Origin Story

This isn’t going to end well.

I never wanted to be here again. Tenochtitlan Basin. The Temple of the Quetzalcóatl Empress. The last time I was here, the Cult of the Quetzalcóatl Empress had stolen the Griffin’s Goblet, and were using it to summon forth the Dark Empress’ power. Blanketed the entire basin with Her dark magic. Before Ahuizotl started to make his move.

I remember the fight on the rock bridge, above the Kutengwa Abyss. Somewhere down in the bowels of that horrible chasm is the Griffin’s Goblet, hopefully dashed to pieces. I remember seeing Quetzalcóatl’s face in that black void, staring up at us. Greedy. Hungry. Envious.

I swore that I’d never come back to this Temple. It’s a cursed place. But then, I swore that I’d never return to the Tenochtitlan Basin when I declared my retirement. Yet, here I am, with a Roaman Legate hot on my tail.

Why am I even here? What am I going to do? This isn’t like one of my books. I can’t just best Legate Jua and run off into the sunset while she waves a hoof and curses my name. That never worked in real life. I can’t beat her into submission and turn her over to the authorities. She is the authority here. My days of hoof-fighting are long behind me. And the poison in my veins is burning away what little strength I have left.

I can’t kill her, not even if I could kill her. I’ve gone this long without willfully taking a life, no matter what’s at stake, and I’m not going to start now.

Unfortunately, she’s not going to have the same reservations. If I want to stop her, I’m going to have to be smarter. Face it, Jua and I are two old mares, well-seasoned but way past our prime. Being smarter is the only edge left in our repertoire.

Or I could turn around and walk away. But I won’t. Never have. It would be a crap note to go out on.

Seventh Pad Begins

Seventh Pad -- a rough draft excerpt from

Chapter 6: Secrets

With all the events of the day, I had not given the riddles of the sphinx any thought. Despite Professor Underhill’s warning, I was in no danger of madness. The riddle the sphinx had given me was so obvious that I had dismissed it utterly. And, in doing so, I had not taken the time to consider the value of it.

I had only known A.K. Yearling for a short time, but we had become friends. Now she was dead, and her body had been spirited away… quite literally, right before my eyes and the eyes of my two companions.

The last thing that I was thinking about was the danger of spreading around what I knew. It was the gravest mistake of my youth. The lesson that followed was hard to learn… and even harder to eventually unlearn.

My companions, Fleetwing and Bluebell, were understandably terrified and confused. I had at least some grasp of what was happening, and I had a mission.

I told them everything.

~-------~ oOo ~-------~

“We just got kicked out of Bahari Soko, and you want to follow her back?” Fleetwing’s raised voice made Bluebell take a step back, but she nodded firmly in response. Fleetwing waved his wings in exasperation. “We’ll be arrested! We could be thrown in jail.”

Daring Do groaned. This argument wasn’t getting them any closer to Bahari Soko. She felt an unpleasant energy nearly vibrating through her. If she didn’t fly soon, she’d fly mad.

“The Roaman Legion is not going to throw students from Equestria in jail,” Bluebell responded, trying to sound reasonable. “Especially not when we’re bringing them some super important amulet thing.”

“The Amulet of Atonement,” Daring Do repeated, touching the Amulet under her jacket. She felt its cool light against her breast. “And we’re not bringing it to the Legion.”

After everything she’d just been through, seeing her friend fade away was one cruel turn too many. She should be completely losing it right now. She felt the frailty of her mental and emotional cohesion. Daring was certain that the Amulet was somehow helping her hold it together.

Bluebell shook her head, “Daring, this is really something for the authorities.”

“Mhudumu doesn’t trust Jua,” Daring Do replied. “He said to bring it to his friend, someone named Imani.”

Fleetwing flipped around in the air, rolling his eyes. “Yeah, because the zebra who pretended to be the ambassador’s servant in order to spy on him for Roam really seems like a guy you can trust.”

“Look, neither of you have to come with me,” Daring Do said. Enumerating, “You could get into trouble for returning. It could be dangerous flying there, especially at night. And I can get there faster on my own.”

“What a load of minotaur dung,” Fleetwing laughed. “I’m way faster than you. Even carrying Bluebell, I’m almost faster than you.” Bluebell looked mildly insulted.

