Solstice

by Scorpius

Rating: teen
Tags: Adventure, Original Character, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Alternate Universe
Length: 36608

Maria, the first neophyte of Everfree, must learn to navigate the treacherous waters of student life and politics, where one wrong step could send her family plummeting into ruin.

House Everfree: ancient, pure, and on the brink of disaster. Despite bowing to the ruling of the Thaumata fourteen years ago and taking on a neophyte, Everfree's very way of life is still under fire: House Whitetail is pressuring the chamber to decree that the burden of impurity be more evenly shared by the ancient lines. With a vote of no confidence in Consul Quercus scheduled to be debated next month, all of Equestria is watching House Everfree's every step—and all are ready to pounce at the first sign of weakness.

The pressure is even felt by Maria, the first neophyte of Everfree, student at Canterlot Arcana. At times, it seems as if almost everything she does will bring shame to her House—her family. Maria must learn to navigate the treacherous waters of student life and politics, all the while juggling her schoolwork with her social life. A difficult act, but such is the life of a neophyte.

She should be careful, though. There's something moving in the dark.

Published 2016-07-22 04:30:01 UTC
Last updated 2017-01-24 00:22:20 UTC

Table Manners

I pledge my life in service of your House,
That I may uphold your values and observe your customs;
Let your enemy become my enemy,
And your ally become my friend.[a]
In all things, I shall serve you.
—from The Neophyte’s Oath

“Have you seen the new fashion line from Anton Chingar?”

“I heard the birds had set up camp near Trotpass Keep.”

“Is it just me, or does the staff table look different this year?”

Sometimes, Maria Everfree was very glad that she wasn’t meant to speak at the table, unless she was spoken too. It could be very lonely, but from the sounds of it, she wouldn’t want to get involved with the mundane conversations that the other students were holding.

Resting her forehooves gently on the table before her, so as not to rely on them to maintain her posture, Maria gently reached out with her hornglow and picked up a ladleful of bread sauce, carefully spooning it beside the carrots and parsnips on her plate. Her hooves felt restless—though she had now mastered her control of levitation (at least of one object at a time), Maria was still struggling to get over the habit of serving up manually.

As she returned the ladle to the pot, Maria happened to catch the eye of a colt who was sitting a little ways down the table from her. A first year, Maria guessed—more from the look of nervousness on his face than his height. It was a look she knew well, if only because she had worn it so many times in her first few weeks at the Arcana, which meant the poor colt was probably a neophyte-to-be. Where’s his chaperone?

Maria nodded her head towards the bread sauce, and the young colt smiled back at her and nodded. She reached out her hornglow once more and carefully—very carefully, since her accuracy generally got worse with distance—floated the ladle down to the young colt, and poured a little bread sauce onto his plate, only to see that there was nothing else there.

Sighing, but still smiling, Maria carefully floated roasted vegetables and stuffed mushrooms from across the table to the colt’s plate. His chaperone should be doing this. Why would you leave a colt without the ability to feed himself? When his plate was relatively full, she picked up her own goblet of water and raised it in a gentle toast to the colt before she started to eat.

“Thank you,” he said, and the bubble of chatter around them stopped.

The colt’s eyes grew wide with embarrassment as every eye fell on him. Maria pushed down and controlled the rage that was building in her chest—It’s his first day!—and tried her best not to let her smile falter. The kid would need every friendly face he could get.

“Did you have something you wanted to say, Oats?” That was Abigail Forthnall, Maria realised. Oscina, now—she was a sixth year, and had taken her rites. So this colt—Oats—was part of House Forthnall? That would explain Abigail knowing his name.

Oats glanced up pleadingly at Maria, who forced her lips into an encouraging smile even as they were trembling. She didn’t let her posture break.

“I…” Oats began, his voice faltering at first. He took a moment to compose himself, and then turned to look Abigail in the eye. “I was merely thanking an older student for their assistance with my meal. I would not wish to spurn their House with a lack of gratitude, nor bring shame upon y-yours.”

Though his voice had faltered again at the end, Oats had held up remarkably well. Maria made a mental note to tell Professor Everfree to watch out for the kid in Oration: any colt who can almost hold his own at dinner with Abigail Forthnall was going to excel in her father’s class.

Abigail hesitated, no doubt gauging the mood of the table around her, before replying.

“Very well. But in future, you should wait for me to serve your dinner until you can do it for yourself. There is no need to demean yourself with pleading glances to older students.”

And as the bubble of chatter returned, and Oats turned to his plate with a relieved expression on his face, Maria found herself once again pushing down hard on her rage. A chaperone was meant to make a neophyte-to-be their priority—in her first year, Arpeggio had always made sure that her plate was full before tending to his own, and he was an Everfree! She wanted to stand up and yell at Abigail, to throw in her face the books and books of recorded tradition that she had just broken, to make sure that Oats knew that it wasn’t his fault…

So Maria lifted up her fork, only barely remembering to use her horn instead of her hoof, and forced herself to chew on a parsnip. It wasn’t her place to criticise.

[a] the change from ‘ally’ to ‘friend’, here, is a recent one. There was much debate among the Thaumata over this alteration: on the one hoof, the traditionalists would argue that the repetition and reinforcement of the structure had originally been intended to strengthen the magic of the oath; on the other, several esteemed academics had been working tirelessly to demonstrate that the new wording would actually tighten the bond. The debate was settled when Headmistress Midsummer Nucifera Whitetail simply used the new wording at the bonding ceremony without the permission of the Thaumata—when all had seen that the bond was stronger, they passed the necessary reforms, but Nucifera was stripped of her title for her insolence.

A Second Mistake

This combination of Maghurst’s Lock woven into the Illusion provides an additional layer of security: a standard Disillusion will not be able to find a point of entry! While counters to Maghurst’s Lock are now common knowledge, the spell was relatively unknown in the classical era, and its application in Illusory Architecture* earned Ragfell a great deal of praise and recognition (eventually resulting in his appointment as vice-chancellor).
—from Architecture of the Pre-Classical and Classical Eras, Mundane and Magical

Her room was dark and cold, but pushing open the door and seeing that the familiar four walls hadn’t been changed always gave her a warm feeling. Still, because it wouldn’t do to let the room get too cold, Maria lit the fire with a quick flicker of hornglow—she didn’t know how she had survived the first months of first year, before she had looked up the firestarting and safety spells in the library. She supposed the curriculum wasn’t designed for the few students who didn’t have serving-mares to set their fires for them.

After taking a moment to herself to drink in the wonderful feelings of being at home, Maria’s horn sparked to life once more, and with a flurry of hornglow—she wasn’t yet practiced enough to levitate all her things at once, but she was getting good enough to do each one very, very quickly—she threw open her trunk and began to unpack. A few photographs for the mantel were treated with care and respect, but everything else (including all her formal gowns and robes) were stashed without much care into her wardrobe and drawers.

Which left her personal library.

Maria thought that this was her proudest achievement to date. It was the result of two years’ hard work and practice: enlarging spells were fifth year material, she knew, but they were as temporary as Illusions, intended only for emergencies when one needed to move a lot of things very quickly. With a lot of hard work and practice, she’d managed to cast one on her trunk that should have lasted long enough to get her to the Arcana and through the feast. It was time to see if her efforts had paid off.

Carefully, so as not to disturb the enchantments, Maria tugged at the Illusory door in the wall of her trunk. It opened, slowly and with a fairly loud creak, to show a small alcove, about three times the height of the trunk—and even after months of getting used to the effect, the fact that she couldn’t see anything solid in the air over her trunk when she raised her head confused her—packed wall-to-wall with bookshelves.

It was things like this, she reflected, as she gently levitated the first book from the Illusory bookshelves and onto the real shelves that lined her bedroom, that had gotten her a reputation as a bit of a bookworm. Not that she minded, of course—though the students might spurn her for it, at least they left her well enough alone, and her teachers would regard her with a little more respect than one might expect for her station. But it was the principle of the thing. She didn’t like books—she needed them to survive.

He might have fulfilled his duties in teaching her what he knew about society and formal behaviour, but Arpeggio was a bit of a recluse: he didn’t really know that much more than she had, at first. He really helped in the little ways (which cutlery to use for which course, and all that kind of nonsense), but he couldn’t teach her the traditions and the customs because he simply didn’t know any more than when to stand and when to sit down again. If she hadn’t been reading up—

A knock on her door interrupted her thoughts. Sighing, she dropped the next book on her shelf and turned to open the door, a professional smile plastered on her face.

“Maria Everfree?” asked the young pony who stood outside the door, before Maria had even finished opening it. A little rude, that. “I’m here to deliver a message from Professor Everfree.”

The mare was a little older than Maria, if she had to guess. She was already reaching into her saddle-bag to retrieve the note as Maria stepped to one side and beckoned her into the room with a nod. The strange mare stopped, hoof half-twisted around her torso, and stared blankly at Maria, who nodded again—perhaps a little too vigorously for polite company, but this wasn’t polite company.

“Come on in,” she said, when it had begun to seem that the mare had no understanding of what it was that she was offering. “I can get you a cup of tea, if you’d like?”

After a moment or two of sputtering, the young mare seemed to finally find her voice.

“Ma’am, with all due respect,” she began, her bright, amber eyes darting nervously and very obviously between Maria’s face and horn, “I am just a serving-mare. I really don’t think it would be appropriate…”

“This is my room,” Maria said, firmly. “And I have been taught to offer my hospitality to anyone who steps hoof at its door.” The mare still seemed nervous, and Maria chuckled, adding gently, “I’m not going to bite. Besides, I’d often spend the evening with serving-ponies back home.”

Turning, Maria reached for the kettle and hung it in the fire, another flicker of hornglow filling it with water. She heard a few tentative hoofsteps on the marble behind her, and turned to see her guest fidgeting in the doorway. Something about the nervous glances the mare was giving her told Maria that maybe she'd crossed a line, here. Perhaps she was being too forward: it must seem odd, to an earth pony, to have any unicorn treat them with hospitality—even a student. Her books hadn't given any advice on the matter, which in retrospect suggested that it simply wasn't done.

Why was she inviting this mare for tea? They'd only just met, after all, and it wasn't like she'd ever invited other serving-ponies to come in for a chat. Am I really getting that lonely?

“You don’t have to stay if you don’t want to,” she said, smiling softly. “I don’t very often get company here, and maybe I got a little over-excited.”

“I understand,” said the other mare, almost smiling. “Though you probably should be seeking the company of unicorns. I know it’s not my place to say, but I suspect that the Professor’s message might have something to do with that.” With that, she carefully put the envelope down on Maria’s dresser, and smiled properly. “Thank you for the invitation to tea, but I’m afraid I must decline.”

“I understand.” Maria tried to hide her disappointment. She wasn’t even sure why she was feeling disappointed. “If you ever decide you do want tea…?”

“I’ll be sure to come over at once, Ma’am.”

“Good.”

There was a silence, for a moment, and it hung heavily in the air between them. Soon enough, though, the serving-mare nodded and curtseyed, before turning with a gentle flick of her braided mane and walking out the door.

It wasn’t until some hours later, as Maria struggled to keep her Enlargement open while she retrieved the last of her books, that she realised she still didn't know the serving-mare's name.

*It was only a century before an enterprising young vandal realised that, since every house in Canterlot was secured with the same spell, a sufficiently strong counter would cause widespread chaos, and used the opportunity to loot half the city—Vandal’s Key is named after this incident, and believed to have been the spell used. The modern expense of Illusory Architecture is entirely due to the extreme difficulty in crafting a unique and secure lock upon the illusion, so that none but the architect can break it.

First Lessons

Maria,

I have received a letter from the head of House Forthnall complaining about your behaviour at dinner tonight. While I know that you had nothing but the kindest of intentions towards the young neophyte-to-be, you must realise that his chaperone saw your interference as an insult to their ability.

Rest assured that I will be speaking to Miss Forthnall about her duties towards your young friend, and I do not believe that you were in the wrong tonight. But I must request that, in future, you be more careful! You have to remember that our House is under a great deal of scrutiny right now, and you most of all as our neophyte. I urge you to be cautious, and do try not to insult anyone else from an ancient House (even if they are being terribly poorly-behaved themselves.)

Good luck with lessons tomorrow: some teachers really do up the pressure in fourth year!

Love,
Dad

“Good morning, class.”

A dull, monotonous rumble that almost sounded like “Good Morning, Deputy Headmaster” filled the air. Appearing satisfied—it was, after all, first period on a Monday—Professor Whitetail lit his horn and raised four pieces of chalk to the blackboard, with which he began to write up some introductory notes.

Maria and the other students had learned early on that Rabastan Whitetail was a stallion of habit: every Illusion lesson would begin with a brief sentence or two outlining the lesson’s focus written up on the blackboard, and the students would be expected to copy it down to their notebooks, and to keep up with the deputy headmaster’s writing. Anyone still writing by the time he turned back around would earn a somewhat vicious stare from the professor.

Which is why it was quite so surprising that, today, he was writing with four pieces of chalk, and writing different lines of notes simultaneously. Maria was staring, eyes wide, her own quill abandoned merely one line in: around her was the desperate scratch of quills trying to keep up with the professor.

This time, when Whitetail turned around, he was smiling.

“Multiple-object levitation is a difficult skill,” he began, “and I certainly don’t expect any of you to keep up with that pace of note-taking—the skill itself might be taught to you this year, but it takes decades of practice to be able to write multiple notes at once. The mental discipline alone is such that most unicorns simply never manage it.

“That said, showing off one’s skills and finesse at magic has always been an important aspect of our society; and as long as that has been so, less powerful but more creative unicorns have been finding ways to cheat.”

At this, the professor cast a Disillusion on the whiteboard—slowly, Maria noted, so that the students were all given a chance to study the spell in action—and a few gasps echoed around the room as the writing vanished before their eyes.

“Some methods of cheating,” he continued, a wry smile twisting at the corners of his lips, “have become so prolific that they are on your fourth year syllabus.”

The task for the rest of the lesson was simple: the students were to write a four-line paragraph of their choice and then rewrite it several times, carefully noting how their quill moved on each line. They were then to produce an Illusion of writing that paragraph with just one quill, which Professor Whitetail felt would be more than enough challenge for the first lesson of the new school year. Any students who had successfully created that Illusion would be given the choice of helping those who hadn’t quite managed it yet, or practicing the same Illusion with chalk on the blackboard—though the professor made it very clear that he didn’t expect anyone to actually manage it.

Despite all the practice she had put in over Summer, with the Illusory door in her trunk being particularly challenging, Maria found that a fully-animated Illusion was a demanding task—they had only studied them for a month at the end of the previous year, since a very basic form of the spell was required on the Illusion exam for third years. This was far more intricate and detailed than anything they had performed for that exam—and Maria was pleased to find herself among the few students who could replicate one line of writing by the end of the lesson.

As the bell rang to signal the lesson was coming to a close, Professor Whitetail called out that the homework was to practice the Illusion, as any one of them could be called upon the next lesson to demonstrate the technique to the class. While some of the students grumbled—perhaps only at the idea of homework on the first day of school, but more likely because not even Professor Von Trots had set such demanding pieces of work last year—most were pleased that the deputy headmaster had, at least, not set them another essay.

“Miss Everfree.”

Maria was just about to leave the room—she was last to leave, as always—when she heard Professor Whitetail’s voice calling her back. She turned to face the old stallion.

“Is everything alright, sir?” she asked.

“Be careful, Miss Everfree,” he said. “I know you are a talented and studious young mare, but this year the magic that you are learning will start to be a little more… serious. In my experience, there are some students who take great offence at a neophyte performing better than them.” The deputy headmaster smiled at that, but the warmth didn’t reach his eyes. “I know that it is a great burden to be asked to hold back for the sake of other students’ egos, but in your House’s position I’m afraid you might have to do it.”

Maria felt her throat tighten, and the slightest of pressure build behind her eyes. She wasn’t going to let herself cry, but every ounce of pride that she had been feeling in her achievements was starting to crumble. It hurt.

“I’m sorry,” Professor Whitetail added, softly. “If you ever need someone to talk to… well, I’m here. And I assure you, it gets better.”

“Why does it have to be like this?” Maria asked, before gasping and trying to formulate an apology faster than her mouth could move. It was the one complaint she was never, ever supposed to voice.

“I don’t know,” Professor Whitetail said, before she could get an apology out. “But it’s normal to feel frustrated. I did, too, at your age.”

With that, Rabastan Whitetail turned back to his lesson plans, leaving Maria to see herself out of the room—and even though her pride had taken a bruising, Maria felt that, for the first time since she joined the Arcana, her future might not be so bleak as she had once thought.

P.S. How did that Enlargement hold up? I know you were trying to keep it secret, but Heather accidentally let slip that you were working on it. Your mother and I are really proud of you for trying, and hope it worked out well!

Practice

… though the attackers had managed to subdue the guards before any could sound the alarm, the warning nexus built into the fort was triggered only minutes later, as Captain Phyra was unable to cast the half-hourly safety check. The signal alerted not only the nearest of the northern keeps, but also the Thaumata, who interrupted their debate to declare a state of emergency.

When reinforcements arrived minutes later, however, they found that all the attackers had fled the scene[a]. Quite what caused them to flee remains a mystery, but many scholars believe that they had realised an alarm had been tripped. Border patrols were increased twofold overnight…
—from The Lesser-Known Battles of the Northern War

The beauty of creating a moving-quill Illusion, Maria thought, was that unless one looked very carefully at what was being written it was virtually indistinguishable from actually taking notes—and so by the time History was over she had just about mastered her paragraph. She had always struggled to pay attention in History, and at least this way she could disguise her boredom. Perhaps learning to create Illusions of text I’ve not written before will keep me occupied until Hearth’s Warming?

Packing away her things (carefully, so that nobody spotted the blank pages of her notebook), she waited for the class to rise and leave before she got up from her seat, nodded once to Doctor Starkad, and turned to leave the room.

“Boo!”

Maria jumped—literally, straight upwards—at the shout as she left the classroom. Her heart drummed loudly in her chest, and she took a few deep breaths to calm herself before turning to see the mass of green mane that was standing by the door.

“Tim!” She said, her voice not as loud as she would have liked. “What are you even doing here? You scared the living daylights out of me!”

The older stallion blushed, his gold-ochre fur tinged with bronze at his cheeks.

“Sorry, Maria,” he said, rubbing a forehoof through his mane. “I just had a free period, and thought that maybe—”

“You get free periods in fifth year?”

“Of course!” Tim said, letting Maria’s outburst slide. “I mean, just three a week, but I figured I could come meet you after classes and walk to lunch with you?”

Maria frowned at that. He should have been using those periods to study, not come and find her: their fifth-year exams determined what subjects they could study in sixth and seventh year, and if Tim wanted to get into law… Still, it was sweet that he’d thought of her.

“Thanks, Tim,” she said, turning to walk towards the dining hall. Tim followed suit, falling into step by her side.

“So, what was Starkad on about today?” Tim asked, clearly fishing for something to make conversation about. Maria rolled her eyes at that, though made sure that he couldn’t see—the older stallion was not the best at idle chatter, but at least he tried.

“Honestly?” she asked. “No idea. I spent the lesson practicing an Illusion instead. Besides, you know what Starkad’s like—there’s no point paying attention when all he’s going to do is read the book at you.”

“Point taken,” Tim said. She knew he couldn’t blame her for ignoring Starkad—not after his first year, when he’d gotten detention for falling asleep in History. It was the first thing she’d heard about him—after hearing that he was a neophyte, of course. “What Illusion were you working on?”

“I was just practicing that note-taking Illusion Whitetail set us for homework,” Maria said, innocently, “so really I was working on school things the whole lesson.”

Tim grinned at that, and his deep chuckle briefly filled the hall. “And, of course, Starkad wouldn’t notice that you weren’t even taking notes on his lecture.”

“Why would I?” Maria said. “It’s not like he’s saying anything I don’t already have in writing. I’m surprised he didn’t call me out for taking notes, after the last three years of just reading the book to myself.”

They both chuckled at that, but as they rounded the corner at the bottom of the staircase and entered the dining hall they hushed themselves, and dropped their voices to a minimum. Tim craned his neck to look over the crowd—he must have spotted a table, Maria thought, because moments later he was snaking his way around the outside of the room to get past the other students.

Maria sighed—it really wouldn’t do for either of them to push through the crowds, or even be seen to be getting in anyone else’s way, but she wasn’t about to let Tim go off on his own. Pressing her lips tight shut to avoid murmuring apologies that would only draw attention to herself, she tried to press herself up as close the the wall as she could, and gently made her way forward whenever there was a space.

The crowd was thinning out as she was moving, which helped, but it still took her a minute or two to reach Tim at his table. It was off to one side, in the shadowy part of the hall, which she supposed was why nobody had been trying to pick it. She hadn’t noticed it when they filed in for dinner the previous night, but she supposed it would have been hard to spot.

“What took you so long, slowpoke?”

Maria sighed as she sat down, tucking her hind legs beneath her on the cushion and inching herself closer to the table. “Prof— Dad’s asked me to try to avoid accidentally insulting any more Houses, and Professor Whitetail said I should be trying not to draw attention to myself. I figured barging past students wouldn’t help much with either of those.”

