Cold Wind Blowing

by Rambling Writer

Rating: teen
Tags: Profanity, Violence, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Dark, Death, Drama, Original Character, Horror
Length: 41910

In the middle of the Frozen North sits a lonely inn. Within that inn are six travelers, trapped by a blizzard. As the temperature drops, hostilities rise, and the situation slowly deteriorates.

A mailmare. A treasure hunter. A botanist. A historian. A rambler. A retired guard.

Six travelers in a frozen forest in the middle of nowhere. None of them knows any of the others. These six people find themselves driven together into the only lodge for miles when a freak storm descends upon the land. But all they have to do is wait out the blizzard, and they can be on their way. Simple, right?

If only. As the storm rages with no sign of stopping, they gradually get to know each other more and more. They don't always like what they learn. And when your world has been reduced to a small common room, the tiniest of annoyances can simmer, fester, and boil over...

Published 2017-10-01 17:10:06 UTC
Last updated 2017-10-31 14:33:18 UTC

1 - Snowbound

“Hen”, Mistral decided, was a woefully poor name for female griffons. Hens were female chickens, with their overly-serious looks and their silly manner of walking and their flighty minds and their mournful bwock-bwock-bwooooocking, and mostly looked harmless. Female griffons, on the other hoof, while too diverse to be jammed into one category, still tended to be moderately intelligent at the very least, and those claws looked dangerous enough to tear through armor. They couldn’t, but Mistral doubted she’d ever want to meet a griffon, female or otherwise, in a dark alley. Definitely not female chickens.

She clamped her wings tighter and tugged her coat further around herself and wondered why that, of all things, was what entered her mind when she saw the griffon and unicorn slowly trudging down the snow-covered path several dozen yards ahead of her. It wasn’t like she had much experience with griffons; she might’ve been a long-distance mailmare, but she’d never gone beyond Equestria’s borders. She’d seen maybe eight or nine of them in her whole life. So why was she thinking that?

Voices, slightly muffled, filtered through the wind. The first one was definitely female, but a bit deep and husky for a mare. Mistral guessed it was the griffon. “You’re literally jumping at shadows! There ain’t another living thing for miles!”

The second one sounded more pony-like. It was a bit quavery and high, just barely short of a mild stutter. “Shadows can hide stuff! We haven’t seen another living thing for miles, but that doesn’t mean they’re not out there.”

“‘Kay, sure, but they haven’t seen ponies or griffons before. They’re just as scared of you as you are of them.”

“You don’t know me. I’m way more scared of them, no matter what.”

They both had a point. When Mistral looked around, all she could see was snow, trees, snow, trees, more snow, and more trees. Plus some trees and some snow, thrown in for flavor. This part of the Frozen North wasn’t very creative. The trees were like crooked black bars poking out from the field of white that was the snow, their branches jutting out and twisting about randomly as they reached towards the sky. Everything was reeling slightly in the slowly-growing wind, but any movement from an animal would be seen immediately. Still, there were only so many directions you could look in at once, and animals could be sneaky little buggers when it came to hiding. Mistral knew that all too well; she still had a few scars from when a chimera, of all things, had jumped out of nowhere and attacked her during one of her routes. It was best to not make assumptions on the presence or lack of monsters.

But for once, the fetlock-deep snow was actually an aid. A few sprinkles were coming down now, but it’d been days since there’d been a proper snowfall. Monsters would leave tracks and the snow would slow them down a little. It wouldn’t actually protect the ponies and griffon, obviously, but it’d give them a little bit of a warning. And besides, it’d been hours since Mistral had seen tracks besides those of the two in front of her, anyway. It almost was like there wasn’t another animal for miles and miles.

“Well, I’m here,” said the griffon, “so if anything attacks you, I’ll attack them.”

“Really? You, you’d do that for me?”

“Nah. I’m just raring for a fight.”

“…Close enough, I guess.”

They were going a little bit slower than Mistral. She was going to catch up to them eventually, so she might as well close the gap now. She went into a trot. “Hey!”

Both figures turned around. After a moment, the griffon waved. “Hey.”

Details came into focus as Mistral approached. Both of them had on thick cloaks and bags for supplies, but the similarities ended there. The unicorn’s bags had the bulky, angular look of containers and books and the like. Probably some kind of academic on a research retreat or a sabbatical or whatever those things were called. The griffon’s bags were incredibly irregular, probably stuffed full of stuff. Unlike the unicorn, she was also armed; a longbow was slung across her back and a quiver of arrows bumped against one of her legs, just above the snow. She proudly displayed a gaudy golden medallion inset with a ruby around her neck.

As she reached the two, Mistral slowed to a walk. “Worried?” she said to the unicorn.

The unicorn giggled nervously. “Juuuuuuust a little,” she whispered. “Something’s gonna jump in front of me and rip my throat out, I just know it. Anyway, I’m Thistledown. I’m a botanist.”

Mistral wondered just what the heck a botanist was doing here, but the griffon spoke up before she could ask. “A- a botanist?” Her laugh sounded a lot like an eagle’s caw. “What kind of plants do you think you’ll find up here? They’re all buried under snow!”

Thistledown giggled again, less nervously. “And that’s why it’s going to take work. I didn’t become a botanist for the money. I’ve heard rumors there’s a rare flower a few dozen miles north of here, and I want to catalog it.” She glared briefly at the griffon. “Yes, I’ll dig it up if I have to. I’m just, well… This is the Frozen North. There’s lots of monsters out here, and I know some defensive spells, but they’re not much good if I can’t see the monsters coming and I keep thinking that-”

“Monsters? Ha!” snapped the griffon. “Haven’t met a monster I couldn’t slay. And I’ve met some nasty ones in old ruins.”

“And you make it a habit of getting lost in them?” Mistral asked. She couldn’t keep a little bit of sarcasm from her voice.

“Yes, actually. I’m a treasure hunter, I am.” The griffon held out her medallion. “Name’s Griselda. If I don’t get lost in ruins, they’ve already been mapped and already been pillaged. Getting lost’s the best way to get into uncharted territory.”

Thistledown looked at a loss for words. Eventually, she said, “…Okay, then.” To Mistral, “And you?”

“Mistral,” said Mistral. “I’m a mailmare.”

“A… a mailmare.” Thistledown released a high-pitched chuckle. “I’m protected by a treasure hunter and a mailmare.”

“Hey, don’t laugh,” said Mistral darkly. “We’re the most effective law enforcement branch in Equestria.”

Thistledown stared at Mistral. Griselda stared at Mistral. Griselda snorted. “Really? The postal service?”

Pouting, Mistral thrust out her chest and flared her wings. A frigid gust of wind chilled them to the roots of her feathers, but she barely noticed. “Totally. The post office’s conviction rate last year was over ninety-eight percent,” she said. “Even the RBI has trouble managing ninety. And besides, I’m a long-distance mailmare. I often need to go through hazardous lands, so I’m used to danger.” She raised a front leg and pulled back on the sleeve. A six-inch folding dirk was stowed there, ready to swing out for use at the proper flick of a hoof. She held it out just long enough for Thistledown to take it in. “See this? I’ve killed bears with it.”

“Wow.” Thistledown looked the blade up and down. “I had no idea delivering the mail needed so much… aggression.”

Nodding gravely, Mistral said, “Don’t fuck with postmares. We’re tough as nails and twice as sharp.”

Thistledown didn’t say anything, but when she started walking again, her pace was just a little bit looser. Griselda moved next to Mistral and whispered, “You serious? Or you just reassuring her?”

“Both,” whispered Mistral. “That really is our conviction rate, and I really have killed bears. Wanna hear about it?”

Griselda looked up and down the path and shrugged. “Eh. Why not? We ain’t got anything better to do.”

“Alright. It was… five moons ago, if I remember right, and I was making a special delivery with a partner…”

Facet was not a happy camper. She was also utterly perplexed by the phrase “happy camper”. Camping was cold, wet, boring, hard, and miserable. How could campers be happy? Maybe it was the company. Ponies almost always went camping with company (after all, misery loved it), but Facet did not like company. Which was a problem at the moment, given that she had it. So, evidently, she was about as (un)happy as she could possibly be while camping.

“Ah, come on, what’s the big deal?” needled the earth pony. “Don’t you wanna talk? We don’t have anything better to do.”

“Not a ponies pony,” Facet grunted.

The earth pony waited a moment for Facet to continue. When she didn’t, the earth pony continued, “…What, that’s it? You’re just gonna clam up?”

“Yep.”

“Well, aren’t you just a bucket of fun.”

“Absolutely.”

They’d run into each other a few miles or so back, at a chance meeting of paths, and ye princesses was she annoying. She just wanted to talk, talk, talk, when all Facet wanted was some peace and quiet and, most importantly, solitude. All things this pony seemed bound and determined to steal from her.

The earth pony looked up and, with a truly record-breaking leap into the banal, said, “Wonderful weather we’re having, isn’t it? We can see the sun and everything’s pretty, but there’s still enough clouds to keep it from being blindingly white. Could do with a bit less snow coming down, though. If we happen to run into any weather pegasi, we sho-”

“Weather works on its own up here,” said Facet. She didn’t take her eyes from the path. It wasn’t visible as much more than a long, continuous depression in the drifts and the occasional signpost. She didn’t want to lose her way; maps weren’t reliable up here. “No weather pegasi. Could turn into a blizzard in a few minutes. And there’s no ‘we’.”

“Hmm. Weird. And of course there’s a ‘we’. There’s you, and there’s me, and that means there’s two, and that means plural, and I’m a part of that plural, so it’s first pony plural, so it’s we. I’m Cassandra.”

Facet choked down the urge to groan and roll her eyes. All she wanted was quiet. What would it take to shut this pony up?

Well, actually…

Time for a little magic.

Crystal pony magic was notoriously vague. The commonly-stated purpose of the Crystal Empire was to amplify the hope and love of the crystal ponies’ magic similar to how a crystal refracted light, sending it across Equestria — a description made even earth pony magic look direct and impressive. But if fear and terror took hold of the crystal ponies, then that would radiate across Equestria. In short, whatever quality of being the Empire sent out was a direct result of the crystal ponies’ state of mind.

Facet strongly doubted anypony outside the Empire, and most ponies within it for that matter, truly understood what that meant: that it was possible for crystal ponies to use magic to manipulate others’ emotions. As above, so below. As within, so without.

It wasn’t just a wacky theory Facet had; she’d tweaked other ponies’ emotions in the past. Done it often, actually. It wasn’t much, usually just making some friend-wannabe get bored with her and leave her in peace. And she knew from experience that there were limits (something to do with cognitive dissonance); if you bent somepony’s emotions too far from what they were naturally, they’d know something was up and they’d get harder to manipulate. You couldn’t, say, drive a loving couple into a murderous rage at each other, not even if you had all the time in the world. Still, in the right situations, it was useful.

Like now, hopefully.

Facet glanced at Cassandra. Her eyes were half-lidded and she spoke in as flat and emotionless a voice as she could muster. When sending out an emotion, she found it easier when she was pretending to be that emotion. “Look,” she said, “not really in the mood right now. So could you be quiet?” As she spoke, she pushed out a sense of boredom and detachment.

Cassandra seemed to take it. She blinked and her steps got less peppy. She nodded. “Yeah.” Her voice was already less upbeat. “Sure. Sorry.”

Facet grunted in acknowledgement and turned back to the path. Finally, she had some-

“I just thought,” mumbled Cassandra, “that since…” She blinked again. “…that… since we… Hang, hang on. How’d you do that?”

Facet’s hopes melted like a snowflake in a dragon’s flame. No way she was making this one bored; Cassandra was too curious for her own good. “Do what?”

“You know. Make me just get bored all of a sudden.”

“You think that was me because…?”

Cassandra rolled her eyes. “Because it happened right when you were talking and told me to drop it.”

“Could be a coincidence.”

“Ha ha ha no. Seriously, tell me and I’ll shut up.”

Facet’s ears went up. “Really?”

“Really really.”

Finally. Facet started talking without a second thought. “It’s how crystal pony magic works. Emotion-tweaking.”

After a few moments, Cassandra nodded. “Yeah, that makes sense, with the relation to the Crystal Empire and all. Can’t believe I-”

“Didn’t you say you were going to shut up?”

Cassandra smiled a very punchable smile. “Well, we’re still walking together. And…” She looked up; the sky was beginning to cloud over. “It looks like we might be in for a blizzard. We’ll have a better chance in it if we stay together. And if we’re staying together, we might as well talk, right?”

Facet bit back a groan and her lip. She was this close to telling Cassandra that she’d rather freeze to death alone than stay alive with her.

“…and stabbed it a few more times once we stopped rolling down the hill,” said Mistral. “Just to be sure, you know? After that, all that was left was to get Wax Seal to a hospital. We were still pretty close to Noon Mount, though, so that wasn’t too hard.” She shrugged. “And that’s how I killed a bear. What do you think?”

Griselda didn’t seem all that impressed, and was almost glaring at Mistral. “You almost let her die,” she said.

“Weren’t you listening? The bear came out of nowhere. I thought she was dead. She’s still alive. Full recovery, even, if you ignore the scars. I know she does.”

“You check to be sure that the bear is dead, but not that your partner is alive?”

