Chapter 01: Adventure Awaits!
A horrid storm loomed over the small sleeping village of Little Shoes. It brought heavy rain along with lightning and harsh biting winds. Silver Bullion had never seen stormy weather this dreadful before and just wanted to get back to his cottage quickly as possible after his long hard day’s work at the ore mine.
“Which Pegasus thought this was a brilliant idea?” Silver grumbled clinging onto his navy-blue coat to keep what little heat is left, his other hand clutched his satchel tightly to his chest to prevent it from flying away. “I mean sure, the trees and flowers need watering but not like this! This is just ridiculous!”
After a while of battling through the stormy weather, Silver finally arrived at his cottage. He could feel the rain on his light blue fur as he rummaged for a key in his pocket. “I can’t wait to make some hot chocolate or something. I’m freezing!”
The cottage itself was quite large with a long and cluttered worktop that expanded most of the left side wall, covered with an assortment of tools and empty mugs of coffee from long nights working on jewellery. The opposite was a rather messy small kitchen as Silver never had any time for cleaning, but a kettle was always on standby ready for hot drinks. At the far end of the cottage was a relaxing sitting area with a few comfy chairs and a fireplace with a bundle of logs and a small dining table. A flight of stairs curved upwards to Silver’s bedroom that overlooked the whole cottage from a balcony, a place he rarely goes to as Silver finds himself sleeping in his chair next to the fire most nights.
Silver hung his coat and satchel on a rack and shivered, “Brrrr. I better get a fire going before I freeze to death.” Silver stumbled in the dark over to the fireplace, filling it with the logs and kindling. The howling sound outside made Silver gaze out of the window and watched the wild storm rampaging outside shaking trees frantically as the wind and rain rushed passed.
“The weather doesn’t seem to be improving at all,” Silver sighed as he lit the fire, holding and rubbing his hands together to keep warm. Silver then stands up and turns to the kitchen for some lovely hot chocolate, until he noticed an orange light shining from within his satchel.
"Blast! Must have left my lamp on or something," Silver walked over and rummaged around inside for his lamp and pulled it out, only to find that it was off. “Wait, what? Where is that light coming from?” He blinked and scratched his white mane in confusion and continued searching around and felt something warm.
The object was an orange round gem, about the size of a pebble and smooth as glass with not a single chip or crack in sight. “Immaculate…” Silver whispered as he rotated the gem in his hand and watched in amazement as the insides flowed around like lava down a volcano.
“What… is this? Is it magical or something? Don’t know… Or perhaps some kind of long lost artefact? I’ve never seen a gem like this before!” A rush of excitement washed over Silver, “I should show Cotton! She’ll know what this might gem be!”
Cotton Carta is an intelligent unicorn that Silver first met when he moved to Little Shoes. She had left her home city of Saddleworth to relax and establish her own bookshop in the village as her family had done for years. Silver visited Cotton often to show her the precious stones that he finds while mining and she is always pleased to help him by giving ideas on what kind of jewellery Silver should make out of the gems.
"Wait, what am I doing —" Silver paused then face-palmed, "—it's late! She might not even be awake… Only one way to find out!” With that said, Silver put his coat on once more, along with his satchel with the mysterious gem inside, and headed outside once again.
Silver hurried through the downpour to the best of his ability and followed the flooded pathway towards Cotton's bookshop with only the street gaslight and flashes of lightning to guide him. As Silver crossed over a small stone bridge he could see all the other cottages, only one of them had lights shining through its windows and that was the bookshop.
"I hope she's still awake," Silver muttered as he knocked on the door. “Hello? Cotton? Are you there? It’s me, Silver!”
“Silver? Is that you?" Cotton replied and hurried to open the door for him.
Cotton emerged with long messy mousy brown mane, looking at Silver with tired and confused green eyes from behind her rounded glasses. Cotton wore an orange long sleeved jumper with rolls of parchment and quills sticking out of her pockets.
"What are you doing here?" Cotton asked tilting her head.
"Standing outside getting wet?" Silver chuckled. "May I come in? I have something to show you!"
It took Cotton a moment for Silver’s joke sink in before saying, "Oh… Yes! Please do!"
Cotton stood aside to let Silver inside and out of the rain, closing the door behind him. The shop was normally tidy with books all tucked away in shelves, however, It seemed that Cotton had her head into some deep reading about something that Silver didn’t understand. Notes with scribbles were scattered over the floor and a table where Cotton had been working at. The bookstore was lit by a few candles from Cotton work table but most of the light came from a fireplace that crackled softly in the corner flanked by two chairs.
"You busy?" Silver asked as he looked around the store while making his way over to the fireplace.
"Oh, no! Not at all," Cotton replied and followed Silver. "I was just looking up the different spells and things I could learn. So, what was it you wanted to show me?”
Silver opened his satchel, the orange light glowing brightly as he withdrew it and held it in a flat hand. “This… This is what I wanted to show you. Do you know what it could be? Is it magical?”