“Point taken,” Tim agreed, grimacing. “Sorry I ran ahead. I should have thought about that.”

“It’s okay,” Maria said, shrugging it off. Tim didn’t have so much to worry about when it came to public appearances—House Sparkle might have seat at the Thaumata, but they generally kept to themselves, and nobody expected all that much of them. “I don’t need you worrying about my appearance, too.”

“I should, though,” Tim said. “That’s what friends are for.”

Maria smiled at that, and levitated over a tray of sandwiches from the nearest serving table. She was glad that lunch was a relatively quiet affair at the Arcana: an opportunity to sit and talk quietly in a corner with Tim was always appreciated after a morning of being the quiet, modest neophyte of Everfree. It was about the only time she got at the Arcana to let her guard down, and she wasn’t going to miss that for the world.

[a] the only sign that that attack had even taken place, despite the wounded & unconscious guards, was a single mauve feather found caught in a doorway.

The Zebra in the Tower

Toxicodendron dicterium
(Common Name: Poison Joke)

T. dicterium is an herbacious perennial plant that is easily identified by its blue colouration, which is present on the stem, leaves, and flower of the plant. On contact with fur, T. dicterium causes a magically-induced allergic reaction[a] specific to each individual… All parts of the plant can, if properly handled, be used safely in potions; the stem, in particular, is a fairly common ingredient. A popular hangover cure requires the ashes of a burnt T. dicterium flower, though this potion has come under a great deal of scrutiny and is widely considered ineffective.
—from The Wild Plants of the Everfree Forest and Their Uses

There were very few other students sitting in the dark, damp classroom that afternoon, but Maria had hardly expected otherwise when she had chosen to study the art of potion-making. It wasn’t exactly an art that was respected by the magical elite, after all, and with so many students looking down on it as “mud magic” it was one of the least-taught classes at the Arcana. The teacher, a zebra by the name Zama, was not often seen outside her classroom—and the less she was spoken about in polite company, the better.

Sometimes Maria had wondered why the subject was even taught, if it was so frowned upon outside of the classroom.

“You are all here because you have made a choice.” Zama’s voice startled Maria out of her thoughts, and she had to spend a moment composing herself. “You have chosen, in the face of great criticism, to ignore the slights of your fellow students in pursuit of knowledge. That alone is bravery enough, and I thank you all for signing up to study with me this year. I am grateful, and I do not think lightly of this choice of yours.

“I am afraid that I must ask you all to be braver still, though.”

Something about the way Zama spoke, and the way her voice echoed in the dark room, had shocked Maria (and, it seemed, her fellow students) into silence. Despite the quiet, Maria could sense the unease in the air, and she shared a few frightened glances with her classmates. Zama took a moment to let the glances settle, before she continued.

“Most of you will have spent your whole lives dependent upon your hornglow for even the most basic of tasks. You use it to light your way in the dark, and to defend yourselves from dangers. Most importantly, you have likely always used it for any precise movement, not trusting the clumsy grasp of your hooves and teeth.

“Today, I will demand that you unlearn a habit that is so ingrained in your way of life that to do otherwise is considered impolite.”

Despite the shocked and troubled faces around her, Maria found herself on the verge of smiling at this statement. If the first lessons of potion-making were going to be in using her hooves, she was going to pass with flying colours.

The reason for these lessons, Zama explained, was that many of the ingredients they were using in their potions were magically volatile and, though hornglow was completely inert, it tended to have subtle effects on the objects and space around it. She talked for a while about tiny fluctuations in magical potential, a speech that was lost on Maria (who had spent so much of her time learning how to use magic that she’d never had the chance to learn how it worked)—but the images of what had happened to a number of unicorn potion-makers who had not learned this lesson, which Zama passed around the classroom for the five students to study, were not.

Zama went on to introduce the students to a few key tools in potion-making, and had them practice using them—first with their hornglow, well away from any actual ingredients, so that they could get the hang of how they were meant to move, and then with their hooves and teeth. Maria couldn’t quite conceal the grin on her face when Zama praised her for her stirring, though the looks of disgust on two of her classmates’ faces were enough to scale it back to a meek smile.

While the other students worked on their technique, Zama sent Maria to the small library at the back of the room to start researching the ingredients in the potion of calm, which they would be learning to brew over the course of the next week. It wasn’t a big library—in fact, it was smaller than her own private library—but it was filled with the kinds of books that Maria had always wanted to see: covered in arcane symbols, and riddled with detailed diagrams and complicated instructions. These were the kinds of books she had expected when she first visited the Everfree Library!

By the time the bell rang, Maria was curled up on the cushions in Zama’s tiny library, with her muzzle in The Wild Plants of the Everfree Forest and Their Uses, almost lost to the world—and if it wasn’t for the fact that the other students needed to get past her to reach the door, she would have happily stayed there for the rest of the afternoon. It would have been an improvement over going to the temple, that much she was certain of.

“I see you have taken quite a liking to my books?” Zama smiled, glancing at the floor where the book was still lying wide open. Maria blushed, quickly closing the book and carefully—very carefully, given she was using her hooves for it—returned it to its shelf. “You are welcome to come and read them any time you wish, my student, so long as I am not teaching at the time—and it is not after curfew. I might not object, but I suspect my colleagues would not agree to it.”

“Th-thank you, Ms. Zama,” Maria mumbled, avoiding her teacher’s gaze. Despite her friendly attitude, Zama seemed quite intimidating, and Maria wasn’t quite sure why.

“Please, just Zama.” She sighed at that, and nodded towards the door. “You’d best get going. I know they are not all that fond of unicorns who show up late to worship.”

[a] though the effects of T. dicterium are well documented, the process by which these reactions occur remain a mystery. Though this author has applied many times to various regulatory bodies for the grants necessary to study this, and other, phenomena which suggest that the natural magic of the forests is far more intricate than often believed, these requests have been regularly denied.

Author's Note

I don't normally use these (though perhaps I should get into the habit of it? I've been rather put off Author's Notes by my days of reading on fanfiction.net, where they almost inevitably feel rather tacky, but this is the kind of project that is well-suited to them), but I felt that in this case I should apologise for the obscenely long delay in getting this chapter out. Suffice to say that I was ill at the end of last week, and that rather threw a schedule that I'd only just started to get used to! I'm trying to keep my days more organised now, so I should be back to posting on a regular basis. I hope that the wait wasn't too disappointing, and I'll be back tomorrow with another chapter!
—Scorpius

A Lesson in the Scriptures

But Starswirl stood his ground and refused the demon’s offer. When he saw that he could not convince Starswirl to worship him, he cursed and howled in frustration. In anger he lashed out with his chaos, and took from Starswirl his horn, as he had the Thaumata[a] who defied him. And still Starswirl did not give in, for though he had no horn with which to wield it, he could still feel his magic in his veins[b].
—Inlectatio 4:15-18

Maria ducked her head down, below the head of the stallion sitting in front of her, and stifled a wide yawn with a hoof. The High Priest could have been the most engaging speaker in all of Equestria, and Maria would still be bored out of her mind—she’d been attending services at the temple twice a week since first year, and still didn’t really understand their purpose. She supposed that was another thing that Arpeggio hadn’t taught her.

“… and we must remember that Starswirl was faced with a dilemma…”

Not, of course, that the High Priest was the most engaging speaker in all of Equestria. Maria suspected that the stallion would probably fail a third-year oration exam. She smiled at that thought, imagining him stood in the examination hall before a class of barely-teenage foals, and droning on in that distant, monotonous voice of his. At least he became a priest instead of a teacher.

“… In that moment, the tool with which he shaped his power was stripped from him…”

There wasn’t a clock in the temple—Maria had always suspected this was deliberate, to prevent people from glancing up at one in frustration—but she’d chosen her seat carefully enough that she could see Canterlot clocktower through one of the arching windows. It didn’t help much to glance at it, given that services in the temple weren’t even close to fixed-length, but it was at least a reassuring sight.

Besides, at the rate things seemed to be going, today’s service might end up finishing right before dinner, and she’d get to avoid any awkward conversations.

“… this sacrifice is the one that we symbolically carry each Thursday, when no horns…”

She tried to turn her attention back to the High Priest, but couldn’t focus. At least she wasn’t asleep—she could see a number of students nodding off in the crowd before her.

The problem with services in the temple was that there was very little one could do except pay attention, for there was nothing more frowned upon in society than not following the teachings of the Church—or at least going through the motions. In fact, there was just one option available to anyone who simply didn’t want to pay attention to the service without being rude: reading the Scriptures.

Maria lit her horn and guided the small, red book from under the desk in front of her and sat it open on the surface. A quick glance up at the signs hanging on the pillar behind the pulpit told her the reference she needed for today’s reading, and she skimmed to it as quietly as she could. It wasn’t Wild Plants, but at least reading about the apparently historical deeds of Starswirl the great would keep her occupied until the High Priest ended his lecture and got around to the dismissal.

“… let us become like him: devout in the face of challenges that seem so insurmountable…”

Oh for crying out loud. It seemed as if the High Priest couldn’t ever come up with something new to say—each week, no matter what parts of Scriptures were read, he would always talk about how the congregation should “be more like Starswirl.” It was enough that, for her first years visiting Canterlot, Maria had become convinced that the Church was all about worshipping and becoming more like Starswirl. It was only after Hearth’s Warming in her first year that she had found out that it was, in fact, supposed to be about revering Magic and its Source, so it was hardly a surprise that she still found the whole thing somewhat pointless.

No, not pointless. No matter how twisted the High Priest’s message seemed to be, Maria had been raised to respect the beliefs of others. They might confuse her, but that didn’t make them pointless.

“… Go, and let the Magic in your veins guide you in the will of the Source.”

Finally!

“We will follow where we are led.” The response was mostly muttered by the congregation, a mix of students on the balconies and citizens on the floor, and yet you could easily make out the words as they rumbled through the hall.

“May the joy and peace of the Source be forever in your hearts.”

There was another loud rumble: this time, the whole congregation rose to their hooves. Seconds later, the deep notes of the bass began to play, and the string quintet struck up a slow, calm tune as the congregation began to amble into the street. Maria was happy not to rush, standing in the crowd of students who were jostling forwards to try to reach the door (and though she loathed the temple services’ dull content, she had to admit that she liked being able to leave with her fellow students, instead of waiting for them to all leave first). A quick glance behind her, back at the clocktower, told her that if she took long enough getting to the door she’d definitely be back just in time for dinner to start.

All in all, today has gone pretty well—for a Monday.

[a] in some versions, “those members of the Thaumata”. (Recall that there is some dispute over whether the Thaumata refused to give way to Discord or put it to a vote which narrowly lost; see Inl. 1:17-23 for further reading.
[b] “In all the Scriptures, there is no word more thoroughly debated than this.”—translated from Uncertainties of Scripture, High Priest Sol Everfree, C.E. 249.
The debate over this word has been twofold: first, there is a great deal of dispute in the source material itself, with almost the same number of copies reading “veins” as “bones”, and a smaller but still significant number reading “soul”; second, there subject of where magic comes from is one that is being hotly debated in present academia, with no clear sign of resolution. We have chosen to use “veins” here in this translation only because it has, by the tiniest of margins, the strongest support from the source texts, and do not intend to comment on which we think is correct.

Bound

To my dear friend,

In my time, I have fought many beings, and in my youth I was as eager as you are now to seek the thrill of battle. And some fights must be fought: there is little[a] wisdom in those who say that the good must always avoid violence. Sometimes, to avoid violence is to risk the loss of all that we hold dear, and it is right and proper to endure great suffering to protect that.

Yet be wary of being too eager to fight, my friend. Though it sometimes cannot be avoided, it must always be abhorred. Therefore, I say unto you: fight only when there are no other options that present themselves to you, whenever yourself and your kin are threatened more by your inaction than your action, and let no fight carry on longer than it needs[b].
—Epistulae 12:1–8

Even for a Monday, this is bad.

Maria weighed the options before her—not that there really was a choice in the matter. Even if one of her options would, at least, keep her out of trouble with the teachers, she couldn’t afford to be seen to cast further slight upon another House, not even to avoid personal troubles. Even though staying safe (and perfectly within school rules) was very tempting, Maria couldn’t let her House’s reputation take any more blows because of her.

She didn’t need to glance at the staff table to know the havoc that Abigail Forthnall had caused, but she did need to catch Professor Everfree’s eye. Standing behind the table while the staff around him panicked (each, of course, trying to reach the source of the commotion as quickly as possible, to catch her before she could bind the two of them into this awful situation), his muzzle twisted into a grimace as he seemed to force himself to nod, once, in affirmation. He knew as well as she did that there really wasn’t another choice.

The students were already growing impatient—and quite the crowd had formed in those few moments since Abigail had called out to her, far more than she would have expected—shouting and jeering as if they expected a fight then and there. But Maria would take her time over this, to ensure that she was composed and dignified throughout, and to ensure that nothing at all went wrong.

“I, Maria, first neophyte of Everfree, do dispute the charges laid before me, and accept your condition of an honour duel.” She spoke carefully, moving her lips more than she normally would and slowing her speech so that all could hear—and who knew that Oration lessons would come in handy in such a strange situation—reciting the words she had forced herself to memorise long ago. She lit her horn, and sent out a small shimmer of hornglow to meet the bright yellow orb of Abigail’s. “So mote it be.”

For just one moment, everything stopped still.

The staff halted, some still halfway over tables in their desperate bid to reach Maria before she could speak, others sat frozen at the staff table in shock. The crowd of students fell silent, staring in awe at the yellow–violet orb that was spinning quietly in the air of the hall, small sparks of multi-coloured hornglow orbiting around it. Out of the corner of her eye, Maria could see Tim’s face fall, almost in slow motion, as he realised what was going on far too late.

But in that moment, Maria’s eyes were focused solely on Abigail Forthnall.

Magic bound the two of them together. It was no longer a possibility for Maria not to duel Abigail—and this was the reason that swearing oaths was so thoroughly against school rules—because dueling Abigail Forthnall was no longer an abstract thought but an intrinsic part of who Maria was. And for that moment, Maria could do nothing but watch as her opponent’s eyes widened slightly in surprise, her lips slacking and parting just a fraction. Had she not known that Maria would have to accept? Did she truly not understand the political ramifications of her challenge? She had cast the Oath first, after all.

Maria smiled, and then sat down to try to eat her dinner. It wasn’t as if the magic bound them to duel right there and then, and she really didn’t want to let her plate get cold. Besides, she should have enough time for a mouthful or two before any of the staff could come back to their senses and reprimand her for breaking school rules.

And so it came as a great surprise to her when, mere moments after the students’ clamour rose again to an uproar, the headmistress’ voice—magically amplified, and booming with barely-concealed fury—filled her ears.

“MARIA EVERFREE AND ABIGAIL OSCINA FORTHNALL! MY OFFICE! NOW!”

Maria sighed, setting down her cutlery, and rose once more from her seat. The crowd of students parted around her as she made her way towards the small door behind the staff table that lead to the base of the Headmistress' tower—there was no point in being polite and waiting for Abigail to go first when they were both in such trouble.

"I'll talk to her after you're finished," Professor Everfree muttered as she walked past him. "This isn't your fault. Stay strong."

She had no time to do anything but nod in response. Soon enough, she was looking up into the fiery eyes of Headmistress Fenglade, and any strength that Maria had left drained out of her. She had never seen the Headmistress so angry, and to know it was all their fault… Maria and Abigail shared a sideways, nervous smile, as the Headmistress turned around and beckoned them to follow up the winding, torchlit stairs.

[a] in some translations, no. Scholars are divided over which word best represents Starswirl’s view, with one camp arguing that a harsh and absolute stance on the matter is contradicted by Starswirl’s later proclamation that violence is to be abhorred, and the other arguing that it reinforces the idea of black-and-white morality that seems so important to Starswirl in this passage. There is certainly a lot to be said about black-and-white morality here, but this author believes that this is clearly not what Starswirl had in mind—despite his command to “always” abhor violence, Starswirl seems to be insisting that there are times to stick to one’s principles and times when it is better not to take the risk.
[b] Though Starswirl does not elaborate, it is generally assumed that he is referring to victories and not losses here. His own advice seems to be to fight on while you still can, but not to let your enemies suffer one moment longer than is necessary to win. Many modern scholars criticise Starswirl’s approach as limiting and stifling in combat, particularly against enemies who will not hesitate to prolong a soldier’s own suffering.

Author's Note

I'm not particularly happy with the ending of this chapter, and will probably come back to tweak it tomorrow. It looks like this long weekend is going to have some rushed chapters—my friends and I are participating in a speedrunning challenge, each trying to learn a video game to speedrun in under 12 hours! Needless to say, that'll take some time away from me when I do mine, but I hope to get around to writing two chapters tomorrow so I don't have to worry on Sunday.
Hope you're all enjoying where things are going—I was going to save this for a few more chapters, but I decided that what this story really needed was plot, not endless worldbuilding and character introduction :raritywink:
—Scorpius

Consequences

Dueling
While dueling has always been an important part of our culture, and bouts of daring, wit, and power between students a long-standing tradition of education, Formal Duels are forbidden to students of the Arcana. Students who wish to settle a dispute by combat are welcome to hold a duel at the dueling society, which meets on Friday evenings and is open to students in their third year and above. It is worth noting that the punishment for casting a Formal Duel Oath is relatively light[a] compared to the punishment for accepting[b]. This is due to the difference in nature of the spells used: while the magic involved in issuing a challenge creates a magical contract, it is only the acceptance of the Oath that is magically binding[c].

Students are taught sparring twice a week. These lessons should serve them well should they be challenged to a duel (Formal or otherwise), whether they are still students or have long-since graduated.
—from The Canterlot Arcana Student Handbook

The Headmistress’ office was a small, cozy affair, with little more than a desk, a few cushions, and a fireplace. And yet the room was well-lit—the sun had not yet set, and its light streamed down reddish hues from the wide windows above them. Soon enough the sun would sink below the windows’ horizon, and the room would be lit only by the flickering glow of the fire, and the small but bright orb of hornglow that Headmistress Fenglade had cast.

This was not the first time that Maria had been inside the Headmistress’ office, and she was certain that it would not be the last—but with Fenglade’s angry glare not yet beginning to fade, Maria knew that it would certainly be one of her more memorable trips.

“I am… disappointed in you both.” The Headmistress’ voice cut through the quiet, distracting Maria from the crackling of the fire. Her voice sounded restrained, and Maria saw Abigail flinch at the barely-concealed fury. “Ms. Forthnall, do you know what you have done?”

“I… I didn’t think…”

“No, you didn’t,” Fenglade interrupted, and Maria couldn’t help but feel glad that she wasn’t on the receiving end of that anger right then. The Headmistress’ ruby eyes were fire, and Abigail was shaking under their blaze.

Then the Headmistress closed her eyes, rested her forehead gently on a hoof, and sighed.

“Ms. Forthnall, had you merely insulted Maria’s self then this gross breach of conduct would be her fault and hers alone. Instead, you brought her House’s reputation into question, and this may have forced her horn. You will be spending a month in detention with Emeritus Chingar. You are dismissed.”

Maria did not turn to look as Abigail left the office; she didn’t need to turn to see the wide smirk on her face. She clenched her teeth tighter together, but kept her face as neutral as she could. She wouldn’t react. To react would be reaching above her station.

Of course, Abigail’s punishment would be a punishment—Chingar would make sure of it, if his lessons were anything to go by—but it was more than that. It wouldn’t do, of course, for a fourth year neophyte to beat a sixth year, so the school would be stepping in. At least, Maria consoled herself, a month of rigorous training might dull the older student’s eagerness to fight.

“Maria.” The Headmistress’ voice was quiet, but cold. Her eyes were no longer blazing with fire, but they were hard. “You are, of course, well aware of the usual punishment for accepting a formal duel on school premises?”

Maria nodded, and swallowed. A month’s suspension, at minimum. She’d read about it, back in first year: allegedly, one stallion had even been expelled, a hundred years ago.

“I understand that politics may have… forced your horn, somewhat,” Fenglade continued, slowly. “For now, I shall assign you a month’s detentions with Deputy Headmaster Whitetail; I will discuss further with your father, and with your head of House, before assigning any further punishment. You are dismissed.”

It wasn’t getting off lightly—far from it, if there was more punishment to come—but Maria Everfree allowed herself to smile as she trotted down the spiral steps from the Headmistress’ office. And Deputy Headmaster Whitetail was, at least, a relatively friendly member of staff, which was more than could be said of Emeritus Chingar. It was going to take every ounce of control she had not to smirk right back at Abigail when she finally made it back to dinner.

Assuming, of course, that dinner was still being served. Her stomach rumbling, Maria quickened her pace and trotted briskly back in the direction of the hall. Even if she was a little late, she should still be able to catch the end of dessert.

[a] a minimum of two weeks and a maximum of seven weeks in detention, unless there are exceptional circumstances.
[b] a minimum of a four weeks' and a maximum of a year's suspension. If the student being challenged chooses to initiate the Duel before punishment can be given, the student may risk expulsion.
[c] it is hence a form of minor soul magic, which may not be performed by minors without the express written permission of the Thaumata. The minimum punishment for its use is specified by law. The Thaumata may also choose to fine any student who accepts a Formal Duel Oath.