“It’s easier to-” A chilly gust of wind blew Mistral’s hood down. She scowled, shivered, and pulled it back up as she blinked the flakes out of her eyes. “I would’ve had to check in the middle of being attacked by a bear, y’know? That’s kinda hard to do.”

“Yeah, but when it had its leg caught in that log, you coulda go-”

“Hey!” yelled Thistledown. She sounded a lot more sure of herself than usual. “Cool it, you two. It’s already annoying.”

Mistral rolled her eyes. “Look,” she whispered, “if I’d had the time, I’d’ve checked up on her. But I didn’t, so I couldn’t. Okay?”

“Okay,” said Griselda in a tone of voice that indicated it wasn’t, but it was easier to just drop it. She kicked briefly at a small drift, then looked up. “Hey. Is it just me, or is it clouding over?”

“Looks like it,” replied Mistral. The sky was darkening to a slate-gray. Not only that, but the wind was picking up and the snowfall was slowly increasing. “Wish I could change the weather. I think a blizzard’s coming.”

“Great. You got a tent or something?”

“I have one for me, but-”

“Hey!” Thistledown yelled again. “I think I see an inn!” She began trotting off.

It only took Mistral a moment to see the small building Thistledown was referring to. “Wait up!” She jogged after Thistledown. She kept her wings at her sides; it was too cold to fly comfortably. Behind her, she could hear Griselda picking up her own pace.

It wasn’t long before Mistral reached the inn. Thistledown had given up her run, wheezing, ninety percent of the way there. Griselda offered Thistledown a shoulder to lean on while Mistral kept running and took the place in. Inn at a crossroads, with a sign indicating the cardinal directions. Completely uninteresting. But it was here, and it had lasted, so it was probably good. Some hoofprints ran from the path to the door and a covered sleigh, of timber from the looks of it, poked out from around a corner.

Griselda and Thistledown loped up next to her; Thistledown was still gasping like a broken bellows. “Does this place-” she coughed, “have- a name?”

Mistral peered at the sign hanging over the door. “Hmm. The… Please Stop Inn.”

“Great Grover,” groaned Griselda. “Must every inn have a punny name?”

“Guess so,” Mistral said with a shrug.

The inside of the inn was functional enough: rock walls, hardwood floors, big common room with plenty of space, big roaring fireplace on one wall with couch and chairs to sit on, table and chairs to eat at. Even accounting for the fireplace, the inside was nice and toasty; Mistral’s limbs slowly stopped feeling like they were liable to shatter at any moment. One wall was taken up by a bar, stocked with a… sufficient amount of beverages. A door sat to one side of the bar, with another on the wall opposite below a staircase leading to the rooms above, both marked with a sign: EMPLOYEE~~S~~ ONLY. A batpony was sitting at the bar, being served by a crystal pony.

Hearing the door open, the ponies looked up. “Hello!” the crystal pony said brightly. Her voice was a bit shaky, slipping into a stutter at times, but ruthlessly happy. “Welcome to the P-Please Stop Inn. I’m Clarity, and I r-run the place. Alone, too.” She chuckled. “There’s n-not another inn for miles, but you’ll be s-safe from the weather here.”

“Hey,” said Mistral with a wave. “Mistral.” She hid a shiver; she didn’t like stutters. She knew she was being silly and she really ought to get over it, but bingeing on books when she was younger had ingrained “stuttering pony equals dishonest pony” into her mind, and she kept thinking that a pony who stuttered was hiding something.

The batpony smiled in a way that didn’t quite reach her eyes. It might’ve been the fangs. It might’ve been the slitted pupils. “Hey. Desmoda.”

“Griselda,” Griselda said as she sort of shoved Thistledown onto a couch. “And this sacked-out pony is Thistledown.”

Desmoda looked at Thistledown, eyebrow raised. “What’re you doing up here if you can’t walk without your heart giving out?”

“Can walk forever,” panted Thistledown. “Not good with running. Was running.”

“Eh-heh,” said Desmoda skeptically. “City slicker.” She turned back to her drink.

“Hey!” said Griselda. “Just bec-”

Clarity faux-coughed loudly. “If y-you think of anything you want or n-need, let me know. I’ll probably have t-to go upstairs and get it, but I can’t l-leave you uncomfortable.”

“No, just need to rest,” said Thistledown.

Mistral didn’t have it nearly as bad, but she appreciated the sentiment. She shrugged off her bags and flopped into a chair. She turned an ear towards the door; she could hear the wind picking up, but it was still plenty warm inside. She wondered if there was some spell to keep the warm air in and the cold air out. Clarity could’ve given a unicorn a free room for the night if they cast it. Or maybe the inn was just really well built. It was warm, it didn’t matter.

“So is this it?” Griselda asked as she surveyed the room. “Not much.”

“N-no,” said Clarity, shaking her head. “Just a place to spend the night and s-shelter from the elements. The rooms are upstairs.” She pointed to the steps. “That goes to storage and the furnace.” The door below the steps. “Kitchen.” The door behind her.

“You’re complaining about this?” Mistral asked. “You said you were a treasure hunter. Shouldn’t you be used to bare rooms like this.” It was less than Mistral wanted, but she figured they couldn’t expect anything more. If the middle of nowhere was a tourist attraction, it wouldn’t be the middle of nowhere.

“I was just observing,” bristled Griselda. Her feathers puffed out a little, which Mistral figured was probably a defensive mechanism to make her look bigger, but really just made her look silly. “It’s fine, but it isn’t much.”

“It’s shelter,” said Thistledown. Her breathing had steadied and sounded less wheezy. “That’s enough. As long as no snow gets in.”

The door banged open, letting gusts of snow and the sounds of howling winds into the inn. A crystal pony and an earth pony staggered in, taking with them half a snowdrift. They immediately planted their backs against the door and pushed it shut against the blizzard.

The earth pony grinned. “See? Told you we needed to stick together. You never would’ve seen this place in that weather if not for me.”

“I noticed it before you said it,” snapped the crystal pony. “I’m just not the kind to belt out every single sunblasted thought that crosses my mind.”

The earth pony chuckled and turned to the inhabitants of the inn. “Hello, fellow travelers!” she said. “My partner and I-” Her eyes fell on Desmoda; her speech stopped and her jaw dropped.

The crystal pony rolled her eyes and mumbled, “I’m Facet, this is Cassandra. And don’t believe what she says, we’re not traveling toge-”

“I’ve never seen a batpony!” Cassandra yelled. She zipped up to within an inch of Desmoda’s face (she shied back; Cassandra just moved forward again) and examined her intently. “Holy crap, you guys! Look at her little fangs! Look at her tufted ea-”

Desmoda swung her hoof in an uppercut, catching Cassandra under the chin. Cassandra’s head snapped up and she staggered back. Desmoda swung again, hitting Cassandra in the jaw; she stumbled and fell, knocking over several chairs.

“Sorry,” Desmoda said, not even trying to convince anyone. “My hoof slipped.” She put a hoof on Cassandra’s neck and pushed lightly. Leaning down next to Cassandra, baring her fangs, flaring her wings, she whispered, “Don’t. Do that. Again. Okay?”

“Okay,” wheezed Cassandra, “just lemme-”

Desmoda stepped off Cassandra’s neck. “Don’t do that. Just don’t.” She promptly went back to her drink.

Except for Cassandra’s coughing, silence reigned for a few moments. Then Clarity cleared her throat and said, “If you think there’s a lot of ponies here, d-don’t worry. You six are my only guests, so there’s enough room, even if you all s-stay.”

“But leaving isn’t really an option, is it?” Mistral asked Cassandra.

Cassandra was still rubbing her neck, so it was Facet who spoke up. “Not really. You saw how bad the blizzard was already, and I think it’s just getting worse. And there aren’t any towns nearby, are there?”

“Not for at least fifteen miles,” said Mistral. “Rounding down.” By quite a bit. Mistral suspected it was more like twenty or twenty-five, but she wasn’t completely sure. Either way, there was no way she was going out in that weather.

“So we’re stuck here until the storm passes, whenever that is.” Desmoda snorted. “Great.” She downed the remainder of her drink, then grinned. “But it’s not that bad. I’m sure we’ll all get along just fine.”

2 - Oh, the Weather Outside is Frightful

After spending a few minutes in the inn, Mistral was impressed: the inside really was warm, and not just warm compared to the outside. Even with the wind howling and sleet battering the outside (that blizzard had borne down on them fast), she couldn’t feel the slightest draft. She’d shrugged off her coat, laid it out next to the fire to dry it off, and was lounging in one of the chairs. It was the really smooshy kind, the kind it seemed a shame to waste by just sitting in; she was more stretched across it, like it was a weirdly-shaped bed, and it felt spectacular.

Griselda was warming her (what was the term? Claws? Talons? Paws? Feet?) front feet at the fire, flexing her claws to get the blood flowing. Probably. Mistral didn’t really get what was up with griffon claws in any way. Her bags, bow, and quiver lay on the floor beside her. “You look comfy,” Griselda observed.

Mistral grinned and nodded. “Mmhmmmmmmm.”

“You sure it’s okay to do that?”

“If it’s not, Clarity’ll say so.”

Griselda chuckled. “Can’t say I don’t treat my own furniture that way.”

“You have furniture? I kinda pictured treasure hunters as being, I don’t know, nomadic or something. Vagrant?” Mistral wiggled into a slightly more upright position. “Because you’re always moving from one place to another in the Quest for More Shinies.”

“I’ve got a home. I need a place to keep the shinies, ‘cause otherwise, what’s the point in getting them? You’re like a kid constantly picking up and discarding toys. I don’t spend much time there — the Quest for More Shinies calls a lot — but it’s got homey stuff like chairs.” Griselda stretched out her back next to the fire and started, of all things, purring. But then, being half-lion did mean she was half-cat. “Mmm. Note to self,” Griselda murmured happily, “use shinies to get bigger fireplace.”

“What’s your home like?”

“Walls and a roof, really. Display case for shinies. It doesn’t really need anything more. I-”

Thistledown popped between the two from nowhere and cleared her throat. “Hey, uh, Griselda?” Her mane was unkempt, like she’d been constantly running her hoof through it. “Quick question, uh, what’s a treasure hunter like you doing all the way out here?”

Griselda propped herself up on her… knees, for lack of a better term. “Just heard about some ruins up here that I thought I’d check out. Nothing real substantial, but…” She shrugged. “If it’s substantial, somebody’s been there already. They may or may not be there. I’ve hit more dead ends than paydirt chasing rumors, but I’ve still hit paydirt.”

“Do…” Thistledown swallowed. “Do you remember how you first heard about it?”

Griselda opened her beak and held up a declarative claw, but didn’t say anything. She frowned and her claw went limp. She looked down, scratching her head, tapping her foot. “Errng… dunno,” she admitted eventually. “Grapevine, I guess.”

Thistledown turned to Mistral. “And what’re you doing out here? Shouldn’t you have mail or so-”

“I made a delivery to the Crystal Empire a day ago,” said Mistral, “and decided to take the scenic route back. I’ll catch a tradewind back to Canterlot from Toreinto.”

“Hnng.” Thistledown scuffed the floor and flicked her tail. “Isn’t that still a day or two away from here?”

“It’s not called the scenic route for nothing.”

“And why’d you decide to, to come out this way? Why not go to Vanhoover? It’s just as pretty but easier to get to.”

Mistral shrugged as best she could in her position. “Dunno. Just wanted to, I guess. What’re you getting at?”

“It’s…” Thistledown bit her lip. “We’re off the edge of the map by at least fifteen miles. The weather’s lousy and uncontrollable. We’re nowhere near anything else. No one comes up here without a damn good reason.” She looked over the common room again and lowered her voice. “So what are the odds that six travelers, none of them related to each other, all end up here at the same time minutes before a blizzard hits?”

“Low, but so what?”

“I, I was thinking about the flower I came up here to study, and I just realized I didn’t know where I’d heard about it,” Thistledown said, ruffling her mane even more. “And that’s odd, because botany isn’t exactly a fast-paced job. I ought to remember who told me. And not only that, but you’re also here-” She pointed at Griselda. “-because of some fact you heard about somewhere, and you’re here-” At Mistral. “-because of some arbitrary reason that came into your head at the right time.” She looked between the two. “None of us really knows the cause of why we decided to come out here. And we all just happen to show up at the same time. That’s…” She drummed the floor, clicked her teeth, and fell silent.

“Oh, come on,” snorted Griselda. “Do you honestly think there’s some reason we’re here? That’s crazy.”

“More like paranoid,” added Mistral.

“Well, I, I-” Thistledown stared at the floor and ran a hoof through her mane again. “I am paranoid, kinda. But it’s only paranoia if you’re wrong, isn’t it? This is the Frozen North. Things are weird up here. Uncontrollable weather, windigoes, strange magic, huge swathes of uncharted territory holding Celestia-knows-what…” She looked at the bar and frowned. “What’re they doing here?” Without another word, she got up and headed over.

“Think she’s got a point?” Griselda asked, looking after her.

“No,” said Mistral. She rubbed her hooves together and held them up to the fire. “She’s just experiencing paranoia and confirmation bias.”

“Con-what?”

Mistral sighed and rubbed her forehead. This was pretty basic stuff, why didn’t more people know about it? “Confirmation bias. You see evidence that may or may not confirm a theory of yours, you assume it does. Sure, a bunch of random travelers being here all at once is coincidental, but from the information she has, it could also be interpreted as us all working together to kill her.”

