The Mercenary Versus Robin Hoof
The slums were on fire. I’d like to make it absolutely clear that this wasn’t my fault. Everyone always blames the pyromancer when something’s on fire.
I’d been in the middle of setting up some new equipment on top of my tower when I spotted the smoke, and I decided I’d help out. The slums were just across the bridge from Freeport proper, so it wouldn’t take me too long to get there. A little known fact is that when your special talent includes manipulating fire, you’re just as good at putting them out as you are at starting them. Besides, I hadn’t done any good deeds for a while.
I stopped on the way out of my tower to grab my magus robes, the symbol of my authority as Freeport’s only officially authorized magus. Not to mention they looked cool.
Freeport’s slums look ugly enough that one could almost not blame the Council for shoving them all onto one of the nearby islands to preserve the city’s aesthetics. The island’s official name was Sandy Shores, but the locals had colorfully re-dubbed it ‘Shitty Shores.’ Judging by the smell, the local name was the more accurate of the two. It didn’t help the supposedly sandy shores were covered up by cheap, ramshackle housing that extended out to what was probably an unsafe distance over the water.
The locals had already organized a basic bucket brigade by the time I got there. They were slowing the fire down, but that was about it. All the buildings were crammed so close together that it was impossible to stop the fire from spreading in every single direction. There was too much fuel, and not enough buckets to stop it all.
Thankfully, I was on the scene. Snuffing out that much wildfire would’ve been incredibly difficult even for me, but I was smart enough to finesse it. Instead of trying to contain the fire, I just redirected it. I felt a bit bad about the unlucky homes in my chosen path, but the end result was that I’d cut the blaze off from most of its fuel. Now that it couldn’t spread in every direction, all I needed to do was keep the embers contained and slowly drain away and disperse the heat.
Between my efforts and the continuing work of the bucket brigade, we managed to get the fire under control. A couple dozen families had lost their homes—or at least the dank hovels that were the closest things they had to proper houses—but a couple quick questions to the locals gave me some confidence that at least everyone had gotten out in time.
I would have been a lot more confident in the quality of our evacuation efforts if I wasn’t going off the word of a couple of slum dwellers. “Where the hay are the condottieri?” I growled. “They’re supposed to handle this kind of thing!” The units assigned to Sandy Shores had a reputation for half-assing their job, but letting a huge fire burn out of control was more than the usual neglect. Even the nastiest, most cynical elements in Freeport wouldn’t want to risk a slum fire spreading out of control and reaching the nicer parts of the city.
A ragged gryphon who seemed to be the closest thing to a leader the bucket brigade had stepped up. “I think they’re busy handling the riots, miss.”
“Riots?” I groaned and ran a hoof down my face. It was going to be one of those days, wasn’t it? This is the problem with random acts of altruism; you can never stop with just one. Someone’s always going to need you to rescue them, and I don’t have time to run around trying to save the world. I could spend my whole life scrambling around trying to help every single poor unfortunate soul I came across, and it would probably never make a significant difference.
Yet, despite knowing that it would only end in more dangerous and unpaid work, I found myself asking, “What riots? Where are they?”
This was all Celestia’s fault. If not for all my lessons with her, I would never suffer these occasional bouts of stupid altruism. They always led to trouble.
“They’re a bit further inland,” the gryphon supplied, pointing helpfully. “I heard they started over in Pearl Square. Something about someone dropping a ton of money, and then everyone just went crazy fighting over it.”
“Oh. Super.” At least there was money involved in the process somewhere. Granted, the only types who would be carrying that much cash on them in this part of Freeport would be up to something very disreputable, but that meant I could keep any money I found for myself instead of turning it over to the rightful owners. Freeport might turn a blind eye to slavers or drug dealers operating inside its borders, but their operations were still technically illegal. The condottieri and the rest of Freeport’s legal system wouldn’t help them recover their lost money.
I moved deeper into the slums, eager to help contain the damage, save some lives, and most importantly get a little bit extra spending money. Building and equipping a brand new mage tower was not cheap.
I heard the riot long before I actually saw it: the dull roar of hundreds of beings shouting in anger and storming around the slums, punctuated with occasional crashes, smashes, and the frequent sound of breaking glass. I just hoped I could come up with some way to contain it all once I got on the scene. I’d never tried to fight a riot before.
Pearl Square looked like a warzone. From the shattered remains of a few stalls, I surmised that in better times the plaza was an impromptu marketplace, but any merchandise that had been for sale had already been destroyed or looted. Now the entire plaza was a single heaving mass of bodies, every single one of whom was intent on doing violence to anyone who had the misfortune of being near them. The mob spoke with a single, roaring shout of mingled fury and pain as dozens of individual skirmishes played out at once.
The condottieri were desperately attempting to restore order, arrayed in a tight wedge formation and driving into the huge mob of angry sentients. Some of the slum dwellers were trying their luck against Freeport’s mercenary guards, but that ended about as well as most fights between unarmed civilians and trained, well-equipped professionals usually did. However, for all their skill, the condottieri just didn’t have the numbers to handle this riot. The worst of the mob violence just flowed around them, like a raging river around a small rock.
Most of the rioters weren’t too interested in going up against the guards anyway, on account of being too busy scrambling to pick up the coins that littered the pavement and fighting off anyone else who tried to grab it first. It was a madhouse of constantly shifting violence as every single being fought against anyone they judged a threat or who looked like an easy target. One hippogriff went staggering by with a matronly earth pony mare holding him in a chokehold while trying to rip a couple more coins out of his talons. A motley alliance of youths from half a dozen different races had claimed one corner of the square for themselves, snatching up all the money they could while hurling rocks and bottles at any who dared to approach.
I’d never needed to stop a riot before, so I was at a bit of a loss for what the proper course of action was. Since the rioters weren’t going to give me a couple minutes to think things over, I did what I usually did in situations like this: improvise.
I found the nearest piece of high ground, a podium which by the looks of it had held a statue at one point, then unleashed a massive column of flame straight up into the air. All the heat I was leeching to power that blast of flame coated the entire square with a thin layer of frost. After the initial column, I reshaped the flames into a pair of wings sprouting from my back and threw some ice under my hooves to lift me up even higher over the crowd. For a final dramatic touch, I had my magus robes flare out dramatically while I used a simple bit of light manipulation to make myself glow; to the ignorant masses, it would look like I was radiating a ton of raw magical power.
I took a deep breath and supplemented my words with an old spell that Celestia used to use back when tradition demanded that royalty be deafeningly loud. “EVERYONE CALM THE BUCK DOWN!”
The Traditional Royal Canterlot Voice might be a bit silly for most occasions, but when you want to be heard over the sounds of a huge riot, it’s damn useful.
For a few precious moments, the entire square went still, everyone staring at me in shock. At least I’d made a solid first impression. Now I just needed to follow that up before the shock wore off and someone decided to take a swing at me. I wouldn’t do a very good job of stopping the violence if I got dragged into being a participant.