Author's Note

I have returned! I think it's fair to say that 2016 has not been a good year for most people, and it certainly wasn't a good year for me. Thankfully, that's all behind us now. Hopefully I'll be able to keep up writing regularly this year far better than I did before!

Practice Makes Perfect

Arthur,

Forthnall and Whitetail putting further pressure on today. Our position in some serious danger. Please ensure that any school squabbles remain confined to the Arcana in future. I can’t shield the little dirt-pusher from a position of weakness. You’re lucky I got the fine down to six thousand. I’ll pay four from the vault.

Please pass the attached missive on to the filly. And please do make sure she understands the importance of making us look good from all this. Forthnall pressing enough as it is, claims of not being able to raise a neophyte will lose us the vote.

My regards to Primrose,
Quercus

An Illusory blackboard covered the larger bookshelf and, in the air before it, four pieces of chalk seemed to hang, steady. It was a moment before Maria even noticed that they cast no shadows—a huff and a flash of hornglow soon fixed that. A second-year mistake.

In her mind’s eye she was watching and replaying the notes that Deputy Headmaster Whitetail had written that morning. She’d memorised the words—not what they’d said, for their content was deliberately nonsensical, but their shapes and their forms. They were art in motion, and Maria had memorised every curve.

She’d mastered the single chalk an hour ago—it wasn’t that different from the quill on paper Illusion, and she’d had all of History to practice that. Four chalks, though? It had been difficult enough to focus on a single line of text at a time.

Slowly, but surely, she tried. The shapes were all familiar—and she’d practiced each line individually, so she hadn’t needed to worry about where each line would start and end—but found her mind unconsciously drifting to one line or the other and, as her attention drifted, so too did the chalk. One line would fall behind the others, so she would try to trace it faster, only to find some other line falling behind or speeding up too much as well.

And casting so many Illusions was exhausting. She could feel the ache in her horn as different spells interfered, and after two hours of near-constant Illusionwork on an empty stomach, even her legs were beginning to feel weak.

With a sigh, she banished the Illusions, and pulled a glass of water across the room to her lips. A quick fli… two quick flicks of hornglow, and it was refreshingly chilled. She lapped it up, the icy cold on her lips slowly flowing to chill her tongue, her throat, her stomach.

And then, just as she began to bend to sit on her cushion, there was a sharp, loud knock at the door. Maria straightened herself up, placing her glass carefully on her bedside table before grasping the door with her hornglow.

“Maria.”

Professor Everfree’s—her father’s—greeting was sharp and formal, but Maria could see the hint of a smile tugging at his muzzle.

“Father,” she replied, inclining her head slightly. “Please, come in.”

“I spoke with the Headmistress.” Professor Everfree made his way over to a cushion by the fire, one that Maria had long since reserved for his visits—not that anyone else ever really visited her, except Tim—and looked right at her. “You realise how lightly you got off?”

“Yes, father,” Maria said, looking at the floor to avoid his eyes. “I’m sorry—”

“Don’t be,” he said. “You had little choice in the matter, and I suspect that we would have come off a great deal worse if you hadn’t. Apparently the Thaumata’s session today was… particularly damaging.”

Professor Everfree took a moment to compose himself, before flicking open a saddle-bag and floating a scroll across to Maria.

“Quercus attached this to his missive tonight. He says it’s for your eyes only.”

It took almost all of her will not to gasp—Consul Quercus was the Head of House Everfree, and though he had been involved in her placement as neophyte he had never communicated with her directly. One of the older serving-mares had said that he didn’t so much as look at her during her Presentation, which had caused quite some scandal.

Instead, she nodded, and tucked the scroll away neatly on the shelf of her bedside table. “I’ll make sure to look at it tonight.”

“Good.” Professor Everfree smiled. “Now all you have to do is lose gracefully and we should be in the clear. Rabastan said he’d be happy to go through that with you—the formalities and all that. Can you believe there are formalities to losing a Duel?”

He’d said it as a joke, of course—there was nothing in Equestria that was not done with formality—but it struck a nerve in Maria. His standing wasn’t remotely threatened by a breach of etiquette: he was a distinguished Professor from an old and powerful House, and he had cultivated an air of absent-mindedness. But Maria was the first neophyte of Everfree, and would always be under scrutiny. One hoof out of line, and Maria would lose what small amount of respect she had been able to cultivate among her fellow students.

Assuming, of course, that anyone would respect her after publicly accepting a Duel Oath.

Professor Everfree seemed to have noticed that he’d said the wrong thing. Awkwardly, he rose, and started towards the door.

“Be careful, Maria,” he said. “Your mother and I would hate to see you hurt.”

“I’ll be okay.” The lie ran smoothly from her tongue. Formal Duels weren’t exactly known for being safe, particularly when one’s opponent was more powerful and more practiced. “Thank you.”

“I’ll send a serving-mare down with some dinner,” the Professor said as he reached the door. “I imagine you didn’t get to eat all that much earlier.”

At that moment, Maria’s stomach growled loudly; she smiled sheepishly at the Professor, who chuckled and closed the door behind him with a creak and soft thud.

When the serving-mare arrived a half hour later, she found Maria standing once more in front of an Illusory blackboard, four pieces of chalk floating slowly across it, wavering and erratic. She placed the tray down on the end-table, knocking a small, curled roll of parchment to the floor, and backed out of the room as quietly as she had arrived, leaving Maria to her exercises and—if she ever noticed it—her dinner.

Neophyte,

Ignore what Arthur says. I need you to win. Don’t mess this up, and don’t make us look bad.

Consul Quercus

Just Our Luck

“Why do we always get cases like this?”

Alexander Candentius Sparkle pointedly ignored the whining voice behind him and instead set to work. The first order of business when arriving at a scene was to take a good, thorough look around. It made no sense trying to analyse the evidence until it had all been taken in. He cast a few observational spells—checking for any magical disturbances, but also heightening his own awareness and vision.

He was pointedly refusing to think about the bodies until he absolutely had to.

“There’s no sign of any latent magic,” he muttered, a shimmer of amber hornglow spreading out from his horn like a web that covered the whole clearing. “No Illusions, no Wards, no Enchantments—”

“You checked for Wards?” Emily sounded surprised. Most unicorns thought Wards only ever belonged in places like Canterlot, or the Northern Keeps, but Alex had seen them used in some truly awful ways at crime scenes before—and this was certainly an awful enough crime.

Five corpses, all unicorns, arranged evenly in a circle around the clearing, their horns pointing inwards. A quick Illusion confirmed that the arrangement was exact, the lines their horns pointing along forming a perfect star. And in the middle of the clearing, perfectly centred in the circle, was the slightest indent in the grass, as if something had been resting there—likely until morning, if the lack of dew was anything to go by.

“Sacrificial rituals often need Wards, Emily,” Alex said, smiling a little when she winced at the name. Before she could tell him off, he added, “Any ritual that required multiple unicorn deaths would almost certainly be volatile. Far too much magic involved in that. To even attempt it without some kind of safety Ward…”

While he was thinking, Emily’s horn lit, and she knelt down beside one of the corpses. Sapphire hornglow traced along the barrel, dodging in and out of the skin. Alex tried not to cringe—autopsy spells always gave him the creeps, so he generally left them to Emily.

It was a few moments later that she looked up at him. “I’m getting natural causes. Around three in the morning. No traces of any Curses.”

“It can’t have been natural causes.” Alex shook his head, and gestured wildly around the clearing. “Look at the placement!”

“Perhaps they were dead before they arrived?”

“What kind of ritual needs dead victims?”

For a moment the two stayed silent, before Emily rose and moved to the next corpse around. “Might as well check them all,” she muttered.

Alex smiled, and adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose. It might have been a truly awful case, but it felt good to be out in the field again. Or, rather, the forest. Anything was better than another day at the office, pushing parchment—even guard duty had been more exciting than that.

“Alex?” Emily’s voice was shaking as she called out. Five years of Adstra training, and a year on the job, and Alex had never heard his partner sound so unsure, or so frightened. Tense, he began to trot over to where she was kneeling, halfway across the clearing. “You need to see this.”

“What’s different about this one?” he asked, praying to Starswirl and the Source that she wouldn’t need him to do an autopsy himself.

Emily’s face was pale—paler than usual, at least—and she swallowed before explaining. “I was casting the standard autopsies, as usual. Nothing fancy, you know? And I’ve been getting the same result on every corpse I’ve checked… they’ve all died from natural causes, there’s not a trace of magic in them.”

Alex frowned. “Okay,” he said, slowly. “But how is that different?”

“I ran a diagnosis spell,” Emily replied, her voice almost a whisper. “It’s not standard procedure, but I figured it might give some more information about how they died? I mean, they use it in hospitals all the time to figure out what’s happened to you…”

Emily had trailed off, but Alex had gotten her point. Turning to the corpse, he lit his horn. Medical spells really weren’t his forte, but after a few seconds he’d managed to get a stable diagnosis spell up.

Not that it told him anything new, of course. The body in front of him had been a healthy earth stallion, twenty-three years old, who had been suffering from a sprained ankle and had died of natural causes some eight hours pre—

Oh.

“That’s not an earth pony,” Alex said, slowly. Beside him, Emily nodded. He didn't even want to think about what that would mean—for a unicorn to register magically as an earth pony? The very thought made his stomach churn.

After taking a moment to settle his thoughts, Alex rose, and dispelled the barrier around them. “I’m going to call in the autopsy specialists,” he said, as he began to trot back towards their carriage. Behind him, he could hear Emily scrambling to her hooves. “This is far beyond our level. The boss will need to hear about this.”

“I can have a report compiled by the time we’re at Everfree Station,” Emily said, briskly. No jokes—she really was shaken by that.

As they left the clearing, Alex nodded sharply to the guards on duty, who were standing diligently beside the path, almost camouflaged in their dark, emerald armour. The captain nodded back, and wordlessly directed their escorts to join them. Alex would have laughed at the thought of trained Adstra needing a guard escort if they were anywhere else—but he’d grown up in Everfree Village, and the tales he’d heard of the forest always put him on edge. Besides, his training was mostly focused on investigating criminals, not self-defence from timberwolves.

“I’ll get the parchmentwork done, then,” he said, softly. He’d need to do more than just the admin for the autopsy team: even with Emily writing up their preliminary report, he was going to need to request access to the Starswirl Wing for research. This kind of ritual went far beyond anything he’d learnt at the Arcana—and when he’d studied there, they still offered an optional course in ritual magic. Not that he’d ever admit to having taken it.

Emily grinned at him. “I’ll race you—let’s see who can get all their parchmentwork done first.”

Alex groaned. It was going to be a long carriage ride to the station, that was for sure.

Author's Note

I have to admit, I'm not best pleased with this chapter. Pacing seems rushed, but I've tried to fix in in a few places and not much is happening. I'm trying to remember not to be a perfectionist with this story, and focus on allowing myself to produce content, but it isn't easy.

Anyway: new characters! A seemingly unrelated plotline! No extracts from books or letters! This chapter has a lot of new things for this story, and I hope they're not all that unwelcome. Things should be back to normal for tomorrow's chapter.
—Scorpius

A Quiet Conversation

FIVE UNICORNS VANISH OVERNIGHT IN CANTERLOT
The Aeropagus have issued an emergency warning to citizens of Canterlot after five unicorns vanished from the city in the early hours of the morning.
“All citizens are urged to take extra care, not only when out late at night, but even within your own homes,” a spokesmare for the Aeropagus has said. “Keep your Wards up to date. Make sure your home is secured magically and mundanely.”
The Thaumata are scheduled to debate on the deployment of additional Guard patrols in the city. The motion is expected to be passed by lunchtime…

Maria lapped at the water she’d levitated over to their table. Oration had been tough on her throat—Professor Everfree had been demonstrating methods for gaining and maintaining attention even over the roar of a shouting crowd, and had given everyone a chance to apply the techniques while the rest of the class tried to shout over them. She was glad that Tim had managed to save them an alcove table again, or she’d have had to watch her manners a little more closely.

“So what’ve you got next?” Tim asked as she was lowering her glass. “I’ve got double Magical Theory and I want to cry.”

Maria chuckled at that. “Don’t be like that,” she said. “Dornsen’s nice! And besides, I’d rather have double Theory than Astro and Runes.”

Tim visibly winced. “You have both of them? In one afternoon?”

Professors Alice Andromeda Fenglade and Rayna Cyatheala Fenglade were regarded throughout the school as two of the strictest teachers—not even Emeritus Chingar was regarded with quite the same kind of wary respect. Maria did well enough in both classes, and kept her head down enough to avoid trouble, but after the start she’d had this year she was beginning to wonder if keeping her head down would be enough.

“And the fourth year Astro practical is tonight as well,” she added bitterly, reaching out for a cheese and onion sandwich from the nearest serving-table. “I swear Whitetail deliberately sets the timetable every year just to make his own deadlines clash with stargazing night.”

Tim snorted, and shook his head. “You’ve just had a run of bad luck, Maria,” he said, smiling at her scowl. “Astronomy hasn’t ever gotten in the way of my Illusion essays.”

“That’s because you always left your Illusion essays until the morning they were due anyway,” Maria replied. Tim had, at least, the decency to gasp in mock outrage, but couldn’t even keep a straight face when she smirked.

“Speaking of Fenglades…” Tim began, and Maria shot him a withering look. He smiled. “You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to. I was just going to ask what punishment she gave you.”

“A month’s detention,” Maria said sharply. “With Whitetail. Abigail got Chingar, of course.”

“Of course,” Tim repeated, bitterness weighing on his voice. Maria didn’t blame him for being bitter—she was pretty sure that every neophyte was—but she still glanced around to make sure nobody had heard his tone. House Sparkle might not have minded such a slight, but Tim was too often unaware of just how little some houses needed to be provoked. If last night hadn’t been a reminder of that, she wasn’t sure what would keep him in line.

“Look, I’m lucky enough not to be chucked out,” Maria replied. “I’m pretty sure Headmistress Fenglade is going to be up against a lot of pressure to come down harder on me than she already has.”

“Why weren’t you suspended?” Tim asked, before adding: “Not that I want you gone, of course. I’m really glad you’re still here. Just… surprised, is all. Even with your perfect record, I can’t see the Headmistress bending rules for a neophyte.”

“Politics,” Maria said, and Tim grimaced.

“Of course,” he said, shaking his head dramatically. “I should have known. You are, after all, a walking political scandal— hey! That hurt!”

Maria sat back, an innocent smile on her face as she levitated a cheese and onion sandwich up to her muzzle and watched Tim nurse the spot on his side where she’d hit him with a stinging jinx. This year might have been shaping up to be dangerous, but at least she and Tim were able to joke and mess around a little at lunchtime. The normality, the lack of pressure… it was nice to not feel as if every eye in the room was always on you, just for once, and to be able to act and talk without worrying about what everyone else would say if they heard.

Which was why it was quite so disturbing, when she looked up, to see such a large number of students' eyes focused on her. Or, rather, Tim, if the glares of the nearest table were anything to go by. Confused and wary, Maria glanced around the hall until her eyes came to rest on the staff table, where the Headmistress was standing up, eyeing her and Tim with a wry, patient smile.

I just can't catch a break around here, can I?

When asked if there was any hint as to the whereabouts of the missing citizens, officials at the Aeropagus declined to comment.

Safety

And when the Devourer saw the Guards arranged upon the wall, he laughed, for they were gathered together in one place that he might consume them all in but one breath. Yet the Guards stood their ground atop the wall, as Starswirl had instructed them, and waited for the Devourer to step closer. And when he approached the line in the sand, that Starswirl had charmed to be visible only to their eyes[a], the Captain of the Guard called out: “Oh mighty Devourer, do not come any closer, for we have between us a mighty power that even you, in your strength, may not overcome.”
—Devotio 26:9-14

Headmistress Fenglade looked out at the quiet hall before her, and cleared her throat once.

“Now that I have everyone’s undivided attention—” at this, she glanced pointedly at the alcove where Maria and Tim sat, squirming awkwardly “—I would like to bring your attention to an important change that will be happening over the next few weeks. No doubt some of you have already seen today’s headlines: for those unaware, there has been a flurry of foalnappings here in the very heart of Canterlot. Until further notice, by order of the Aeropagus, all of Canterlot is on high alert. The Arcana will be provided with a small contingent of Guards to maintain security.

“These Guards will mostly be patrolling the perimeter of the Arcana, though a few”—she nodded at the Guards flanking the entrance to the Hall—”should be keeping an eye on our internal security at all times. Most of you will only notice this change when being escorted to and from the Temple, as these additional Guards will be accompanying you.

“Still,” the Headmistress continued, “it is always important to review personal safety, particularly in light of these recent crimes. For this reason, all students in their fifth year and below will be subject to an earlier curfew than usual…” At this, the hall exploded with noise. The hushed whisperings of the students grew into a dull roar.

Maria caught Tim’s eye and rolled her eyes. Neither of them would be pleased with an early curfew, but there was clearly no point in arguing against measures introduced for their own safety. Though nobody had mentioned it, Maria had a sneaking suspicion that many of those kidnapped were likely to be neophytes.

The Headmistress looked as if she were about to open her mouth to continue speaking over the din, when an unnaturally loud voice shouted through the hall: “QUIET!” The chattering and protest died instantly, and all eyes turned to the staff table to find the Deputy Headmaster standing, a tiny aura of ice-blue hornglow ringing his neck like a collar; a strand of his mane caught in it ever so slightly, and was vibrating back and forth intensely until he swept it out of the way with a hoof. I’m surprised Dad doesn’t teach us that one in Oration.

After a moment, when the students had calmed under the harsh, angry eyes of the Deputy Headmaster, the Headmistress smiled. “Thank you, Deputy Headmaster Whitetail,” she said. “As I was saying: students in the fifth year and below will be required to go straight to their rooms following dinner for the foreseeable future, unless engaged in a supervised extracurricular activity. Students will be escorted to their rooms and activities by Guards and staff.

“Furthermore, the Hall will be open every evening, with members of staff on duty to supervise you, until eight o’clock, should you wish to simply sit and talk. Likewise, the Library will be open for any who wish to undertake research or quiet study.”

The Headmistress paused, as if to gauge the reaction of the students, and Maria took the opportunity to glance around. Many of the students who had been protesting vocally before seemed placated by this compromise, and the fact that so many clubs would still be on was likely tipping the balance in the Headmistress’ favour. It didn’t affect Maria either way: she would be in detention every night, most likely until curfew.

“Students in their sixth and seventh years, particularly Prefects, will be required to assist with the safety and protection of the Arcana,” the Headmistress continued. “Any classes these year groups might have for this afternoon have been cancelled, and you will be asked to remain in the Hall following lunch for a briefing session with Emeritus Chingar and myself.”

Then, without another word, the Headmistress merely sat down, and plucked a sandwich from the table before her in her hornglow. After a moment, the voices in the Hall started back up again, and Tim and Maria looked at each other with wide eyes.

“Foalnappings?” Maria said, surprise making her voice come out as a squeak. It was a surprise—sure, Canterlot had a not insignificant crime rate, but foalnappings and vanished unicorns were a cut above petty burglary and street muggings. Unicorns vanishing in the middle of the night… it was a scary thought, in a city where everyone had put their trust so firmly in Wards and Illusory Architecture, where magical security far outstripped mundane. “Did you know anything about this?”

Tim shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t get the papers delivered, Maria.”

“Your older brother’s an Adstra, though,” Maria said. Tim’s eyes were blank for a moment before he remembered, and had the decency to look a little embarrassed. Maria didn’t blame him, though—family could be a very confusing topic for a neophyte.

“Alexander doesn’t say much about his work,” Tim muttered. “Though in his defense, that’s probably for legal reasons. I expect he might send me a letter about the importance of personal safety over the next few days; he can be a bit of a worrywort.”

Maria smiled at that. She had met Tim’s brother only once before, when she had been invited to attend lunch with Tim at a formal event hosted by House Sparkle. Alex had seemed focused and hard-working to her at the time—he never bragged about his work, but the way he spoke of it was filled with such reverence that she could tell in just ten minutes of conversation that it was all that was on his mind. Part of her wished it was him, and Adstra like him defending the Arcana now: even though she knew they were mostly trained for investigative work, Maria would have felt safer under their watch, somehow. She didn’t trust the brawn of the Guard without the brains of the Adstra to back them up.

Still, as she took another bite of her sandwich, Maria felt safe enough inside the towering walls of the Arcana. It would be enough.

[a] No modern Scholars are quite sure how Starswirl achieved this effect. Or, rather, many modern scholars are absolutely certain of how Starswirl achieved this effect, though since no entity like the Devourer has ever been seen since his defeat and subsequent banishment there has not been any easy way to test the multitude of conflicting hypotheses.