“…Well, that’s extreme.”

“Exactly! But, technically, it could still fit. She’s picking up on random facts and acting like they mean something.”

Griselda made a vague noncommittal noise and wiggled her wings a little.

Rolling her eyes and sighing, Mistral went limp over the chair. Of all the things to pick up on… That? Really? Something was up just because a bunch of people happened to arrive here all at the same time? No way. Thistledown was being crazy. There was nothing wrong here. Coincidences happened.

But when Mistral looked at the six other people in the common room, after not seeing another person for hours, she had to admit that it was a pretty big coincidence.

“Some place, huh?” said Cassandra.

“Yep,” Facet said in a low voice. She hunched over her book even more. “Bug off.” The table was in the corner of the common room and would’ve been perfect for reading if Cassandra hadn’t decided to magnetize herself to Facet.

“Where to?”

“Over there.” Facet pointed at the fireplace.

“You must be great at parties.”

“I don’t agree with them and they don’t agree with me. Not a ponies pony, remember? Bug off.”

“You’re sure you just haven’t gone to enough?”

Desmoda walked up to the table with a steaming mug of something. Facet sniffed. Hot chocolate, maybe. “Some ponies don’t like parties,” Desmoda said. “They’re filled with, say, annoying ponies who make it their goal in life to stuff their nose into other ponies’ business. Now, do the mare a favor and bug off.”

With a snort, Cassandra locked eyes with Desmoda. Facet looked up briefly; Desmoda was glaring at Cassandra with a blazing intensity, but Cassandra was giving as good as she got. “And if I don’t?” Cassandra asked.

“I have here a mug of very hot liquid,” Desmoda said, lifting her cup, “and a dislike of you for getting in my face earlier.” Her grin was fangy, borderline predatory. “Do you really want to push me?”

Cassandra put up her hooves in a “hey, now” gesture. “Alright, alright, geez,” she muttered. She left her chair and slouched towards the fireplace. “You don’t need to threaten me, I…” Her words slid together into incoherence.

“Thanks,” Facet said to Desmoda. It felt obligatory.

“I didn’t do it for you,” Desmoda responded. She took a long chug from her cup. “Anything to get back at that stot.”

Facet twitched at the epithet — even she thought that was a bit strong — but whatever. Cassandra was gone. Desmoda didn’t look conversational, and Facet didn’t feel the need to start plying her with questions. Well, except for one thing she’d always wondered about batponies. “If you’re a batpony, aren’t your eyes adjusted for darkness?” she asked, not looking up.

“Yeah,” said Desmoda. “But I’ve gotten used to normal light, even if it is still a bit bright.”

“Oh. Cool.”

Desmoda didn’t elaborate. Facet didn’t press the issue. They sat in silence, and that was a-okay by Facet.

“Hey, um, mind if I ask you two a few questions?” Thistledown asked as she slid into a chair.

…Frig. “If you must,” Facet said with a sigh.

“Why?” asked Desmoda.

“Bad weather outside,” said Thistledown. “Us in here. Nowhere to go. I ought to get to know you, right?”

Clarity came up to the table balancing a tray with several steaming cups on her head. In an incredibly deft move Facet knew she’d never be able to replicate, Clarity set the tray on the table. “W-we’re going to know each other anyways,” she said. She swapped Desmoda’s empty cup with a full. “A-all things considered, it’s only natural that we get that train g-going soon. I’ve lived up here a while, and it’s easy t-to tell that that storm-” She nodded at a nearby window, matte white from the snow pounding against it. “-won’t d-die down quickly. Cocoa?” She nudged a cup each towards Facet and Thistledown.

“Sure, thanks,” Thistledown said, taking a cup.

Facet wordlessly took her own cup and sipped. The cocoa was rich and just the right temperature (maybe a little bit hot). “Thank you,” she said.

“I’m here to serve,” Clarity said with a bow. She left, taking the tray with her.

Thistledown took a swallow of cocoa and coughed. “Woo. Strong,” she muttered. “So. Facet. If you don’t mind, what’re you doing out here?”

“Historian,” said Facet. She didn’t look up. “A millennium of time displacement means a lot of missed history, and I’m traveling between towns, interviewing the ponies there, seeing how the communities reacted to the years I didn’t see.” It was actually turning out quite fruitfully. Less so for large-scale history, but some of the small-town history and anecdotes she’d heard were simply fascinating. She was thinking of writing a book about them; Northern Histories of Small-Town Equestria was her bland, overly-descriptive working title.

“Huh.” Thistledown nodded. “Okay, cool.” Another sip. “So what’re you doing out here, this far away from… anything?”

Facet almost answered automatically, but for some reason, the only answer that came up was, “it seemed like a good idea at the time”; the route had seemed shorter back then. Maybe it was the isolation. The distance pretty much guaranteed she wouldn’t meet anypony else. (At least, it was supposed to; perhaps her good luck in towns was responsible for her bad luck out here, to balance the scales somehow.) “Don’t know,” she said. She shrugged. “‘Cause, I guess. Traveling from one town to another at the moment, and there isn’t a good way to get from Isolated Small Village #24 to Isolated Small Village #25. This just seemed like the least-bad way.”

“Hmm. Uh, okay.” Thistledown nodded, but from the way she was looking off into the distance, Facet suspected she was thinking a lot. “And… Desmoda, was it?”

Desmoda grunted in affirmation.

“Right, uh… Are you a royal guard?” Thistledown asked.

Desmoda’s head snapped up so quickly it made Facet and Thistledown jump. “Why?” she asked quietly.

“Well, it’s, I, I,” stammered Thistledown, “you, uh, don’t really see batponies much outside the Lunar Regiment, and you, uh, don’t look like you, you have anything guard-y, so I’m, uh, wondering.” She grinned awkwardly.

“Oh.” Desmoda looked back down at her drink.

Silence. Thistledown cleared her throat. “So, uh, are you?”

Desmoda bared her fangs and got in Thistledown’s face. “What’s it to you?”

“Nothing!” squeaked Thistledown. “I was just-” Her chair fell over backwards as she tried to shuffle away. “I was just asking!” she said from the floor, shielding her face.

“Whatever,” Desmoda grunted. “No, I’m not a guard anymore. I didn’t like it and I quit. Now I just want some peace and quiet. Away from it all.”

“You’ll definitely find that up here,” said Facet. She smiled a little and nodded. Don’t bug Desmoda, and she wouldn’t bug her. Why couldn’t more ponies be like that? Even if she was being a tool otherwise.

Thistledown was shaking slightly as she got to her hooves and set her chair back up. As she settled in, she said, “And, and you came here for that? Why here? Why not tr-”

“Because,” Desmoda snapped, “this is the most isolated- place- in Equestria-” She punctuated her words with forceful jabs to Thistledown’s muzzle; the latter recoiled and tried to bat the former away. “-and so the best place to get away from it all. Satisfied, Ms. Snoopy?”

“You didn’t need to- do- all that!” Thistledown said, slapping at the air between her and Desmoda, even putting up a shield with her magic. “Just say you don’t want to talk or something!”

“Uh-huh,” said Desmoda. “And that definitely would’ve made you stop asking.”

“W-well, yeah!” said Thistledown. She lowered her shield, but she pushed her chair a few inches away from Desmoda. “I’m not constantly nosy or anything, I just- There’s a lot of ponies in the middle of nowhere at the same time, and I-”

“If you’re not constantly nosy, are you done now?”

“Yes, I am,” said Thistledown. “Good. Day.” She pushed away from the table, and… She was probably supposed to be flouncing off, but to Facet, it looked like a lot of very ineffectual stomping.

“Sweet Luna,” mumbled Desmoda. “What’s her deal?”

You, Facet didn’t say. She eyed Desmoda for a moment. She wa-

“What’re you looking at?” said Desmoda.

“Nothing,” said Facet quickly. She returned her attention to her book.

Desmoda snorted. “Good.”

“So…” Mistral said, her stomach churning even more, “you… eat the flesh… with the blood still inside?” She barely managed to disguise her heave. Meat in general disgusted her, but this…

“I said not always,” said Griselda. “I prefer medium to rare-”

“Medium what-”

“-but sometimes that’s not an option-”

“-to rare what?”

“-so I have to make do with-”

“A word to the wise,” Cassandra said as she walked up. “Don’t try talking to Facet.” She down on the opposite side of the fireplace as Griselda and rubbed her hooves together. “I swear, I act perfectly polite to her, and she treats me like I’m dried vomit.”

Mistral glanced at the table she’d come from. The crystal pony and batpony — Facet and Desmoda, if she recalled correctly — were already there and Thistledown had just taken a seat. Facet didn’t seem all that bad. Introverted and snappish, maybe, but leave her alone and she’d leave you alone. At the very least, she and Thistledown were talking and Thistledown — fearful, paranoid Thistledown — looked like she was taking it alright. Mistral guessed Facet’s problem lay between Cassandra’s ears.

“It’s not like I attacked her or anything,” mumbled Cassandra, “so why-”

“Oh, shut up,” said Griselda. “She doesn’t like you. She said something mean to you. So frigging what?”

“We’re stuck in this tiny room,” said Cassandra. “Until the storm ends, I’m never going to be more than fifty feet from her.”

“So frigging what?” repeated Griselda. “Nobody’s forcing you to talk to her. Ignore her.”

“I can’t-”

Griselda flared her wings. “Ain’t you ever been on a long train ride and not talked to the pony next to you? It’s like that, but we’re not going anywhere.”

“This-”

“Celestiaaaaa,” groaned Mistral. “Is it really that important? If you really can’t ignore her, just try to talk to somepony else. Like us.”

“Fine,” huffed Cassandra. She shuffled a few inches closer to the fire.Griselda and Mistral looked at each other. Griselda rolled her eyes, shook her head, and turned back to the fire. Mistral nodded. There ought to be a term for depending too much on others’ approval, she thought.

Something caught Mistral’s ears and she turned to look back at the table. Desmoda was jabbing Thistledown in the face. She must’ve hit a nerve somewhere. Talking about why Desmoda was out here, probably.

And if that hit a nerve…

An idea bubbled into Mistral’s mind. It was, she admitted to herself, probably a stupid idea. But it’d only take a minute, and maybe, just maybe, Thistledown was on to something. “So, Cassandra,” she said, “what’re you doing up here?”

“Oh, y’know,” Cassandra said with a shrug, “just kinda rambling around. I’m a bit of a roamer. I don’t really have a permanent home.”

Mistral twitched and Griselda gave her a weird look. “What’re you doing up here?” Mistral asked.

Cassandra blinked and coughed. “I don’t know, it’s where I ended up,” she said. “I don’t need a reason to travel, do I?”

“‘Course not,” said Mistral quickly. “Just asking.”

“She doesn’t need a reason to ask, does she?” Griselda asked with a smirk.

“No,” said Cassandra, “but a question that specific seems really personal, don’t you think?”

“No, I don’t think. I think being out here at all is a bit strange for anybody.”

“Including you?”

Mistral groaned quietly. They were just going to keep sniping at each other, weren’t they? But the chair was so comfy. She subtly wiggled a little to fold her ears down against the chair back. It might be enough to block them out.

“Totally. What am I doing out here? Going north to check out some ruins, by the by.”

“‘Check out’ some ruins.” Cassandra eyed Griselda’s medallion. “You mean ‘plunder’?”

“If you wanna demonize it, sure.” Griselda didn’t sound the least bit put out. “Everyone who owned it is dead, what’re they gonna do with it? Decay on it? It’s not like I’m hurting anyone.”

“That doesn’t mean you can-”

Nope. It wasn’t enough. Mistral hopped off the chair and slouched over to the bar, where Clarity was grinding some beans for (Mistral sniffed; it wasn’t coffee, but she did smell-) hot chocolate. “Excuse me,” she asked, “what’re the rooms like?” She tried to keep her voice neutral, hoping Clarity wouldn’t take offense at such a direct question.

Clarity laughed. “Oh, d-don’t worry. They’re just as warm as down here. I s-stay in some of them every now and then to be sure that travelers are comfortable when they’re sleeping h-here.”

“Thanks,” Mistral said with a nod. She shivered a little as she turned away; stupid stutter. After a quick swing by the hearth to pick up her stuff (Griselda and Cassandra were still arguing), Mistral trudged up the stairs to find a room.

Facet stayed hunched over her book, Desmoda stayed hunched over her cocoa. Just as Desmoda wasn’t drinking, Facet wasn’t reading.

She was thinking. Partially about Thistledown, but also about Desmoda. She didn’t want to hold anything against ponies who were frank and spoke their minds, but what was the point in “being yourself” if that meant being a jerk? Especially in this environment. If you couldn’t get away from somepony like Desmoda, any feelings you had towards her would rapidly turn to disgust and/or hatred, even if you only saw how she treated others and she never hurt you.

The thing was, Facet suspected trying to call Desmoda out on it would only bring contempt as an answer. Somepony that open about treating others like crap obviously wouldn’t like it if one of those others tried to stop it. It was a power thing, a grownup version of bullies on the playground. Facet suspected that if she tried it, she’d wind up with a black eye and a missing tooth or two.

Still, it was probably worth a shot. Facet coughed. “For how great I am at parties,” she said, “you must be positively sublime at them.”