I targeted the cluster of young bravos, since they were one of the few semi-organized groups within the mob, and would probably be the biggest problem if I didn’t do something to contain them. I mustered every single trick I’d picked up from Celestia to make myself look like an authority figure. “You, over there! Yes, you! Get to work clearing a path for the medics and start gathering up all the wounded.”
They hesitated, so I tossed out another spell to give them some incentive. A dozen foot-long spikes of solid ice shot out, embedding themselves in the pavement near their hooves, talons, or other applicable appendages. “Now!”
They jumped in shock, and any stubborn resolve to resist me out of sheer contrariness crumbled. As they got to work, the rest of the mob began milling about uncertainly. Now that I’d broken the riot’s momentum, none of them seemed quite sure what to do next. I could already see the people on the edges of the crowd starting to drift away, presumably headed back to their homes.
Just when it looked like I finally had things under control, the captain of the condottieri company stepped up forward and shouted out. “Halt! Nobody is to leave this square until we have recovered every single ducat of the stolen currency! You will all be searched, and anyone found holding contraband will be arrested and—”
The rest of whatever he was about to say came to an abrupt end as someone pegged his helmet with a wine bottle. It didn’t look like any broken glass got through his helmet’s visor, but he still got a big faceful of cheap wine. The rest of the condottieri stiffened, and I could see a few of them drawing clubs and readying other weapons. Nothing intended to kill, but they’d leave behind plenty of broken bones. Even worse, there was no telling what the mob would do if the fighting started again, especially if they were all semi-united against the soldiers.
I quickly teleported to the captain’s side. “I admit I’m not an expert on this kind of thing, but maybe we shouldn’t provoke the angry mob that outnumbers us at least twenty-to-one. Disperse them and calm them down first before you worry about the money.”
The condottieri turned to me. I couldn’t make out much of his face behind the helmet—I wasn’t even sure if he was a pony, a zebra, or something else entirely. However, I could see a pair of eyes glaring out at me through his visor. “Magus Shimmer, we appreciate your efforts to help contain this situation, but by our estimates there are over fifty thousand ducats out there that belong to the World’s Port Bank. The bank wants their money back. If we let the crowd disperse, we’ll never recover it.”
Oh great, the money this whole mess had started over belonged to a bank. And not just any bank, but the World’s Port Bank—one of the most prestigious banks that catered only to Freeport’s elite. At least that explained why the captain was being so stupidly stubborn about getting the money back. His future career prospects would be heavily influenced by how satisfied the bank was with his efforts to recover their lost money.
Thankfully, I could appeal to an even higher authority. The highest one, when it came to any mercenary: the ones who signed his paychecks. “What do you think the Council will say if they find out you reignited a riot that could cost several million ducats in damage just to recover fifty thousand? Doesn’t seem like very good economic sense to me. Plus, there would be no way to tell for sure which ducats were stolen from the bank and which ones are legitimate. Imagine the trouble that would stir up if you took someone’s rightful property.”
He thought that over for a bit, then slowly nodded. “You raise reasonable points.” He signalled his troops, and they sheathed their weapons as he turned back to the crowd, raising his voice once more. “Disperse and return to your homes at once! Anyone in possession of the World’s Port Bank’s money should return it at the soonest possible opportunity, and they will be justly rewarded for it.”
Mentioning a reward seemed to be a smart move, since it left the crowd in a much more positive mood than they’d been when he was talking about searching them all. It didn’t take the crowd too long to disperse after that, except for the ones who’d been wounded. I suppose they all wanted to get out of there before the condottieri had a chance to change their minds and start making arrests. Personally, I was just glad the crisis had been resolved without things coming to blows again.
With the mob gone, I could see coins scattered over the streets. Nowhere close to the fifty thousand that the condottieri were looking for, but enough to be noticeable. I was surprised the mob had left anything behind, but I guess it was no surprise that some of the money had gotten lost in the mad scramble. And apparently nobody wanted to risk lingering too long in the square picking up the missed coins for fear of being singled out by the condottieri. Well, more likely it was fear of me. I had made just a bit of an impression with my entrance and all the magic I’d slung around.
The captain sighed and waved his soldiers forward. Some of them went to check on the wounded or establish a cordon, but a bit over half of his mercenaries were hard at work recovering every single bit of the bank’s money they could find. Nice to know what his priorities were.
Once he’d finished passing out orders, the condottieri commander turned back to me. “Magus Shimmer, thank you for your assistance in this matter. I will be sure to mention your contribution in my official report.” He paused, and despite the helmet blocking my view, I could swear he was smiling. “I will also, of course, be sure to mention that it was you suggested that we allow these miscreants to leave with the World’s Port Bank’s money.”
Oh. Well that was sure to make my life a little more complicated. Not that I was going to give the mercenary the pleasure of seeing me sweat. “You tell the bank whatever you think you need to. And make sure your soldiers get every single coin; I bet the bank’ll give you a treat like a good little dog if you get enough of them.”
I could practically hear the condottieri captain’s teeth grinding by the time I was done. That was satisfying. Now I just hoped the Council paid me some sort of bonus for fixing the whole riot and fire situation—I needed some good news out of this whole mess.
With the riot and fire settled, I headed back to my tower for a well-earned shower. My brief sojourn to Sandy Shores had left me with a thin but noticeable layer of grime, sweat, and ash covering my body, and I wanted to get rid of it as soon as possible. I’m not fanatical about hygiene, but once my skin feels gross and sticky I want to get clean. Quickly.
Getting all the plumbing set up had been one of the things that almost made me regret my decision to have my tower made out of obsidian. Volcanic glass is not very easy to run pipes through, especially when that glass tends to produce incredibly sharp edges whenever it’s broken, and in the end I wound up having to pay my plumber more than double the normal rate. Some would say you can’t put a price on style, but it turns out that it costs an extra one thousand, three hundred and seventy-five ducats to have both style and running water.
I groaned and rested my head against one of the black glass walls, closing my eyes and reveling in the feel of water on my skin. The entire riot and fire hadn’t taken up that much time if you went by the clock—only a couple hours, really—but I felt utterly drained by it. I suppose that was no surprise, given how much magic I’d thrown around. Even though I’d been working almost exclusively with my best spells, I have my limits.
I was just finishing up with my shower when somebody started knocking at the front door. I growled a few uncomplimentary things about the knocker’s heritage, then used a quick spell to dry myself off. I retrieved and tossed on a fresh magus robe to replace the one soiled by the riot, then trotted downstairs.
The pony standing in the entryway was a particularly drab, unremarkable brown pegasus stallion. Or at least, that’s what he looked like. “Hello, Puzzle.”
The changeling stepped inside, shedding his disguise with a flash of green fire once he was out of the public eye. “Hello, Sunset. This one has heard that you’ve had quite the busy morning.” He set a small bag down on my coffee table, and I grinned when I heard coins jingling against each other. “The Council appreciates your efforts in ensuring that half the city did not burn down. Even if it is the poorer half of it, Freeport needs its dockworkers and servants too.”
“I appreciate the Council’s appreciation.” Especially since that appreciation came in the form of a sack full of money. I didn’t count it in front of Puzzle; I did remember at least some of the etiquette lessons Celestia had drilled into me. Instead, I led him over to one of my nicer sofas and used my magic to fetch him a glass of water. “So what brings you by? I doubt you walked all the way out to my tower just to deliver some money.”