From One Fenglade to Another

It used to be said that the night sky, in its shimmering beauty, was a spell cast by some mythical being or other to protect the unicorns below while they slept*. This view has long since been debunked, but there is something about the night sky that draws the gaze of any true scholar of magic. Consider, for example, the five points of Orion’s Saddle, which upon closer inspection by use of a telescope provided Headmaster Marcus Cirenius Merstrum with the inspiration for what has now become known as Cirenius’ Basket. All this, through the intricate study of the strands of pure magic that appear to weave the tapestry of the sky…
—from Astronomy and Magical Theory: A Guide for the Unfamiliar but Aspiring Student

“That is all,” Professor Fenglade said, her tone as stern and dry as it had been for the whole lesson. “You may leave.”

Maria sat patiently, her notes rolled up neatly in her saddle-bags, as she waited for her fellow students to stand and leave. Her face was calm and relaxed, years of practice creating a mask lest her reactions provoke one of her classmates holding her in place, but inside she was fuming. As always happened with the theory lessons, she felt as if her last hour had been entirely wasted.

Astronomy, Maria had always been told, was an ancient and important subject that held great traditional importance to the culture of Equestria. Apparently the stars held within them the deepest secrets of magic, and many new discoveries in magical theory had come about from the study of the heavenly bodies. To understand the stars, in their infinite beauty, flickering in the night sky like the texture of hornglow itself, was key to understanding the magic that guided everyone through life; the High Priest had always said that there was no finer joy in life than contemplating the motions of the stars and, through them, the will of the Source.

Maria couldn’t have cared less—she’d much rather study potion-making, and she’d only had one lesson of that so far.

After the other students had filed slowly out of the room, Maria stood and bowed briefly to Professor Fenglade, who gave her a sharp nod in return, before heading out of the room herself. Astro had overrun, of course, and Fenglade—the other Professor Fenglade, not the Headmistress—could never stand latecomers. Thankfully the Runes classroom was not too far from Astronomy: down the hallway, turn left, and take a right just before the Cloisters.

It wasn’t so far that one could get easily lost—especially at the start of a new year, students could often find themselves taking a wrong turn and stumbling upon a room they had never seen before, given the changeable nature of the Arcana—but it was just far enough for Maria’s mind to wander.

Foalnappings, in Canterlot. It seemed crazy: foalnappings were rare enough in rural areas, and among ponies who, Maria thought bitterly, were much less likely to be reported missing to the authorities. The idea that multiple unicorns could vanish from Canterlot itself was deeply unsettling… and yet, Maria found herself mostly untroubled. She was safe inside the Arcana, of that she was certain, but so were almost all the unicorns she was close enough to to care about. Primro—Mum might be in some danger, but Maria was sure that the Wards at home would keep her safe. Besides, if Dad thought she were in any danger, he could always arrange accommodation in the Arcana for her.

It was Tim’s family she was more worried about.

The Sparkles weren’t a particularly old House, having sprung up from a rogue descendant of House Everfree barely a century ago. They were small, and all very close—and though the family had no land to their name, they had just enough money and influence to remain a minor political power in Canterlot. Tim’s father was cousin to the Head of House, and worked a minor position in some regulatory department at the Thaumata; his mother was a researcher, formerly a teacher at the Arcana.

Arthur and Primrose Everfree were only able to afford the Wards on their home as an expense from the family vaults (House Everfree had traditionally always protected its own—at least, those of its own who were respectable enough), and Maria knew that such provisions would not be made for Tim’s family by House Sparkle. If one of them were to be foalnapped…

Maria shook her head. There was nothing she would be able to do to protect them. Even if she could convince her Dad to offer them a room to stay, until any danger had passed, he never would—Quercus would never let him offer such a close sign of friendship to House Sparkle.

She caught her fellow students up as they neared the corner by the Cloisters—it seemed that Harry had jumped through the balcony and was showing off some Illusion or other in the open air, and most of the year group had gathered around to watch. She rolled her eyes, but respectfully stood to one side to watch his antics, though didn’t really pay him very much attention. It wasn’t as if Illusory juggling were that impressive, being such a simple loop of motion. Had this been first year, she would have out-done him easily and with pleasure… but she knew better, now, what a neophyte’s place was, so she simply watched.

Even when the bell rang, signifying that they were all late for class, Maria stayed where she was and watched her classmates, thinking. It wouldn’t do for a neophyte to arrive on time when the rest of the class was late; she would rather risk the wrath of Fenglade, distributed among the class, than to draw any further attention to herself.

She really, really couldn’t afford to be singled out any more.

*It is worth reading up on these ancient mythologies and religions of the earliest unicorns. Popular Historian Sophia Luminare Everfree has written several engaging books on the subject, building upon the work of scholars such as Michelle Papyrah Dornsen and Timothy Whitetail.

Author's Note

I'm not a huge fan of this chapter (it doesn't really do very much, does it?), but I like it well enough—it's certainly better than yesterday's showing, if you ask me.

Tomorrow should bring something a little more exciting, I hope :twilightsmile:
—Scorpius

The First Detention

In the twenties, House Whitetail was under a great deal of scrutiny from its close allies in House Everfree. For thirty-seven years, under the leadership of Gregory Juliannos Whitetail, they had joined Everfree in rejection of the Neophyte Tradition, but upon his death[a], and the subsequent rise of Harold Noxae Whitetail to Headship[b], House Whitetail took on its first neophyte in half a century.

With none of the other Houses yet ready to embrace Whitetail as allies, Harold knew that drastic action needed to be taken to restore the House to power. His own courtship of Marie Sol Starkad[c] was a carefully calculated risk…
—from The Manor in the Woods: A History of House Whitetail

“Good evening, Maria.”

Maria took a deep, calming breath, shutting her eyes for just a moment. “Good evening, Deputy Headmaster.”

Deputy Headmaster Whitetail smiled slightly, and nodded toward the three cushions that were arranged on the opposite side of his desk. “Please,” he said, “do sit down.”

Maria’s heart was pounding in her chest, but her slow, deliberate breaths were keeping it in check somewhat. It was her first detention—she didn’t count that time where Harriet had gotten the whole year group in detention with Starkad—and she wasn’t at all sure what to expect. It’s only a detention. And even Dad will tell you it wasn’t your fault.

Slowly, gently, she sat down on the middle cushion, though it took her quite some time before she felt comfortable enough to put her whole weight on it.

“Now, Maria,” Whitetail began, levitating from a drawer some rolls of parchment and a quill, “the Headmistress has informed me that you are to serve detention for the next month, as punishment for accepting Ms. Forthnall’s Formal Duel. Personally, I believe this to be hogwash, but I have no authority over either the Headmistress or the rules of the school.”

Maria frowned. Her heart wasn’t yet calm, she could still feel its pounding shaking her ribs, but it was slower now. Uncertain. “Hogwash, sir?” she asked. “I very clearly broke school rules—“

“And you did so entirely for political reasons, Maria.” Whitetail shook his head, and a dark look fell across his eyes. “Quite unlike my peers, I know exactly what it is like to be a student under political pressure. School rules are nothing when compared to loyalty to the House that has taken you in… and yet, there must be a consequence for breaking them, or so I am told.

“For that reason, and that reason alone, I will be asking you to assist me with the marking of Illusion essays, because the alternative of setting you lines”—the word was spat with distaste—“is simply unthinkable. Far better that we use this time to do something productive.” And, quite unceremoniously, Maria found a small stack of parchment sitting in front of her on the desk, piled about muzzle-high. For a moment, she wasn’t quite sure what to say—then she glanced down at the top paper to read the title, and her eyes widened.

“Sir?” Her lips were shaking, but she managed not to stutter. “Aren’t these fifth-year essays? I recognise the material…”

At that, the Deputy Headmaster let out a mighty guffaw, shaking his head in mirth. It was the first time Maria had seen Whitetail open up, and the old unicorn finally had some energy in his eyes.

“Oh, Maria,” he said, still chuckling a little to himself. “You have no idea. The very fact that you recognise the material is more than any other student in your year would have managed. Besides,” he continued, lifting an old, ringbound book from the shelves on the wall, “I was hardly going to make you mark them all off of your own knowledge of the subject.”

Maria took the offered binder in her own hornglow, and for a moment amethyst met ice in midair… before Whitetail let the book go, and Maria found herself supporting its whole weight. She floated it down to her side of the desk and spread it open, gently leafing one page after another from right to left. “Sir… is this?”

“My personal notes,” Whitetail said, the pride evident in his voice. “I’ve been using them to teach for goodness knows how many years. They’re tailored to the syllabus as best I can make them—see those marks?” He levitated a quill and gestured with it towards the many different kinds of asterisks that lined each side of the pages. “Those are all the places where I’ve had to change things in different years.”

Maria nodded, and almost considered lifting a hoof to stroke at the pages. It was more than just an incredible piece of scholarship: it was an incredible symbol of trust. One of the first things Maria had learned at the Arcana was the general attitude of the scholars against sharing one’s notes, which were a private affair. For her to be shown, and allowed to use, a Professor’s notes was a statement—she was sure of it.

“Thank you, sir,” she said, quietly. The older unicorn smiled, and nodded.

“Neophytes have to stick together, Maria,” he said. “There aren’t enough of us to let anything petty get in our way. Besides, if you weren’t a neophyte, I think all the staff would be in agreement that you’re one of the most dedicated scholars to step into the Arcana in years. You work hard, Maria. We all respect you for it.

“Now,” he continued a moment later, after clearing his throat, “the notes you’ll need for these essays are between the pages I’ve marked with bookmarks. I’ll just get you a copy of the mark scheme…”

[a] Gregory was found dead in his own bedroom one morning by a serving-mare. The Wards of Whitetail Manor had not detected any hostile magic cast within the walls, and the autopsy report showed him to have died of natural causes—yet he was only fifty-three years of age, and all eyewitness reports suggested he was in quite good health the night before. Though the papers at the time stirred up fear of a conspiracy, the Adstra investigation into his death was dropped after a few days due to insufficient evidence that there had been any foul play.
[b] Harold's rise to power was as ruthless as it was ambitious. He was a distant cousin of Gregory, single and foalless at the time, and yet it has been said that he was blessed with a tongue of shining hornglow. His speeches, rallying together the divided House in a time of crisis, were targeted and clever, carefully undermining the trust of the family and the Thaumata in each of his competitors one by one. That he survived as Head of House Whitetail for some decades was a surprise to many, and is discussed in more detail in the next chapter.
[c] Though their position in recent years has become more central, a the time House Starkad was one of the staunchest supporters of the Neophyte Tradition, and treated their own neophytes with a respect that many houses, even today, would consider quite inappropriate.

The Magic of the Stars

The magic of the stars is static. It holds the night sky together, weaving great threads of something like hornglow across the stars, like a spell magnified a thousand times. And like any spell, it may be studied, and if it is studied for long enough it can be reverse-engineered. Nobody quite knows what the spell of the sky is casting, but it seems made of a hundred thousand effects. This year, my students, you shall be attempting to unravel just a handful of those effects, and you shall see in them the origin of many of the spells that you have come to take for granted…
—Professor Alice Andromeda Fenglade

It was about ten past eleven at night, and the fourth year students were being escorted by Guards from their dormitories in the Western tower to the Northern wall, where Professor Alice Andromeda Fenglade was waiting for them. In their hornglow they carried their own telescopes, charmed themselves the previous year, and in their saddlebags they brought rolls and rolls of star-charts.

Maria’s head was too full of Illusion to really pay all that much attention to the stars. An evening of marking essays on a subject she hadn’t fully studied herself was enough to set her thinking about all kinds of practical applications, and her plans for new Illusory furniture in her room were far more interesting than anything Fenglade might want them to learn about the mysteries of the cosmos, and the triangulation of the stars. Still, because she had to keep up appearances, she was more than willing to spend an evening staring through a small tube at the tiny pinpricks and lights in the sky, and compare their position and brightness with the charts in her textbook.

As the Guards led them up the final staircase, and onto the roof where Fenglade was standing patiently, Maria carefully twisted her telescope around to make sure that it didn’t get caught on the low ceiling, or hit any of the other telescopes hovering in front of her. She tried to make her movements as delicate as possible—despite her loathing of the subject, she had put a great deal of time and effort into the charms on her telescope, and she was rather proud of it. As she emerged onto the rooftop, bringing up the rear of her classmates, she trotted briskly over to her usual spot at the very fringe of the group, and started to unpack her saddlebag.

Astronomy lessons had become routine: the Professor would have already mentioned which stars they’d be looking for during the lesson earlier in the day, and so would simply watch as the students carefully trained their telescopes on various patches of the night sky. For the last three years, they had done little more than sketch what they had seen, and make detailed measurements; this year, they would be training their telescopes not on the stars themselves but on the magic that held them in place, though the process wasn’t all that different.

After checking that Fenglade was on the other side of the rooftop, Maria let out a quiet sigh, and trained her telescope on Orion’s back hoof. Rigel, the star was called, not that she’d be looking at it.

With her hornglow, Maria flicked a switch near the very end of the telescope, and watched as strands of deep blue faded into existence across her field of view. It was magic—wild magic—and with the enchantments she had made she was actually able to see it. It was exciting, for all of five seconds. Observational spells weren’t exactly difficult, or even all that uncommon, but she had cast it, and it worked, even after a Summer away—which was more than could be said of some of her classmates’ efforts.

And all the while, as she made notes on the strands, and the formulae that would make them, Maria’s mind kept drifting back to her detention with the Deputy Headmaster.

It was… nice, knowing that one of her teachers trusted her to help them, to be good enough to help them. It was a wonderful change from her normal school life, where she stayed quiet and let her own accomplishments fade into the background while her peers’ work shone. And yet, it hurt that she could only be trusted in private—that anywhere else, her being considered anything beyond an average student would be a grave insult to her classmates.

When she looked up from her telescope, she almost jumped: Professor Fenglade was standing next to her, reading her notes with a look of distaste on her face. Frowning, Maria looked down and re-read what she had been writing. Oh. Squared, not cubed. A quick flourish of her quill, and the offending index was fixed; with a huff of satisfaction, Fenglade walked over to the next student.

Maria shook her head, and turned back to her telescope. If she was right, Fenglade couldn’t say anything about her error because none of her fellow students were even close to where she was in the exercise. She didn’t consider practicing over the Summer break an unfair advantage—if she could even have an unfair advantage, as a neophyte, when everything seemed stacked against her.

She very, very nearly missed the flash of purple that darted along a thread of magic, before fizzling out as it reached the end that seemed almost tied into Rydel. For a moment, she found herself paralysed in shock, before quickly reaching out with her hornglow to adjust a few dials on the telescope, glad that she had thought to work in a spell she’d borrowed from Security Orbs, one that allowed her to replay what she had seen. With a careful, gentle turning, Maria watched the flash play out again, and again, and once in slow-motion. It was like nothing she had ever seen before.

“P-professor Fenglade?” she called out, her voice catching briefly in her suddenly dry throat. “Could you take a look at something for me?”

There are, of course, a few accounts of those individuals who claim to have seen the magic of the stars change. Accounts too few and far between, in the olden days, to possibly verify; in modern times, all are more easily demonstrated to be faulty equipment, or simple error. If you believe you have seen the night sky alter, my students, you may perhaps want to fix your telescopes.

The Acorn Café

Emily Oramis Fenglade, better known to her friends and family as Em, was sitting impatiently on a cushion in The Acorn Café, an empty mug on the low table in front of her, fidgeting from side to side. Not that she wasn’t glad to be there—she won the race, and getting to sit down and enjoy a hot mug of cocoa while Alex struggled through the last of a small mountain of parchmentwork was her reward. But she really hadn’t expected him to take quite this long when she first arrived, and even though she tried to make that mug last as long as it could, she still found herself waiting around for him.

It was at times like this that Em wondered how she had even ended up with a partner like Alex. The guy was nice enough, of course, but he was too serious, and sometimes he got so caught up in his work that he would almost seem to forget that she was even there. It could be a bit difficult, to work on an investigation like that. More than once she’d accidentally found herself working on some evidence that Alex had already checked over, without telling her, and he’d snap at her for wasting their time. It had taken her a long time to get used to his quirks, that was for sure—but then, she knew he was probably struggling with her own habits, and she tried not to get too mad at him.

He was a good investigator, though. A damned good investigator. And she might not trust him to tell her everything she needed to know at a crime scene, but she’d trust him with her life if a situation turned nasty.

That, she supposed, was what being partners in the Adstra was all about.

She started when she heard the little bell above the door ring, but refused to look up, or even glance, in that direction. If it was Alex, she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction; if it wasn’t, she wouldn’t want to give away that she was waiting for someone. It was getting quite late, and though Canterlot had once made her feel safe, the remnants of the ritual they’d found that morning had her on edge. There were some elements of Adstra training that one did well not to forget.

She’d studied ritual magic before—for a term, at the Arcana. She had dropped it as quickly as she could, since it didn’t hold her interest, but she knew the basics. All rituals needed a sacrifice, and that sacrifice powered a spell. Usually a far simpler spell than most unicorns would imagine, given the kinds of tales that ritual magic was associated with, but a spell with far more power behind it than even the most practiced of mages could achieve with mere hornglow.

The course she’d taken only studied legal rituals, of course, and even though the principle was the same, she didn’t even want to think about how one might start to sacrifice a unicorn’s magic…

“Evening.” Alex’s familiar voice, accompanied by the gentle thud of a cushion. Em smirked and looked up at him.

“Have a good one so far?” she asked, as innocently as she could manage. “Get much work done?”

“I’ve got the parchmentwork done, Emily,” he said, and she shot him the dirtiest look she could muster. One day he’d remember to call her Em. It wasn’t as if they weren’t close, after all. “Hopefully we’ll hear back tomorrow about the library.”

Em nodded, and floated her empty mug back to the bar with a small pile of bits. “Aren’t you just so excited to spend day after day browsing through the most restricted section of the library to look for illegal magic?”

She’d meant it sarcastically, but Alex’s nod was genuine and enthusiastic.

“Of course,” he said, grasping one of the mugs that had floated over to their table in his amber hornglow. “I have absolutely no idea how this kind of ritual could even be carried out. It’s horrific, of course it is, but wouldn’t it be so much better if we knew how it was done?”

Em wasn’t so sure that knowing anything about how the ritual was performed would be good for them. It seemed like the kind of knowledge that would inevitably go wrong, once it was out of the safe confinement of the Starswirl Wing, and the idea that they would be the ones retrieving it didn’t sit well with her.

But they did need it to solve this case. And if someone had already cast such a ritual, she supposed the knowledge wasn’t really well-confined at all.

“I suppose it can’t do any more harm than is already done,” she agreed, grudgingly. “And it’s not as if we’re likely to catch the bastard behind it without knowing how it’s done.”

Alex nodded again. It was less vigorous this time—just a single nod, really—but his eyes were set in grim determination. The hornglow around his mug flared up in brightness, rippling in waves of shimmering gold, like fire and water, all in one. She watched as he took a deep, slow breath, and his hornglow settled to its usual, gentle glow.

“We will catch them, Alex,” she said. “I’m sure we will.”

Alex smirked. When he spoke, his voice was deeper than usual, dark and determined: “And when we do, they’re going to pay for what they did.”

Em raised her mug in a mock salute of agreement, and smiled before lowering it to her lips. Alex was right—they were going to ensure that whoever was behind this would receive the justice they deserved. It wouldn’t be pretty, and she couldn’t think of any unicorn who would want it to be.

She just hoped they caught the bastard before they lost anyone else.

Sleepless Nights

And when at last the Devourer came to realise that he had been tricked, he stamped upon the ground in fury, and beneath his hooves the ground opened up into a deep and narrow chasm that rippled with wild magic[a]; and he cried out in great anguish, as if wounded, and the very air surged forth with the force of his voice…
—Devotio 26:21-23

Amethyst hornglow ran back and forth along the length of the brass telescope, gently testing the web of magic that was wrapped tightly around it. If it had been any other enchanted item, Maria would have struggled to even identify the spells placed on it, as they merged and wove through each other. But this was her telescope, and she had placed each of those spells there herself. She knew what each strand of magic did, and she could check every one of them with precision.

None of them were out of place, but that didn’t mean nothing was wrong. She could have made a mistake when casting any of those spells, and never noticed, so they wouldn’t quite perform their function, or she could have missed interactions between the spells, tightly-woven as they were, that would interfere with normal operation. The latter wasn’t easily spotted, and her meeting with the Headmistress tomorrow would be the best chance to find anything like that, but the former was something she could work on.

Starswirl, help me. This is going to take forever!

She had been trying not to glance at the clock, doing her best to keep her eyes very firmly rooted on any one of the many textbooks she had open around her, each held open by a heavy weight (paperweights, at first. Then, as the number of books she’d needed had continued to grow, she’d branched out to her own notes, wedged books’ corners under each other, and even resorted to an inkwell in the case of one, old book that she wouldn’t have minded damaging.) There were around a dozen in total, and they each described the formulae for just one of the enchantments.

She knew it was at least gone three in the morning, though—she didn’t have the will or strength any more to keep her eyes from wandering all the time, and she wasn’t sure how much longer she could keep going. It was too late, far too late, to order a coffee up from the kitchens, and her mind was torn between wanting sleep and wanting caffeine.