“Oh, what,” said Desmoda, folding her ears back, “you’re gonna start whining about that? She shouldn’t be so nosy.”

“That doesn’t mean you get to practically assault her. We’ve got five ponies and a griffon stuck in a tiny inn with a bad blizzard going that’ll last Celestia-knows-how-long,” Facet pointed out. “Do you really want a reputation among us all of being an absolute jerk?”

“Isn’t getting too caught up in what other ponies think a Bad Thing?” Desmoda asked slowly, in the vein of explaining to somepony that water was wet. “I got over that a long time ago.”

Facet slammed her book shut. “Context matters,” she said, looking Desmoda in the eye. “You can’t keep mouthing off to people and not expect them to react.” Even Facet, with her loathing of company, knew that you had to treat certain ponies politely. In situations like this, nearly everyone was a certain pony. Desmoda especially so, it appeared.

“So what?” Desmoda said with a shrug. “What if I’m fine with them reacting?”

Then you’re a sunblasted idiot, Facet didn’t say, because cabin fever means their tempers will be high, and they’ll do something violent. She took a deep breath, doing her best to hide it. “She’s a unicorn, remember. She could use magic to hurt you badly, if not worse.”

“Really.” Desmoda raised an eyebrow. “Her? Get real.”

“‘Put the army in the face of death where there is no escape,’” recited Facet, “‘and they will not flee or be afraid — there is nothing they cannot achieve.’ Sun Zhì.” That quote had been around even before the Crystal Empire had vanished, and it’d always struck a chord with her for some reason. “There’s no escape here; push her too hard and she will push back. What if, while you’re here and she’s there, she rips open the door with magic, throws you out, and seals it shu-”

She was cut off when Desmoda burst out laughing. “Oh, come on! You- you can’t be-” She shook and coughed as she forced the laughs back down. “Look,” she said seriously. “I know her type. She doesn’t have a fight-or-flight instinct — it’s all flight. The others might do something. She definitely won’t.”

Facet groaned inwardly. There was no way she was getting to Desmoda normally. On the off chance magic would help, Facet sent out a sense of calm and lethargy, trying to get her to just not care enough to be snappy. “Just don’t try anything,” Facet said. “It’ll be easier on you.”

After a moment, Desmoda blinked. Her pupils dilated and contracted just out of sync with each other, then she rolled her eyes. “Fine. Whatever.” She looked down at her cocoa.

Facet waited a few moments with baited breath. When Desmoda didn’t do anything else, Facet let that breath out and went back to her book. Apparently, Desmoda wasn’t so aggressive that she couldn’t be calmed temporarily. It wouldn’t solve the whole problem, but it would do for now.

Problem was, it was only a matter of time before that artificial emotion wore off.

3 - Make Yourselves Comfortable

The staircase to the rooms was so narrow Mistral was actually feeling a little claustrophobic. With her wings brushing against both walls, she kept thinking it was only a matter of time before she triggered something, causing the walls to slam together and crush her. It was probably to save space, but yeesh, did it need to be this narrow? Stress made her wings ache after only a few steps.

The hallway at the top was also narrow, but more than twice the width of the stairs, and Mistral immediately seized upon the opportunity to spread her wings a little. Her heart slowed as she flexed them. Even when her feathers bumped the walls, it was still better than those stairs. The hallway itself was just as spartan as everything else, something that was there simply to connect the rooms together. Five or six rooms on each side. Plenty of space for sleepers, but from how close the doors were together, there couldn’t be much space in each individual room.

“Um, excuse me,” Thistledown said from the staircase. She was climbing up right behind Mistral. “Could you-?”

“Sorry.” Mistral squeezed herself to one side, giving Thistledown enough space to wiggle past her. Curiosity prompted her next question. “Did you find anything about the other ponies being here?”

“They just kinda-sorta wound up here, too.” Thistledown ran a hoof through her mane. “I know I’m… I’m probably being stupid, but it makes you wonder. Especially out here.”

“Hmm.” Mistral still wasn’t completely convinced, but the feeling didn’t stop nagging at her. And she might as well tell Thistledown what she’d found out. “Oh, and you know the earth pony, Cassandra? She says she’s just a rambler and just happened to come this far north.”

“Well, that’s, um,” said Thistledown. She looked down and tapped the floor a few times. “Oookay.” She coughed. “Well, uh, not much we can do about it. Just, keep your eyes open.” She grinned nervously and started walking down the hall.

“Hey!” said Mistral. Thistledown stopped and looked over her shoulder. “Why’re you going all the way down? Why not just take this one?”

“It’s…” Thistledown looked away and flicked her tail. “Inns are creepy, if you think about it. And, and I’m saying that in general, not just isolated ones like these.”

“Inns. Creepy.”

“And not just inns.” Thistledown kept rambling like she hadn’t heard Mistral. “Hotels, motels, rentable houses and cabins, any place you can temporarily spend the night. Heck, any place something gets reused. It’s…” She threw open a door at random and pointed inside. “That bed. How many ponies have slept on that bed before you? How many ponies have been sick in that bed? How many…” She shivered and closed the door. “You get what I’m saying, right?”

Mistral cocked her head. “Kinda. I don’t agree with it, but I kinda know what you mean.”

“Or, like, restaurants. You have a fork. You put it in your mouth. How many other ponies have put that fork in their mouth?”

That hit Mistral a bit more. She cringed. “Yeegh.”

“So here’s what I’m thinking,” said Thistledown. “Inn. Middle of nowhere. Tired travelers. They’ll go to the first empty room, right? Which means these rooms here have been used a lot, while those-” She pointed down the hall. “-haven’t been used all that much. Less ponies have slept in those beds.”

“Eh. I guess.” Mistral shrugged. It didn’t make a lot of sense to her, but she wasn’t the kind of pony to get paranoid over beds in an inn. “I’m taking this room, though.”

“You do that. I’m going that way.” Thistledown headed down the hall and vanished into the room at the end. Mistral rolled her eyes and entered the first room.

Desmoda hadn’t moved much or said anything, which Facet was taking as an alright sign. Not having used her magic on this big a level before, she didn’t know whether or not Desmoda would react in any noticeable way once that calmness wore off. Most of the time, when she shooed somepony away with her magic, they went away and she stopped paying attention to them. She knew that the magic did wear off, but she didn’t know how long it took or what happened when it did. Maybe it’d already worn off and, absent any ponies to abuse, Desmoda was just being quiet. Facet didn’t want to try poking her to find out.

She took a last drink of her cocoa (now only a few degrees above lukewarm) and swished the dregs around inside the cup. It’d probably be best to make some excuse about being tired and hide up in a room. If something bad happened, she’d be out of the worst of it and nopony would think twice about it. That was probably for the b-

Movement out of the corner of her vision caught her eye. Griselda was walking towards them, although Cassandra was still stewing by the fireplace. Facet held her breath, hoping for two things. One, that Griselda wasn’t as “be my frieeeend!” as Cassandra was. Two, that she’d do… something… to get a reaction from Desmoda, one way or another.

“Hey, gals,” said Griselda as she slid into a chair. She reached out for Desmoda’s cup. “How’s-”

Abruptly, Desmoda slammed her hoof on top of Griselda’s ankle. Facet jumped in shock; Griselda yelped and tried to pull away, scrabbling at the table with her claws and pulling with her other foot, but Desmoda was pushing down too hard for her to get any leverage.

“My drink,” Desmoda said quietly. “Don’t touch.” She released Griselda.

“Alright,” said Griselda through a tight beak. “You don’t need to tell me twice.” She wiggled her foot around. From what Facet could tell, nothing was broken, especially since Griselda wasn’t holding down any screams. Facet glanced at Desmoda. She didn’t seem to have changed much; it was hard to tell whether or not her magic had worn off, and, if it had, whether or not this was a side effect of it. She suspected it had, and this wasn’t.

“So, birdie,” said Desmoda, “what do you want?” She downed the last of her cocoa.

Either Griselda didn’t notice the slur or she was great at ignoring it. “I’ve been thinking… you’re a batpony, you can see great in the dark, right?”

“Yes.”

“Uh-huh,” said Griselda, nodding. “Uh-huh. Neat. And can you echolocationate or whatever?” She clicked her tongue.

“Echolocate,” said Desmoda. “And no. Some batponies can, but I can’t. High pitches bug me.” She squinted at Griselda. “Why?”

“I’m a treasure hunter-”

At that, Facet’s ears both turned towards Griselda. Being a historian, she had a… thing against treasure hunters, grave robbers, tomb raiders, looters, “dynamic archaeologists”, or whatever butt-covering epithet they’d come up with. She stopped reading her book and started trying to hold down her anger.

Griselda didn’t notice Facet’s reaction. “-and that means ruins, and that usually means darkness. But you’re a batpony, so you’re adapted to darkness.” Griselda grinned. (Not for the first time, Facet wondered how griffons could grin.) “I know a perfect match when I see one. What if you and I-”

“Hold on. You want me to be a grave robber?”

“Don’t be stupid! That’s illegal! We won’t go anywhere near graves.” Griselda paused. “On purpose.”

Facet tightened her jaw and just barely managed to stay silent.

“Grave robbing applies to more than just graves, you know,” said Desmoda.

“Does not. Grave robbing is the act of stealing a body from a grave. I only take-”

Desmoda rolled her eyes. “You… You’re in denial, you know that? You’re only getting so worked up about this because that technicality is the only way you can convince yourself what you’re doing is alright.” She snorted. “Idiot.”

“Maybe, maybe not. Don’t care.” Griselda shrugged. “Besides, robbing the dead is a lot easier than robbing the living.”

“Yeah,” muttered Facet darkly. “Screw the dead, am I right? It’s not like you’re damaging anything of great historical significance and cheerfully trampling over vital links to the past.”

She hadn’t intended for Griselda or Desmoda to hear her, but they both stared at her. She looked up. They kept staring. She tightened her jaw. “What?”

“…Where did that come from?” asked Desmoda.

“I’m a historian,” Facet said quietly. Deep breath in, deep breath out. “I… don’t like it…” Deep breath in, deep breath out. “…when history gets mistreated.”

“Hey, I’m just taking stuff nobody’s using anymore,” said Griselda. “I’m careful when I transport it and I keep it clean and nicely-organized when I take it home. It’s better than it sitting around, buried underground. What’s so bad about that?”

“What- ‘What’s so bad’?!” spluttered Facet. “Ponies- People like you, they’re…” She pointed a shaking hoof at Griselda, barely able to contain her rage. “You’re destroying the ancient world for knick-knacks! You’re ripping its greatest, most important creations out from the ground, artifacts of cultural meaning and artistic merit, all to- to plop them on a random shelf next to a dozen other things from a dozen other civilizations. There’s no context! They’re just there to wook pwetty!” Her voice was slowly growing. “And without context, what’s the sunblasted point? There’s no meaning to it, no significance! They just sit there, devoid of all worth! People like you take all the history we’ve gathered over the centuries and turn it into mere tchotchkes!” She slammed her hoof on the table hard enough to rattle it.

Desmoda and Griselda stared at Facet. The latter coughed and scratched at the tabletop. “I don’t always keep them,” she said. “Some I sell to collectors. I need to ma-”

“And what do you think they do with it?” snapped Facet. “They plop it on a random shelf next to you know what. They care about history just as little as you, except they can’t even be bothered to get up and defile it themselves.”

Griselda blinked, then seemed to relax a little. “Call me crazy, but it seems like you don’t like me all that much, then.”

“To be honest,” said Facet, “I think you’re an idiotic, rapacious, ignorant bitch.”

Silence fell. Griselda looked at Facet. Facet looked at Griselda.

“Ha!” squawked Griselda. “Too bad you think that, ‘cause at least you’re honest about it! The world needs more honesty and honor and all that jazz. If you didn’t think that, I might’ve liked you.”

“Enough to leave me alone?” Facet said coldly.

“To leave you alone. I still need an answer from-”

“No,” said Desmoda. She bared her teeth a little. “I am not going to dig around in cold, dark, dank ruins just because you’re too lazy to get a torch.”

“All I needed,” Griselda said with a shrug. She saluted. “Later.” And she was away.

Desmoda cocked her head at Facet. “Funny. I didn’t imagine you to be the ‘explode with rage’ type.”

“Usually, I’m not,” Facet said. She glared back down at her book. She swore she could feel a vein pounding in her head. “But I am a historian, and you don’t become a historian unless you take history seriously. And to see it- violated like that…” She took a few deep breaths. “I remember punishments from a millennium ago that would be seen as barbaric today. One in particular. Treasure hunters ought to be hanged, drawn, and quartered.”

“Ah. Then I take it you don’t like Daring Do books.”

“I can differentiate between fiction and reality,” Facet said. “I know that those books exist mainly to entertain ponies and to make A. K. Yearling big stacks of money. They’re actually fairly well-researched, given the genre. I do have problems with them, but they have nothing to do with the artistic license applied to archaeology. For instance, the use of the ahuizotl was creative, but then Yearling just names it ‘Ahuizotl’? Why not rename Daring to ‘Pegasus’?” She buried her nose deeper into her own book.

“What else?”

Oh, great. Now Desmoda was taking away her peace and quiet, too. “Not in the mood. Keep quiet or bug off.”

Desmoda rolled her eyes and made a zipping motion across her mouth. At least she could listen.

