Sins of the Mother

Good morning, my uncrowned prince. Octavia’s melodic voice echoed from deep within my mind, interrupting a dream of me meeting some strange alien beings on two legs with what they called hands.

Does it have to be morning already? I groaned internally as my body began to respond to the heightened brain activity. But, good morning beautiful.

Unfortunately, it does. It’s already late in the morning and I’m certain you have things to do today, right? Octavia inquired, sounding like she’d only just woken up herself.

Yeah, I’m currently at a rock farm helping them to raise some bits for my next train trip outta here. I’m actually surprised my boss hasn’t come and woken me up already. I replied, cracking open an eye to see a seething Limestone glaring at me. Nevermind, she’s here and she looks pissed.

Is that normal for her?

Regretfully so. I sighed and raised myself up to address my boss. “You know, if your pissed off at me for being late to work, it’s not my fault I didn’t get a wakeup call or can wake myself up on time.”

“What, so it’s my fault you're three hours late to work?” Limestone growled. I yawned and magically stretched out my wings.

“Not necessarily your fault in particular, but it would've been better for the both of us if someone had come to wake me.” I replied, dragging myself outta bed with the blanket trailing after me having hooked it on my left rear hoof. Kicking it off I turned back to Limestone. “So, lead on!”

“Don’t you tell me what to do. You’re no prince.” Limestone grumbled, turning from the room to lead me out of the house and back down into the quarry. “Now, we’re hoping there may be more Red Diamond in that hole you made so Marble should be currently down there already working at exploring for more. You’re going to go help her.”

“Yes ma’am.” I mock saluted before holding my wings out to jump off the edge of the cliff before the mare could slap me. Landing just as softly as yesterday, I magically collected the four picks I was using and trotted into the cave; aiming for the hole i’d previously made.

Except the hole wasn’t there. It was covered in fallen rocks.

“Oh shit.” I could tell my eyes went narrow as I began carefully mining through the rock as quickly as I could, gripping two picks each by the handle to get them spinning to break away the slide. “Marble, are you in there?” I shouted and turned my ears forwards.

“Mmm…” came the faintest of replies.

“Hold on, i’m going to get you out of there alright?” I shouted, now dropping the picks entirely to start up a rather complex spell. A large seal appeared before me in a deep red colour and began to slowly spin as I pushed it into the rocks trapping the mare. The noise that it generated as it disintegrated the stone’s materials very likely would have alerted everypony within a five mile radius of the quarry, something I was counting on as an alert of the Pie’s up above.

Increasing the rotation a bit, all free falling rocks merely fizzled away into smoke as they came in contact with my deep earth mining spell until A small grey hoof stuck out of the rubble. Changing the aspects of the spell, I made sure that no organic matter beyond stone would be dissolved as the spell began to clear up the a second, then third and then finally four hooves until Marble’s belly was revealed.

“H-help.” Marble requested weakly as I cleared away the remainder of the stone, as well as most of the wall around us away from her. Ending the use of the spell I crouched down and began to gently prod at her body, checking for severe injuries.

“That’s what I plan to do, don’t worry. I’m sure your sister heard the sound of the drill so she should be here any minute.” I explained warmly. Creating a small mote of warm light, I carefully lifted Marble’s entire body without moving anything awkwardly and held her aloft over my back as I gently walked out of the cave itself and to Limestone.

Her face went from sheer rage to sheer terror as she saw the state of her sister.

“What did you do!” she demanded as I set her sister down so she could inspect her. “How did this happen?”

“He… rescued me.” Marble whispered. “Cave in, my fault.” she explained, her eyes remaining shut as the ground beneath her became damp with blood.

“How’d you get her out so quickly?” Limestone looked up at me with tears for her sister in her eyes.

“Magic.” I explained with a shrug. “Come on, you gotta go get a proper doctor here to take care of her. I figure she’s got at least eight broken ribs and maybe a punctured lung, never mind all the internal bleeding she’s suffering.”

“But… Can’t you do anything? Don’t you have some kind of amazing spell that can fix her right up? Some kind of Restoration ability?” Limestone demanded, getting frantic as her parents galloped hard down the path into the quarry to check on things.

“I wish.” I sighed and let my wings hang at my side. “If I did, my wings wouldn’t be mostly useless beyond gliding. The doctor I spoke to back in Applewood said that I would need an in depth knowledge of the Equine anatomy which comes from eight years of medical school. Since Marble’s injuries are likely worse off than my wings, the spells I do know won’t cut it.” I explained, mostly parroting the female doctor from before.