A faint smile crossed his chitinous lips as he took the glass of water. “As always, the Shimmer-mare is most perceptive. This one is told you are aware of what provoked the riots in Sandy Shores?”
“Kind of,” I confirmed. “I didn’t get the full story, but something about how the World’s Port Bank lost a lot of money in the middle of the slum, and everyone went crazy scrambling to grab it all.”
“That is largely correct, save for one small detail.” Puzzle sipped his water, letting me stew on the unanswered question for a long moment. “They did not lose the money; it was taken from them. And they lost far more than fifty thousand ducats.”
That caught my attention. “Someone robbed the World’s Port Bank? I thought they had a small army of security minotaurs.”
“They do,” Puzzle confirmed. “And many other countermeasures. However, it seems that there was a slight flaw in their security precautions.” He chuckled, setting his glass aside for the moment. “A common oversight in high-security areas, I have found. They spent all their time and money protecting against intelligent, well-equipped adversaries, and were thus caught off guard by someone strong and stupid.” His compound eyes flicked to me. “A unicorn of considerable power simply walked in and waited until they opened the vault to perform a transaction, then blasted the guards, grabbed as much money as she could, and ran for it.”
That got a scoff out of me. “I guess the World’s Port Bank isn’t quite so fearsome as their reputation suggests if a single unicorn could rob the place.” I thought that over for a minute, then amended, “I mean, I could probably bust through a bank vault if I really put my mind to it, but...” I trailed off as a rather worrying possibility sprang to mind. “Oh please don’t tell me I’m the prime suspect for this! I wasn’t anywhere near the bank while it was being robbed!”
“The Shimmer-mare is one of the most prominent and powerful magical practitioners in Freeport,” he answered neutrally. “However, this one will be happy to confirm the Shimmer-mare’s alibi, should that be an issue. Additionally, this one would hope that if she were to rob a bank, she would have the sense to consult with this one first; it could concoct a far more reliable plan. According to this one’s sources, the thief got away with less than one percent of the vault’s contents, and passed up several more valuable objects in favor of grabbing simple twenty-ducat coins.”
“So it’s less like she robbed the bank and more like she picked its pockets.” Not that the bank would be any less offended by that. The World’s Port Bank had a reputation to maintain, and if someone had actually managed to rob them, even if it was a very sloppy robbery, they would be out for blood.
That’s when I figured out why Puzzle was in my tower, talking to me about all this. “Let me guess: the bank’s offering a nice, fat bounty on the robber?”
“Indeed it is.” Puzzle took a moment to finish off his glass of water. “Two hundred thousand ducats, equivalent to the amount stolen. Standard practice. In addition, they have promised to offer additional considerations.”
So even if we recovered every single coin the thief stole, the bank would just break even after paying out the reward. I suppose they stood to lose a lot more money in the long term if someone robbed them and got away with it. That kind of blow to your reputation can have all kinds of consequences.
Regardless, a two hundred thousand ducat bounty sounded just about perfect. “So I guess you’re bringing me in on this since the crook’s a unicorn with enough raw power to smack around a couple minotaur guards?”
“Precisely.” He waved a hoof towards me. “This one could likely capture her unaided, but it would prefer certainty.”
“Makes sense to me.” I wasn’t going to argue with him. I thought it over for a moment, then asked, “You said it was two hundred thousand plus considerations. What kind of considerations?”
Puzzle chuckled. “Oh, being one of the bank’s preferred customers for the rest of your life. This one need not explain that a bank’s gratitude can come in many forms; waived banking fees, better investment options, extremely low-interest loans...”
That sounded almost as tempting as the huge cash reward. If I was smart with my money, I could make more off of the bank’s ‘considerations’ than I would off the reward itself. Not to mention forging connections I would need to reform Freeport in the future.
“Alright, I’m in.” I certainly wasn’t going to turn down a rich bounty like that. Though that did bring one potential complication to mind. “How many others are going to be chasing after the thief?”
“This one expects just about every bounty-hunter and fortune-seeker in Freeport will be doing so,” Puzzle confirmed. “Fortunately, this one has something of an edge over the rest of them. Or at the very least, a slim possibility and good gut instinct.”
“Oh really?” I grinned and leaned in a bit closer. “I guess your information network paid off again, huh?”
“Actually, no.” A faint smirk quirked across his lips. “Or at least, not in the traditional sense. This one was escorting the Heartstrings-mare during a function at the Equestrian Embassy and happened to have a most intriguing conversation with a rather gifted young unicorn mare who possessed some rather ... radical beliefs. In particular, she was severely offended by the extreme inequality within Freeport.”
It didn’t take long to connect the dots from there. “Somepony robs the richest bank in Freeport, then drops a huge chunk of the stolen cash right in the middle of the poorest part of town a short time later. I can see the connection.” A moment later the other horseshoe dropped. “And everyone else investigating this will probably assume the bank robber just lost the money while running to a hideout in the slums.” Sandy Shores was where most of the city’s criminals went when they needed to lie low for a while, after all.
“Precisely,” he confirmed. “And few would think that the thief was the privileged daughter of two wealthy merchants. And the amateurish nature of the crime is more consistent with a young idealist than a hardened criminal mastermind.”
I thought it over for a bit and decided to play Nightmare’s advocate. “Still, you’re basing all of this off of one conversation with a mare who didn’t like the inequality in Freeport. Except a lot of ponies don’t like how things are here. Hay, I don’t like it, and unless I miss my guess you’re not a huge fan of it either.”
“You raise a valid point.” He paused, rubbing his chin as he thought it over. “This one supposes it has little in the way of solid evidence. It is more a matter of ... gut instinct.” He shrugged. “Still, it provides us a unique angle of investigation, rather than joining the dozens of bounty hunters who will be swarming over the slums searching for a hideout. If nothing comes of it, we will not have wasted much time.”
“Fair enough, then.” If we joined in on the general scramble in the slums, finding the robber before anyone else would be as much a matter of luck as skill. Not to mention that, just like I’d seen during the riots where everyone fought over the coins, we might end up fighting other hunters who were after the bounty and wanted to eliminate the competition. “Alright, so let’s check out this lead of yours. Does she have a name?”
“Yes,” he answered. “Starlight Glimmer.”
Puzzle led the way to the rather impressive mansion owned by the Glimmer family. Puzzle had given me a quick run-down of the family history on the way over. The Glimmers were relatively new to Freeport, and also relatively new to high society. Golden Glimmer, the patriarch of the family, had just been an ordinary citizen until the day he purchased a ticket in the Freeport Lottery and got lucky. Surprisingly, he had the good sense to invest his money wisely instead of spending it all on pointless luxuries, and he now ran a very profitable import/export business.
The one exception to his business sense was his daughter, Starlight. According to Puzzle, she’d been to several very expensive and quite prestigious boarding schools, but hadn’t lasted too long at any of them. Her father doted on her, giving her all the things he’d been deprived of during his own childhood.