The thing that stood out the most to Mistral was that her room had wallpaper plastered all around it from floor to ceiling. It wasn’t the kind of wallpaper that drew her attention (it was a bland, uniform, inoffensive yellow), just the presence of it. Why would an inn like this want wallpaper? The owners would have to go out of their way to get it, and it wasn’t like the kind of travelers who voluntarily came this far out would be offended if they saw naked stone. Just… why?

But whatever, Mistral said to herself as she shrugged off her saddlebags. It’s not like I’ll be looking at it much.

Like the rest of the inn, the room was small (a few paces across) and, furniture-wise, as basic as you could get, wallpaper notwithstanding. Bed (straw mattress, thick blankets and sheets), closet, beside table, lantern with oil, window. The wind howled, and the snow battered against the glass, but Mistral couldn’t feel the slightest bit of a draft. Yes, this would do nicely.

She half-suspected the hangers would’ve been stolen from the closet a while ago, but when she looked, there were plenty. She tried to wiggle the rod, but it was perfectly firm. Good. She hung up what few extra clothes she had, giving extra space for her cloak; it was still a touch damp from the melting snow, and the fire hadn’t dried it out completely. She detached her dirk from her leg and tossed it in the bottom of the closet. After rooting around inside her saddlebags for her toiletries, she opened the drawer to the bedside table and dropped them ins-

There was a book in the drawer. A worn, leatherbound journal with a blank cover, the generic kind you bought when you needed a journal and didn’t really care what it looked like. Mistral plucked it out, frowning. A travel journal, maybe? She’d considered keeping one, once. Maybe somepony had left it behind. Not exactly a hard place to forget about it. She idly flipped it open to the first page. No name was inside the cover and the first entry was very short.

Not sure how much I’ll be using this journal, but it’s something to do when I’m on the road and bored. Here’s to eating up the miles between here and Neightaly. Can’t wait to get there.

Weather’s not bad. Cloudy, but no rain scheduled. Apparently some weather recruits are undergoing training. Didn’t hear how they’re training, so I don’t know how good or bad they’re doing. Kind of hard to mess up a cloudy day.

Geez. Listen to me. Talking about the weather already? Celestia, I’m boring.

Mistral nodded in appreciation of the destination. She’d been to Neightaly twice, and it was the most gorgeous place she’d ever been to. And, being a long-distance mailpony, she’d been to a lot of places. She flipped forwards half a dozen pages. Much gushing on Neightaly occurred, with the entries growing longer as the writer grew more used to writing.

She fanned to the back. The entries stopped somewhere between two-thirds and three-fourths of the way to the end. At least they’d gotten a lot of use of the journal. Shame they’d lost it. She flipped several pages back.

Heard pegasi can’t control weather up here. Looks like it — no self-respecting pegasus would let snow fall this irregularly. Hard to describe — light one moment hard the next stops completely the next. Tent’s working fine but I wouldn’t want to be caught in actual blizzard.

Been too long since I’ve seen newly-fall-

Bored by the scenery descriptions, Mistral flicked ahead, skimming the entries. Nothing major; just the writer talking about how enchanting the snow was before the writer started talking about how the enchantment had worn off. They didn’t seem to be going anywhere in particular. Then:

Got lucky. Found inn all the way out here. Hope innkeep likes job. Bunch of other ponies showed up too. Got scared about space and talked to innkeep but he said we don’t need to worry. Blizzard coming down on us; can hear wind already. Can’t feel draft so should be safe.

“Roomies”: griffon crystal pony unicorn earth pony. Earth has long thin package she’s annoyingly “secretive” about. Gloating about having a secret — makes it obvious she has it but tells us to not look at it touch it breathe at it etc. Looks like sword or something. Uni looks like he hates her for it but might be b/c he’s dragging big sleigh of timber.

Heard innkeep warn griffon that he didn’t have much meat. Why do griffons eat meat? It’s disgusting. You need-

Even though Mistral sympathized, she wasn’t in the mood to be preached at. She skipped that paragraph.

Might write in here more often than just evening if weather keeps up. Not looking too promising. Should talk to crystal pony — never met one before.

Mistral looked out the window at a lot of splotchy white. The weather wasn’t looking too promising now, either.

“Hey, you guys up there!” Cassandra yelled from below. “Clarity’s made dinner, and it smells great! It’s being served now, and we’re not saving stuff for you!” A few seconds later, Thistledown’s frantic hoofsteps clip-clopped down the hall and stairs outside Mistral’s door. Mistral slammed the journal closed and shut it away in the drawer again. Interesting reading, maybe, if worst came to worst. But right now, she was hungry.

But as she wiggled her way down the staircase, she couldn’t get her mind off the journal. There was something about it, something she’d read in it that wasn’t quite right. Already, she could tell that it was going to be one of those things that sat in her mind, taking up too much space. Dinner should get my mind off of it. I wonder what kind of food Clarity ma-

It hit her.

She scrambled back into the room, yanked the journal out, and began flipping through the pages. Where is it, where is it…

“Ay! Missy!” screeched Griselda. “You wanna eat or not?”

“I’ll be down in a sec!” Mistral howled back. “Start without me!” The entries were looking familiar now. First snowfall; Mistral slowed down her search. Entry to the inn… Aaaand-

Got scared about space and talked to innkeep but he said we don’t need to worry.

There it was. Mistral frowned and focused on two words in turn.

innkeep

he

The innkeep then was a stallion. Clarity was a mare. She’d said she was the only pony working here. Mistral furrowed her brow and flipped to the next pa-

“HEY!”

Mistral twitched at Griselda’s scream and the journal went flying into the air.

“MISTRAL!” bellowed Griselda. “ARE YOU-”

“Shut up, you ass!” snapped Desmoda. Her voice was a lot quieter than Griselda’s, if only because it wasn’t directed at Mistral. “She’ll come down when she wants to come down.”

“Don’t compare me to a donkey!”

“You know what? Yeah. That’s an insult to asses!”

As Desmoda and Griselda quarrelled, Mistral quickly scooped the journal up from the floor and slid it back into the drawer. She couldn’t think, not when she was hungry and had ponies (or a griffon) screaming at her. I’ll get to that later, she told herself as she headed downstairs.

4 - Bundles of Nerves

Mistral didn’t have much of a nose for food, so she couldn’t say what she was smelling as she walked down the staircase. Other ponies could probably differentiate the plants being used, but to her, it smelled decent, and that was it.

She’d only just stepped off the stairs when Griselda was in her face and pulling her towards a corner. “Over here,” Griselda muttered. “Don’t want her to hear us.”

“Which ‘her’? We’re all wo-”

“Desmoda!” Griselda swung Mistral around and leaned in close, dropping her voice even more. “She’s nuts. Don’t try to talk to her. I think she’s just looking for an excuse to hurt somebody. I mean, just a few minutes ago, I try to take her hot chocolate and she nearly breaks my frigging arm!”

“…Why’d you try to take her hot chocolate?”

“Wha- No, listen, she’s crazy, y-”

“No, seriously, why’d you try to take her hot chocolate?”

“It doesn’t justify her almost breaking my arm!”

“Of course it doesn’t. But you had to expect some kind of response from that. Why the mother duck did you try to take her hot chocolate?”

Griselda scowled. “Breaking my arm is kinda over-the-top, don’t you think?”

“I’m not denying that, but-” Mistral sighed and planted her face in her hoof. “Forget it, I’ll try to not annoy her, let’s go eat.”

The table wasn’t completely set just yet; Clarity was bringing the last few dishes out, with some help from Thistledown. Like the rest of the inn, the food seemed to be Mistral to be adequate enough, given the circumstances. In fact, the variety looked better than she expected. Not to mention… “Hey, Clarity?” Mistral asked. “Did you make all of this yourself?”

“Mmhmm.” Clarity nudged a bowlful of apples into place. “I-I have to, since I’m the only one here. Plus, I c-can’t exactly go out and buy food. I’ve worked here as long as I can r-remember, so-” She grinned. “-I’ve been working with limited ingredients long enough that I can make a meal from a-anything.”

“Yeah, great,” said Griselda, “but you’ve got my meat, right? You said you were cooking it.”

“Uh, yeah, here.” Thistledown plucked a plate from her levitated collection and set it on the table. On the plate was a misshapen brown blob that made Mistral’s stomach churn.

“Finally,” said Griselda, rubbing her front feet together as she took her seat. “I’m starving, and this looks great.”

“Yeah. Great.” Mistral restrained a gag. “‘Cause there’s nothing quite like eating the seared flesh of another living thing.”

Griselda grinned and, not even bothering with utensils, picked up her meat. “Nope!” She bit into it and suddenly paused. After a moment, she ripped off a chunk and swallowed. She stared at her food. “Huh.”

“What?” asked Mistral. “Something wrong?”

“No,” Griselda said, “just- I’ve never tasted this kind of meat before.” She tore away another chunk. “Not bad, just unexpected.” Another tear. “Although, actually, I think it might just be the spices.”

“You could ask Clarity what kind of meat it is or what she uses.”

“Nah. It’s not really the kind of taste I’m dying for.” Tear. “‘S ahwite,” Griselda said through a full beak, “bu’ no’ da’ gweat.” She swallowed. “Still, meat is meat, so I don’t mind. Except for fish. Every fish I’ve had tastes like every other fish I’ve had: bland and thin.”

“Ah.” Neither knowing nor wanting what “bland” meat was supposed to taste like, Mistral dug into her salad. She liked salads. Clean some vegetables (maybe some fruits, too), cut them up, throw them all in a bowl, done. Not like meat, where you could spend a quarter hour preparing it using specialized equipment and it still might not be done. She considered bringing this up to Griselda, but the latter was busy wolfing down her meat, so she said nothing.

No one else said anything, either. The group ate in silence for several moments before Cassandra cleared her throat. “So. Who’s got an icebreaker?”

Everyone looked up at her so simultaneously the sounds they made started and ended at the same time. “Icebreaker,” Cassandra said quickly, perhaps a touch exasperatedly. “You know. A story or something to get conversation going? Don’t tell me you want to just sit here and eat.”

After a moment, Thistledown coughed. “I, um, I’ve got nothing,” she said quietly. “I study plants. Not even plants that are interesting if you’re not a botanist. I’m a regular botanist, not an arcanobotanist.” She grinned for half an instant and quickly looked down. “So don’t expect much from me. Just, FYI.”

“Fat lot of good that was,” Desmoda said.

Thistledown quailed and folded her ears back. “Sorry,” she whispered.

“Lay off, not everypony has stories,” said Cassandra. “What about you? If you’re so-”

“How about the time I was in the Royal Guard and my squad was called in to secure a water park?”

Cassandra’s jaw dropped. “…What, seriously? The Lunar Regiment. Securing a water park.”

“It was, let’s just say…” Desmoda clicked her tongue. “…a very odd assignment.” She chuckled. “So?”

“Heck, yeah,” said Mistral. Even if Desmoda was half as bad as she appeared and Griselda said, she might be a good storyteller. And if she was lying, so what? A story to pass the time was a story to pass the time.

“Spit it out,” said Griselda.

Desmoda snickered and flicked her tail. “Alright. It was…” She tapped her chin. “…just after one in the morning — perfectly ordinary for the Lunar Regiment, we weren’t getting some shit detail — and suddenly this pegasus comes screaming in full tilt from the Canterlot Zoo…”

“-and you should’ve seen the look on the sergeant’s face when she heard what we’d needed the catnip for!”

Everybody’s laughs doubled. Even Facet, who apparently wasn’t listening, was giggling a little. Mistral had actually had to stop eating to keep herself from choking. This story was good.

“Oh, and the best part?” said Desmoda, just barely keeping it together. “You remember the bit with the dark slide? Asio actually managed to argue that we deserved hazard pay from that!”

“How does that happen?” asked Griselda, still laughing. “You’re soldiers!”

“I don’t know! But he got it! A hundred extra bits for each of us!”

Royal guards. Hazard pay. If she hadn’t been in a chair already, Mistral would’ve collapsed. It was just too rich.“You know, Desmoda,” she chuckled, “you’re a funny mare.”

All lightness dropped from Desmoda’s voice. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Silence fell. Mistral looked up; Desmoda was glaring at her, ears back and wings flared, and those slitted pupils were looking very monstrous all of a sudden. The other people eating were subtly shying away from her. Mistral blinked. “You, you know,” she said, “you’re funny. You know?”

“No,” whispered Desmoda, “I don’t know. I’m funny how?”

“Well, it’s…” Mistral swallowed. Anypony else, this wouldn’t’ve been a problem. Not from Desmoda. Not after what she’d seen and heard. “The, the story, the way you told it, it’s…” She rustled her wings. “It’s funny.”

“Oh, so I’m a stand-up comedian, now?” hissed Desmoda. “I tell stories that make you laugh? Is that what you think I’m here for?”

“I’m getting something to drink,” Facet said loudly, and immediately left the table for the bar.

For an instant, Mistral hoped that would distract Desmoda. No luck. Mistral swallowed again. “N-no, it’s-”

“Look, Desmoda,” said Griselda, “she meant-”

Without taking her eyes from Mistral, Desmoda backhoofed Griselda across the face. “She’s a big filly, she can explain it herself. What’s so funny about me?”

Mistral was sure she was sweating. She could hear her blood rushing in her ears. Griselda, Thistledown, and Cassandra were all exchanging glances. It took Mistral several seconds to find the right words. “It’s, it’s just… You’re funny. You know?”