Maria was determined that she would have neither until she’d tested every spell on the telescope.

Alex turned in his bed, his hooves getting caught up in the soft, silk covers. He couldn’t sleep—for hours, every time he closed his eyes, he pictured the dead unicorns in the clearing. Sometimes he’d see them alive, trying to cast at an enemy that was cloaked in the shadows of the trees, and see the shock on their faces as their horns wouldn’t light.

Once he had tried to levitate a glass of water over from his bedside table, and had panicked when he couldn’t see any amber light, only to realise he was facing the wrong way and the table was behind him. His relief had been immense, but he could still feel the thud of his heart against his rib.

The worst part was not knowing. They were sure that the ritual had sacrificed five unicorns’ magic—perhaps also their lives, though there was no way of knowing if they had died from ritual magic or the shock of losing their own—but he couldn’t even begin to imagine what kind of spell would need that kind of sacrifice to cast. Whatever it was, it would be dangerous—certainly more dangerous than whatever had been used to foalnap unicorns from behind their own wards, and that was a scary thought.

Groaning with exhaustion and resignation, Alex rolled back over and illuminated his clock with a flicker of hornglow, craning his neck to make it out in the darkness: twelve minutes past three. He threw his head back down upon the pillow, frustrated and tired and still so very, very terrified.

He hoped Emily was right about them catching the bastard behind this soon, or he was never going to get any sleep.

[a] fera magicae: though there is no doubt that “wild magic” is the intended meaning of this phrase, it is worth noting that the authors of scripture are unlikely to have meant it in the sense that we use the term “wild magic” today: that is, to describe the magic of the land, sea, and sky, and any other magics that are not of unicorn origin. It is more likely that “wild” here is meant more in a sense of a lack of control, a wild kind of savagery, rather than truly being the magic of the land.

Being On Time

Then, Captain, let me board your boat
And we’ll set sail to sweeter shores.
In Northern plains
I’ll find again
A mare who’ll make my feelings soar.
—from Ex Ad Aquilonem

A knock at the door.

Maria groaned and rubbed at her eyes with a hoof. Her neck ached, a dull pain that faded into being as her eyes opened. In the fireplace, the last embers were dwindling; on the floor around her, books were still wedged open, and rolls and rolls of parchment were sprawled across the room, covered in scribbled calculations that became larger and more illegible with every passing inch.

And before her lay her telescope, the wretched brass tube that had kept her from sleep for so many hours. She still didn’t know what was wrong with it, and—as her thoughts started to gain a momentum of their own, and she looked over her scrawlings—she doubted much of her work last night would have been reliable, anyway.

A second knock. She could just hear a muffled cough, too, from beyond the door.

Oh. Right. The door.

Maria grasped the door handle in her hornglow, twisting it and pulling it open, only barely remembering to smile as she did so. Beyond it stood a serving-mare, a mug of coffee carried in her mouth and a braid of blue-striped mane tossed over a shoulder. Maria’s smile turned genuine then, and she grabbed the mug of coffee in her hornglow, setting it down on a table near the door.

“Thank you,” she said, just as the serving-mare said the same. For a moment, both stood silent in mortification, before Maria burst into a fit of giggles; it didn’t take too long for the serving-mare to join her.

“Professor Everfree noticed you weren’t at breakfast,” she said, as she managed to bring her laughter under control. “He sent me to make sure you were awake in time for class.”

“Well, then,” Maria said. “Thank you for coming to wake me…”

“Heavyweight.” She stood a little awkwardly in the doorway for a moment, before curtseying. “But really, don’t thank me. Thank the Professor. It is five minutes till class, after all.”

Maria glanced up at the clock, her eyes widening in horror. She wasn’t even washed! What would her classmates say about that? Not that they weren’t already likely talking—what with her being sent away from Astronomy class early to fix her telescope, and being sent to the Headmistress twice in as many days. And, of course, the Duel, which was still the hot topic for gossip across the Arcana.

“I’ve prepared a tub of hot water for you,” Heavyweight added sheepishly. “I figured you might want to wash yourself quickly.”

Maria let out a sigh of relief, and tilted her head to get a better look at the corridor outside. The tub was just right of the door—a round, wooden affair, barely large enough for a pony to stand in, a small cloud of steam slowly rising from the surface of the water. It wasn’t how she’d usually wash in the mornings, not since coming to the Arcana, but she didn’t really have time for her full morning routine: a quick splash of water and a drying spell would have to do.

“Thank you, Heavyweight,” Maria said, and Heavyweight blushed a little, and seemed to half-curtsey out of reflex; Maria almost laughed, but managed to control herself. The serving-mare seemed almost as if she were waiting for permission to leave, she was so nervous and tense, so Maria nodded sharply. As soon as Heavyweight had left, she tugged the tub into her room and dived into it.

Her hornglow carefully controlled the water as she washed it over her coat, lifting an orb of liquid and rubbing it over her body instead of merely splashing the water over her, as she had done when she was a filly. It took some effort, but she managed to focus on the soap in her adjoining bathroom, floating a bar over so that she could use it.

In a matter of a minute, she was washed—nowhere near as thoroughly as she would have liked, but enough to make sure her classmates wouldn’t notice. She dried herself off with a blast of controlled hot air, a specialised drying spell she’d learned in first year, as she stepped out of the tub, vanishing the water inside it. Her bags weren’t packed, but it only took a few seconds to throw her textbooks and a couple of rolls of parchment in, and float the saddlebags onto her back. She picked up her headband and a brush as she was leaving the room, resting the former in her bags as she shut the door.

She was lucky that Starkad’s classroom was so close to the dormitories, but the short walk didn’t leave her all that much time to brush her mane. In the end, as she walked through the door of the History classroom mere seconds after the bell—and of course all her classmates would have to turn and look at her when she entered—to the disapproving glare of Doctor Starkad, she was only just sliding her headband over her horn.

Maria bowed her head apologetically, and turned towards her usual seat, at the back of the classroom, only to find Harry sitting at the desk, a smirk on his face. Before she could even frown in confusion, he raised his eyebrows, and nodded his head towards the front of the classroom… where, she saw, her classmates had oh so kindly left a seat in the very middle of the front row.

Refusing to give them any kind of reaction, Maria trotted briskly over to the desk, and set her things down, muttering a quick apology to Doctor Starkad as soon as he was in hearing range. The Professor nodded, and turned to the blackboard with a piece of chalk ready in his emerald hornglow, but Maria could feel the eyes of her classmates boring into the back of her head.

I’m never going to catch a break this year, am I?

Ex Ad Aquilonem was banned by the Thaumata, barely a week after it was published. It was republished a month afterwards, with a few minor changes. In the poem, Clover speaks of his love for the land to the north of the Equestrian border, and how he would brave the dangers of mountains or the sea to see it again. No copies survive of the original manuscript, and no scholar has yet found an adequate explanation for its initial censorship.

One Letter at a Time

Since she hadn’t any chores to do that morning, and Miss Everfree was up and about, Heavyweight had headed down to what she liked to think of as her own, private room—an old, abandoned classroom in the basement of the Arcana that almost certainly would have vanished from the floorplan years ago had Heavyweight not made sure to visit it every day. That was the thing about the Chaos of the Arcana—it was only able to work when the old building was sure that nobody would be around to watch it. Heavyweight could understand that. After all, she’d never liked braiding her mane in front of the other serving-mares.

The room was smaller than many of the classrooms still in use. Heavyweight supposed it had been used for one of those optional lessons, like the ones Miss Zama took up in her tower with only a few students in attendance. There were a few desks, which she’d pushed to one side and were now slowly collecting cobwebs, and a small bookshelf with a few, damaged textbooks left lying on it.

Heavyweight smiled, and trotted over to the bookcase. Picking one book up with her teeth, she flopped it down to the floor and settled herself down beside it, turning over the cover with a nudge of her muzzle.

She liked books. They smelled nice, and when she was looking at them she could pretend that she was studying magic, like one of the students.

She lifted a hoof and flicked over a page, watching as the parchment curved slightly under pressure before falling down on the inside cover. Straightening it out with a hoof, Heavyweight looked at the markings on that page, and tried to see if she could recognise any of the words. There were only a few on there… but the writing in the book was particularly small, and in the dim light of the candle from the corner Heavyweight found herself straining her eyes to make out even a single one of the words.

Sighing, she rose and walked over to the chest in the corner of the room. The lid was heavy, but she was more than used to carrying far greater weights—it took her barely a moment to push it open, the crown of her head shoving against the lid of the chest at just the right angle to slide it up. Inside lay a small, sky-blue orb of glass, glowing brightly. It was just large enough that she had to struggle to hold it with her teeth, but after three attempts she managed to lift it out; carrying it carefully in her teeth, hoping (as she always did) that she would not break it, she trotted back to her book, laying the light-ball down beside it.

Heavyweight, like most earth ponies, had never formally been taught how to read, but, before she had been moved to the Arcana, she had been stationed at a nursery in Canterlot. She had spent more time than was proper listening in on the young unicorns’ lessons, and had made sure to commit to memory the most useful skills that she was able to learn. She never learned to read many words, but she’d learned every letter.

Mumbling to herself, she traced one letter at a time with a hoof, her lips carefully forming each letter’s sound as she came to it. After each word, her hoof paused, and her lips repeated their movements. Sometimes, she would smile to herself and move straight along, but more often than not her brows would furrow and she’d keep on saying each word in different ways, her volume rising with each repetition.

“Luh… oh… vee…”

“Miss Heavyweight!” The voice at the doorway startled her, and she jumped to her hooves almost without thinking. She had never been found in her room before, and she’d been coming to it for three years. Had she gotten careless?

Then she stared up at the figure in the doorway, and her body froze in shock. Standing almost tall enough to touch the tip of her horn to the doorframe, her fire red eyes wide with surprise, Headmistress Phyra Sol Fenglade was staring at her with mouth agape. Heavyweight very quickly lowered her head to the ground in a bow, touching her forehead softly to the cold, stone tiles and holding it there for a few seconds before rising again. Despite etiquette, she couldn’t quite bring herself to make eye contact with the formidable unicorn.

“What are you…” the Headmistress’ eyes darted around the room, quickly settling on the light-ball by Heavyweight’s feet, and the incriminating book that lay open beside it. Heavyweight could only watch as all pretense of humour faded from the Headmistress’ face. “You were reading?”

“Yes,” Heavyweight admitted, in a small voice. “Well, no, not really, ma’am. I can’t read, but I know my alphabet, you see, and I like to try reading out the letters. I wasn’t meant to be working now, ma’am, and I didn’t think it would hurt anypo— anyone.”

Heavyweight gulped as the Headmistress too a step towards the book, before lifting the light-ball in a shining sphere of red magic, which did strange things to the light that was being cast around the room. “And this?”

“A g-gift,” Heavyweight replied. “A student wanted to thank me for helping them.”

“It is your job to help them,” the Headmistress replied. “So this gift was entirely unnecessary. I shall be taking it with me—if it was a student’s Enchantment, then it has likely not been inspected by a member of staff for safety, which as I’m sure you’re aware is against school rules. You should have taken it to one of us at once, Miss Heavyweight.”

“Yes, Ma’am.” Heavyweight wasn’t even pretending to look at the Headmistress’ eyes any more, instead staring down at the floor, her cheeks hot with shame.

“Your break times are, of course, your own to use as you see fit,” the Headmistress continued, her voice now somewhat wary. Heavyweight was sure she hadn’t broken any more rules—but then again, she hadn’t thought the light-ball was breaking any rules at the time. “But I should recommend that you do not read in here. The candlelight in the basement is dreadfully dim and, since you are unable to create any further light of your own, it would be terribly bad for your eyes.”

Heavyweight understood. “Yes, Ma’am,” she repeated, lifting her head and meeting the Headmistress’ eyes for the first time, so that she could nod, slightly, in agreement. It was only then that the Headmistress finally smiled.

“I’m glad you understand, Miss Heavyweight,” she said, her voice softer now, and calming. She stepped back into the corridor, as if to leave, before turning to look over her shoulder. “Oh, and do please rearrange the furniture in this room. It may not be used with the current timetable, but one never knows when one might need a spare classroom in an emergency.”

And then the Headmistress was gone, her hoofsteps echoing down the corridor, quieter and quieter, and with her went Heavyweight’s only tool for reading. She couldn’t take a book out of this room—where else would she be able to read, away from prying eyes?—and she couldn’t read here. It might have been a stupid, unachievable dream, but being able to pretend had been such a wonderful escape…

Heavyweight sunk to the ground, rested her head against the open book that she could no longer see clearly, and sobbed.

On the Way to Lunch

On the second day, the demon said unto Starswirl: “Look upon my feats, little pony. See how I twist the very fabric of reality[a] itself with no rhyme or reason save my own enjoyment. For is it not written in your precious scrolls that ‘above all else, one must seek joy’[b]?”

And Starswirl the Great said unto the demon, “It is written in the scrolls of my ancestors: ‘Find not your joy in the pain of others, but in their comfort and their joy.’[c]” And Starswirl stood firm, and the demon left once more.
—Inlectatio 4:5-9

In front of her, Maria’s classmates walked slowly forward, muttering to themselves and to each other in tones of quiet disappointment. Maria waited politely for them all to exit the room, hopping impatiently from hoof to hoof as she did so; when at last the crowd had cleared enough for her to exit the classroom and get into the corridor, she took a sharp left, turning away from her classmates and almost galloping towards the History classroom. None of the others noticed her, or called after her, which was certainly an improvement on her luck for the morning.

They’d made her sit in the front row two lessons in a row! It was as if they were actively trying to pull her further and further into the spotlight, but she couldn’t figure out why. They had yet to do anything particularly mean-spirited—certainly nothing half as bad as what she had faced in her first year, and she was hardly going to feel intimidated by mere glances after three years of proving to herself that she was better than all of them (even if only because she put in hours of practice while they socialised without her.) Perhaps they were just trying to make her uncomfortable?

She shook her head, and made sure that her attention was on the corridor ahead of her. With classes having just ended, she wouldn’t want to barrel into any students as they left classrooms. Even for the others, that would have been a faux pas.

It didn’t take her too long to reach the History classroom, and she was pleased to see that the fifth years were still inside. She smiled, and stood patiently against the wall by the door, so as not to get in the way of any of the students when they left. Soon enough, she heard the telltale patter of the students rising to their hooves, and she smiled in anticipation.

She didn’t bother searching the throng of students that left the classroom for Tim. He would be last, like she always was. He may not be as keen on etiquette as she was, and he may have had far friendlier classmates, but he wouldn’t stand on tradition.

Sure enough, after the other fifth years had all left, Tim stepped out of the classroom, determinedly striding after the others and towards the Hall. He hadn’t noticed Maria, tucked away in her little spot to his right.

Perfect.

“Boo!” Maria called, grinning as Tim turned around in a panicked whirl of grass green mane and daffodil fur.

“Did you have to do that?” he asked, his face relaxing in relief. “You scared the magic out of me!”

“It seemed like fair payback,” Maria replied, trotting down the corridor and nodding for Tim to follow. “Besides, Dornsen finished early, and I knew you had History. Did you really expect me not to come and meet you?”

“Point taken,” Time said, his tone resigned. “But I still think the shouting was unnecessary.”

“I didn’t shout!” Maria shot Tim a disapproving look that was met with a satisfied smirk. “I projected. You’d know the difference if you paid attention in Oration.” And with that, she stuck out her tongue. Tim stuck his out in return. It was the most mature and civilised argument the two of them had ever managed.

“How was your morning?” Tim asked, after a minute of comfortable silence walking side-by-side. “You had Dornsen and…?”

“Starkad, actually,” Maria said. Tim’s eyebrows rose a little, but he said nothing. “And if I’m honest with you, it’s been a pretty terrible morning. Everyone else forced me into the front row when I was late because I’d overslept—”

“You overslept?” Tim interrupted. “I don’t believe it. You haven’t overslept and shown up late to class in three whole years, Maria. How’d you manage that?”

“It’s a long story,” Maria said darkly, her voice barely more than a mutter. “I’ll tell you about it over lunch. Though it’ll have to be brief, because I’ve got a meeting with the Headmistress half way through.”

“Wow.” Tim’s voice was soft, and he seemed to slow his pace a little, as if deep in thought. “Late for class and another meeting with the Head? You really have had a bad morning.”

“Thanks for the show of support.”

“You’re welcome!”

Tim’s bright and cheerful response earned him a light swat to the head with a roll of parchment, carefully retrieved from Maria’s saddlebag while he wasn’t looking. Smirking, she walked on ahead as Tim stood still in the middle of the corridor, his face frozen somewhere between shock and indignation.

“Come on, slowpoke,” she called over her shoulder. Behind her, Maria heard the clacking of deliberate, swift hoofsteps on the stone-tiled floor, and a huff of faked contempt. She chuckled and kept on walking, a smile stretching across her face for the first time since Astronomy began the previous night. “I’m not going to wait around for you to get to lunch. I already missed breakfast!”

[a] pannos magicos: literally, magical cloths. This phrase was often used in antiquity to refer to the magic that was believed to hold the entire world together. The night sky was considered to be a chance to glance at this magic, though it was said to be throughout the land and seas as well. Though this literal interpretation has long since been abandoned, the thread-like nature of wild magic (which, coincidentally, is found in sky, sea, and land) lends itself quite nicely to the comparison with cloth: hence the modern phrase “fabric of reality” or, sometimes, “fabric of the world”.
[b] Adagia Patrum 16:1.
[c] Adagia Patrum 16:12.

Author's Note

You have no idea how long it took me to decide to go with pannos magicos and stop fiddling about with synonyms and declensions. It's been a long time since I studied Latin. I can only hope I'm remembering half of it correctly, because some of the free translation software online doesn't always agree with me—or each other!

I hope you're all enjoying these chapters. I've got a couple of really exciting story moments planned for the start of next week, but we're going to have to get through the weekend first, which I'm afraid means a little more filler. I'm quite busy this weekend, and I want to take my time over those moments because I think they deserve better than whatever I can spit out in an hour and a half!

See you tomorrow. Here's to hoping I'll have another good writing day—the last couple of updates have been really enjoyable to write!
—Scorpius

Release

I dedicate this book to my dear Juniper,
Who has helped me through many a rough night of fruitless research
And has kept me smiling even when all things seemed grey.
I love you very much, my wife.
—from the dedication to An Advanced Guide to Sacrificial Magic

“... and as I’m looking up and taking all my notes, you know, cross-referencing the pattern I’m seeing with the standard resources and running calculations on the Numerological formulae, I swear I see this flash of purple streak along one of the threads. It’s totally unexpected, because of course all the books say that there’s never any change to them, right? So I rewind my view because, you know, I could have just hallucinated it? But no. It’s there every time I replay it, and I have no idea what it is.

“Of course Fenglade says it’s my telescope—she took one look at the recording I’d made and then just shot me an awful look of… I don’t how to describe it. You know when teachers think we’re never going to be any good because we’re neophytes, but they put on that fake air of sympathy and disappointment? It was like that, but worse. And she told me to head straight back down to my dorm and start work on checking my telescope for faults, because she didn’t have time to do that right then.

“Half an hour later they must have changed their minds, because a serving-mare knocks on my door and tells me that I’m expected in the Headmistress’ office tomorrow… well, today now, I guess. Clearly Fenglade must have thought something more was was going on than just my telescope malfunctioning, but if she did why didn’t she say something in front of the others?”

She left just enough time for Tim to start to open his mouth before she carried on. He didn’t seem to mind. Tim was an excellent listener—and besides, while she was talking he was able to carry on eating. If she was honest with herself, Maria knew she'd reached the point where she no longer cared whether Tim wanted to listen or not—she needed to get this off her chest, now, before she ended up having this outburst at someone who might take offense. Besides, it felt incredibly cathartic to just talk.

“Because I’m a neophyte, so obviously I couldn’t have spotted anything important during a lesson that my classmates hadn’t. And she certainly didn’t want them to know I’d got that replay Charm working, because I bet you none of them have ever even thought about trying that.

“But you know what bothers me the most? That she said she ‘didn’t have time’ to check my telescope right then. She’d spent the entire sourcedamn lesson fixing all the others’ telescopes, but she couldn’t spare a second to even check if mine was faulty? I was up all night looking over those charms, and she could have checked them all in just a few minutes.”

Maria let out a long breath and felt her shoulders slump with a release of stress she hadn’t even noticed building up. She looked down at her plate of barely-touched salad and her stomach growled once more. No longer caring for etiquette, she picked up a fork in her hornglow and stabbed it down onto a leaf.

“Sounds like a night from Tartarus,” Tim commented drily. Maria frowned, mid-mouthful, and looked up at him questioningly. “Sorry,” he added. “I didn’t mean for that to come out quite like that. It did sound like a pretty awful night. I just… I’m not sure what else you expected.

“Don’t get me wrong,” he interjected, cutting off her protest before it began and gesturing at her plate with his own fork, which was floating in the air beside him, reminding her to eat, “I’m not saying that it’s right that we get put down all the time and treated as second-class citizens just because we’re neophytes. But… it’s how things are, Maria, and at least for now? There’s nothing we can do about it.”