I frowned over at the changeling, now back in his brown pegasus disguise. “So you really think our bank robber is a spoiled daddy’s girl? That doesn’t track for me.”
“My instincts have rarely led me astray.” I’d been spending too much time around Puzzle; even though I knew it was part of the disguise, the shift away from ‘this one’ still didn’t sit right with me. He paused, a faint smile crossing his lips. “I should mention that she attended Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns, prior to her removal for disciplinary issues. And her grades were exemplary from what I have been able to determine, so she would have the skills needed for the crime. However, she was prone to losing her temper whenever certain social issues were discussed.”
“Ugh, she’s one of those types.” Puzzle shot a curious glance my way, and I did my best to explain. “You know—the kind of ponies who seem like intelligent, perfectly ordinary individuals until That One Thing comes up. Then they just completely lose their cool and start ranting and raving, and won’t shut up about it.”
“Ah, of course.” He turned to me, a teasing light in his eyes. “Such as a mare who is quite certain she deserves to be an alicorn princess and will not ever cease stating as much.”
I glared at him. “I can hurt you.”
“You are most cruel, and terribly lacking in any capacity to enjoy self-deprecating humor.” He let that hang in the air for a moment, then chuckled and shook his head. “In any case, I would say that your assessment is correct. Starlight was charming and personable, but once the topic of Freeport’s economic inequality was broached...”
“She went psycho on you,” I finished for him.
“I would not put it in those precise terms,” he answered diplomatically.
“But it is pretty much what happened.” I gave the house a quick once-over, looking for any back doors or other escape routes. “So what’s the plan for now? I assume it’s something more sophisticated than just walking up to her and asking if she did it.”
“I like to think I operate with slightly more finesse than that,” he confirmed. “Though I do not think it will be that complicated. If she is responsible, I do not think that the Glimmer-mare would care to hide the fact. Her personal pride as well as her antipathy for Freeport’s inequality will make her want to take credit for her actions. I believe that with the right prompting, she will say enough to incriminate herself.”
“And after that it’s just a matter of arresting her and finding where she stashed the rest of the money.” I grinned and rolled my shoulders. “I’m guessing you brought me along to help with the arresting part of that plan.”
“Indeed.” He smirked at me. “You are my dumb muscle.”
“Hey!” Puzzle seemed to be in a really snarky mood today. I blame it on the fact that he’d gone on a date with Strumming Heartstrings. “I’m smart muscle, thank you very much!”
The changeling chuckled and nodded. “I will concede the point for the sake of maintaining harmony within our current business arrangement.” He waved the matter away, and threw in a little careful flattery. “In any case, I thought it prudent to bring Freeport’s only official magus when confronting a unicorn powerful enough to successfully rob the World’s Port Bank, however amateurishly it was done.”
“So I guess I’ll get to show her the difference between a full-fledged magus and a unicorn with a bit of talent, power, and training? Sounds fun.” I’d come up with a few new tricks since my escape from the EIS, and I won’t deny that I was rather eager to get a chance to properly try them out yet.
“Indeed. I think it rather unlikely that she will agree to come quietly.”
“Her mistake.” I have to admit, I was looking forward to the fight. It’s not like I’m obsessed with combat or anything, but I really wanted to try out some of my new spells in the field.
“Quite.” Puzzle led the way across a nicely maintained yard, towards the mansion itself. Though using the term ‘mansion’ seemed a touch generous. The home had clearly been designed by an architect who had passing familiarity with all the features of a proper mansion, but little understanding of how all those features were supposed to come together as part of a single cohesive whole. Windows, columns, and other design elements had all been slapped onto the home in seemingly random places, and the red brick facade did a poor job of hiding the cheap slate cladding covering the sides and rear of the house. There was a large stained-glass window on the second floor that looked painfully out of place, and a large archway over the front door that clearly should have contained a window, yet for some reason did not.
Puzzle let out a disdainful sniff. “My home is far more tasteful.”
“Mine too.” Admittedly, a solid black featureless glass tower was a bit non-traditional, but it was unusual in a good way. Striking and bold, not something that was desperately attempting to emulate the appearance of wealth and class while operating on a budget.
My tower also didn’t look like a tornado had struck a supply depot. It’s the little things that make a house a home.
The changeling sighed. “However, we’re not here to be architecture critics.” He stepped up to the front door and rapped a hoof against it.
After several seconds, a refined zebra in a butler’s uniform answered the door. “Yes? Can I help you?”
“Good day,” Puzzle greeted with a polite smile. “I am Fair Share, and my associate here is Miss Even Slice. We are here representing the Freeport Equality Commission. We were hoping to speak to Miss Starlight Glimmer about joining our organization. Is she available?”
The butler stiffened, frowning down at us. “Do you have an appointment? Madam Glimmer is a very busy young mare.”
“We do not,” Puzzle admitted. The butler began to close the door, but Puzzle quickly got in the last word. “However, we believe that Miss Glimmer would be very interested in speaking with us, regardless. It would be most unfortunate if she felt she were unfairly denied an opportunity to discuss the future of Freeport with us.”
The zebra hesitated, and I could see the thoughts flashing through his mind. On the one hoof, he didn’t want to let some random ponies with no credentials in; on the other, if Starlight found out that he’d blocked her from meeting with someone who shared her personal obsession, he could be in for weeks of grief from her. Eventually, fear of his mistress’s wrath won over propriety. “Very well then. I shall inform Madam Glimmer of your presence at once.” He opened the door, revealing a ridiculously oversized and painfully bare foyer. “Please wait here.”
Puzzle entered with a gracious smile. “Thank you very much, sir. We promise not to take up too much of your mistress’s time.”
The butler nodded and immediately trotted up a nearby staircase. As he left, I clearly heard him mutter under his breath, “It’s not you I’m worried about.”
The two of us didn’t have to wait very long for the lady of the house to put in an appearance. A unicorn mare who looked a couple years younger than me trotted down the stairs quickly enough to betray her eagerness, grabbing Puzzle’s hoof and enthusiastically shaking it. “Hi! Nice to meet you. I’m Starlight Glimmer. I’ve never heard of the Freeport Equality Commission before, but if you’re working to make things fairer for everypony in Freeport then I’d just love to help you in whatever way I can.”
Puzzle returned her hoofshake, though I noted a carefully concealed grimace at how hard she was pumping his forearm. “It is our pleasure to meet you. The Freeport Equality Commission is a relatively new organization, and we’re still recruiting members and formulating our mission statement. Our goal is to address the severe economic and social inequalities within Freeport. Several individuals spoke quite highly of you and told us you would be interested in our cause.”
“Oh, definitely.” She trotted over to me, and I was subjected to the same vigorous hoofshake. “I’m just glad I finally met somepony who agrees with me about the terrible inequality within Freeport. It’s completely intolerable!” She led us into her home’s parlour, which looked surprisingly classy compared to the rest of the house. There were several comfortable looking couches, a chandelier, statues in each of the room’s four corners, a bookcase filled with a reasonably impressive selection, and a large picture window looking out over Freeport. Starlight trotted over to the window, angrily waving at the city outside. “Look at this! We’re surrounded by mansions that cost enough money to feed a dozen families for a year! Just across the water from us is Sandy Shores, where entire families are living in two-room shacks! It’s just wrong!”