Desmoda twitched her head a millimeter back and forth. “No. I don’t know. Do I look like a mind reader? Funny how?”

Mistral’s wings and hooves twitched in fear. Her instincts screamed at her to run. She pushed her stool an inch away from the table. “I, I just-”

Then Desmoda burst out laughing. “Oh, sweet Luna, you should see the look on your face!” She doubled over the table, she was shaking so hard. “I had you! I so had you!”

After a moment, Cassandra started chuckling. “Okay,” she said, “your face was pretty funny.”

Then Griselda. “Yeah, it- hehe- It was kinda ridiculous.” She clamped her claws around her beak, but that didn’t stop the laughter.

It was infectious. Mistral started laughing, too. She imagined what her face had been like and, well, now it just seemed ridiculous. It was one of those times where you had to laugh at yourself.

After a few moments, the ridiculousness had run its course. Not just for Mistral, but for Griselda and Cassandra, too. Hearty laughs petered out to minor chuckles before vanishing altogether. Soon, everyone gone silent.

But not Desmoda. Desmoda kept laughing.

And laughing.

And laughing.

And laughing.

Mistral and Griselda looked at each other in confusion and nervousness. Griselda coughed. “It’s not that funny,” she said.

“It is!” said Desmoda when she could take a breath. “Did- did you see the way she squirmed?! It was great!”

Mistral bit her tongue and waited a few more seconds. Desmoda didn’t stop. Eventually, Mistral cleared her throat. “Desmoda, it-”

Desmoda waved her down, still giggling. “Sorry, just- give me a minute.” She coughed, hit herself on the chest a few times. She cleared her throat. “Hem. Sorry.”

Mistral stared at Desmoda. Seeing somepony squirm could be funny, yes. But not that funny. What sort of pony laughed that hard at something like… like that? “Exactly what was so funny about that?” she asked in a low voice.

“Oh, pssht, really?” Desmoda said, waving a hoof. “You can’t explain humor. I just found it funny, that’s all. Really.” She smirked. “Your face was pretty great.”

“You were threatening me,” Mistral replied. She was breathing deeply. “I just want to know what’s so funny about threats.”

“You- You really thought-” Desmoda’s jaw dropped. “Oh, whaaaat?” She grinned disarmingly. Or, at least, it would’ve been disarming if not for her fangs. “I didn’t make any actual threats, did I? What do think I’m gonna do?”

Rock, hard place. Hammer, anvil. Mistral swallowed and did her best to soften the blow. “Well, I don’t know,” she said, “but you haven’t exactly been the nicest, so-”

“It’s not that hard to see you snapping,” Thistledown said breathlessly. “You pretty much punched me in the face for asking you a few questions about what you were doing out here.”

The smile vanished. Desmoda folded her ears back and glared at Thistledown. “You were being nosy,” she whispered, “and-”

“You nearly broke my arm!” put in Griselda. “I just wanted some hot chocolate!”

“Then don’t take my hot chocolate,” snapped Desmoda.

“And you’re getting hostile now,” said Cassandra. Her voice was surprisingly steady. “You really need to get that temper under control. You could hurt somepony.”

Desmoda gave Cassandra a black look, but for once she didn’t have a response. She grunted and mumbled very quickly to Mistral, “Fine sorry won’t do it again happy?”

No, thought Mistral. “Apology accepted-ish,” said Mistral.

For a moment, nothing. Then Desmoda smirked. “Your face was pretty great, though.”

Mistral opened her mouth just in time for Griselda to bellow, “SO WHO WANTS TO HEAR ABOUT HOW I GOT THIS?” She held up her amulet and was talking loudly before anypony could say “yay” or “nay”.

With the distraction going, Mistral focused on her food to blot out her thoughts of Desmoda. Griselda’s story dissolved into white noise as she breathed in and out. Gradually, she stopped being so fixated on Desmoda, even if the thoughts kept coming back whenever she tried pushing them out. In between bites, she tried to keep half an ear on Griselda’s story, but she soon got lost amid a jumble of names she didn’t recognize. Desmoda was listening to it with a sort of detached interest. At first glance, Cassandra seemed to be more invested, but she kept shooting sideways looks at Desmoda. But Thistledown wasn’t listening at all. She was staring at her drink, deep in thought. Glad to take another distraction, Mistral asked, “What’s up?”

Thistledown waited a moment before whispering, “Clarity.” She looked over her shoulder at the bar for a second. “She said she’s worked here all her life, right?”

“Yeah…”

“And she’s a crystal pony.”

“Yeah…”

“But all the crystal ponies were in the Crystal Empire, which vanished over a thousand years ago and only returned two years ago.” Thistledown looked Mistral in the eye and dropped her voice even more. “What is up with her?”

Mistral swiveled to look at Clarity moments before she disappeared into the back. Yeah, that was true. Why hadn’t she noticed it before? Why would Clarity-

The journal. The innkeep had been a stallion. If she dug deeper, there’d be something in there, Mistral was sure of it. “I don’t know,” she said, “but, listen to this: in my room, I-”

Thistledown’s ears suddenly stood up and she slid off her chair. “Back in a sec.” She trotted over to the bar and took a seat next to Facet before Mistral could react.

“But…” Mistral stammered to the empty space. “I-I was… going to tell you…” She groaned, but didn’t move. If Thistledown wasn’t going to stick around to listen, Mistral wasn’t going to walk around to talk. Deprived of her main distraction from Desmoda, and with Griselda’s names growing ever more impenetrable, Mistral buried her muzzle in her salad.

Clarity nudged the cup in Facet’s direction. “Problem?” she asked.

The steam said the hot chocolate was still scalding; Facet downed it anyway. She wasn’t claustrophobic, but the tight space was getting to her and she needed some comfort drink.

No, not the space. If it was just the space, she’d be fine. It was the company. Desmoda was psycho (something she may or may not have had a hoof in, Facet was forced to admit), Cassandra was intrusive, Griselda was a barbaric vandal, Thistledown was horrifically inoffensive, and Mistral- Actually, Facet didn’t know a thing about Mistral. Though that didn’t mean there wasn’t something about her lurking just under the surface. Between those four (possibly plus one) and the tight inn, to say she was quite vexed was a colossal understatement. Desmoda’s story had almost deflated her irritation, but then she got all bitter with Mistral and inflated it right back up. Of course, the space wasn’t helping things; she couldn’t get more than fifty feet from anypony.

“Ponies,” grunted Facet. “Soon as the storm clears-” She swept a hoof across nothing in particular. “Gone.”

“Ah. Cabin fever,” said Clarity, nodding sympathetically. “I see it all the time when it’s storming and ponies can’t l-leave.” As if for emphasis, the wind outside howled and the entrance door rattled a little.

“And I don’t like company in the first place,” Facet grumbled, “so it’s even worse.”

“So sorry. What if you were alone in here?”

“Not great, but much better.” Another deep quaff. The heat made Facet’s throat itch, even though it still tasted good. “Be able to just sit and read and not have to worry about-”

Griselda screamed something and Facet twitched, narrowly avoiding spilling her cup. She sighed and ruffled her mane. “-about that,” she mumbled.

“Oh, it can’t be that b-bad,” said Clarity. “Just you wait. Th-things will calm down once you a-are all settled in. Those bad thoughts will stop c-coming.” She smiled, as if she hadn’t said something mind-bogglingly banal. “Now, sorry, but I’ve got to clean some dishes.” She vanished into the door behind the bar.

Facet rolled her eyes and swirled her hot chocolate around. Oh. Sure. “Can’t be that bad.” Yeah, right. Wouldn’t mind if they all just dropped dead. Nopony to pester me then.

Speak of the draconequus, Thistledown took a seat next to her to pester her. “Um, sorry to bother you,” she said, “but would you mind if I asked you a few questions?”

Based on the ones she’d asked earlier? “Probably,” said Facet.

“Not personal ones,” Thistledown said quickly. “Ones about mental magic, if you know that. The kind crystal ponies can use.”

Facet sat up and turned to Thistledown in surprise. She hadn’t thought she’d ever meet a pony outside the Crystal Empire. Maybe Thistledown just liked to read up on different kinds of magic. And besides- “You’re a unicorn and you’re asking me about magic?”

“Well, it’s, I, I don’t really, um, know much about the mechanics of magic outside my field. Heh. Field. Plant pun.” After a strained chuckle, Thistledown clopped her hooves together, bit her lip, and looked away. “I work with plants. So though I’m not an arcanobotanist, I know lot about earth magic — ley lines, thaumatic wells, those sorts of things, I even took a couple of electives on the theory of earth pony magic. But outside of that, I mostly just know the basics. Levitation and light and whatnot. So… please?”

“Why?” asked Facet, looking flatly at Thistledown.

“Call it… paranoid curiosity.” Thistledown did something halfway between a grin and a grimace.

Facet squinted at Thistledown for a second. She was feeling spiteful at the moment and didn’t want to spend time with anypony. But Thistledown was, from what she’d seen, the least-intolerable pony, and she’d feel guilty (for some reason) if she turned Thistledown down. Facet gritted her teeth internally. “I can give you the basics, on one condition. When it’s done, leave me alone. Alright?”

“Sure. Great. Promise. Cross my heart.” Thistledown did so. At least she seemed like the kind of pony to keep that promise.

“Fine.” Facet took a sip of cocoa for a little bit of nerve-calming. “And remember-” She pointed at herself. “Crystal pony. You’ll get a limited perspective on this.”

Thistledown nodded. “I know.”

Facet sipped again to wet her throat. This was probably going to be the longest conversation she’d ever had with another pony. “As you probably know, mental magic’s not very widely used, even when it’s legal.”

“Uh-huh.”

“The main issue with it, disregarding all the moral implications, is that it’s hard to account for just how fast the mind changes from moment to moment. It’s possible to modify emotions, bu-” She suddenly slammed her hoof on the table.

Thistledown yipped and almost fell from her chair. Her ears twitching, she asked, “What was that for?”

“A demonstration,” said Facet. “Think about it. You were thinking about mental magic. I hit the table. You immediately thought about me hitting the table. Get it?”

At first, Thistledown frowned. Then her frown slowly turned to realization as her brain worked. “So no matter what you do to somepony,” she said slowly, “it could be gone in an instant once their mental state changed.”

“Exaggeration, maybe, but accurate enough.” Actually, Thistledown was closer to it than most. Which didn’t say great things about the ‘most’. “The mind is always changing. A pony may have a certain emotion, but there’s nothing stopping that emotion from changing at a moment’s notice or even just slipping away on its own. The same is true whether the emotion is natural or artificial.”

“Could you keep it in if you kept applying magic to the pony?”

“Well… hypothetically, maybe, but it’d be too much effort for too little gain. It’s not like you can force emotions into ponies from halfway across the country. You’d have to keep near them — follow them around or keep them in one area — if you wanted to keep doing magic on them.” Why’s she asking me this? She said “paranoid curiosity, so what’s she paranoid about? It’s not me, is it?

“Uh-huh. Okay.” Thistledown chewed on her lip for a moment. “So, uh, emotions can change easily. But, but what about ideas? I mean, fully-formed ideas, those things stick. They just… eat away at you, you know? If you put one of those in, would it stay longer?”

“Those, um…” Facet frowned. She hadn’t actually tried pushing ideas into ponies before, but now that she thought about it, there didn’t seem to be any reason that couldn’t work, aside from some metaphysical rule about crystal pony magic not working that way that she didn’t know about. Her curiosity was piqued, she had to admit, and Thistledown seemed to be intelligent enough to be a sounding board of sorts. Maybe this particular back-and-forth would actually be something other than an annoyance. “That might not actually need anything,” she said slowly, “beyond the initial planting. The pony’s own mind would feed it.”

“But it’d still need to be in line with their actual beliefs, right? Otherwise they’d know it wasn’t theirs, and they’d start feeling… feeling… Gah, what’s the term…” Thistledown kneaded her forehead, mumbling quiet nothings. “That thing where you have two ideas that’re the opposite of each other-”

“Cognitive dissonance, I presume?”

“Yeah, that’s it.”

“Probably.” Facet actually found herself enjoying this a little. She’d never actually talked with somepony about this. New perspectives were nice. “And if you noticed a thought that probably wasn’t yours, you’d do your best to ignore it. Wouldn’t make it fully go away, though. Not for a while, at least.”

“Erng-hrng… Okay…” Thistledown swallowed. “What about… What about subconscious ideas?”

The enjoyment was suddenly strained. “Subconscious ideas?”

“You know. Ideas that you don’t, it’s like, you don’t know they’re ideas you have. They just kinda… push you a certain way and you attribute it to random stuff in your head. You know?”

“…No, I don’t know.” Facet’s good feeling began dripping away. “What’re you talking about?”

Thistledown gave a tiny, somewhat exasperated thing somewhere between a squeak and a moan. She ruffled her mane. “Stuff like favorite colors, favorite foods, why you went down this way when that way was just a good, randomly picking something from a list, those things.”

Facet stared. Blinked. Thistledown was still the least-intolerable pony, but something was up with her. This wasn’t just curiosity. “Just what, exactly, are you getting at?”

“It’s, I-” Thistledown’s ears twitched towards the door Clarity had disappeared into. “You know what I’ve asked too much this way past the basics thank you sorry to waste your time goodbye!” She quickly left her seat and bolted up the stairs.