Cotton edged her head closer to the gem and she adjusted her glasses to get a better look, “It does look very pretty. Perhaps the most beautiful gem you have ever shown me.”
"Not as beautiful as some-pony I know,” Silver whispered with a blush on his face.
"Pardon? Did you say something?"
"Nothing!" Silver quickly blurted. “So, you don’t know anything about it?”
Cotton raised an eyebrow before standing back upright, “No, not really. I’ve never come across anything like this before.”
"Neither have I, and I’ve been mining for most of my life!”
"Where did you find it?" Cotton asked.
“That’s the thing!” Silver explained how the gem somehow got into his satchel and started to glow when he got back to the cottage. Cotton looked stunned for a moment, the starts to play with her mane and mumble to herself.
"What could this gem be? Come on Cotton, you must have read something about glowing gems somewhere around here… Perhaps 'Wonderful Magical Items and Where to Find Them'? No, that's mainly pony made items. Wait!” Cotton face lit up and dashed to a bookshelf behind the counter, throwing books over her shoulder before making a squeaking sound.
"What? Have you found what you’re looking for? " Silver jumped from his chair and rushed over to Cotton.
"Give me a second here…," Cotton squeaked again and pulled an old black book covered in ribbons. "Ah! Here's the little devil!" She carefully places the book on the counter and opened it, flicking through its pages with some care until she points to one of the pages.
"The Soul Gem of Fire?" Silver read from the book.
"Yes! According to this, the gem you found can empower fire magic and allow non-magical users to use fire magic too,” Cotton explained. “All you need to do is speak an incantation. Let me show you,” She opened out a hand and Silver gave her the gem. Cotton held the gem tightly and spoke in a strong voice, in a language that Silver could not understand, and sparks exploded from her hand that flew across the shop to each fire source, setting each one ablaze and melted some of the candles.
"W… Wow! That was awesome! So, I can use the gem too?" Silver looked shocked as Cotton handed the gem back to him.
"Sure, all you need to do is hold the gem and repeat what I--,“ a sudden bang came from the front door, making both ponies jump.
"Who's there? Silver, did you see any pony while outside?" Cotton asked but to no response.
"No, I swear," Silver replied before turning to the door. "Hey, she asked who you are!"
Again, no response.
"Did you scare it off?" Cotton timidly asked as Silver slowly approached the door.
A loud angry hiss suddenly erupted behind the door as it started to scrape the door with what sounded like heavy claws. Both Silver and Cotton gasped and backed away slowly.
“What is that thing?!”
“How would I know?” Cotton blurted, “Are you sure--”
“Yes, no pony else! What do we do?”
“We’ll have to leave through the backdoor!” Cotton turned and dashed for another door behind her marked ‘the storage room’. “Quickly, this way!”
Silver dropped the Gem into his satchel and followed her into the storage room, where an even larger book collection was stored, all on shelves that stood in rows.
At the very end of the row was a large door.
“Here, hurry!” Cotton reached for the key and was about to unlock it until another thud came from behind it.
The creature had barged open the door with much force that made Cotton scream and falls back and over. Silver helped her back to her hoofs and they looked at their foe.
This horrid creature stood in front of them, its greenish black horn was torn and twisted just like its chitin skin along with a bluish grey mane. It arctic blue eyes wide and alert and locked onto the two ponies as it stomped a threatening hoof on the floor. It raised a thick clawed finger at Silver and demanded in a slow and distorted voice.
“Give. Me. Stone!”
“What are we going to do!” Cotton screamed.
Silver looked around the room, searching for anything he could use as a weapon until his hand slowly reached for the gem in his satchel and took a deep breath and pointed the gem at the creature.
Nothing happened at first as the creature approached with a clawed hand outstretched until a sudden burst of light came from Silvers' hand and blasted the creature with flames.
With a deafening screech of fear and pain, the creature doubled back through the door and fled into the night. Silver stood there shocked and looked at his hand, the light from the gem had faded.
“That worked?” Cotton slowly got back to her feet and took the opportunity to close and lock the door. “How… How did you cast that? You didn’t say a word!”
‘I… don’t know. I just thought of protecting us from that thing, then all that happened!”
“We need to find out more information about this gem,” Cotton placed a soft hand on top of his hand to lower it down. “And to see how dangerous it could be in the wrong hands.” Silver softly nodded in agreement.
“Where can we find such information?” He asked as he slipped the gem back into his satchel.
“There’s Canterlot, were the largest library is, but that’s across the Northern Ocean. The closest and second largest would be in Saddleworth, where I used to live. So that’s our best bet,” Cotton sighed softly and turned back into the store. “I better start packing us some food and things for our journey. Wasn’t going to get much sleep anyway.”
Author's Note
Thank you for reading!
Please do not just "down-vote" without leaving criticism. I'm very open and would love to hear ways to improve or enrich the reading experience.
Special thanks with proof reading, Eliza.
