Signs and Wonders, Wines and Drunkards
It all started shortly after Starlight’s graduation, which was probably to be expected. Suddenly free from a vast number of responsibilities, former students are wont to do slightly stupid things in the free time they have after graduation for the sake of doing them.
Several hours after the ceremony, Starlight was in her room, tweaking the knot of one of her kites’ bridle point, when Trixie pushed the door open. “Oooooooh, Starliiiiight,” she singsonged, “gu-”
Starlight twitched. “What are you still doing here? The ceremony was hours ago!”
“I just thought,” Trixie said with a smile, “that since you graduated, you and I should celebrate it in some way, just the two of us. But I didn’t have anything for that in my cart, so I started looking around the castle for something good-”
“You were snooping around the castle for hours?”
“I wasn’t snooping, I was investigating!” Trixie said with a pout. “Anyway, did you know this castle has a fully-stocked wine cellar?” Smiling, she pulled out a crate of wine bottles from behind her and plonked it between the two of them.
“What? I didn’t know that!” Starlight pulled out a bottle and examined it. “This… this is a Shetland. Aren’t those supposed to be really good? And the date’s over a century ago.” She frowned down at the crate. “Where did they come from? I don’t see Twilight as the wine-collecting type.”
“Maybe they were created with the rest of the castle,” said Trixie. “There were lots of different types down there.”
“Really. You think the Elements of Harmony can create already-aged wine.”
“They can create a castle! They created the room we’re in! They created a map! Wine isn’t completely out of the question.”
Starlight rolled her eyes, but knew it was best not to belabor the issue. The wine was here; that was really all that mattered.
“So whaddya say, Starlight?” Trixie smiled hopefully. “Some drinks to celebrate your graduation?”
“Fine,” said Starlight. She popped the cork on the bottle. “But I don’t want to get drunk. Just one bottle.”
TOO MANY BOTTLES LATER
“This’s some gooooooood wine, Trixshie!” said Starlight, wobbily waving a bottle. It slipped out of her telekinetic grasp, fell to the floor, and rolled underneath her bed. She was lucky it was empty.
“Uh’ course i’s good!” slurred Trixie. She was leaning against Starlight’s bed; it was the easiest way for her to stay upright. “I’s fit f’r a princesssss! An’ me.”
“‘Spec’ly you,” Starlight confirmed. She popped open another bottle and took a few swallows before passing it to Trixie. “Think we oughta tell Twiligh’ ‘bout this?”
Trixie dismissed the thought with a wave. “Naaaaaah. She tot’ly already knows.”
It was strong wine; Starlight was sure it hadn’t been this late with this many empty bottles a few minutes ago. But whatever. That didn’t matter right now. Right now, all she had to do was just relax and ooze down into the floorboards. Yeah. There was absolutely nothing to worry about.
“Starry,” mumbled Trixie, “I was thinkin’… since you’re all graduationed an’ stuff, you should be bedder a’ magic th’n Twiligh’.”
Even beneath the sweet haze of being sloshed, that didn’t exactly make sense to Starlight. “Why?”
“‘Cause y’should!”
Trixie’s logic was impeccable.
“Y’should,” continued Trixie, “find a spell tha’s, tha’s, tha’s too hard f’r Twiligh’, an’… poof!” She made an exploding motion with her hooves and fell over. That didn’t slow her down in the slightest. “Jus’… cast it. ‘Cause Twiligh’ can’t. An’ you can. ‘Cause.”
“Weeeeellllllllll…” Starlight’s mind made the dangerous straddling act between logic and tipsiness, calling forth the perfect action for the stupidest idea. Starlight weaved her way to her desk and, after a few bumps, pulled out a spellbook. As she flipped through the pages, she said, “There was th’s one spell I saw… Old Starwhirl one… No desc’ption o’wha’ it does, so gotta be… A-ha!”
She’d found it right at the end; a lengthy, messily-scribed description of how to set up and perform the spell took up two full pages of tiny writing, and yet there wasn’t a single word of what it actually did. High dosages of Shetland meant this failed to concern Starlight in the slightest. She squinted at the end of the name, some of the few letters she could make out. “Wha’ does finem mundi mean?”
“Fine money,” said Trixie confidently. “Soun’s like it, don’t it?”
“Yesh.” Starlight looked over the book for a few more seconds. “Trixshie? D’, d’, d’you think this’s a good idea?”
Trixie opened her mouth.