Odd. But she was gone, and gone one way was gone all ways, so Facet wasn’t complaining. She went back to her hot chocolate (although it’d cooled off enough that it was now above-warm chocolate).

Clarity walked out of the back, brushing flour from her mane. “Errands: r-run. So. What did you think of while I was a-away?”

Facet snorted. “All the ponies in this inn,” she muttered, “are crazy.”

“Including you?”

“Probably.”

5 - Reading Between the Lines

Mistral stared at Desmoda and took another bite of her salad.

“-and as if that wasn’t enough, THEN her body slipped down the waterwheel and jammed the cogs, freezing all the traps!” Griselda said loudly.

Desmoda stared at Mistral and took another bite of her pasty.

“Oh, Celestia, that’s terrible!” Cassandra said loudly. She chuckled. Somehow, it wasn’t forced. “So why’s it so funny?”

Mistral stared at Desmoda and took another bite of her salad.

“Because it’s so terrible it swings all the way back around to wonderful and kind of amazing!” Griselda said loudly.

Desmoda stared at Mistral and took another bite of her pasty.

The pegasus and the batpony hadn’t said more than five words to each other at a time ever since Desmoda’s story. Once Thistledown had left, Mistral had found it harder and harder to distract herself, and eventually she found herself engaged in a sort of staring contest with Desmoda. They both blinked freely, but they rarely looked away from each other for more than a few seconds. With the awkward silence to rule all awkward silences looming, Griselda had taken it upon herself to fill that void and then some. Cassandra quickly caught on and tried to help.

Mistral stared at Desmoda and took another bite of her salad.

It wasn’t really working.

Desmoda stared at Mistral and took another bite of her pasty.

“So what happened next?” Cassandra said loudly.

Mistral stared at Desmoda and took another bite of her salad.

“Well,” Griselda said loudly, “with the traps gone kaput, I could fly down that one shaft with no problem-”

Desmoda stared at Mistral and took another bite of her air.

She blinked and looked down at her plate. Her pasty was finished. “I’m full,” she said. She promptly left the table and walked to a far corner of the room.

Mistral sighed and slouched, releasing a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding. “Stupid… little…” she muttered. She chugged down a cupful of water.

“Hey. Mistral,” said Griselda sternly. “Forget about it.”

“Forget- Forget about-” Mistral pointed a shaking hoof at Desmoda, who wasn’t doing much more than brooding in her corner. “I seriously think she wanted to hurt me and was just covering it up,” she growled. “You were right, she’s crazy.”

“See? Told you. But, really, drop it.”

Mistral faced Griselda, her mouth hanging open. “You- You pulled me aside to tell me she was psycho, and now you just- just- just want me to forget about it? Just like that?” She clicked her tongue. “Why did-”

“I told you to avoid her, not to make her the center of your life! You sho-”

“All I did was say I thought she was funny and she acts like she wants to murder me! And, no.” Mistral pointed at Griselda for emphasis. “Don’t say it was a joke. Even if she was joking, there was way too much schadenfreude in there.”

Griselda cocked her head and flicked her tail. “Too much what?”

“Fancy word for sadism.” Mistral sighed and banged her head against the table. “That- stupid- sunblasted-” She sat up and started breathing deeply. She could handle this. She could handle this. She had to. The storm was still going strong. If all she did was sulk and mope about Desmoda, it’d only be a matter of time before one of them caved in the head of the other.

Cassandra coughed. “I know I shouldn’t be listening in,” she said, not sounding very sorry, “but Mistral’s got a point. There’s jokes and then there’s…” She waved a hoof at Desmoda. “That. Earlier, she threatened to throw boiling water in my face when all I was doing was trying to make conversation. Not even with her, with Facet. It’s like she just wants to hurt ponies for shits and giggles.”

“See?” Mistral said, smirking at Griselda. “She agrees with me.”

“But that doesn’t mean you should keep thinking about it,” continued Cassandra. “Find something else to do. Listen to Griselda’s story, since I know you weren’t. There’re books in here, read them. Clean up the table to make it easy for Clarity. Heck, ask her if there’s anything you can do to help. I bet she’d love to have an extra set of hooves for once. Maybe she can be somepony to talk with once you know everypony else.”

“See?” Griselda said, smirking at Mistral. “She agrees with me.”

Cassandra sighed. “You two,” she muttered, “are just…” She shook her head and glanced over at the bar. “Can you put a hold on that story for a moment, Griselda? I need a drink.” She left them alone.

Mistral chewed on the last leaf of her salad and thought. It didn’t take very long for her to come to a conclusion: take Griselda’s and Cassandra’s advice and do something. Cassandra had even given some halfway-decent suggestions. Not ones Mistral was fond of, but she was a beggar, not a chooser, at the moment. Besides, every second she spent doing something inane, like tidying the table, was another second she wouldn’t spend waiting in boredom for the blizzard to abate. Tidying the table it was.

It was a familiar routine Mistral remember from numerous family get-togethers: scrape all the leftovers onto one plate, put all the plates in a stack with that food-receiving one on top, stick the silverware in a cup to keep it together, all that boring stuff. With only four people to actually clean up (Facet had taken her food to the bar and Griselda wasn’t done yet, still finishing up her meat), it went quickly. Thistledown had left behind quite a bit of her fruit salad when she left, so Mistral helped herself to a few grapes and a chunk of cantaloupe.

Griselda watched Mistral for a few moments as she wolfed down the last of her meat. When she was finally done, she stuck her plate on the bottom of Mistral’s stack and asked, “So? How’re you feeling?”

After a moment’s thought, Mistral settled on, “Better.” A distraction was a distraction, one way or another, and she hadn’t been stewing while she was cleaning. Plus, now that Desmoda was way over there, it might be easier to not start stewing again.

“See?” Griselda said, grinning. “What’d I tell you?” She looked around the room for a few moments. “Hey, did you see where Thistledown went?”

“Um…” Mistral tapped her head. “Upstairs, I think. Why?”

“I just wanna be sure she’s okay.” Griselda headed for the stairs. “She was looking even jumpier than usual during dinner.”

“She’ll be fine,” protested Mistral, following Griselda up. “She’s just a bit high-strung. You don’t need to worry about her.”

“Her high-strung-ness is why I’m worried about her.” Griselda looked over her shoulder as best she could in the narrow staircase and continued, “What if she has, like, a nervous breakdown or something? Do you really wanna be stuck in here with that?”

Ooo. Yeah. Mistral had always considered herself a “go with the flow” kind of mare, someone who could handle being snowed-in (even if she loathed a certain other occupant), and hadn’t really considered what it might be like for somepony like Thistledown who jumped at shadows.

“So I’m just gonna let her know I’m there if she needs me,” said Griselda. “Give her somebody to lean on, y’know?”

“Out of curiosity, are you doing it because of sympathy, or just to keep her not-panicky so it’s easier for you?”

“Ehm…” Griselda coughed. “Yes, I guess.” She reached the top of the stairs and stepped aside to let Mistral onto the landing. “It’s…” She rubbed the back of her neck. “It’s not a terrible thing to do, is it? Doing good things for selfish reasons? You’re still doing good, so-”

“Well, you won’t hear me complaining,” Mistral said with a shrug. “A good thing is a good thing. And the term’s ‘enlightened self-interest’.”

Griselda nodded. “Hmm. Good to know.” She turned to head down the hall to Thistledown’s room, then kept turning until she was facing Mistral again, looking slightly sheepish. “Ah… You wouldn’t happen to know which ro-”

“Last door on the left.”

“Thanks.” Griselda scampered down and knocked on Thistledown’s door. “Hey! Thistledown! You in there? It’s Griselda and Mistral!”

“Who?” Thistledown called from inside. “Oh, uh, sure! Come on in!”

Griselda looked at Mistral, jerked her head towards Thistledown’s room, and entered. Mistral snorted and reluctantly followed. She hadn’t come up here to talk with Thistledown, she’d come up here to keep talking with Griselda. But, well, she couldn’t really back out of it now, not without looking like a jerk on Desmoda’s scale.

Thistledown’s room looked more-or-less the same as Mistral’s, although she was on the corner, so she had two windows instead of just one, and she didn’t have any wallpaper. Outside, the blizzard kept battering away, strong as ever. No drafts, thankfully. Thistledown was standing in the back of the room, eyes closed and her horn glowing. With not much floor space left, thanks to Griselda’s additional presence, Mistral settled on Thistledown’s bed.

“Do you need anything?” Thistledown asked, not opening her eyes.

“Just wanted to check in,” said Griselda. “You doing okay? No psychotic breaks coming or anything?”

Thistledown chuckled. “Not any more than usual. No, for the moment, I, I’m fine, thanks.” She still didn’t open her eyes.

Mistral and Griselda exchanged looks. Mistral pointed at the side of her head and made a circling motion with her hoof. Griselda gave her a dirty look and cleared her throat. “So, if you’re fine, what are you doing?”

“Hmm?” Thistledown opened one eye. “Magic. What’s it look like I’m doing?”

Before Mistral could start ranting about the stupidity and vagueness of that answer, Griselda beat her to it. “I know you’re doing magic,” said Griselda, her voice a bit tense. “But I don’t know anything about magic, so I don’t know what kind of magic you’re doing. For all I know, you might be trying to make teacups dance.”

“It’s a kind of long-running spell,” Thistledown said, closing her eye again.“Basic magic detection. It helps with finding magical plants, and it didn’t take much tweaking to work with magic in general.”

“And just why are you trying to detect magic?” Mistral asked. She had a pretty good idea, but wanted to be sure. She wasn’t sure whether Thistledown was overreacting or not. On the one hoof, she still hadn’t yet seen anything that wasn’t just a coincidence or personalities clashing. But on the other, between the journal and Clarity’s (probable) lie, it was kind of hard to deny that something was up here.

“If I’m right and there’s weirdness ahoof,” said Thistledown, “I want to start doing something about it rather than sitting down and wringing my hooves.” For the first time, Mistral noticed her voice sounded a lot more confident than usual. “Step one is finding out if there’s any strange magic around here, hence the spell.” She pointed at her horn. “I won’t know what any magic’s doing, but I should be able to tell if there’s any up here in the first place. If the- Haaaang ooooon…”

“You feel something?” asked Mistral.

“I… I think so,” said Thistledown. “It’s kinda faint, though, so I don’t really know if it’s there or not. Maybe if I…” Her horn flared a little and its aura began wavering. Eyes still closed, she frowned. “Huh. That’s-”

She abruptly clapped a hoof to her chest and began retching. Her legs weakened and she started sinking to the floor as her legs weakened.

“Whoa!” Griselda was at her side in an instant, giving her something to lean on. “What’s up?”

“I…” Thistledown’s voice was shaking. “It’s…” Her eyes flew open, her pupils shrunk down to pinpricks. She clutched her head in her hooves and breathed deeply. Then she fell to the floor, screaming and thrashing.

With her hot chocolate gone, Facet was thinking.

A lot of ponies didn’t really get the Frozen North. To them, it was strange, uninhabitable, uncontrollable, the place windigoes lived and Celestia knows what other kinds of monsters. The Crystal Empire, to them, was an island of Equestrian facts and ideals, the one place things worked properly. (In fact, a lot of scholars believed that the Empire was an oasis of warmth because the snow was caused by roving windigo tribes, hence its wildness, while the friendship radiated by the Empire was enough to drive them away, preventing any non-pegasus snow from falling in it and keeping it more in line with Equestria proper.) Outside of that, almost anything could happen.

So what if Thistledown was paranoid about that in some way? Frightened that something was manipulating them? Say, windigoes. Facet didn’t think windigoes could manipulate emotions in any way, but the only things she knew about windigoes were, A, they were responsible for driving the original tribes out from… whatever land they lived in (why couldn’t she remember the name?), B, they fed off negative emotions like fear and hate, and, C, sightings of them were very rare outside of quick glimpses. No windigo had ever been captured for study. It wasn’t unthinkable that-

“So, how’s my best frenemy?”

Facet almost punched Cassandra’s teeth out right then and there. She slowly turned to Cassandra, who grinning cluelessly. “What,” whispered Facet. “Do you. Want?”

“I’ve been thinking,” said Cassandra. She pointed at Facet. “You. Crystal pony. Can tweak emotions.” She gestured to the rest of the room. “Everypony else. Emotions running high.” Her grin vanished and her voice became completely serious. “Do you think you could maybe get everypony else to, I don’t know, turn it down a notch? Make them less likely to want to strangle each other?”

Although she immediately knew what Cassandra was getting at, Facet doubted Cassandra truly knew what she was asking for. “Everypony?”

“I said that, didn’t I?”

Facet stared at Cassandra. “You’re clueless.”

“So clue me in,” Cassandra said with a shrug. “Why can’t you? If things heat up a lot more, somepony’s probably going to get hurt, so if you can cool them off a little, that’d be great.”

“Do you… really think… I can manipulate the emotions of an entire group of ponies at once?”

“Do you think I’d ask you if I did know?”

Facet rolled her eyes, but had to admit that Cassandra had a point. “No,” she said, “I can’t. Too many ponies.”

“Ah,” Cassandra said. She sounded disappointed, but not very. “Bummer. Kinda hoping… Ah, well. But what about just, say, Desmoda?”

