed out. Perhaps whatever had done this had left Manty to die, intent on returning to devour the corpse. If that was what happened, at least the manticorn no longer had to suffer - and Sanguine did not want to be around when whatever it was, returned for its meal.
"Well, now's a good time. C'mon." Keeping one leg around Fluttershy, Applejack guided the others away from the scene, unable to move fast on three legs but eager to literally put this behind her.
22: Princess Twilight Sparkle's Other Court
"Alright, I'm here," Rainbow Dash announced as she entered the library through the window. "Let's get this party started!"
Twilight chuckled. Some day, she was going to have to teach that pegasus about doors. "Settle down, Rainbow Dash. Spike, show her Celestia's letter?"
Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Applejack were muttering to one another, while Fluttershy drooped a hoof around a downcast Sanguine and reassured her, "It'll be okay. Twilight isn't mad at you."
Twilight glanced at Fluttershy and Sanguine. Actually, Twilight was still ticked off - the time had given her anger a chance to simmer down, and for her to identify exactly why she objected so strongly to Sanguine's antics that morning. But Twilight would not let that anger control her, especially not on something this important.
Rainbow Dash fluttered down to Spike and glanced over the parchment he displayed to her. "Blah blah 'wrong' blah 'silly fillies' blah blah blah 'remand judgment'..." She blinked, then looked up at Twilight. "So she's yours now?"
Twilight nodded. "That's what this is about. Now that we're all here..." She walked a short distance away to an unoccupied part of the floor, then turned back and sat facing the crowd. "Spike, if you would?"
Spike cleared his throat. "Hear ye, hear ye! The court of Princess Twilight Sparkle is now in session! All be seated!"
Applejack sat down. "The who in the what now?"
The others followed suit except for Rainbow Dash, which earned her a glare from Twilight and a yank on the tail from Applejack, pulling the pegasus's rear to the ground. Rainbow Dash's protest died in her throat as a wave of raw power washed over her. Spike flinched, almost bowled over from the invisible but ineffable pressure.
Twilight now hovered, surrounded by a purple-white aura. Her eyes blazed like twin white stars, and her lips were set firm. Every strand of her mane and tail - no, every feather and strand of fur on her body seemed to radiate its own subtle power.
Fluttershy looked around. She could feel Twilight's presence in every direction, though she could not see where. Looking close, she noticed the room had gotten a bit darker, with occasional warps in the air, like short-lived watery prisms. Glancing out the window, she saw the effect was limited to the room. And while Fluttershy was no unicorn, when she turned her silent examination on the alicorn body in front of her, it looked empty somehow, as if Twilight was manipulating it from the outside. If it was Twilight that now filled the room, Fluttershy hoped Twilight could get back inside her own skin. She also hoped Twilight was safe to breathe, though none of her friends seemed to be immediately suffocating or coughing.
Rarity was of two minds. On the one hoof, the imperious look was actually not that useful for socializing. Useful for formal occasions, true, but usually when the subtleties of decor went right out the window. Twilight could be sitting in a pig sty and still command attention and respect like this. On the other, an aura like that would make a perfect accessory - if Rarity could figure out how to duplicate it without being disrespectful. She wondered if Twilight would be willing to pose like this while Rarity studied.
Rainbow Dash had been contemplating the kiss. The moment the wave hit, her wings went up and her mind went blank. Her intended retort left her mouth hanging open until Applejack nudged it shut.
Applejack gave a small nod of approval. It seemed that Twilight was finally starting to get comfortable with her new station. Now Applejack would see how she used her power.
Pinkie Pie got new inspiration for streamers. They would later prove essential in thwarting a changeling army attempting to devour all friendship, but that is another story.
"THE CONDEMNED WILL NOW STEP FORWARD!" Twilight's voice echoed, and none doubted it would have been audible in the middle of a stampede even if it somehow did not deafen. She pointed imperiously at a spot on the floor in front of her, where she projected a gently glowing purple circle.
Fluttershy leaned over to Rarity and muttered, "Pretty."
"Yes," Rarity muttered back, "but the Royal Canterlot Voice is a bit much."
"I'm sure it's for Sanguine's sake."
"Hmm, I suppose." Rarity leaned away to forestall any response. Even among friends, at a time like this such side conversations could be dangerous if carried on too long, and something in the air felt especially dangerous to Rarity just then.
Sanguine hesitantly stepped into the circle, head bowed.
"STATE YOUR NAME FOR THE RECORD," Twilight's voice boomed. While her lips moved, they were slightly out of sync, as if her mouth was just pretending to speak.
"Sanguine Spray."
Twilight's eyes were locked on Sanguine's, though it was impossible to tell where her pupils were pointed - or if she still had any. "DO YOU PLEAD GUILTY TO YOUR CRIMES, AND TO THOSE ACTS WHICH YOU HAVE BEEN USED FOR?"
"I do."