I rather pointedly looked around Starlight’s grossly oversized home. “If you’ll forgive me for saying so, it seems rather unusual that you’re so dedicated to the cause of equality while living in a mansion in one of Freeport’s wealthiest neighborhoods.”
Starlight snorted angrily, fixing me with a furious glare. A second later she closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and then she was all smiles again. “Yes, well, my father’s good fortune just adds more weight to my point. My family isn’t wealthy because we’re better than the poor or some horseapples like that, it’s because he got lucky and won the lottery. That’s the only thing that separates the rich from the poor: pure luck.”
She started pacing back and forth in front of the window, growling under her breath. “And don’t think that just because we have money my family is part of the elite. They never miss a chance to remind me that I’m new money.” She shifted to a haughty, disdainful aristocratic voice for those last two words. “I don’t have a long, illustrious family history, so as far as they’re concerned I’m just an up-jumped peasant! Like it really matters that my ancestors weren’t rich and famous!
“Besides, have you looked at the histories of some of the old bluebloods?” Her volume picked up a bit more as she devolved into full-on ranting. “Freeport’s full of old established trading firms that are just so proud of their family history, and their stupid little fights over who owns what island. And all the mercenary groups that talk about their noble history and grand accomplishments when they’re really nothing more than hired goons working to prop up the elites! It’s horrible! And yet they treat me like dirt, just because my family hasn’t been rich for as long as theirs has!”
She whirled back to face us, glaring as if this was all our fault. “And don’t get me started on all the noble families back in Equestria! The Polarises love to talk about how they’re supposedly descended from the old Unicornian royal family, but when was the last time any of them ever did anything worth talking about? And then there’s the Sparkles! Nine hundred years of service to the crown ... but their ancient and noble house was founded by a sociopathic, power-hungry child-killer!”
I had to grit my teeth to resist the urge to say something about that. After all, the Shimmers were another one of Canterlot’s old, established families. Hay, that pot-shot against the Sparkles had been a bit close to home for me, since our families were distantly related—not to mention I was something of an admirer of Sunbeam Sparkle, who was the ‘sociopathic child-killer’ Starlight had mentioned. Though I preferred to focus on the fact that she was also the greatest pyromancer of her age and an accomplished politician and reformer.
Starlight was on far too much of a roll to pick up on the fact that she was getting on my nerves. “What makes them think they’re better than me? They’re not! But I was never invited to any of those fancy old money parties, or allowed into any of the good cliques! Would you actually believe that—”
Puzzle must have picked up on my mood, or maybe he was just getting tired of listening to Starlight rant. “I agree with everything you’ve said, but it’s not enough to point out the injustices of society. We have to take action to fix them.”
“Yeah, action!” Starlight agreed, nodding enthusiastically. Apparently she didn’t mind being interrupted as long as somepony was agreeing with her.
“We need to do something extreme,” I chimed in. “Really shake things up, make everyone pay attention to the cause.”
“Exactly!” she all but shouted. “They’ll never take us seriously until we make them! And when it comes to rich snobs exploiting the poor, there’s only one thing they really care about.”
“Money,” Puzzle concluded, barely containing his smile as he emulated her fiery enthusiasm. “That’s why you robbed the richest bank in Freeport and passed the money out to the poor.”
“You’re damn right I did!” she crowed triumphantly. “You should have seen how many ducats they had just sitting there uselessly in that vault, when they could’ve been using all that money to help poor families who needed it. Nobody’s gonna be able to ignore that!”
Huh. So Puzzle was right about her being the thief. I guess that’s why he’s the best information broker in Freeport. And sure enough, all we’d needed to do was give Starlight an approving audience and she’d gleefully taken credit for everything.
Now that she’d confessed, I figured it was about time to put an end to the charade. I certainly didn’t want to suffer through any more of her equalist ranting. I drew myself up to my full height and put on my best authority figure voice. “Starlight Glimmer, by my authority as a Magus of Freeport, I am placing you under arrest for the robbery of the World’s Port Bank, and for inciting a riot in Sandy Shores that resulted in numerous injuries and significant destruction of property.”
Her jaw dropped in shock. “I—you—WHAT?!” She opened and closed her mouth a few times, a strangled gasping sound emitting from her throat. “But ... but you said...”
“We lied.” I pulled a suppression ring out of my saddlebag. “Now, are we going to do this the easy way, or the hard way?” Out of the corner of my eye I noticed Puzzle quietly slipping out of the room, which gave me a pretty good idea what the answer would be.
Starlight’s lips peeled back from her teeth in a positively feral snarl, and her horn began glowing. “You lied to me! You came into my home, pretended to be my friend, and tricked me! How about I shove your face into the dirt?!”
I lit my own horn, answering her rage with a cool, confident smile. “I was hoping you'd go for the hard way. It's more fun.”
The two of us started slowly circling each other. “Oh it's not going to be fun,” Starlight shot back. “It's going to be a blast!”
She opened the duel by firing a blast of kinetic force from her horn. I was slightly disappointed she was using something so basic; energy blasts are the first combat spell any unicorn learns. I’d been hoping she might actually present a challenge.
I drew the heat out of the air between us, conjuring a sheet of solid ice to intercept her attack. I got my defense up in time to block her strike, but to my surprise the blast shattered my wall when it hit. My respect for her went up a notch; she might not have opened with a very high-level spell, but there had been plenty of raw power behind it.
A moment later I launched my counterattack, using the heat I’d leeched out for my ice wall to send a fireball hurtling at her face. Starlight answered with another energy blast which met my fire halfway. The two spells crashed together, and when neither of them had enough force to overwhelm the other they both deflected. My fireball scorched a hole through the large window, while Starlight’s energy blast shredded one of the couches.
I sat back and watched her for a moment after that exchange. She might not have shown off any fancy spellwork yet, but she definitely had enough raw power to be a threat. She might even be Alpha-level. It would certainly explain how she’d been able to brute force her way past the bank’s security. I still held the advantage, though; after all, she hadn’t been trained by Princess Celestia. For that matter, she hadn’t even finished a proper magical education.
Starlight let out a frustrated scream, and I could hear her teeth grinding from across the room. She’d probably never gone up against another unicorn who could match her raw power before. “Is that all you’ve got?!” she snarled. “‘Cause I’m just getting started!” She telekinetically lifted up all four of the statues, then hurled three of them at me. She kept the fourth in reserve, presumably to toss at me if I dodged the others.
“So am I.” I teleported away a moment before the statues would’ve hit me, reappearing right behind Starlight. Then I fired a twinned beam of fire and ice directly at her back.
Unfortunately, Starlight was smart enough to guess where I had reappeared, and quickly whirled around to face me. Her eyes widened when she saw my incoming attack, and she barely managed to throw up a hemisphere barrier of green energy in time to block it. Electricity crackled along her shield as our energies clashed with one another. My clashing fire and ice beams produced a cloud of superheated steam that would’ve punched through many conventional magical shields, but it seemed that Starlight’s spell was sophisticated enough to deal with that too.