“If it’s dangerous, then that’s another reason not to go alone,” Bluebell insisted. “Oh, and in case you’ve forgotten, we’re not going to get into trouble because Fleetwing and I weren’t banished, Daring. Just you.” She shot Fleetwing a look.

Fleetwing closed his eyes briefly, shrugged as if to say that was that, and scooped up Bluebell. “Coming?” he asked Daring Do as he shot ahead of her, heading towards Bahari Soko.

“Gaaaah,” Daring Do vented, taking to the air, feeling the warm night air in her feathers. She tipped the pith hat forward on her head so it wouldn’t blow off.

They flew for over an hour without speaking, the wind and the sounds of the jungle below filling their ears.

Daring Do spotted dark shapes flitting past the moon-silvered clouds. “Whoa,” Daring Do said as she darted ahead of Fleetwing and Bluebell, stretching out her hooves.

“What?” the two of them asked in unison.

“Ahools,” Daring Do warned. She dropped down through the canopy into the jungle below.

She heard Fleetwing drop through a moment later. “We’ll be safe down here until they pass,” she said.

At the roar of a distant jungle cat, Bluebell nervously echoed, “Yeah, s-safe.” A moment later, Daring Do was blinded by a dazzling burst of light. Bluebell stuffed the flashlight into her mane. “So long as we don’t get eaten by whatever that was. Or vanished by that... that thing earlier. Wh-what was that?”

And what did it do to A.K.? Daring Do wanted to hear her ask.

“It was a spirit of whispers,” Fleetwing said knowledgeably. Daring Do and Bluebell both turned to stare at him.

“A what?” Bluebell asked.

“The Faceless. It is spirit of whispers,” Fleetwing repeated. “A powerful one, too.” Then, as if reciting, he told them, “Originally native to the upper Zebricon, spirits of whispers are the keepers of secrets and sowers of omens. Silence surrounds them; suspicions and rumors flourish in their wake. If one is desperate to know a truth or hide one, she may seek a spirit of whispers and attempt to bargain with it.”

“How do you know all that?” Daring Do asked in disbelief. She didn’t recall anything like that covered in class.

“Because while you were buying jewelry, I was buying this,” Fleetwing said smugly, producing a booklet titled A Pony’s Guide to the Spirits of the Zebra Lands. On the cover was a cartoonish picture of a wide-eyed pony surrounded by strange creatures.

Fleetwing held the booklet in one wing while flipping through the pages with his other. Finding the page he was looking for, he held it up for Daring Do and Bluebell to see. On the center of the page was a primitive drawing of a tall, slender zebra without stripes or facial features and black tentacles writhing from its back. Around the picture were long strings of zebra glyphs with smaller Equestrian translations written underneath. He had quoted it precisely.

“After Professor Underhill and the ambassador did all that talking at dinner about the spirits here, I thought this book would be a smart investment.”

Maybe it was because she was grieving for her friend and Fleetwing’s jab about friendship necklace cut cruelly, but the pegasus’ know-it-all grin made Daring Do want to put a hoof in his face. Just a little.

The screeching cry of an ahool cut the night. The three ponies immediately fell silent. Bluebell covered the end of her flashlight with a hoof.

No pony moved, each hoping the creatures would pass by without noticing. Ears strained to catch any sound that would signal the ahools’ nearness or passing. The air was filled with the sounds of night insects and the rustling of the canopy in the light wind.

After remaining silent had stretched uncomfortably long, Bluebell whispered to Fleetwing, “What does your book say about ahools?”

“Bluebell, the book is about spirits,” Fleetwing whispered back. “Ahools are monsters.”

“How can you tell the difference?”

Daring Do thought it was a good question considering the spirits she had encountered. Fleetwing answered something about monsters being from Tartarus and spirits being from the world, but Daring Do wasn’t impressed. She was fairly certain that not all monsters were from Tartarus, and that didn’t answer the question of how to tell them apart. “First the sphinx...” she muttered to herself.

“Spirit of riddles,” Fleetwing whispered informatively. Daring Do gave him a flat look, mildly annoyed that he couldn’t see it in the darkness.

“Sphinxes are spirits of riddles, or at least a breed of them,” Fleetwing elaborated in a low whisper, pausing briefly to listen for ahools. “Like the Faceless is a spirit of whispers. They’re all categorized in the book.” Musing, he added, “Like pegasi, earth ponies and unicorns, I guess. Different kinds of spirits kinda like how there are different kinds of ponies.”