“Aren’t you trying to get into Law—”

“Yes,” Tim said, and then shook his head, sighing and resting his forehooves on the table. “But that’s years down the line. Right here, and right now? Neither of us can do a thing about this country’s prejudice. We’re practically foals, for crying out loud!”

Maria took a moment to chew on another mouthful of salad, which kept her from replying immediately. She’d wanted to, though. She was tired of accepting the status quo, of following pointless rules of etiquette that treated her—no, that made her treat herself like she was worth less than the students around her. And after the night she’d had, staying in her place and behaving like a good little neophyte was the last thing she wanted to do.

But in the end, she never got her chance to say any of that.

“M-Maria Everfree?”

The trembling voice came from behind her. Twisting around, Maria saw the red-maned colt she’d helped at the start of year feast, standing nervously and trembling a little.

“Hello…” she scoured her mind for a name, and found one. “Oats, wasn’t it?”

“Yes, Miss,” he replied. “The, uh… Headmistress Fenglade wanted to see you. Uhm, n-now.”

Maria nodded, and rose from her cushion. Perhaps it was for the best that she wasn't able to argue with Tim any further. If she'd been ranting as much as she'd wanted to when Oats arrived… she didn't even want to think about it. And how much worse would it have been had anyone else been sent? “Thank you, Oats. If you ever need anything, me and Tim here are always more than happy to help.”

And with one last, comforting smile to Oats—more for her own benefit than his—she turned and made her way calmly up towards the staff table, followed by a wave of turning heads and sudden, hushed whispers where conversation once was. The Headmistress rose as she approached, nodded to Professor Fenglade, and the three mares made their way over to the staircase that led to the Headmistress’ office.

She almost didn't feel angry any more.

And to my editor, Charles Pickwick Everfree,
Who has managed to spot errors in formulae even I hadn’t noticed
And without whose contributions this book would be much poorer.

Author's Note

So this chapter marks two weeks of consistent daily releases for me, and I think that's quite a cool little milestone to have hit. I honestly didn't think I'd make it in time—I overran working on a playtest earlier this evening, and I ended up sitting down in front of a blank document an hour before my deadline. Somehow I managed to get the bulk of a draft for this chapter written in twenty minutes, which left enough time for me to edit—albeit only slightly. Quite impressive for an update that I wasn't even convinced would be finished an hour ago, huh?

To everyone reading this, thank you so much for sticking with this story so far, and I hope you continue to stick with it for a good while to come. It's been an absolute pleasure writing this regularly, and I'm looking forward to more of the same.
—Scorpius

Interference, Part 1

Enchantments are not like ordinary spells. Illusions and the like may be physically anchored to other objects, but an Enchantment is tied into an object magically, and draws the power to maintain itself from the wild magic that fills the land around it. Enchantments do not fail because they are weakened, like Illusions, but because the wild magic that powers them has interfered* with the very structure of the spell; it is for this reason that Enchantments should be regularly inspected and corrected, before their effects begin to stray too far from their intended purpose.
—from A Treatise on the Differences Between the Schools of Magic

To be in the Headmistress’ office again was unsettling, to say the least. Maria hadn’t known any student who had been in here in such quick succession—even the most notorious troublemakers hadn’t managed to get themselves back in here so quickly. She had to constantly remind herself that today, at least, she wasn’t being called in for purposes of discipline.

Maria sat on a cushion, barely making eye contact with the Professor and Headmistress across from her. The silence was awkward and heavy, but there was little she could do until the serving-mare returned with her telescope. If only she hadn’t overslept, and had remembered to pack it in her bag! This meeting would have been over in a couple of minutes, as the Professor and Headmistress found whatever it was that was wrong with her telescope, and she would be able to get back to lunch.

“You had your first detention with Deputy Headmaster Whitetail last night, didn’t you?”

The Headmistress’ voice was gentle, almost friendly. Is that what she calls small talk? Professor Fenglade clearly shared Maria’s disapproval of the subject matter, or at the very least her cousin’s handling of it, judging by the soft shaking of her head, and her short, quiet snort. Maria tried to keep her face neutral, but appreciated that at least someone had been there to react.

“Yes, Headmistress,” Maria said softly, casting her eyes downward so that she could better hide the slight, fond smile on her face. It wouldn’t do for the Headmistress to think that she had enjoyed her punishment.

“I hope that he is making sure you understand how much trouble you have caused for the school,” the Headmistress continued, her voice still friendly and conversational. It was an odd dissonance. Maria would have expected some anger, in those words. “It really has been a bit of a headache. Still, not wholly your fault.”

A knock at the door was accompanied by an audible sigh of relief from Professor Fenglade. The Headmistress smiled softly and opened the door, her horn flickering out almost as quickly as it had lit. On the other side of the door stood a young serving-mare, who placed the bag she had been carrying on the floor, curtseyed to the Headmistress and the Professor, nodded to Maria, and left.

Almost immediately the Headmistress’ hornglow was surrounding the bag, flicking open the cover and filling it. Mere moments later, Maria’s telescope was flying across the room, landing on the Headmistress’ desk without a sound. For a while, the Headmistress merely stared at the telescope, her eyes devouring it like a fire blazes through the forest.

And then, suddenly, she looked up at Maria.

“I’ve been told that you have Enchanted this telescope to play back things that it has previously seen?”

“Yes, Headmistress,” Maria replied. “Would you like me to demonstrate?”

The Headmistress nodded eagerly, and Maria reached out with her hornglow to raise the telescope to head height. She couldn’t help but notice that Professor Fenglade, though she was feigning disinterest, seemed to be stealing brief, fascinated glances at the telescope.

Marai cast the thought out from her mind, and focused on setting the many dials and switches around the telescope to their correct positions. She had made sure to make a copy of the telescope’s recording last night, in case anything were lost during the various tests it would likely be put through, but she would still be able to find the memory…

Maria floated the telescope over to her face, and glanced down it. It showed the stars as she had seen them last night, which was a good start. It only took her a minute more to narrow down the right settings, and all of a sudden the flash of purple streaked across the sky before her once more. A few more twists, to rewind the viewer, and she passed the telescope back into the waiting hornglow of the Headmistress.

“It should be ready to replay, now,” Maria said, as the Headmistress lifted the telescope to her own eye and peered down it. It seemed funny, watching a unicorn stare down a telescope indoors. She hoped that she had not looked quite as silly as the Headmistress now did. “It was quite a few hours ago, now, so it took me a while to find. Turn the furthest dial from you clockwise to play the recording—”

“By Starswirl’s beard,” the Headmistress whispered. “Andi, have you seen this?”

“I have,” Professor Fenglade replied, her voice dry. “I’m sure that it is just a malfunction that none of us have seen before. It wouldn’t be all that surprising, with so many experimental charms on this telescope… cast by a third-year neophyte, a year ago.”

“I haven’t seen anything like this before,” the Headmistress said. “It could be interference, of course, but I want to assume nothing until we have examined the Enchantments for ourselves.” Professor Fenglade rolled her eyes, and Maria got the distinct impression that she was angry that this investigation was even being taken seriously. Maria allowed herself to feel a faint swelling of pride, though, that the Headmistress was not dismissing her Enchantments without thorough inspection.

It took a lot of will not to smirk at the Professor’s frustration.

“Maria.” The Headmistress had torn her eyes away from the telescope for the first time since she had pulled it from the bag, and was now staring directly at her with a strange look on her face. “As you know, we’ve summoned you here to inspect this telescope’s Enchantments. This may take… some time. You are, I believe, scheduled for double Enchanting after lunch, correct?”

“Y-yes, Headmistress,” Maria answered, suddenly feeling rather uncertain of herself.

“I will send Doctor Whitetail a note excusing you from the lesson,” the Headmistress said, earning herself yet another disapproving glance from the Professor. “I imagine you’ll learn just as much helping us with this. Besides,” she added, almost as an afterthought, “you’re the one who enchanted it. If anyone can know what these charms do better than you, I’d be thoroughly impressed.”

* Interference in magic is a well-documented and ill-studied field. Two offensive spells cast directly into each other’s path, for example, will interact with a near-unpredictable effect (though it is likely to be incredibly destructive.) Indeed, Enchantments may interfere with each other, as well as wild magic, if they are placed in too close proximity without the appropriate charms to keep them isolated from each other.

Interference, Part 2

... and, greatest of all, is the relief above the columns on the Temple steps, depicting Starswirl posed in victory above the demon Discord, who is howling in agony[a], beneath which is carved the words Quaero Voluntatem Fons[b], as if to remind all who step through the Temple's doors of where they are, and what they are called to do.
—from Pre-Classical Architecture of Canterlot: Thaumata, Arcana, Ecclesia

On the Headmistress’ desk lay Maria’s telescope, now almost as transparent as glass, and shining brightly within it was a web of amethyst strands, each pulsing and flickering with raw magic. On one side of the desk sat Phyra Sol Fenglade, Headmistress of the Canterlot Arcana, her horn dancing with flame-like hornglow and her brows furrowed with concentration; across from her sat Maria, the first neophyte of Everfree, whose quill was running back and forth across the roll of parchment that spilled over the edge of the desk.

“Is this…”

“Maghurst’s Lock.” Maria didn’t look up from the telescope in front of them, and neither did the Headmistress. “I wanted to try—”

“Yes, I can see.” The Headmistress was already plucking at another thread with her hornglow. “It’s not an elegant solution, but it works.”

Maria smiled. She didn’t care so much for elegant solutions—not when it was so much more important to her that she could find a solution where her classmates couldn’t.

It had taken quite a little while for the two of them to fall into what passed for a comfortable rhythm, and at first Maria had been terrified that she wouldn’t be able to keep up with the Headmistress or the Professor while they were working. To keep pace with one of the foremost researchers in Enchantments in the whole of Canterlot? She would have to be conceited to think she could manage that as a mere fourth-year.

But the Headmistress was an educator first and foremost, and Maria had been surprised by how well she had explained the various tests that they would be applying. She was a far better teacher than Doctor Whitetail, whose nervous mannerisms and too-quiet voice often made Enchantment lessons either trying or boring. It wasn’t too long before Maria found herself envying the students who had studied under the Headmistress, in the years before she took on her role—she had learned more in the last hour than she had in the last year of lessons with Whitetail.

“Ah!” The Headmistress’ shoulders relaxed, and Maria could see her physically slump in relief. “I think I found some interference. Do you see here, in the spiral?”

Maria peered closely at the offending thread. It was vibrating rapidly, and a single pulse of white light bounced back and forth along it to a strange, exotic rhythm.

“No…” she said, her voice trailing off as she tilted her head to get a better look. “I don’t think anything’s wrong there.”

For a moment the Headmistress was silent. “Maria, it’s practically right at resonant frequency…”

Maria nodded, looking up from the telescope to catch the Headmistress’ eye, and smiled. “That’s intentional. I’m using it to absorb excess energy from Westport’s Siphon.”

“Oh.” For a moment there was silence, before the scratching of quill on parchment resumed. And then: “Was that your idea?”

“A happy accident,” Maria admitted, sheepishly. “I came across the effect while trying to incorporate the recording charms, and I figured I could put it to good use.”

The Headmistress nodded, and turned back to the telescope.

Even after an hour, it felt strange to be working alongside the Headmistress. It wasn’t like the immense feeling of pride she’d felt in detention with the Deputy Headmaster, because her contributions didn’t feel so valuable—she was mostly running calculations, after all, to save time for the Headmistress. Rather, she felt like the Headmistress was offering her a rare chance to see an expert at work, and she couldn’t bear to let the Headmistress down by not doing her very best to help. And yet, she was nervous. The longer this took, the more intricate the mistake she must have made would have been—and, no doubt, the Headmistress would scold her for overstretching herself quite so much. Every thread that bent and shone with ruby hornglow was another chance that she would fall.

It had been easier, strangely enough, with Professor Fenglade alongside them. She had been able to check the calculations far better and far more quickly than Maria had, and, though it had taken her a few minutes to warm up to the idea, she and Maria found it easy to bounce ideas off each other—far easier than Maria worked with the Headmistress, who often seemed to know what Maria would say before she had said it.

But the Professor had lessons to teach, and when the bell had rung for classes she had risen with sincere apologies.

"Seventeen," the Headmistress mumbled. Maria dragged her thoughts back to the telescope in front of her, and quickly looked over her calculations for the offending error. Soon enough, it was covered in a hasty cross-hatching of ink, and a new calculation written out more carefully above it. The Headmistress barely seemed to notice—already her hornglow was testing another thread, and Maria had yet another formula to write out, and another opportunity to be proven a fool.

For Source's sake, I hope this is over soon. Maria stared at the tangled mess of charms that was her telescope in grim frustration. It was her own fault that this was taking so long—if she hadn't been so arrogant, if she hadn't been so determined to prove her worth, she'd have stuck to standard charms and none of this would even be happening. I'm not sure I can take much more of this.

[a] "and still the demon writhed in pain, and cried out with a voice as cold as ice itself"Devotio 13:2.
[b]Quaero Voluntatem Fons: literally, “seek the will of the Source”. The Temple of the Source establishes the priority of unicorns as the study of magic, and has a strong relationship with the Canterlot Arcana. The two buildings were built together for the purpose of educating the youth of Equestria academically and spiritually, and to guide them on the Source’s path.

Author's Note

My apologies: this feels like the weakest chapter we've had in quite a little while, and to top it all off it's late! (If only by about half an hour.) Still, I'm not going to count this as a broken New Year's Resolution just yet. I think it only fair to allow for minor slip-ups like tonight. And besides: this story is my opportunity to try to develop good writing habits, and being able to write something even when a lack of inspiration is working against you is probably a good habit to try and get into!

Let's hope things go a little better tomorrow. Until then, I wish you all the best, and I hope you have a lovely day.
—Scorpius

Onyx and Sapphire

Deep in the heart of the Everfree Forest, beneath the now-ruined castle that was once the seat of all power in Equestria and the lands beyond*, grows an ancient tree. It is as tall and sturdy as an oak, and yet it has been warped to the purpose of a wild magic that is as breathtakingly beautiful as it is destructive.
—from A History of Harmony: The Fall of Discord, Tirek, and Sombra

Despite the unfamiliar hornglow that was brushing against his mane, Alex stood as still as he possibly could, his neck straight and his head held firm. He wasn’t as good at it as any of the Guard might be, but he was a damn sight better than Emily—he could hear her fidgeting behind him, shifting her weight from hoof to hoof. It was probably driving her mad that they had to do this.

But there wasn’t very much choice. The Starswirl Wing was one of the few magic-free zones in all of Canterlot, and obligatory horn-rings would be needed if they wanted to research inside.

As the onyx ring was slowly lowered over his horn, Alex felt a shiver of cold run down his spine. His horn felt… different, somehow. He turned to send a questioning glance at the nearest Guard, as if to ask if he should test whether the ring was working, and the Guard nodded back stiffly.

And then Alex’s horn wouldn’t light.

All he’d cast was a simple levitation spell, the kind of spell that most unicorns would learn for themselves as foals before even learning a single word, let alone any magical theory. It was something that was so second-nature to him that it happened without a single thought: he would will his hornglow to be lifting an object, and almost at once his horn would be alight and the object in his control… except that now, with the magic-suppressing ring fitted snugly against his horn, he couldn't even feel his magic responding to his will.

In his mind’s eye he was no longer in the pristine corridors of the Thaumata Chambers, but instead in a dark clearing of the forest. His body stiffened, in fear and in panic. His breaths quickened. His heartbeat was loud in his ears. In every shadow lurked a dangerous foe, one who would happily break him without consequence, and his horn was failing to light and the darkness was coming closer oh Starswirl it was getting closer and he didn’t want to die but everything was pressing around me and I don’t want to die please don’t let

A gentle touch on his shoulder. Alex whipped around, panicked, to find Em smiling softly at him, her deep blue eyes at once both a welcome sight and a desperately-needed comfort.

“It’s alright,” she whispered. “It’s just the ring. You’re okay. You’ll be able to cast again as soon as we’re done here, I promise.”

Alex swallowed, and tried to calm his breathing. His lungs were still heaving, pulling in too much air, too quickly, each time, but with a concerted effort he could force the pause between breaths to fit a more relaxed rhythm. And all the while, Em stood beside him and smiled, and whispered words of encouragement and comfort.

“I should have s-seen that coming,” he muttered, when he could at last trust his breath to hold for a sentence. It was a weak joke, but Em smiled all the same.

“I hope you’re ready to catch me if I faint,” she teased. Alex rolled his eyes, but nodded all the same. If she did, he wouldn’t make fun of her for it. Not today.

When it was clear that he was ready, and not about to freak out again over his sudden loss of magic, Em stepped forward and nodded to the Guards. Alex watched, fascinated, as they lowered another onyx ring onto her horn, and saw her immediately begin to tremble the moment it touched her. He started forward, already reaching out with a hoof of his own, when Em turned to him and smiled, albeit a little shakily.

“Alright, Alex,” she said. “Let’s go read some forbidden knowledge!”

Alex raised his eyebrows, and shot her a questioning look. “Are you not even going to test that it works?”

“If your reaction was anything to go by, that sounds like a terrible idea,” Emily drawled, before perking up a little and grinning widely at him. “Come on, we might as well get on with it.”

The two Guards who had been flanking the doorway, their spears held diagonally across it like a gate, stepped to one side, and opened up the path for the two Adstra to make their way inside. Alex took a cautious step forwards, but before he could reach the threshold Emily was already trotting inside, her eyes wide and darting all around her.

“What happened to being frightened of this place?” Alex muttered, picking up his pace to catch up with his partner. Emily twisted her head back to glance at him, and stuck out her tongue.

“We’re in here now,” she answered simply. “And we’re probably going to forget most of it, anyway. Might as well enjoy it while we can, right?”

Trust Emily to use the memory-removal charms as a reason to be excited. Most Adstra, Alex included, considered the possibility of completely losing one’s memory of an event to be frightening. Just knowing that you’d signed the parchmentwork that gave your superiors the right to do that to you… Alex was not a particularly paranoid stallion, but the thought that he might have already had patches of his memory removed did not sit easily on his mind.

It was, allegedly, all for good reason. The Starswirl Wing was full of every piece of knowledge, magical or mundane, that the Thaumata had considered too dangerous to be studied. It was said that this room contained spells that could raise entire cities to the ground, and even—though how the rumours could even have been started, Alex didn’t know—a spell that could turn back time.

It didn’t truly matter what the knowledge was. All that Alex cared about was that it was all illegal, and dangerous, and he wouldn’t be allowed to leave the room with any memories not directly pertaining to his investigation. That was why the magic-suppression rings were necessary—just in case the room itself contained information that would allow a visitor to bypass the memory runes.

Emily was trotting straight towards the centre of the room, where a single table stood underneath the middle of a great glass dome, above which the bright afternoon sky shone. They were walking straight down one of eight aisles of bookshelves, according to the map by the door—the section on rituals should be at the very end of it, if Alex remembered rightly, on their right.

“Oh, Alex!” Emily cried out. There was no need to remain quiet, as in any other research library, as they would be the only ones allowed to access the room. It was quite likely that nobody else would visit at all for at least another month. “Look at this title!”

Alex shook his head, and sauntered over to the shelf Emily was pointing at with a hoof. He peered closely at the spine of the book in question: A History of Harmony: The Fall of Discord, Tirek, and Sombra. As Emily lifted a hoof to the book, Alex frowned. Something seemed… wrong, but he couldn’t quite put a hoof on it. Frowning, he shook his head. It wasn’t important.

“Emily,” he said, sharply, and she shot him an annoyed glance. “We came here for a reason. Don’t waste our time on research we’re going to have to forget.”

Emily pouted, but pushed the book gently back onto its shelf, and muttered something Alex didn’t quite catch before resuming her walk towards their research table. Alex took one last look back at the book—what was wrong with a history book?—and forced himself to walk on, too.

By the time he reached the table, Emily already seemed to have identified the comfiest cushion, and was making herself at home on it—spreading out her parchment and ink across her “side” of the table by hoof was taking her a little longer, but Alex knew better than to interfere and try to claim another seat on that side. Instead, he dropped his saddlebag softly across from her, and turned back the way he came.

“I’m going to try to find some materials on advanced ritual patterns,” he said. “If you could find anything on soul magic, when you’re done setting yourself up, we should be able to split the initial workload between us.”

If they were lucky, they might be able to make some headway with the task, before they forgot most of what they had done. This was going to take a lot more than a single afternoon.

*It is said that the Princesses’ kingdom extended far into the Southern Badlands and, following the fall of King Sombra, as far as the legendary Crystal Empire in the north. The modern boundaries of Equestria are far smaller in comparison.

Interference, Part 3

And so it came to pass that Starswirl entered the town of Westport, and at once the local official[a] approached him and said: “Oh, mage, we are blessed! For our town has been devastated by a most dreadful disease, and many of the townsfolk are bedridden and afraid that they might die. Many doctors and mages have tried to cure their ills[b], or ease their pain, but nothing that they have tried has worked. You are our last hope, great Starswirl.”