Now that her attention was fully focused on defending herself from my main attack, I tried for another strike from behind. I snatched up a nearby bookcase and pulled it towards her.
Starlight must have anticipated that too, because the one statue she still had a telekinetic grip on hurled into the bookcase, smashing it apart. Thankfully, the statue itself was apparently made of cheap plaster instead of authentic stone, and it fell to pieces as well. Starlight let out a frustrated snarl, and I broke off my attack. We went back to watching and circling, considering our options and looking for a weakness to exploit.
Starlight’s eyes flicked over myself and my cutie mark, and a knowing smile appeared on her face. “I know who you are now! I didn’t recognize you at first, but it’s not like there are that many ponies in Freeport who throw around fire and can use one of Princess Celestia’s personal spells. Nopony else can teleport like that. You’re Sunset Shimmer, aren’t you?”
“Guilty as charged.” I threw out a tiny burst of flame to test her reaction time, and she batted it aside with a contemptuous flick of her horn. “I guess I should be flattered that you know who I am. Then again, maybe you don’t really know me, since you aren't anywhere close to being scared enough.”
“What’s there to be scared of?” she scoffed. “You’re not so tough. I guess Celestia didn’t do a very good job of teaching you—after all, you wound up here.” Her eyes flicked around the room, looking for something else to use against me, but our clash had rather thoroughly demolished everything except the floor and walls. “And now listen to you, thinking you're so good because the Council gave you some fancy title.” She barked out a mocking laugh. “A Freeport Magus? That's about the emptiest title I’ve ever heard of, and the Council loves selling empty titles.”
With a grunt of effort, she magically ripped a dozen tiles loose from the floor, and set them all spinning dangerously fast. “Maybe after I take you out, the Council will ask me to be their next pet magus. It’d be fun to see the looks on their faces when I tell them that they can take their stupid titles and shove them up their collective asses!”
“Not really,” I countered. “They all wear masks, so you wouldn’t be able to see how shocked and indignant they looked.” I took another step to the side, and Starlight mirrored my move, keeping herself directly opposite from me. That normally would have been a good move, since it kept me from flanking her, but what she had failed to notice was that her latest shift of position placed her directly underneath the parlour’s massive chandelier.
I fired a quick blast into the roof, knocking loose the chandelier and a decent-sized chunk of the surrounding ceiling. Several hundred pounds of assorted debris came loose, all plummeting directly towards Starlight Glimmer.
She closed her eyes and concentrated, and managed to catch the chandelier and most of the larger chunks of falling ceiling before they connected. She took a few minor hits, including a shallow but painful-looking gash down the length of her nose. Her mane and face were covered in the powdered remnants of the parlour’s ceiling, but she was still very much in the fight. Her eyes snapped open, and she smirked at me. “You think anypony’s impressed by your reputation? Please. I'm not seeing anything to be scared of.”
She feinted at throwing a bit of debris at me, then caught me off guard by switching things up and using something a with bit more finesse than the blunt force attacks she’d tried before. It was a simple light spell, but so overcharged that it all but blinded me. I closed my eyes as soon as I realized what she was doing, but it wasn’t fast enough.
“Augh!” I knew she would take advantage of my temporary blindness, so I quickly threw a solid dome of ice around myself. Hopefully that would be enough to keep me safe until my eyes recovered. Moments after I got my defenses up, the floor and my ice dome groaned in protest as Starlight dropped all the debris she’d gathered on top of it.
Despite the huge mound of rubble sitting on top of my shield, I could hear Starlight cackling gleefully as she piled more and more weight onto my dome. I could already hear the ice straining and cracking as she slowly increased the pressure on it. I desperately blinked and rubbed at my eyes, trying to get all the spots out. I didn’t have much longer to recover, and I didn’t like my odds of fighting her without working eyes.
Starlight let out another mocking laugh. “What's the matter? That fancy-shmancy special talent of yours not holding up when you can't just burn your way out of a problem?” I could dimly see the rubble surrounding my shield glowing with her magic, and then she made it all start spinning, grinding away at my ice dome. “That's the problem with being a specialist: you start counting on your cutie mark spells to take care of everything, so you don’t have any variety. Oh, and before you get any bright ideas about getting away...”
A moment later I groaned as I felt a new spell settle into place. She’d just put up a dimensional lockdown ward. It was crude and overcharged like every other spell she’d used, but it would keep me from teleporting for the next couple minutes. Not good, when I’d been planning on teleporting out of the ice dome she had me trapped underneath.
“I’ve got everything I need to crush you like a bug!” Starlight crowed triumphantly. “Focusing on your special talent just made you weak!”
“Horseapples,” I growled, trying to come up with a good way out of the corner I’d backed myself into. Without teleportation, I had no choice but to try and bash my way through the attack. I quickly wrapped a second layer of ice around myself like a suit of armor. Right as the ice dome crumbled I hurled a blast of fire directly to the rear, propelling myself forwards through the wave of debris rushing in to crush me. I managed to punch my way through it all without getting pulverized or skewered, but even with the ice armor I was picking up a lovely collection of future bruises.
My landing on the other side of the parlour was rough, and it took me a couple seconds to get back to my hooves. Starlight wasted any potential opening she might’ve had by ridiculing me. “Oooh! Look at big, bad Magus Sunset Shimmer.” She let out mocking chortle. “Pyromancer extraordinaire, and personal student of the great Princess Celestia! And now, just a stupid dupe working for the Council.” She finally stopped grandstanding long enough to throw a blast at me. “Well if you want to stand with the Council and against equality and justice, then you can burn with them!”
I blocked the blast with another ice shield, then countered with a fireball that splashed uselessly against her shield. “You must be really fond of the sound of your own voice,” I growled, “because you talk way too much.”
“Does the truth hurt?” she shot back with a nasty smile. “I can’t believe you fell so far. Look at you—you’re just a two-bit thug working to preserve a decadent, corrupt, oppressive regime!”
I admit, she was starting to get on my nerves. That’s why I decided to give her a taste of her own medicine. “Well at least I graduated from Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns. Too bad you couldn’t cut it, but they only take the best.”
“Shut up!” she screamed, hurling a blast at me that punched a large hole through the wall. “That stupid school wasn’t any good anyway! It’s just a snobby club for the Canterlot elite to get together and feel good about themselves. A bunch of rich, snobby unicorns who think they're special because they were born to the right family or have a bit more magical muscle than everypony else! Besides, my grades were fine. They just threw me out because they felt threatened by me! I wouldn’t go along with all their horseapples about how the students there were better than everypony else!”
Well well well, it looked like I’d touched a nerve. Time to see what I could do with that. “Hate to break it to you, but I am better than everypony else. I’m smarter, more talented, and more magically gifted. I was Celestia's personal student, for pony’s sake!” I threw out a relatively harmless spark of electricity that popped her right on the nose. “Really, you're just an unimportant nopony by comparison. Probably why I never heard of you when you were going to the School for Gifted Unicorns. But you heard all about me, didn’t you?”