Daring Do shushed at him.

“Oh!” Bluebell’s hoof fell from her flashlight as she turned wide-eyed to Daring, asking, “Did you get a riddle?”

Daring Do sighed and rolled her eyes. “My value becomes lesser with each who knows about me. What am I?”

“A secret,” Fleetwing answered. “Everyone knows that. Wow, if a sphinx gave me that riddle, I’d feel cheated.”

Daring Do nickered. Honestly, she did feel a little cheated. What was the point of a riddle that everyone knew the answer to?

“Well, it is a classic,” Bluebell offered.

“Professor Underhill’s was better,” Daring Do admitted, “But it was just a variation on the theme. ‘My value becomes greater with each who knows about me. What am I?’”

Bluebell ooohed. “So, maybe it’s a two-part riddle?” Daring Do hadn’t considered that.

“Lies?” Fleetwing offered.

Bluebell cocked her head to the side, pondering. “ehhh... Maybe, if it’s like propaganda. But the more ponies know a lie, the greater the chance of it being exposed, right? Doesn’t really fit, does it?

Daring Do thought on that a moment. “Truth?” she offered.

Fleetwing shook his head. “What’s true is true. It doesn’t care how many people know about it.”

Daring Do sighed, staring at the ground resolutely. “It doesn’t matter. I just want to get this Amulet to Bahari Soko and then find a way to get A.K. Yearling’s body back.”

“Who?” Bluebell asked.

“Wait, what’s this about a body?” Fleetwing demanded.

Daring Do looked up sharply. What? Seriously? “A.K. Yearling...” she said slowly, barely reining in her anger. “...Ambassador Goldentongue’s goddaughter? The girl whose body that Faceless took?”

“When was this?” Fleetwing asked, concerned.

“The ambassador had a goddaughter?” Bluebell looked and sounded confused.

Daring Do glared at them, her jaw working. She turned away, spreading her wings. To Tartarus with both of them! She was going to go to Bahari Soko alone.

“Daring, wait!” Bluebell called out.

“Why?” What was wrong with those two? Did they somehow not see what happened? No, Bluebell had definitely seen her carrying A.K.s body. Maybe they didn’t hear that weird, headache-inducing memory-talk that the Faceless had fed right into her brain, but they had to have seen what it did!

Wait. Daring Do frowned, shaking her head and digging at the ground with her hoof. There was something she was missing. Something...

Daring Do felt like she had been splashed with ice water.

“It wasn’t a riddle,” she whispered.

“Huh?” was her companions’ confused response.

Daring Do ignored them, speaking more to herself. Working through it. “The sphinx’s riddle. It wasn’t hard because she wasn’t trying to confuse me. It’s just how she can communicate.” Daring reasoned that spirits, at least some spirits, can’t easily just talk to you. Like the Faceless. Being a thing of silence, it had no words of its own. Instead, it spoke through the memories of words. “It wasn’t a riddle. It was a warning.”

Daring Do turned to face Fleetwing and Bluebell. “Secrets! The sphinx was trying to warn me about the spirit of whispers.”

Like a jigsaw puzzle, the clues began to assemble themselves in Daring Do’s mind.

Hadn’t the primi ordines Jua suggested that Goldentongue was up to something? Something that had enraged the Quetzalcóatl Empress enough for her cultists to come after them? What was it she said? “Dark empress’ cult with arrows of fire. Whose foolishness has drawn here her ire?”

The airship captain Mhalifu, an associate of Goldentongue, had said “No, your Empress’ will not win fight when her secrets are exposed to light.”

Fleetwing’s book had said: “If one is desparate to know a truth or hide one, she may seek a spirit of whispers and attempt to bargain with it.”

“She will be ready for you before the moon,” Goldentongue had told the Faceless.

“You fools will expose nothing!” the cultist had replied. “We have your sacrifice, and soon we will have the Amulet!”

Goldentongue had bargained with the Faceless for the Dark Empress’ secrets. And in return, he had promised the spirit of whispers his goddaughter. The value of a secret becomes greater the fewer people know about it… or in this case, her. A.K. Yearling’s entire existence was being erased!

Daring Do made a strangled sound.

The canopy above them exploded with cultist-mounted ahools!

Seventh Pad Ends