“Then… I dunno, can’t alicorn’s teleport? Aren’t you supposed to be so great and powerful of beings?” Limestone demanded, now switching back to anger as her parents slid to Marble’s side to comfort her.

“Well,” I drifted off anxiously. “I technically do, but there’s something you should know about it.”

“I don’t care! You have to save my little sister!” Limestone pleaded, taking me by the scruff of my neck in her hooves.

“The spell I know is black magic, okay?” I shouted, making everypony present gasp. “Not all the magic I know is light. Some of it is dark, some of it is black. If I use the spell on Marble in her current state, I don’t know what would happen to her!”

“What do you need for it?” Limestone asked sternly, staring at me dead-set in the eyes with her own bright green irises.

“It requires a lot of blood. I have to not only transport myself, but I’d have to bring a broken body with me and keep it from being the sacrifice.” I sat back defiantly.

“How much?” Limestone demanded, picking up a sharp stone with her teeth to hold it over her fetlock.

“About ten litres…” I mumbled. The rock was dropped from the mouth of the mare as the mare’s mouth hung wide open, as did everypony’s at the announcement.

“That… That’s like half of our blood!” Limestone stared at me in shock.

“Yeah, I know. In return I could take her across the world in one go.” I replied quietly. Marble whimpered as her breathing became more and more laboured.

“What if we three were to donate a portion of our life blood to get her to care?” them other inquired, offering up a relatively decent idea.

“Three and a bit litres of blood from all three of you, that would work.” I replied, looking up in thought. “Shouldn’t harm you too badly and the spell would have enough that it wouldn’t try to take whatever’s left of Marble’s.”

“How dost one go abouts performing such a malevolent incantation?” the father inquired, stroking his beard.

“A bit of preparation for one… We’ll need a really large bucket, a paint brush and something sharp to draw the blood.” I replied. All three ponies disappeared, looking for the appropriate items while I remained with Marble.

Marble poked me in the leg with her hoof, an even her straining to do so would’ve made a lesser pony cry.

“It’s alright, you’ll be in good hooves soon enough…” I whispered, gently stroking her mane from her face as she rested with laboured breaths.

“Okay,” Limestone panted, having returned with a large enough pale that they could all let their blood run into. Her parents returned with a brush and a knife from their kitchen, hopefully freshly cleaned. “We’ve got everything, now what?”

“Now, we bleed you three.” I remarked, taking the knife in my magic. “Just hold your hooves over the bucket and I’ll make the cut.” As instructed, all three earth ponies rested their hooves over the edge of the bucket and allowed me to draw the blade over their flesh one by one. “I hope none of you faint at the sight of this.” I mumbled as I watched the crimson fluids quickly drain from their bodies and fill the bucket.

As they offered their a portion of their lift, I wiped the blade off on my fur before drawing a line of blood from my own hoof to begin painting myself with it, my fur matting at the sticky substance. I then moved to Marble and began painting the same tribalistic marking on her own fur, making the older ponies’ eyes go wide.

“What are you doing to her!” Limestone shrieked, pulling her hoof back and held it with her free one once the bucket had filled.

“I’m marking her with my blood in order to transport her.” I explained, drawing a single line down her nose from her forehead. “If I don’t, she’ll die.”

“Oh…” mother Pie whispered, holding her own injury to halt the flow.

“You all best get those cuts wrapped up. You… also may not want to be here for the next part.” I grimaced, already imagining the next step. It was not going to be fun… “Is there a particular hospital you want me to take her to?”

“Uhm, Ponyville General is closest I guess.” Limestone replied as she limped off with her parents. “Take good care of her and tell the doctors there to get in contact with Pinkamena, okay? She’ll want to make sure Marble’s alright!”

“Alright, i’ll tell them!” I shouted as I dyed the paintbrush red and began painting the ground with it in a particular spell seal pattern. Setting the brush and the remainder of the blood in the center next to Marble and me, I fired up my magic and could immediately feel my eyes change shape to slits; the most definite marker that I was born to Nightmare Moon.

Marble seemed to have looked up at me and noticed my eyes and began quivering as I stood over her, the blood seal around us firing up in a bright red light.

“Just close your eyes and ignore everything about to happen.” I instructed before I began chanting. The seal broke away from its stony surface and began to spin around us, gradually increasing in speed.

Soon enough large sanguine tentacles rose up from the aspects of the seal and began to reach for us, tasting my blood on both Marble and I. The largest, the main, began to reach around the rest of the circle until it found the blood in the bucket.