Starlight snarled and blew out half of the front facade of the mansion with her next blast. I was starting to get a bit worried that the whole building might collapse on top of us. I think she was too pissed to notice or care about details like that, though. “Oh, you think you're all special just because you were taught by a pony with both wings and a horn? What did you even do to deserve that? Was it just because you were born to the right family?”
“Nah, like I said, she picked me because I'm smarter, stronger, and all around better than you.” I advanced a step closer. “You know, you had to have gone to the school for gifted unicorns around the same time I did. We might have even had a class or two together.”
“We did,” Starlight growled. “Advanced Evocation Theory.”
“Oh yeah, Professor Sculpted Staff’s class.” She had been one of my favorite instructors aside from Celestia, though part of that was because I was a very good evoker. “I guess that just goes to prove my point, though: you remembered being in a class with me, but I don’t even remember you. At all. Probably because you weren’t worth remembering. Just another nopony.”
Starlight’s teeth clenched. “Oh buck you! You're just some stooge of the Council now. They'll use you and throw you away someday, just like they do all the other rich idiots that curry their favor. And I'm way out of your league. Without your pyromancy and special talent, I’d take you down just like any other unicorn!”
I answered her with cold smile. “Oh, you think fire is all I can do?” I grinned and stretched out. “Fine then. If you wanna see something new, then I'll show you something new.”
I cast a spell, and the room plunged into complete darkness. A second later I shifted my own vision to the infrared spectrum, allowing me to clearly see Starlight’s body heat. I wouldn’t be able to see any of the debris that littered the floor around us, but at least I wasn’t as blind as she was.
Starlight briefly stumbled in confusion after I’d turned out the lights, then hastily put up a shield to cover herself from any attacks. After that she tried a light spell, which was the absolute worst thing she could’ve possibly done. My own working instantly started draining away the power of her light spell, giving me even more to work with.
The other unicorn grimaced, and while it’s hard to make out facial expressions while you’re using heat vision, I’m pretty sure she was nervous. Her voice gave it away a second later. “What are you doing?!”
I grinned, though it was wasted when she couldn’t see it. “You wanted to see something new, didn't you? Well here you go!”
I’d gotten started on the theory for this new spell about four months back, when I’d figured out a couple things about what my cutie mark meant while I was hanging out in a graveyard. (Long story.) The point is, I’d realized I had a real knack for manipulating diametrically opposed types of magic. Up to that point I’d only really worked with fire and ice, since I’d assumed that fire was my special talent and anyone familiar with Sunbeam’s First Law of Pyromancy knows that fire and ice are just two sides of the same coin. However, after my little moment of revelation I’d started branching out a little bit more.
For example, darkness and light: just like I removed all the heat from an area to create ice while concentrating that heat to produce fire, now I was ripping all the light out of a specific area to create a zone of darkness while also concentrating all that light into a single very, very powerful beam. And now that Starlight had tossed in a light spell that I’d also absorbed, my attack would have a bit of her magic mixed in with it.
One fun fact about most magical shield spells is they don’t block your own magic. If they did, the shield spell would come into conflict with itself and collapse. Not to mention using any offensive spells would require dropping your own defenses.
Starlight was trying to blindly navigate the room by memory, and not doing a very good job of it. In her defense, we’d rearranged things quite a bit by blowing all the furniture up. As one foreleg blindly tried to find a wall that didn’t exist anymore she called out, “You said you were gonna show me something new, but how am I supposed to see it when you’ve turned off the lights? Sheesh, you really are a dolt!”
“Good point.” I’d pulled in about as much light as I could keep concentrated and under control, so it was time to cut that spell and hit her anyway. I was still getting used to the spell, and I didn’t want to risk losing control over it and ruining all this wonderful buildup.
Starlight blinked in shock as I stopped drawing in light and she could suddenly see again. A second later her eyes went wide as dinner plates when she saw the intense ball of light building up around my horn. Thankfully, she tried reinforcing her shield instead of dodging it. Not that one can dodge light, but she certainly could’ve dodged my aim. I might’ve missed, or accidentally put a hole through her brain.
Instead, my laser shot right through her shield and drilled a neat, precise little hole right through her horn. Starlight’s shield spell instantly collapsed, and the mare quickly followed suit, clutching her damaged horn and shrieking in pain. My own horn gave a sympathetic little twinge when I noticed a small trickle of blood leaking out from both ends of the hole.
Starlight grimaced and slowly pawed around the hole I’d put in her horn, trying to get an idea of how bad the damage was. She jerked her hooves back when she touched a bit too close the damaged area, then gasped in horror when she saw the blood staining them. “M-my horn! You hurt my horn! I might never be able to use magic again! You monster!”
I quickly buried any sympathy; I rather doubt Starlight would’ve had any for me if the situation had been reversed. “Oh, stop crying. The hole in your horn's not that big. It'll heal up and you'll get your magic back in a couple months.” I trotted over to the downed unicorn and put a suppression ring on her, just to be safe. “You’d almost won my respect by giving me a good fight, but now you’re whining like a big baby. Besides, you were trying to kill me. I think taking away your magic for a little bit is letting you off easy.”
I conjured up some ice manacles and got to work securing them around Starlight’s legs. She flinched as I attached icy chains to her. “Come on, you can’t do this!” A hint of desperation crept into her voice. “Th—This isn't right. I didn't do anything wrong!”
“You didn’t?” I shot her a cold, disbelieving smile. “That’s funny, last time I checked robbing a bank, starting a riot, and resisting arrest were all against the law.”
“The same laws that turned Freeport into the unequal, unfair mess that it is now?” she shot right back.
“And your way’s so much better?” I snapped. “Celestia only knows how many ponies got hurt fighting over that money you tossed into the slums. How many families lost their homes? Plus, you wrecked a market square full of vendors just trying to make an honest living.” I threw a piercing gaze her way.
“The whole reason those riots happened is because Freeport’s such a mess to begin with!” Starlight snarled. “If the poor ponies of Sandy Shores started fighting over the money, it was because they’re desperate! Whose fault do you think that was? The same Council you’re defending! If everyone had an equal share, they wouldn’t be fighting over money! Inequality is the fundamental cause of every single conflict in the history of the world!”
“And you really think stealing from the rich and giving to the poor would fix that?” I scoffed and rolled my eyes. “The problem with your whole equality idea is that if you handed out an equal share of money to everyone some of them would use it wisely, and some of them wouldn’t.” I grinned as a wonderfully fitting example came to mind. “Just look at what happened with your father: while most ponies who suddenly get a ton of cash dropped in their laps end up losing most of it buying a bunch of stuff they don’t need, your dad had the sense to invest that money and use it to build something that would last.” I yanked on her chains just a little bit to make sure she was paying attention. “Even if you gave everyone equal money, it wouldn’t change anything in the long term because not all ponies are equal. Like how I’m smarter, more magically talented, and better-looking than you.”