“Orrrrrrrr…” Starlight looked up and grinned lopsidedly. “The goodest idea?”
“Goodest!” said Trixie, her voice full of assurance where it wasn’t filled with alcohol. “The Prate and Gowerful Trrrrrixie doesn’ never have the goodest ideas!” She whinnied and attempted to rear triumphantly, but toppled over onto her back.
“Yyyyeeeeaaaahhhh,” said Starlight, nodding almost sagely. “That you don’t never do. Now…” She squinted at the book, wishing the words would stop running around. “Le’ss geht to it!” She fumbled around in her desk for a piece of chalk.
The spell was a complex one, and even after assembly of the prerequisites, it took Starlight several tries to get it right. It had a lot of doubling back, performing unnecessary side trips and the magical equivalent of banging your head on the door of reality. But whatever. It didn’t have a description, so that obviously meant it what was powerful and awesome, and therefore totally worth performing without checking out what it did. What could possibly go wrong?
Something clicked.
A sourceless blast of trumpets resounded throughout the room, rattling everything that wasn’t nailed down and a few things that were. Immediately, Starlight began to feel more alert, both from the sheer volume and the way the fanfare seemed go straight to her brain without bothering with the whole “ears” thing. As realization began to seep into her head, Starlight felt something aching in her horn. It was like a strong, strong spell was being cast near her, and yet somehow, even more fundamental than magic itself.
And then the sky was opened.
Starlight began to wonder if performing a random spell with no description really was the goodest idea, after all.
Out of the sky stepped a great horse. Not a large pony, an actual horse. But this was no mere horse. Power emanated from her in waves and she strode with an unearthly confidence. Her coat was a brilliant, spotless white, shining forth with a heavenly radiance that made Starlight feel unworthy. Atop her brow sat a silver crown of impossible magnificence, a ring of endless light. Slung across her back was a bow of yew, gilded with precious metals of many kinds.
Trixie stared at the horse and her eyes slowly widened. “Starlight?” she whispered.
“Yes, Trixie?” Starlight whispered back.
“I think we might’ve done a bad thing that was bad, Starlight.”
“I think so too, Trixie.”
“Ponies!” bellowed the horse. Her words were underscored by the voices of a great multitude, bespeaking a might and authority far surpassing anything Starlight could imagine, possibly even comprehend. “The end may be nigh, but fear not! You are not alone in this time of turmoil! For even as the gates of Tartarus come crashing down, even as the blood of the land churns and boils, even as the very heavens themselves are rent asunder and rain down upon you, you shall be…”
As she took in her surroundings, the horse faltered. “…be under… the protection… of…” She looked around Starlight’s room. “This…” she said slowly, “is not the apocalypse. The closest thing to apocalyptic about this is the organization of those papers.”
“Um…” Starlight blinked the last few drops of inebriation out of her mind. She didn’t like the ideas they left behind. “Ap… apocalypse?”
Incensed, the horse whipped her gaze to Starlight. Her eyes were the burning blue of the hottest fires. She looked briefly at Trixie, who yelped, before turning back to Starlight. “Yeah! I, I’m sorry, do you not recognize the crown? The bow? The absolutely stunningly pure white coat?” She pointed at each item in turn. “I’m Victory, the first of the Four Horses!”
Suddenly, drunkenness seemed far more preferable to sobriety for Starlight. It’d probably mean everything would make some lick of sense. “Of the… of the Apocalypse?”
“You… you performed…” Victory spluttered a few seconds of incoherent anger that stung Starlight’s ears. “You performed the summoning ritual! The end of the world should be oh sweet cosmos not again. Please not again.” With clenched teeth, she leaned in close to Starlight. Starlight wanted to scramble away, but her legs locked up and she couldn’t concentrate enough to draw on magic.
Victory sniffed, then folded her ears back. As she stood up, the room darkened and Victory took big, heaving breaths, the kind one does when demonstrating tremendous restraint. “Did you…” she rumbled between breaths, “cast… the summoning spell… without knowing what it did… while drunk?”
“Um…” Starlight looked at Trixie for help.
Trixie quickly scooted away. “Your fault.”
Grinning nervously at Victory, Starlight said, “M-maybe?”
Victory blinked and, with an wrath that could split the world in two, screamed, “Geez louise, lady, what the frig?!”
Author's Note
Yes, I know it's usually "Conquest". In some translations, it's "Victory", and I like the sound of "Victory" better.