"UP TO AND INCLUDING, JUST THIS MORNING, AWAKENING THAT WHICH WAS NEVER TO BE AWAKENED, AND THE GENERAL DESTRUCTION ATTENDANT UPON ITS RECAPTURE?"
Sanguine winced, but had to admit to herself that "general destruction" was accurate. Who knew a cabbage could do so much damage? Although perhaps the things she knocked down and over in her eagerness to catch it had contributed. "I do."
"KNOW THAT JUDGMENT UPON YOU IS OURS NOW." Twilight pointed to herself. "WE DECIDE IF YOU SHALL LIVE OR DIE. WE HAVE OBSERVED YOUR ACTIONS SINCE YOUR ARRIVAL, AND WE KNOW YOUR HISTORY. WE HAVE JUDGED YOUR ATTEMPT AT REHABILITATION, ITS SUCCESSES AND ITS FAILURES. WE KNOW YOUR HEART." She looked across her friends, noticing that Rainbow Dash was building tension despite having her tail held down by Applejack. "WE RESCIND CELESTIA'S COMMANDS UPON YOU, STARTING WITH HER FORBIDDANCE OF SUICIDE. YOUR SENTENCE IS..."
Sanguine gulped.
"...COMMUTED."
Rainbow Dash's retort - a defense of Sanguine against the inevitable execution order - finally broke free of her stun just as she processed Twilight's words. A moment of desire to charge forward, followed by a moment realizing she should stop because her defense was no longer relevant, wound up planting her face on the floor.
"YOU ARE FREE TO GO. THE COURT'S SECRETARY SHALL NOW INFORM CELESTIA AND LUNA THAT YOUR PAST CRIMES ARE BEYOND FURTHER JUSTICE."
Smiling, Spike pulled out two small prepared scrolls and incinerated them, one at a time.
"THIS COURT IS ADJOURNED!" Power washed back into Twilight, as if she was inhaling the very fabric of the universe, and soon she was a normal alicorn sitting on the floor again.
Sanguine just stood there, uncertain if she should faint.
"Yaaay!" Pinkie ran up and hugged Sanguine. "You beat the rap!"
Sanguine blinked. "You're...letting me go?"
"Mm-hmm!" Twilight nodded. "I don't think you're a danger to anypony. Not any more than most ponies, anyway."
"But...but I'm..."
"In control, aware of your flaws, and ready to live as normal a life as you can have," Twilight listed. "Any pony you might kill is honestly at risk of...well, let's just say your actions will result in a net gain to the welfare of all ponies involved, compared to what would happen if you did not intervene, and leave it at that."
Pinkie, still hugging Sanguine, gave Twilight a look. "That's a mouthful. Why not just say she'll make things better?"
"Th...thank you...Twilight!" Sanguine once again found herself on the cusp of tears.
Twilight waved a hoof dismissively. "There's just one problem: adventuring isn't a steady career. What will you do for bits?"
"Actually ah had an idea on that," Applejack noted. "Appleloosa's sheriff's an Apple, an' we'd traded letters before. He's been pressin' fer a bounty system t' be set up, so's we can do more'n chase criminals outta one town only fer them to show up in another. Turns out that necromancer'd been up to a few other dirty deeds. Ah hinted to th' sheriff that Sanguine here was a little more responsible than she let on. He says there've been other problems of late, but he won't get into details. Sanguine, if'n ya head down there th' sheriff says he's got a bounty payment waitin' fer ya - an' he's got a few more cases he'd like yer help with, if ya got a nose fer varmints."
"And I hope you don't mind," Rarity added, "but I took the liberty of finding buyers for those ursa claws you knocked free the other day. Can you imagine, a diamond dog came to me and confessed a certain weariness about dealing with nothing but gems all day? Naturally I've taken a cut for my work, but how does ten thousand bits sound as a starting nest egg?"
Sanguine squeaked.
Rarity tilted her head. "I'm sorry, I didn't catch that?"
"T, ten thou..." Sanguine stammered. "I've never had that much money in my life!"
"Well now you do." Rarity's adventures, when they resulted in financial gain, often resulted in gain for more than just her, so she had had practice informing ponies that they were suddenly wealthier. "Certain exotic bits can fetch a very high price if you know the right buyers. It's an uncertain market - one day you might strike it rich, the next the very same things won't fetch a single bit - but I would be happy to discuss if you, err, just happen to acquire exotica in your travels. But please keep it to the clean things: if you want to offload blood and meat I highly recommend you look to griffon merchants."
Sanguine nodded.
"Sorry to cut the week short," Twilight noted. "But...weeell...let's just say I'd like you out of town by sundown, so you don't become 'necessary' again."
All six ponies gave her a confused look.
"Luna found out. She's going to-" was all Twilight got out before Applejack started hustling Sanguine out the door, and the last three words were only squeezed in because it took that long for Applejack to move.