“Well everypony should be equal! I’ll make them equal!” Starlight shouted, straining against her manacles with an almost mad light in her eyes. “What gives you the right to be smarter or more talented or—”
I slapped a silence spell over her before she could get any further. I have to admit, it was kind of funny to look at her ranting and raving without hearing a single word she was saying. Once she’d settled down a bit and gone from shouting to just glaring sullenly, I dropped the spell. “Oh, and there’s another problem with your whole equality thing: not everyone’s going to be content with having an equal share. Some ponies just aren’t happy unless they have more. And speaking of greed, I couldn’t help but notice that you only gave away about a quarter of what you stole. What’d you do with the rest of the money?”
Starlight sneered at me as I hauled her up to her hooves. “Pfft. Why should I tell you anything?”
“Because the World’s Port Bank wants their money back,” I answered, taking a moment to make sure the chains didn’t get tangled up as she stood. “You cooperate in returning the rest of it, and they’ll go a little easier on you. If they don’t get it back ... well, you’re probably going to be in jail for a very, very long time.”
She nearly tripped over her own hooves at that. “I—I can’t go to jail!” She hesitated for a moment, then crumbled. “It's in my room, hidden in a safe under my bed. I already spent some of it, though.”
“Oh really?” I smirked and nudged her along, hoping that there was still a staircase in good enough condition to get us to her bedroom. “So the Robin Hoof act only applies to a quarter of what you steal while you keep for yourself?”
Starlight bristled in fury. “It’s not like that! I just have to maintain a basic standard of living! I can’t help anypony else unless I take care of myself! Everypony else already had a Golden Brooch dress, so it’s fine for me to use some of the money to get one for myself too!”
I didn’t know much about clothes, but even I recognized that name. “Oh. Right. Of course everypony else has a five thousand ducat dress. I know those families that can barely afford food and shelter—you know, the ones you claim to care so much about—always have a closet full of expensive designer clothes. How many families do you suppose that dress could’ve fed?”
“Oh shut up,” she growled. “I needed that dress! Besides, after everything I’ve done to help the common pony, I think I earned a small—”
I rolled my eyes and threw another silence spell over her. I was really getting tired of her horseapples.
Thankfully I didn’t have to deal with her for too much longer. Apparently after Puzzle had pulled off his disappearing act, he’d gone to fetch some condottieri to take Starlight into custody. And probably get a head-start explaining what was going on with our magic duel. The whole confrontation had been rather noticeable, though thankfully there hadn’t been any collateral damage.
Puzzle, now once more in his natural form, looked over the shattered remnants of the Glimmer family mansion. “This one suspects that the building, or rather what is left of it, will have to be condemned and torn down.”
“In my defense, Starlight caused most of the structural damage.” I pointed to one of the blown-out walls. “If it was my fault, the building would be on fire too.”
The changeling chuckled and nodded, conceding the point. “This one is certain that assurance will be a great comfort to Golden Glimmer when he learns that his home has been destroyed and his daughter arrested.”
“Oh.” I felt a brief pang of sympathy for Starlight’s father. “Wow, he just had a really rotten day, didn’t he?” Then again, he was probably at least partially responsible for how Starlight had turned out, and his house had been pretty ugly.
That brought my prisoner to mind, who was currently being hauled away by a rather large condottieri escort. “So what’s gonna happen to her, anyway?”
Puzzle thought that over for a moment, then shrugged. “Normally, this one would say she would be spending much of her remaining life in prison. However, her father is wealthy, influential, and loves his daughter very much. This one expects that bribes will be paid, favors called in, and concessions made. In that case, perhaps a suspended sentence and community service, or simply exile back to Equestria.”
That got a bitter chuckle out of me. “Isn’t that ironic? She was so pissed off about how unfair and corrupt Freeport is, but now she’s counting on all that privilege and money to get her out of the hole she dug herself into.”
The changeling nodded, a faint smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “In this one’s experience, one’s principles often become much more flexible when faced with the threat of extended imprisonment. One might do many things that once seemed unthinkable, such as rely on the very system one dislikes for protection.” He paused, shifting his gaze fully to me. “Or resorting to the use of dark magic.”
That hit a little closer to home than I cared for. “I’m not like that self-centered little bitch,” I snarled. “I’m not saying I’m perfect, but ... well ... I never robbed a bank, claimed I was doing it for the good of the common pony, then kept most of the money for myself.” I may be a cynical amoral mercenary selling my services to a corrupt regime, but at least I’m not a hypocrite.
The more I thought about what had happened with Starlight, the more it pissed me off. That’s what prompted me to make a decision. “You know what? I think I’ll donate the money from this job to whatever charity’s gonna be fixing up Sandy Shores. Somepony needs to do something to actually help the poor in this city, so it might as well be me.”
Puzzle was silent for several seconds after that. I think I’d actually managed to surprise him for once. When he finally answered, his tone was surprisingly lighthearted. “This one believes the Shimmer-mare means she will donate half of the pay for this job. This one intends to collect its share of the bounty and is not afflicted with such charitable impulses.”
“Hold on a minute.” I stepped in front of the changeling, meeting his eyes. “Exactly how do you figure you earned an equal share of the reward? I seem to remember you slipping out of the room as soon as you realized Starlight and I were going to get into a fight.”
“This one requested your services specifically to apprehend the mare if she proved to be guilty.” Puzzle countered mildly. “And it feels compelled to point out that if not for its information, the Shimmer-mare would never have thought to investigate Starlight Glimmer in connection with the robbery. And that it was this one who secured her confession.”
“I’m not saying you didn’t help,” I assured him. “But I’m the one who nearly got blasted, crushed, and skewered while you were running away to safety. I figure I deserve a little extra for the hazard pay. Balms for bruises, and all that. You want an equal share of the money, you can take an equal share of the risks.”
“This one has found it far more profitable to avoid placing itself in danger of losing life and limb whenever possible,” he returned. “And if this one had involved itself in the Shimmer-mare’s fight with the Glimmer-mare, you would be complaining that I denied you the chance to beat her fairly by yourself. This one was only attempting to preserve the Shimmer-mare’s pride by withdrawing from the battlefield.”
“Yeah, yeah, you’re all heart.” I rolled my eyes. “So ... split the reward seventy-thirty?”
“Equal shares,” Puzzle insisted stubbornly. “Though this one wonders why the Shimmer-mare is arguing so strongly for more money when she intends to give it all away regardless.”
“It’s the principle of the thing.”
Puzzle stared at me for a long moment, then sighed and resignedly shook his head. “Perhaps this one should have agreed to simply donate the full sum to charity, so that it would be spared the unceasing argument over how much its share would be.”
“My heart bleeds for you,” I assured him, unamused by his Drama Changeling antics. “Maybe you shouldn’t give the money away after all. Instead you can use some of it to buy the world’s smallest violin and play sad songs for yourself.”
“Perhaps this one will. It needs some solace from the ruthless mercenary nature of its partner.”
“I’m giving my pay to charity, and I’m a ruthless mercenary?”
We kept on bickering about how to divide the pay for the rest of the trip back to the World’s Port Bank. Helpful as all that money would’ve been, it felt good to use it for something altruistic, even if I was doing it partially to spite Starlight Glimmer.