Starswirl said, “Let me see the sick, that I might understand this illness.” And the local official brought him before a house, and from within they could hear cries and screams of pain. Yet Starswirl did not cower in fear, but faced the house with determined eyes, and knocked upon the door thrice.
—from Signa 16:1-7

“How did it go?”

Of course Tim was waiting at the bottom of the stairs for her. Maria smiled warmly and trotted carefully down the last few steps from the Headmistress’ office, before turning back to him.

“It could have gone better,” she said, gesturing for Tim to follow her as she started to walk down the corridor. “Neither of us found any traces of any interference on the telescope, and the Headmistress still has no idea why I saw what I did.”

“At least you got to skip classes,” Tim replied, and Maria grudgingly nodded in agreement. “Some of us have had to put up with Illusion all afternoon while you were off doing fancy academics with the Headmistress.”

Maria smirked.

“It’s hardly my fault that my telescope broke,” she said, “but I suppose it is my fault that half the charms on it aren't exactly standard…”

“Wait,” Tim said, his brows twisted in a frown. “I thought we were going to dinner? This isn’t the way to the Hall.”

Maria grimaced in apology.

“Sorry,” she said. “I’m really not feeling up to seeing people at the moment. I thought maybe I could get someone to bring dinner down to my room for us?”

“That sounds nice. I could do with a quiet evening in.”

“That’s what I thought.”

There were a few moments of comfortable, friendly silence after that. It made a nice change from the expectant quiet of the Headmistress’ office, where Maria had felt constantly under scrutiny, and was always on edge to prepare herself for the moment a mistake was found. It felt good to fall into step alongside a friend, and enjoy their presence, without having to worry about their imminent judgement.

Of course, Tim had to ruin it.

“So were you really just inspecting Enchantments all afternoon?” He sounded incredulous, as if he didn’t understand that even the Headmistress wouldn’t have been able to fix a problem merely by glancing at it. She didn’t blame him, though—hadn’t she thought the same only that morning?

“Yes. There was a lot to look through. We had to check every single charm to see if it had been compromised in any way.”

“Oh.” Tim looked surprised, and his brows were furrowed deeply in thought. For a moment he said nothing, and the two simply resumed their walk in quiet, until they had turned the corner into the cloisters. “But… surely you knew what the effect of the interference was, right?”

Maria frowned. “Not really,” she replied. “Interference, particularly with wild magic, is so unpredictable. There wouldn’t really be any way of knowing what effects it would have until we’d found it—”

“But you knew that an effect was making a purple flash appear specifically on a line of wild magic,” Tim continued, interrupting her. “So surely you would just have to reverse-engineer a charm that did something similar and look for any formulae that shared the basic structure with that.”

Maria stopped dead in her tracks. For a moment, it seemed, Tim didn’t notice and continued to walk along the old, stone corridor; when he did notice, he turned back, and offered Maria a questioning glance.

It was actually a perfect solution. Tim was right—there was no need to inspect every single charm for any signs of alteration when they could simply pinpoint any threads that could have the effect she’d witnessed. Even if she couldn’t perfectly reverse-engineer the charm, the structures would be similar enough to identify…

“Since when were you an Enchanting genius?” Maria asked, shocked and—though she’d never admit it—a little bit hurt. She might not have a huge amount of talent for the subject, but she had put in a lot of effort to be among the best in her year at Enchanting in particular. She’d always felt just a little possessive of it, as a subject.

“It’s pretty much the only class I get As in, Maria,” Tim replied. “Not to mention one of the only ones I like. I swear we’ve talked about this before…”

Maria closed her eyes for a moment, and forced herself to push any feelings of jealousy or bitterness out of her mind. Tim had every right to excel at a subject—and besides, he had just offered her a solution to her problem on a silver platter. That was reason enough to celebrate, wasn’t it?

“Thank you, Tim,” she said, quietly but sincerely. “Would you care to help me figure out the right formula over dinner?”

Tim grinned at her, a glint of mischief in his eye. “Why, Maria! You do know how to treat a stallion. That must be the most romantic suggestion I’ve ever heard!”

Maria swung her saddlebag at his head, but he ducked before it could make contact, chuckling to himself. Maria snorted as loudly as she could, and kept on walking along the corridor towards the dormitories.

“Come on, you prat,” she said, an affectionate smile playing on her lips. “Let’s get this over with.”

[a] magistratus: literally, “magistrate”. In modern context, this unicorn would have had duties similar to a town’s mayor, both over the citizenry and the ponies in the town’s care.
[b]: it is worth noting that the author of Signa is widely believed to have been a (medical) doctor by profession, and he could well be trying to defend his fellow practitioners. Phrases such as this are missing from other sources that otherwise corroborate the histories in this book.

Asking for Favours

The proposal was considered to be part of Starswirl’s own legacy, and had been presented to the Thaumata as an idea of his that had been taken to completion. Quite whether that was so is still a question of great debate—there is no mention of any idea quite like it[a] in Epistulae or any of Starswirl’s other surviving writings[b]. And yet that presentation won the vote almost unanimous approval of the Thaumata, and began a tradition that dates back to the very start[c] of the Classical Era.
—from The History of the Neophyte Oath

Maria stood nervously outside the Deputy Headmaster’s office, her saddlebags resting heavily on her back. She wasn’t worried about her detention—after last night, she was almost looking forward to it—but she wasn’t sure that the Deputy Headmaster was going to like the questions she needed to ask.

For starters, she needed to take Tim’s idea, and their joint work on the project, up to the Headmistress, though that hopefully wouldn’t prove too troublesome—the worst case scenario was that Whitetail would have to escort her there himself due to curfew. Still, it was asking for a favour during detention, which was a weird enough thought.

But she also needed to ask him about training.

She couldn’t share Quercus’ instructions with Whitetail: those were family business, and House Whitetail wasn’t exactly friendly to House Everfree these days. But she couldn’t let down her family, and she certainly couldn’t ignore a direct order from her Head of House. To do so would be political suicide, not just for her but likely for her whole family. She wouldn’t—couldn’t—be the one to make House Everfree fall. There was simply too much at stake.

Abigail Oscina Forthnall had enough advantages in this Duel as it was. If Maria wanted to stand a chance of winning, she was going to have to train just as often as her.

Raising a shaking hoof, Maria knocked twice on the door. After a moment, it swung open, sparkling with hornglow, and a quiet, unintelligible sound from the Deputy Headmaster summoned her inside.

“Maria,” he said, nodding in greeting. Maria trotted towards a cushion, and sat herself down.

“Good evening, Deputy Headmaster,” she replied. Whitetail smiled, and floated a stack of essays across the desk.

“First year,” he said, turning his head to look towards a bookshelf in concentration. “You shouldn’t need notes, but I’ll just grab you the mark scheme I use…”

“Sir?” Maria asked, her voice louder than she had planned. The old stallion looked back at her in surprise, and she felt her cheeks grow warm in embarrassment. “Sorry. That wasn’t meant to be a shout.”

The Deputy Headmaster waved a hoof dismissively. “It happens to all of us, Maria. Don’t worry about it.”

Maria nodded, swallowed, and tried again. “Sir, I was wondering. About Ms. Forthnall’s detentions…”

“It would not be appropriate for a member of staff to discuss with a student the discipline of their fellows.” Whitetail took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and rubbed a hoof against his forehead, before adding, “Maria, please don’t drag me into this.”

“But sir,” Maria continued, “surely Emeritus Chingar will be using her detentions to train her for the Duel?”

“So far as I am aware, Maria, Abigail’s detentions consist of repetitive drills and stamina tests.”

Maria bit her lip. So she’s being trained, but nobody will admit to it…

“Deputy Headmaster,” Maria began again, taking her time and making sure that she carefully considered her words, “I understand that these detentions are a punishment, but you seemed to be understanding of my position. You said you wanted me to be using this time usefully, productively.” As she neared the conclusion of her argument, Maria took a deep breath. The Deputy Headmaster’s expression was unreadable, and that unsettled her. “I don’t think that there is any more useful or productive way to spend this time than making sure I am well-prepared for this Duel.”

Whitetail was silent for the longest time, staring at her with a thoughtful, cold look. Maria did her best not to break eye contact for too long, and held her ground even when she felt like fidgeting. She could not afford to show weakness here.

“I had been asked,” he said, his voice breaking the silence like thunder whilst barely rising above a whisper, “to instruct you in due course, and to ensure that you would be able to lose the Duel gracefully and, above all else, without losing what really matters—your House’s respect.”

“Why must I lose?”

Her voice was quiet, but as the words slipped out of her mouth a flood of emotions that she had been holding back crashed into her. All of a sudden she was trembling, and her mouth was dry, and her jaw clenched. She felt constricted, crushed by the force of raw feeling.

“You know the answer, Maria,” Whitetail replied. “And you know that I truly wish it wasn’t so.”

She wanted to hit something. Abigail would have been a good target, but at that moment Maria would have happily lashed out at anything or anyone. Instead, she slammed her hoof as carefully as she could against the stone tiles, feeling the sudden force of impact numb her nerves, and squeeze at her shoulder. A single, choked sob clawed its way out of her throat, and pushed past her lips before she could stop it.

From across the table, Maria could hear the gentle patter of the Deputy Headmaster rising to his hooves. She glanced up as he took a few quiet steps around the table, and her eyes opened wide as he sat down on the cushion beside her, and placed a comforting hoof upon her shoulder. Being this close to him, and at the same level, Maria was surprised by how much shorter the old stallion seemed.

“Maria,” he said, his voice calm but his ice-blue eyes wide with concern and worry. “I can’t promise to train you. Even if I were allowed to, I couldn’t—I almost failed Dueling when I was a student, would you believe?

“But I know you, Maria.” Maria frowned in confusion, and the Whitetail chuckled. “I’ve taught you for over three years, now! I know that some of my colleagues might not try to know their students, but I’d like to think that I had learned a little about you all over the years, hmm? I’ve watched you grow from a filly so fascinated by everything around her that she could never stop asking questions into a young mare who has already looked up the answers, and learned them by rote; I’ve watched as you’ve grown from a filly who wrote fragmented essays in shaky hornwriting into a young mare who can articulate complex, logical arguments concisely with immaculate penmareship; I’ve watched as you’ve grown from a filly who couldn’t understand why the other students wouldn’t play with her at lunchtime to a young mare who has convinced her classmates that she has accepted her place beneath them whilst simultaneously outperforming every one of them!

“Maria, I was never a fighter,” Whitetail said, sighing, his icy eyes glancing down to the floor for a moment. “But you are. You’ve been fighting for three years now to show the world that a neophyte can be so much better than anyone from the Houses. If there were any fourth year who could beat Ms Forthnall in a Formal Duel, even after she’d had a year of private training with Emeritus Chingar, it would be you. But you don’t have to win every fight, Maria. And even if you lose this one, I want you to know that your father and I are both so very proud of all that you’ve done.”

Maria smiled, her lips shaking but her body relaxed with relief from a stress she hadn’t known she’d been feeling. She blinked, and a single, warm tear rolled down her cheek—she rubbed her face against her shoulder to dry it away.

“Th-thank you,” she whispered, her breathing ragged. Whitetail met her smile, and took a deep, slow breath that she tried to match.

“Now,” he began, rising to his hooves slowly, “do you think you’re still up to looking over these essays? They are only first-year, after all…”

[a] However, even in the years before Starswirl, there is a relatively large amount of evidence that a similar, but informal system of patronage was used by some families, when a unicorn of significant potential was found among the ponies of their lands. This practice is even recognised in Scripture (c.f. Annales 23: 6) and in Pilante’s Historiae.
[b] There are many writings that, throughout the history of Equestria, have been considered to be works of Starswirl. It is often highly dubious that they are so, and most have since been demonstrated to be hoaxes—some teachings from these hoaxes have even been declared Heresy by the Church.
[c] Some scholars would consider the passing of the First Equestrian Reform Bill (which, among other things, began the Neophyte tradition by bringing it into law) to be the moment that the Classical Era began. Most, however, prefer to see this move as part of a kind of “buffer period” between the Pre-Classical and Classical Eras.

Interference, Part 4

And when he came upon the bay, Starswirl saw a siren lying and laughing upon the rocks, and around her was the wreckage of a ship. Even her laugh was musical[a], such that the Guards, whom Starswirl had brought, would have walked into the sea, had Starswirl not formed a barrier of magic before them.
—Inlectatio 16:10-13

“Thank you for walking me here, Deputy Headmaster.”

Whitetail smiled softly at her, one last time, before turning his back and descending the spiral staircase from the Headmistress’ office door. For a moment, Maria was alone at the top of the stairs, trapped between the dark descent and the large, imposing door and feeling as if she were about to fall; then, with a flash of red hornglow, the door was opened, and her hooves felt as if they were on solid ground once more.

“Maria.” The Headmistress was sitting at her desk, a small storm of parchmentwork flying around her. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

Maria took a few cautious steps forward, afraid to get too near the whirling mass of parchment lest she get sucked into it herself. To her surprise, the storm expanded rapidly, and before she knew it parchment was flying past her and settling on shelves all around the room, calm descending with one final, deafening rustle.

I suppose that’s one way to tidy up.

“I was talking with Timothy Sparkle over dinner,” Maria began, taking a seat on the now-familiar cushion, “and he had a rather impressive suggestion for how we might find the interference on the telescope. He and I were working on it until my detention began, and I wanted to show you the results of our work.”

As she was talking, Maria flipped open the top of her saddlebag, and floated a few rolls of parchment onto the desk, spreading them out flat and keeping them held down at the corners with the weights she had brought with her. The Headmistress didn’t look at the parchment, and instead eyes Maria warily.

“How exactly do you expect to narrow down this search, Maria?” she asked sharply. “Finding the effects of interference has always been a long and arduous task. While I am always excited to see students exploring new approaches to problems, it seems almost impossible that the two of you have made a breakthrough like that.”

The Headmistress’ horn lit, then, and Maria could see the hornglow forming around her parchment. She lit her own horn as quickly as she could, pushing down on the weights in the corner with all her might.

“Headmistress, please,” Maria said, and for a moment she saw in Fenglade’s eyes a blazing fire of anger, so fierce that it nearly caused her to fall back and relinquish her grip. “This technique wouldn’t work to identify interference in a general case, but Tim and I are confident that this particular instance has a much simpler solution.”

The Headmistress’ eyes were narrowed in suspicion, but she seemed less likely to lash out in anger, now. After taking a long, deep breath, she asked, “What is your idea?”

“It’s Tim’s idea, really,” Maria began, but she smiled with pride anyway as the Headmistress’ horn flickered out. “We’re not just looking for any interference—we’re specifically looking for the interference that caused the strange effect I saw. We’ve figured out a formula for an Illusion-like charm that would have a similar effect, which is what’s on the parchment. We propose that any interference that could cause that effect must at least resemble the form of this enchantment.”

The Headmistress’s eyes seemed to glaze over and her expression slacked into gentle contemplation. For a long while, there was silence, save for the sound of Maria clearing her throat.

“That sounds—”

“We might be wrong—”

Maria nodded to the Headmistress, gesturing that she should speak first.

“That sounds like it might work,” Fenglade said slowly. “I’m… I’m honestly surprised I hadn’t thought of something like that.”

“It was a rather unique solution,” Maria said, smiling despite herself. “It only works—”

“Yes,” the Headmistress interrupted. “It really does only work for this one special case, doesn’t it?”

Maria hummed in agreement, not really willing to speak in case the Headmistress interrupted her again. As nice as it could be to have her—or, in this case, Tim’s—ideas confirmed by the Headmistress’ quick agreement, it could be somewhat frustrating to be unable to finish her own point.

At last, the Headmistress looked down at the parchment Maria had strewn across her desk, her eyes flicking back and forth as she scanned the calculations. After a moment, she muttered, “I should like to have a little while to look over these myself. Not, of course, that I don’t trust this work, but it is always better to have another pair of eyes to look things over. Shall we meet tomorrow evening to try and put your friend’s idea into practice?”

“M-meet?” Maria asked, her eyes wide. The Headmistress chuckled at her confusion, a light, melodic laugh that didn’t quite fit her serious, almost dangerous appearance.

“I don’t suppose you and Tim thought I would deprive you of the chance to help apply this new technique of yours?” The Headmistress laughed again, and smiled widely at Maria, whose mouth had fallen open in shock—it took her a few moments before she regained her composure, and closed it. “I think, perhaps, immediately after dinner will suffice. I’ll inform Deputy Headmaster Whitetail that your detention may have to be a little shorter tomorrow night; I’m sure he wouldn’t object.”

“Th-thank you, Headmistress,” Maria replied, barely concealing a grin.

“You’re welcome, Maria.” Fenglade nodded towards the door, and offered Maria a mock-stern look. “Now, you’d best head off to bed. It is, after all, quite a while past curfew.”

Maria rose and dipped her head towards the Headmistress in a slight bow, before turning to leave the room. As she pulled open the door and stepped onto the spiral staircase, she could hear the rustle of parchment flying from shelves, and returning to its storm.

[a] The magical properties of a siren’s music have been well documented in antiquity, but due to the lack of surviving specimen scholars have no explanations for their allure. The phenomenon has been classed by most scholars as wild magic, which requires little explanation beyond being a manifestation of the Source’s will.

Tower of Memories and Warmth

Rhododendron desiderium
(Common Name: Heart’s Desire)

R. desiderium is an evergreen shrub that can be identified by heart-shaped petals that hang just below the main flower, and by the particularly long filaments of its stamen. Its petals, when ingested, have hallucinogenic properties, showing to each individual the very vision that they most desire[a]. Many potions have made particular use of this effect, and R. desiderium petals are commonly used in so-called Luck Potions[b]… The stalk of the plant contains a highly addictive substance that is an effective painkiller, and was for some time outlawed as a narcotic by the Thaumata of Equestria.
—from The Wild Plants of the Everfree Forest and Their Uses

“Good morning, class.” Zama was sat on a cushion at the front of her classroom, and beckoned with a hoof for the small huddle of students by the door to come in. Maria waited patiently for her classmates to enter—it didn’t take quite so long with a class like this, that had such a small attendance—and then trotted herself over to a cauldron near the back of the classroom. She didn’t mind. The back was where Zama’s library was, after all.

“Today,” Zama said slowly, when all the students had taken their seats and the quiet whisperings had died down, “we shall be making your first potion. It is a simple Potion of Warming, and what better potion to learn for cold nights such as these?

“Now, there is a great deal of theory to potion-making, and by the end of this year we shall have learned the very basics. But what fun are theory lessons when you have no experience of brewing? How can you truly understand me when I talk of this or that effect, when you have not witnessed it for yourselves? That is why we shall start by brewing; when you have learned to make a potion, then I shall teach you how they work.”

At this point Zama rose, and walked over to her own cauldron. “I will be making the brew alongside you, so that you can watch and copy what I do. Please turn to page 39 of your textbooks—” there was a sudden rustling of parchment that filled the room, as books were levitated swiftly from bags. Just as Maria was about to light her horn and do the same, a mighty drumbeat filled the room, echoing off every surface, a deep reverberation. The rustling stopped, and all eyes turned to the zebra.

“Are you all so quick to forget your first lesson?” Zama asked, her eyes wide in shock. “Mr. Dornsen, please remind your friends: does hornglow belong in this classroom?”

Andrew Dornsen, a timid but not unintelligent fellow, cleared his throat. “N-no, Ms. Zama.”

“And why not?”

“B-because hornglow can react with the magical potential of unfinished potions and ingredients.”

“Thank you, Mr. Dornsen.” Zama smiled, not unkindly, at Andrew, and turned back to the rest of the class. “Hornglow is not permitted so close to a potion—no, not even to open your books. Potion-making is a dangerous subject, my pupils, but I have not yet had a student foolish enough to cause any serious damage. I should hope that you would not let me down.

“Now, without using your horns, please turn to page 39 of your textbooks, and read carefully the instructions for a Potion of Warming…”

It felt odd, lifting a book from her saddlebag with her teeth, and turning the pages by hoof instead of hornglow. It reminded Maria of days long gone, and she smiled despite herself at fond memories. She remembered how she had used to grumble, her voice muffled by the book in her mouth, as she was made to practice her reading each Tuesday, and how she had been made to sound out each letter of each word despite her protests that she would never need to read, and that Leo had never been made to spend his afternoons inside; she remembered how old Mr. McLaughrin had made her read an extra sentence for every complaint.

Things had changed a lot, since she was a filly.

By the time the lesson had ended—Maria’s potion was praised alongside Andrew’s by Zama for being particularly effective, and the whole class had been made to try a small sip of both potions—Maria had almost managed to lose herself in the familiarity of using her mouth and hooves. The stirring of the cauldron was no different to how she had been taught to cook; the feeling of a tool clasped between her teeth was no different to her childhood chores. And so it was with a warm feeling—of nostalgia, of pride, and of magical warmth from the potion—that Maria rose to leave potion-making.

“Ms. Everfree?” Zama’s voice called across the room to her, and Maria turned her head to look at her teacher. The zebra was once again sitting on a cushion, and smiling. “You did well today, but you seemed to be quite lost in thought. Is something troubling you?”