Stabbing it’s tip into the bucket, it began to drink heavily until the bucket and brush were dry again before it let the other tentacles began to explore our bodies while the light began to grow greater and greater till all at once, everything died away and the tentacles wrapped themselves around our bodies and dragged us into the seal.

Despite her punctured lung and broken ribs, Marble let out the shrillest, most terrified scream i’d ever heard a pony make as her body sunk into the lake of blood that spilled out from the center. I too desired to scream, the feeling of the tentacles on my body would have been enough to scramble the brains of many but I bit my tongue and held onto nothing.

Our heads sank into the pool and seemed to drag the black magic with us as we were unceremoniously dropped on ourselves before what appeared to be a large white hospital denoted by the medical star on it’s exterior walls.

Oh, and the squadron of elite Royal Guard with their weapons drawn and pointed at the pair of us. There was that too…

“By order of the princesses, you will not move! You are under arrest for the use of black magic!” The captain demanded. I weakly pointed to Marble as she gasped for air.

“It…” I coughed up a lungful of blood. “It was all me, she needs medical attention. I just got her here.” I explained before collapsing. “Tell the doctors to tell a Pinkamena Pie her sister is here.” I requested before blacking out.

~~~

“Where did you learn that black magic?” A guard demanded, giving me an eighth kick in the stomach as I hung from my hooves and wings in what appeared to be my cell.

“I was taught by my mother.” I coughed back, the blood coming from my mouth no longer from the Pies, but rather from my own supply.

“Who was your mother and why would she graft wings onto your body? Did you aim to claim the royal throne?” The guard demanded, at least keeping from causing me further injury while I was cooperative.

“My mother was Nightmare Moon, I was born on the moon and my wings are just as natural as my horn.” I explained again. This had the guard kick me in the side again, probably breaking a rib. Another rib.

“You don’t want to tell us, fine! Then explain why your wings don’t work?” The guard smirked, thinking he’d found a flaw in my excuses.

“I was captured by a group of cultists in Las Pegasus and they clipped the tendons in my wings. I’ve since had the wings mended but I haven’t been able to restore the tendon.” I explained wearily.

“Cultists huh? You wouldn’t happen to have been talking about that murder a few days back, would you? Cultists who believe in keeping the Royalty purely female alicorns as decided by Celestia and Luna would certainly seem like the type who’d hate on a fake like you.” The guard remarked, slowly circling my broken body. “I suppose that black magic like yours would achieve results like the murders found in that house.”

“It probably would, if I was the one who did it.” I wheezed. “They clipped me and threw me out on my ass.” I blatantly lied, though in my state I’m pretty certain that I could lie pretty convincingly. Octavia, the Guard have arrested me for black magic. They’re pretty damn sure i’m the one who murdered everypony in that cult house so they’re likely to come looking for whoever harboured me. Get out as soon as you can, I’ll not tell them anything about you. I warned mentally. Even if Octavia wasn’t by the page, she’d still get it when she next went to use it. Oh, and destroy the page entirely. burn it.

“You know, I don’t really believe that’s what happened. I think they got you, clipped your fake wings and you got revenge by slaughtering all but two. That’s your biggest problem, you left them alive to easily identify you from their hospital beds.” The guard chuckled to himself, now facing me head on again. “I find it interesting that all you did to them was break off one of their horns and clipped the pegasi’s wings. What I wanna know, why didn’t you just kill them?”

“Maybe they didn’t have anything to do with the precedings? Even if it was me they’re identifying, I’m not heartless. I’d have let them go if they were repenting their actions.” I sighed, pulling on my chains to lift myself up enough to give my body a shake; try and get some feeling back into my wings.

“Even though you knew they could identify you?” the guard inquired. He had me and we both knew it. I wasn’t going anywhere until my execution.

“Yeah, big mistake on my part, huh?” I replied with a yawn.

“Yeah, yeah it was. By the way, I know there wasn’t any black magic used there. The Princess of Friendship went down to check and said the place was more or less clean.” The guard explained, turning to leave from the cell. “She did find traces of dark magic though, but she says that’s not illegal so she left it alone.”

Damn.

“How’d she know all that?” I asked hoping for some interesting information to think about.

“Heard she used her Element of Harmony by order of Princess Luna. It apparently boosts her already incredible alicorn magic enough to let her detect traces of all kinds of magic, or something like that.” The guard replied before trotting off and my cell latched shut.

“Element of Harmony, huh?” I mumbled to myself. “Ordered by my mother, no less… I know what I’ll do to punish my mother for leaving me behind.” I grinned to myself as I examined my chains. My heavy chains. “Oh right… these…” I uttered as I gave my leg a kick, jingling the steel links binding me.

“Hmm, seems like you're in quite a bind.” an older male voice noted, the origin of the voice seemingly coming from the wall ahead of me.

“So it does, yes. Who’re you?” I demanded, looking around for the source of the spoken word.

“Who, me? I’m surprised your mother never spoke about me during your lessons on the moon.” the voice remarked, sounding insulted. A pair of yellow eyes with red irises appeared in the concrete, with a single cheshire smile forming in the cracks beneath that.

“She probably did, but since I can’t make out any distinguishing features… I’ve got nothing to go on.” I replied, watching the face turn into the shadow of a head with a pair of strange horns on his head; one an antler and the other I wasn’t sure what it was from.

“Oh, of course. My apologies. Let me make a proper introduction.” The multi-creature remarked with a flourishing bow of his serpentine body. “I am-”

“Discord, spirit of Chaos and disharmony.” I finished his sentence with my own. “Yeah, mom did talk of you. Said you were defeated before Sombre and her banishment.”

“Oh good, you have heard of me! I’m so happy!” Discord smirked as he stood before me, claw/paw on his hips.

“Uh huh, so too what do I owe the pleasure of your visit? I thought you were reformed?” I inquired, wishing I could scratch my back.

“Oh I am, I am…” Discord replied first chipper, then dropped it for complete boredom with the second. “It gets so boring being a creature of chaos in a world of harmony. It’s so dull! But you, you’re free to act!”

“Not really at the moment.” I noted, giving my chains a shake. “Kinda tied up at the moment.”

“Oh right, right. Let me help you with that.” Discord replied and snapped his fingers. The chains turned into what I assumed was some kind of sausage link, something I’d read was quite popular with some extinct species or something…

“Right… And in return for my release, I owe you… what?” I asked, rubbing some feeling back into my limbs.

“Well it’s quite simple: I return something lost to you, you return something lost to me.” Discord replied casually, pacing back and forth in thought. “See, long ago I had a couple of powerful stones of my own but they were lost with my stony imprisonment some thousand years back.”

“I assume you’re talking about the Elements of Chaos?”

“Yes, however did you know? I never even had a chance to reveal them so there shouldn’t be anypony who knows about them, past or present…” Discord inquired interestedly, getting down to look at me in question.

“Logic. You’re a creature of Chaos and if they were likely formed as a counterbalance to ultimate stones of Harmony, the logic dictates that they’d be Elements of Chaos. So what, you want me to find these Elements of Chaos for you?” I sat back and worked at massaging my wings, flicking the sausages off them.

“Oh, not just find them. I want you to use them in your goals to get revenge for being left behind on the moon.” Discord grinned malevolently.

“That’s pretty evil sounding for a supposedly reformed ally to the princesses.” I noted with a glance at the single tooth hanging from the creature’s lips.

“Probably, but as far as I’m concerned, this conversation never occurred. You heard about the stones in your research on the moon after your mother left you behind and I had nothing to do with any of this.” Discord replied, holding his hands up in surrender.

“Right. Now, so you said I help you retrieve something you lost, you’ll help me retrieve something I lost. What’d I lose?” I asked, tucking my wings back against my body before tying them up.

With a click of the claws, I could feel the warmth of the power of flight radiating from my wings again. With a curious grin, I stretched them out in their full glory without the use of my magic and sighed at the cracking joints.

“So, have we got a deal?” Discord grinned hopefully, his paw outstretched towards me.

“Deal.” I grinned back, planting my hoof in his and shook. “Now I just have to get outta here.”

“Dealt with.” Discord replied as a guard with spinning eyes approached with the keys and unlocked my cell before dropping a rolled up document at my hooves.

“Wow, you’ve just thought of everything; haven’t you? You must really want those stones back.” I asked, pulling open the scroll to silently read out my pardons.

“Yes, I really do. Now, you’ve got some work to do. Fortunately, the first stone is actually fairly close by. Try the dark, scary forest south of here.” Discord suggested before fading from view.

“Dark, scary forest… Right then!” I declared with a hop in my step, my pardons in my magical grip. “Let’s get started then!”

~~~

Having successfully exfiltrated the jailhouse I was captive in, I was now sat with my personal effects at the edge of the Everfree Forest; the name having been given to me by a guard as I signed out of the cell.

“Dark, scary forest…” I mumbled, staring into the depths of tartarus. “Yeah, no shit Discord… It’s certainly not the forest of light and fluffy things…”

With a sigh I stood and began placing hooves in front of hooves, beating tracks into the depths of the Everfree Forest.