Maria smirked, despite herself. These days, something was always troubling her—be it her upcoming Duel, the pressures from the Consul, or merely the complications of her investigations with the Headmistress. It was as if her mind was permanently full of troubles, sometimes. And it had been so nice, so very nice, to forget about it all for an hour. Perhaps it was the warmth, but it felt as if a weight had been lifted from her shoulders during the lesson, and as her troubles came rushing back to mind she almost felt like slouching once more beneath it.

“No,” she lied. “Everything is quite alright.”

And with a smile and a nod, she took her leave.

[a] Quite how the magic of the plant decides what any given individual’s greatest desire is remains a mystery. Studies have shown that the effect does not necessarily correlate with what an individual thinks their desire will be, and there is plenty of anecdotal evidence of unicorns disappointed to find that they did not quite want what they had thought they did.
[b] Luck Potions, of course, very rarely affect true chance and probability, but instead affect in some way the confidence of the drinker—often with rather unpleasant side-effects. Despite this, as recently as last decade they were outlawed in casinos to incentivise their use, for if would-be cheats used ineffective potions instead of actual techniques of fraud the casinos would benefit greatly.

Traces in the Margins

Substituting this result into equation 4.36, it becomes clear that the limit as S➝∞ is, in fact, the Dilown Equation! This means that, for arbitrarily large sacrificial energies*, the energy available for a ritual’s spell is inversely proportional to the power of the Wards that are in place to contain it, and any ritual spellcaster is limited by the very spells they have cast to protect themselves. This has led to the modern practice of finely-balanced safety Wards for powerful rituals, that are exactly strong enough to protect from the damage of any miscast spell, given the limitations on that spell's power by the Wards themselves. A method for calculating this is derived in chapter five.
—from The Perfect Ritual: The Necessity of Wards in Sacrificial Magic

Even after an hour, Em was still having difficulty getting to grips with the whole “magical memory loss” business. They had, it appeared, been allowed to leave their notes and the books they had been using out on the desk—since they had complete reservation of the Starswirl Wing for the next few days, there was no worry about things being lost or misplaced. But it was strange to see notes written in her own scrappy mouthwriting that were full of ideas and information she genuinely didn’t know, and it was stranger still to read a passage from a book she knew she must have read but couldn’t begin to remember.

At least she could take consolation in the fact that Alex was having as much trouble adjusting as she was.

“I can’t make any sense of this,” he said, groaning and resting his head against the desk for the third time that morning. “And I wrote the damn notes. Do you recognise any of this formula from what you’ve been reading?”

Em glanced over at the scroll Alex had open, and let out a small gasp when she saw the complexity of the spell formula he’d written down.

“I’ll take that as a ‘no’,” he continued, drily, and Em stuck her tongue out at him in response, before turning back to her own notes.

It seemed as if she’d spent most of the previous afternoon studying soul magic and, if her own notes were anything to go by, the subject was as disgusting as it sounded. One parchment simply contained a list of books, with the phrase “Do Not Read” scrawled in large letters at the top and underlined three times. Em hadn’t let her curiosity get the better of her. Yet.

“This would be so much easier if they let us sleep in here,” Em muttered. “We’d not have to go through that damn memory-wipe every evening, and we might be able to make some progress.”

Alex rolled his eyes. “As much as I like the sound of living in a library, I’d rather not sleep in the most terrifying rooms in all of Canterlot. Besides, I’m struggling enough with sleep from this case alone—can you imagine how much worse it would be if we had to remember all this while trying to sleep?”

Em considered it for about half a second, before violently shaking her head. Her partner smirked. “Didn’t think so.”

“Emily?”

Em looked up from Magic and the Soul, shooting Alex a dark look. It had been long enough now that she’d given up on correcting him, but that didn’t mean that she couldn’t show her frustration in other, little ways. “Yes, Alexander?”

Alex’s face remained unchanged, a neutral expression of slight worry, as he slid a book across the table to her.

“Can you take a look at this?” he asked. Em gingerly lifted the front cover of the book to check the title: The Perfect Ritual: The Necessity of Wards in Sacrificial Magic. Frowning, she lowered the pages, and let her eyes skim over the page Alex had passed to her.

“What am I looking at, exactly?” she asked, a few moments later. Sure, the text was interesting—and given their culprit had avoided using any safety Wards at the site of the ritual, probably very useful—but there didn’t seem to be anything in particular on that page that was worth talking about that Alex hadn’t already written a little footnote about.

“The note, Emily.” Alex’s voice sounded urgent, and Em looked again at the uneven scrawl across the bottom of the page.

“You don’t need to communicate by passing notes, you know,” Em said, smirking at Alex’s frustrated expression. “I mean, this isn’t the Arcana. Nobody’s stopping us talking. And your mouthwriting is worse than mine—now that’s saying something. Unless… did you write the note yesterday and only just find it again? Because that would make some sen—”

“I didn’t write it.”

Alex’s voice was barely even a whisper, but it felt as loud as a shout in Em’s mind. For a moment, all she could think was those words, as if they were echoing in her brain, repeating before she had a chance to figure out what it was that they meant.

I didn’t write it.

Alex wasn’t passing her notes like a stallion at the Arcana—he was sharing probably the most important discovery of their time here. Because if he hadn’t written it, and she hadn’t written it either, then…

I didn’t write it.

… then someone else must have. Someone who had been in the Starswirl Wing to research ritual magic and sacrifices. Someone who had gone to the lengths of marking a passage in a restricted textbook to help themselves remember their thoughts when they next came back. Someone who wanted to perform a ritual without safety Wards…

I didn’t write it.

“The killer did.”

The words were out of her mouth before she’d consciously thought them, but she knew the moment that she said it they were true. It could be coincidence—it could always be coincidence—but so few ponies ever accessed the Starswirl Wing that the chances were miniscule.

The killer had been here, in the Starswirl Wing. Part of her had always known, for where else would anyone find the kind of information they needed to cast a ritual of that sort of power, of that kind of horrific scale? But all of a sudden the thought took on a whole new, awful meaning, and Em found herself standing up in shock, as if afraid that she might have shared a cushion with the nameless unicorn who had haunted her nightmares.

Alex rose, too, albeit calmly and slowly.

“We should report this to the boss,” he said. “I’ll have a word with the Guards about needing this book as evidence.”

Em watched as Alex trotted calmly down an aisle of the Starswirl Wing, towards the wide, open doors where the Guards stood just beyond the memory Wards. She forced herself to take a deep, slow breath, before calmly picking up one of the books on the table and glancing around to remind herself where it came from: just because Alex was willing to leave without tidying up their mess didn’t mean she was.

It wasn’t until three books later that she realised the bastard had done it on purpose.

*~~Soul?~~
Magic

Author's Note

Sorry for a late chapter two days in a row! This one in particular has been quite difficult for me to write—it started out as filler and as I was writing morphed into something very, very different, and I really struggled to keep the pacing and tone on track. I may take a bit of time out later this week to try to nail down a few more concrete plans for this story to stop something like this happening again.

Hope you're all enjoying the story, despite any tonal mishaps!
—Scorpius

Before the Feast

And when Starswirl the Great cast down the demon to the pit, and restored order to the land, the Devourer looked on and laughed. He appeared before Starswirl, taking the guise[a] of a frail and ancient centaur; but Starswirl was not fooled by this guise, for he could feel the pull on his magic. Noticing this, the Devourer said: “O little pony, whose magic[b] is greater even than the demon of chaos—bow before me and beg that you may be saved.”

But Starswirl neither begged nor cowered in fear, and returned to the Thaumata to report what he had seen.
―Devotio 13:5-7

The hall looked different this year.

Not that the hall hadn’t looked different every year—Maria had spotted that fact in one of her history books early enough to avoid the surprise in her second year—but that didn’t make it any less noteworthy. Maria’s favourite moment of the new school year was spotting the changes that had been made, from the little detailings on the wall depicting parasprites instead of the breezies that had adorned them since she joined, to the complete redesign of the staff table into a crescent that reached out and around the heads of the student tables.

She’d also read about how the changes had been made, which was by far more fascinating than what the changes themselves were. When Canterlot Arcana was first built, shortly after the demon’s defeat, Starswirl had gathered up all the dregs of chaos that were left in the world and tied them into the architecture, thus maintaining the order that he had created… at least, that was what the scriptures said, more or less. Historians tended to disagree on some of the finer points, but the gist of it was there.

Out of the corner of her eye, Maria caught sight of a flickering, ice-blue hornglow raising a gong into the air above the staff table. She quickly closed her eyes—she was supposed to be meditating, like the students around her.

The gong sounded out not long after, and the gentle patter of the students rising to their hooves and turning to face the staff table echoed drowned out its last few echoes. Maria remained seated, and chanced a glance across the hall at Tim. He offered her a wry smile, before glancing up at the students standing either side of him and rolling his eyes just enough for her to see, but not so much that he would draw attention to himself. They were, after all, meant to be unnoticed.

That must be a little more difficult when your mane is such a bright green. Poor Tim. Maria reached her own hornglow up to check her headband. It felt in place, but in public it was always worth double-checking that her appearance was in order.

Someone at the staff table nodded—Maria had never actually seen it happen, but had read about the tradition enough times to know what was going on—and the patter returned, students across the hall sitting down. Headmistress Fenglade was standing, now, adorned in the traditional robes of the post that had been worn (or, at least, something like them had been worn—not even the best magical tailors could keep a garment like that together indefinitely) since the time that Clover Whitetail had taken the position: a cape the shade of the night, twinkling with stars and a fluttering with a lightness that suggested the cloth was more hornglow than silk, and an amethyst-studded, silver tiara that shone brightly in the Headmistress’ enchanted, fiery mane.

“My students,” she began, her voice rough but warm, “it is a pleasure to welcome you back once more to the Canterlot Arcana. It has been, for many of us, a difficult Summer, and a great many of you have felt the effects of the famine in the South. I myself have had to go without dessert on many occasions.” There was a hearty chuckle from the older members of the student body at this, and muffled whispers as the newest students had the Headmistress’ love affair with apple pies explained to them. Maria wasn’t laughing, though—and she was pleased to see that, across the room, Tim’s smile was forced. Even the Headmistress’ face had grown serious, now.

“But this famine is causing serious harm. I can see it in your faces: there are those among you who have had to bear more than your fair share of this load. It is, perhaps, wrong of me to make light of such a disaster.

“To address any fears that you might have, I want to make it very clear that the Arcana is well-stocked, and that you shall not be found wanting for food this year.” A cheer, at that, and even Maria found herself smiling in relief. “Our weathermages are working very closely with the ponies of the South, and together they will find a solution to this crisis before things get out of hand.

“Before we eat, however, I should like to address another fear.” The whispers started up again at that, a quiet hiss of voice that filled the room. This was unexpected—Headmistress Fenglade usually kept things brief. “There are those who would like you to think that our neighbours to the north are responsible for our woes; and there are those who would like you to think that this famine is an act of treason against us by the ponies. I cannot stress enough how wrong, how foolish it would be for us to pin the blame for a natural disaster upon others.

“There are those who would want to bring war to this great country, who wear the form of concerned and frightened citizens. I pray that you might see through their guise, my students, and see them for the scaremongers they truly are. In the wisdom of Starswirl, be guided; in the will of magic, be strong.”

Now there were no whispers, but a sea of silent faces that bore more expressions than Maria could count. There were those who were relieved at the Headmistress’ words, but some—many, Maria saw, members of House Everfree—whose faces were twisted in barely-concealed anger. It lasted but a moment; as her words drew to a close, Headmistress Fenglade raised her horn, grasping the gong in her ruby hornglow, and with three loud beats summoned the serving-ponies to bring out the feast.

[a] in some translations, wearing the form.
[b] venēficium: though sometimes translated as poison, venēficium was also used to refer to the creation of magical potions. Scholars agree that this refers to Starswirl’s magic, due to Tirek’s unique ability to imbibe hornglow as one might drink a potion.

Concerns at the Staff Table

On the third day, the demon said unto Starswirl: “Look upon this land, and see all that I can achieve. The very trees uproot and dance like ponies; the rocks[a] themselves flow like water and the rivers stand strong as boulders. I can even twist space and time themselves into loops. You have a great thirst for knowledge, stallion—I will allow you to study my chaos[b], freely, and learn from it all you wish, if you were only to bow to me.”
—Inlectatio 4:12-14

“I’m worried about Maria.”

Rabastan Whitetail took a moment to savour the last bite of his egg salad sandwich—though he’d had to add a little salt, the cooks had done a fantastic job once again. It was bursting with flavour, the crunch of the lettuce a perfect accent upon the soft, smooth egg mayonnaise (and was that onion he could taste? Another light, crunching note, but not too sharp.) And as much as he missed his wife’s cooking while he was away, he knew that in any real contest the Arcana chefs had her beaten.

It was only after he had swallowed that he turned and frowned at the professor to his right. “What’s bothering you?”

Professor Everfree sighed, glanced quickly over towards the darkened side of the room, and said, “She has a good heart, bless her, but I don’t think she always realises the implications of her helping. And as a neophyte, especially at her age, the very fact that she can help would be taken as an insult by some Houses…”

“I wouldn’t be so quick to judge other Houses by your own’s standards, Arthur.” Rabastan reached out for another sandwich with his hornglow, quickly raising a salt shaker and giving it a light sprinkling—Melody would never approve, which was another reason he preferred term time—before he dropped it on his plate. “Not every House is so quick to offense at a neophyte’s every action.”

“True.” Professor Everfree sighed, raising a chalice of water to his lips and gulping down a quick mouthful. “But that doesn’t mean that there are no such Houses. Sometimes, I think my House would take insult at one of its own.”

“That would hardly surprise me,” Rabastan muttered. House Everfree was well-known for being unusually intolerant of neophytes—their head, Invictus, had personally tried to block his appointment as deputy headmaster, and had been an outspoken critic of his job ever since. How that House had managed to give rise to a stallion such as Arthur was beyond him.

“Regardless,” Professor Everfree began, clearly acting as if he hadn’t heard Rabastan’s remark, “It’s a shame that she should have to learn to quash her charitable instincts. This world needs more mares like her, I think.”

“You mean people for whom ‘charity’ means more than dressing up and spending lavish amounts at some auction for the local foals’ home?”

Professor Everfree nodded, his eyes narrowing dangerously. Rabastan smiled.

“Relax, old friend,” he said. “You’re not the only one who’s worried about her—but we’re not the only ones looking out for her, you know.” He didn’t need to mention that he was worried about Maria for very different reasons. Besides, it would hardly do to tell the mare’s father that he was worried about her for doing too well academically, even if he suspected that her thirst for knowledge may be just as unintentionally insulting as her helpful nature.

“Timothy Sparkle is not the kind of stallion I’d want looking out for my daughter.” Rabastan chuckled at that—the lad was hardly an expert in social etiquette, even if he was fairly harmless.

“But they are friends,” Rabastan said, “and they are looking out for each other, in little ways. Besides, it could be worse. She could have made friends with a serving-mare.”

Professor Everfree almost spilled his drink—Rabastan felt that he had obviously said the wrong thing, since his colleague’s violent snort into his chalice was hardly appropriate public behaviour. The oration professor might have been a bit scatterbrained academically, but he was rarely one to shy away from proper conduct (in public, at least—Rabastan had seen what the stallion was like after a pint or two of hard cider.)

“Didn’t stop her from trying last night,” he muttered. Rabastan’s eyes went wide for a moment as he processed what he heard—no wonder Arthur was worried about the young mare. He sighed, shook his head, and turned back to his next sandwich, fresh and ready on his plate.

So long as she listens, and keeps our warnings in mind, he thought, I’m sure everything will be absolutely fine.

[a] in some translations, mountains.
[b] though the original text clearly reads magicās, it is the belief of many modern scholars that Discord’s powers were so vastly dissimilar to our own magic that it would be misleading to use the same word—some argue that to do so may even tempt modern unicorns into disastrous attempts to recreate the chaos of Discord.

Attention, Darkness, and Knowledge

Heavyweight trotted slowly along the corridor, a large silver platter of lettuce sandwiches held tightly in her teeth. She asked herself—as she often found herself doing, when a task she had been assigned seemed particularly unnecessary—why the staff even needed serving-mares to carry things, anyway. For unicorns carrying a tray was easy, because their hornglow could carry all of it at once, but when an earth pony like herself picked up a tray in their teeth, the weight was constantly pulling it down, and the strain on their jaw after even a few minutes could become quite uncomfortable. Not to mention the difficult balancing act of carrying a tray whilst walking, without upsetting the delicate arrangement of the items on it.

Because that’s how unicorns were: anything that they could do easily but that bored them, they made others do, even if the others were less-suited to the task. Even if it hurt them.

She let out a slow breath through her nose, and tried to relax. It wouldn’t do to get upset in front of the students. Not only were they unicorns, but some of them were her elders, and it wouldn’t do to disrespect them.

Even if they could take away one of your greatest joys in life on a whim, without concern or afterthought.

Turning the corner into the Hall, Heavyweight kept her posture as perfect as she could manage as she strode purposefully, if slowly, towards one of the serving tables. There was something at once both pleasant and deeply uncomfortable about being so unnoticed that one could walk through a crowded hall of students this slowly, and yet not a single head would turn to track you. It was lonely… but she supposed it could be worse.

As she set down the tray, she noticed the room’s background chatter fall to a whispered hush. Despite herself, she looked up, worrying that she had done something wrong, but the first student that she saw was not looking at her, but watching a young mare walk deliberately up towards the staff table.

The mare’s soft blue coat seemed familiar, but there was something in the way that she was moving that threw Heavyweight, and made her struggle to remember the mare’s name. She was sure that she’d seen her recently…

Heavyweight watched, mesmerised, as the young mare approached the Headmistress. She appeared… not confident, but certainly not afraid, almost as if she were very deliberately keeping her emotions in check. There was a slight tension in the tight line of her lips, but otherwise her expression was as clear and blank as Heavyweight’s own.

Heavyweight tore her eyes away from the sight, and turned to leave the Hall. There were more trays to carry, waiting for her back in the kitchen, after all.

At the top of the Southern Tower of Canterlot Arcana, there was one room that had only two high, small windows, between which a breeze would occasionally blow. What little light entered those windows diffused through the room, but only enough to cast shadows in the darkness. Each morning, its lone inhabitant would rise and light the candles that floated on permanent Enchantments around the room, flickering and wobbling, but otherwise providing steady light, until the candles burned through and needed to be replaced.

That was how Zama knew that it was time to eat, at least.

Silently, she closed the book that she had been reading, and walked over to the fireplace, grasping one candle in her teeth and lighting it with utmost care and practice, even if it were mostly out of habit than safety: the fire was charmed that it should never burn her, or a student.

She’d made it three candles around the room—almost a quarter of the way around—when she heard the gentle knocking at the door that meant a serving-pony had arrived with her lunch. She smiled and returned the candle she was carrying to its original spot, before trotting briskly over to the door to greet the serving-pony. With a smile and a nod, she took the tray in her teeth, and moved to put it down by her cushion.

Three candles would be enough to eat by.

“So I heard back from administration.”

Em looked up from her salad and shot her partner a withering look. “Alex, can it wait? It’s lunch. And I don’t know about you, but I don’t particularly want to think about this case while I’m eating.”

For a second, a dark look fell over Alex’s eyes. For the first time that day, Em thought she could see the subtle shimmer of a glamour Illusion that was beginning to fade beneath his eyes. She frowned. It wasn’t like Alex to miss out on sleep—and it certainly wasn't like Alex to let his Illusions fade. He was usually the kind of stallion who would be in bed comfortably just an hour or two after moonrise, and he’d be up as the sun rose.

“I know,” he said softly, setting down his tray and sitting down on the cushion across from her. “Neither do I. But this is important: we’ve been given the all-clear for the Starswirl Wing.”

Em froze.

The Starswirl Wing. It had seemed so much less frightening when it was just a possibility, a mere concept, and not a place that she would be going. A part of her hadn’t actually thought he’d been serious about researching there—or she wouldn’t have if she hadn’t known how seriously he took his work. She certainly hadn’t expected them to be allowed access, no matter how much they might need it to solve the case. She knew veteran Adstra who had needed to use the Starswirl Wing for some of their cases, and none of them had ever wanted to talk about the experience.

“By the Source, Alex,” she whispered in shock. “They’re actually letting us in there?”

“Yeah,” he said. “This afternoon, too. Apparently they’re really worried about this case and are willing to do just about anything to get results.” Even letting two rookies, barely out of training, into the Starswirl Wing. He hadn’t said it, but she knew that was what he was thinking.

“Well then,” Em said, picking up a slice of tomato with her hornglow. “I guess we’re spending the afternoon researching. It’s not all that different from what I had planned anyway.”

Alex hummed, and nodded in agreement, tucking into his own meal as the pair lapsed into a familiar, pregnant silence. Em didn’t want to break it—to talk about the Starswirl Wing now seemed almost as bad as the case—but behind her carefully-composed features her heart was throbbing in terror. There were things in the Starswirl wing that unicorns were simply not meant to know…

And the worst part was that they might not have to forget all of them.