That nagging thought came back to Facet: had her earlier manipulation had any after-effects on Desmoda? She was still kind of leaning towards “no”, but it was still impossible to say for certain. She decided to play it safe. “Right now? Probably not,” she said. “Too angry. Any calmness’d just get pushed aside.”

“Ah,” Cassandra said. She sounded a little more disappointed. “Double bummer. But, maybe, if-”

An ear-splitting scream rent the air from upstairs. Everypony in the room jumped and looked up. “The heck…?” Cassandra asked.

“Ignore it,” muttered Facet, fully aware of just how much wishful thinking was involved in that. “It’ll stop eventually.”

For several seconds, it didn’t. In her corner, Desmoda flattened her ears with her hooves and groaned. Then it slowly wound down until Facet couldn’t hear anything, even if she strained. She sighed in relief, but Cassandra wasn’t satisfied. “What do you think that was about?” Cassandra asked.

“Don’t know, don’t care,” Facet said. “It-”

“Hey! Does anyone know anything about first aid?!” Griselda yelled from the stairs. She came down slowly, supporting Thistledown. The latter was staring off into space and shaking.

Cassandra was up in an instant. “What happened?” she asked. “What did she do?”

“I don’t know! Gimme some space!” Still supporting Thistledown, Griselda shoved aside the dinner table and chairs, leaving a patch of empty floor. She slowly settled Thistledown on the ground. “We were upstairs, in her room,” she said breathlessly, “and she was analyzing the magic here, and suddenly she just started screaming!”

Mistral scrambled down the stairs, breathing deeply and her mane in a tussle. “Checked her bags,” she said quickly. “No seizure medicine or anything.”

“Crap crap crap,” muttered Griselda. She placed a talon in front of Thistledown’s mouth. “Okay. Hyperventilating. What does that mean?” She gripped her headfeathers in her talons and rocked back and forth slightly, her breathing loud. “WhatdoIdo whatdoIdo whatdoIdo…”

Desmoda cleared her throat. “I know some first aid,” she said disinterestedly.

“Yeah?” Griselda asked hopefully. “What is it?”

Desmoda smirked. “Don’t move the patient.”

Griselda blinked rapidly, then screamed, “I didn’t know! Those rooms are tight and she needed space! If you’re not going to offer anything useful then shut the fuck up!” She turned to Clarity, who was restocking something behind the bar and hadn’t so much as glanced up. “Don’t you know anything?”

“Hmm?” Clarity looked vaguely in Thistledown’s direction. “Oh, sorry. Sh-she doesn’t have anything I can help. Who kn-knows what she has?” She shrugged. “Can’t do anything.”

“Some help you are!”

All the while, Facet was chewing her lip. She had no idea what was up. For all she knew, trying to magically calm Thistledown would just make everything worse. But she’d be lying if she said she wanted Thistledown to stay like this. And if she could do something… She walked over to Thistledown, sitting opposite Griselda. “I think I can try something,” she said. “Don’t disturb me.”

Griselda opened her beak, then snapped it shut, nodded, and moved away.

Thistledown’s eyes were open but unfocused. Facet looked into them and awkwardly patted Thistledown’s still-shaking fetlock with what little bedside manner she could muster. Trying to push out as much calm and serenity as she could, she said, “Okay, listen. Can you hear me? Everything’s going to be okay. It’s-”

“No, it’s not!” screamed Thistledown, making Facet fall back. Her eyes suddenly came back into focus and she stared at Facet, wheezing. “It’s not gonna be okay!” she gasped. “I felt it! I felt it!”

“What?” Griselda asked. “Whatisit? What’dyoufeel?”

“It’s- There’s-” Thistledown started pacing. “Look, I, I don’t know what there is! It’s, I can feel-” She smashed her head against the wall once, twice. “I don’t know what I can feel! But it’s, it’s bad. It’s really fucking bad!”

“If you can’t tell us, keep quiet,” snapped Desmoda. She didn’t sound very invested. “I don’t want to listen to you whine.”

Everyone else ignored her. “What is it?” asked Cassandra. “You’re not-”

“I told you, I don’t know! It’s- It’s like-” Thistledown made tiny choking sounds. “I can’t even think about it without wanting to puke, it’s…” She paced faster, whimpering quietly.

Facet’s heart began racing as she exchanged looks with Griselda, Mistral, and Cassandra. She had no idea what Thistledown had done; “analyzing the magic” was incredibly vague, and she didn’t have an inkling as to how unicorn magic worked anyway. She didn’t even know if her own magic had been of any help. But her gut told her that Thistledown had hit on… something. That this wasn’t just some “I’m scared!” reaction.

“Will you shut her up?” bellowed Desmoda. “Go upstairs or something, I don’t want to listen to a whiny little pansy!”

“You shut up!” Griselda bellowed back.

For half a moment, Facet seriously considered trying to shut the two of them down with her magic, but before she could, Clarity spoke up. “D-Desmoda is right, you know. That screaming w-will get annoying soon-”

“It’s annoying now,” said Desmoda.

“-so could you k-kill the panic? Y-you don’t need to worry.”

Facet (and, she noticed, Mistral) stared at Clarity. She’d expect an innkeeper to have a little more sympathy for her customers, even it really wasn’t anything to worry about. Unless-

Thistledown wasn’t listening to Clarity. “We need to leave,” she muttered, derailing Facet’s train of thought. “We need to leave RIGHT NOW! If, if we don’t-”

Desmoda stomped out of her corner and shoved her muzzle into Thistledown’s. “I’m warning you,” she snarled, “if you s-”

“You don’t get it!” shrieked Thistledown, shoving Desmoda away. “We’re all gonna-”

Desmoda jumped, hurled Thistledown to the floor, lunged. She sank her fangs into Thistledown’s neck.

And ripped.

Thistledown’s breathing turned to a wet rattle. She fruitlessly pressed her hooves to her throat. The blood kept flowing. With every gasp she took, she got a little quieter.

After a few moments, she was silent.

Desmoda casually spat out the chunk of flesh in her mouth and licked the blood from her lips. She looked around the room, at everyone staring at her. She shrugged. “What? I had to stop her screaming.”

6 - As the Dust Settles

Somepony might’ve been saying something. Mistral couldn’t hear them if they were. It was like all sound had been turned off, leaving nothing but white noise.

Thistledown’s body just… lay there. Mistral hadn’t realized before just how much movement breathing caused. Now that it was gone, the effect was disturbing. She’d never seen somepony be so still before. That wasn’t even getting into the eyes. Those eyes would haunt her for the rest of her life.

The worst part about it was Desmoda, just sitting at the bar, completely uncaring. Mistral knew that, in a perfect world, she would’ve done something to Desmoda by now. Knocked her out, tied her up, something. But even with her dirk (which was upstairs in her closet anyway), she doubted she’d have much of a chance against Desmoda. She was a former royal guard, after all, and she’d already shown she didn’t have much qualms against murder.

Desmoda looked around the room again and smiled. Some of her teeth were still bloodstained. “So. I take it from the lack of objections that you’re all cool with that, okay? Okay.”

Before Mistral could respond, her brain spat something out: the journal. Maybe it being here wasn’t just an unlucky traveller leaving something behind. Maybe- “Okay,” she blurted out, sounding far more confident than she felt. “I’m just, uh, just gonna…” She pointed at the staircase as her mind tried to put words together. “I’m just gonna head upstairs.” She turned and had another thought. Might as well include Griselda, too. She believed Thistledown. Heck, she believed Thistledown before me. “Come on, Griselda.”

Griselda was flexing her claws and wings in a way that Mistral thought looked very predatory, and when she swiveled her head to look at Mistral, her pupils were very small. “Mistral, wh-”

“Come on, Griselda,” Mistral said through gritted teeth. She started shuffling forward, herding Griselda towards the stairs. “Let’s get some space.”

Griselda was too shocked to react with much more than stare, so she started shuffling with Mistral, looking between her and Desmoda. When they reached the stairs, Mistral hop-skipped around her, stuck a hoof in her collar, and lightly tugged her up. They stumbled a little, but even so, Mistral counted herself lucky that Griselda wasn’t so shocked that she didn’t remember how to climb stairs entirely.

They were halfway up, just out of sight of the common room, when Griselda finally reacted, swatting away Mistral’s hooves. “Mistral, what- Just what are you doing?”

“Going upstairs, away from the murderer,” Mistral said in a low voice. “There’s something I want to show you.”

“But we’re-” Griselda gestured down the staircase. “We’re just gonna-?”

“Listen.” Mistral yanked Griselda up to the landing and lowered her voice even more. “It’s best to stay away from Desmoda anyway, but I think Thistledown was on to something with the whole coincidence thing. I-”

“Oh, now you think she had a point? When she brought it up, you-”

“That was then, this is now! Listen, I found a journal in the drawer of my nightstand, and-”

“A journal!” Griselda made a face and did jazz talons. “Ooo, dramatic. So convincing. I-”

Mistral smacked Griselda across the beak, perhaps a little harder than she intended. “For Celestia’s and Luna’s sakes, let me talk!” (As she rubbed her face, Griselda looked offended, but clamped her beak shut.) “I’ve only skimmed it, but the entry when the writer first came here said the innkeeper was a stallion.”

Griselda blinked, first in a complete lack of recognition, then in confusion, then in shock. “So… Clarity-”

“You think that’s bad? There’s more. Thistledown pointed out that Clarity’s a crystal pony. She said she’s worked here all her life. How could she be around here all her life when crystal ponies didn’t even exist in Equestria until a couple of years ago?”

Griselda’s eyes widened. “Ooooh boy…”

Mistral glanced down the staircase again. “Something’s up with her, I know it. Don’t know what, but…” She shook her head. “And maybe Desmoda’s involved, too. She was already here when we arrived, remember, and Clarity just happens to ignore her killing a mare in cold blood?”

“Did the journal mention any batponies?”

“Not in the bit I read,” Mistral admitted, “but it was just one entry. Dunno what the rest of it’ll be like.”

Mistral half-suspected the journal would be gone, but when she looked in the side table, it was still right where she’d left it. Lying down on the bed, she flipped to where she’d left-

“What’s up with the wallpaper?” asked Griselda. “This place has wallpaper?”

“Yeah, weird, I dunno either,” Mistral grunted. She found the entry where she’d left off and skimmed it to reacquaint herself with it. “Okay,” she said to Griselda, “the writer’s a pegasus, and the other customers at the inn are a griffon, a crystal pony, a unicorn, and an earth pony.”

Griselda, sitting on the floor, cocked her head and leaned in to take a closer look. “Crystal pony? Mare or stallion?”

“Doesn’t say yet.” Mistral pushed the journal to one side so it was between them. “And the writer uses ‘he’ to refer to the innkeeper right… there.” She poked at the relevant line. “But it doesn’t say what tribe of pony he is.”

“Keep going. Maybe it’ll say later.”

Mistral nodded and flipped to the next page and started reading for Griselda.

Storm bad. Only few hours gone but writing again to kill time.

Uni really hating earth for package. No w-

“Package?” interrupted Griselda. “What package?”

“The earth pony had a package. Um…” Mistral flipped back a page and jabbed. “That package. Long, thin, earth pony’s really vocal about it for wanting to keep it under wraps.”

“Ah. The old ‘I know something you don’t know’ syndrome.”

“Right.”

Griselda’s eyes flicked back and forth as she read the line over and over. “Sounds like a scepter or a short sword, maybe. Ooo, and the writer agrees with me.”

Mistral hadn’t given the package much thought, but supposed Griselda’s treasure-hunter instincts would be more drawn to it. Mysterious object, possibly of great value, unknown origin? Yeah, that’d be attractive to a tomb raider. “Do you really think it’d be something like that? Those’re unwieldy for most ponies.”

“Few problems with that assumption.” Griselda lifted one of her front feet and started raising her claws one by one. “A, we don’t know where it came from. It might be from, say, the ruins of Alto Reál, which would probably make it an old pegasus flight sword, which were made by the bucketload in that era. And that’s assuming it’s pony-related at all. It could’ve come from somewhere near Griffonstone or Tauros, making it more likely to originate from griffons or minotaurs, and that’s just to start. B, just because they’re unwieldy doesn’t mean they don’t exist. If they’re sitting in the ground, someone’s gonna find them eventually. And, C…” She shrugged, almost sheepishly. “I’m guessing anyway. I don’t know jack about it except for the basic shape. Could be anything. Might just be an old scroll.”

It didn’t take long for Mistral to see the logic in that. (Griselda, treasure hunter and archaeological detective. Who would’ve guessed?) And even if Griselda was completely off-base, she didn’t want to think about some stupid package for too long. She flipped forward again and continued reading.

Uni really hating earth for package. No words said yet but everypony can see it except earth. Glares keeps moving from her uses short sentences etc. Can sympathize — uni getting even more annoying. Louder more frequent almost literally rubbing it in my face. Don’t know why. Don’t care about package.

Everyone on edge b/c of that. Crystal pony jumpy griffon keeps picking at table w/ claws innkeeper more tense. Conversation hard — haven’t been able to talk w/ crystal pony much b/c earth keeps interrupting. Have all time I need to do it later but still annoying.

Inn staying warm at least. Thought it’d-

Mistral stopped talking and skimmed the rest of the entry. Not much interesting there; just the writer rambling on about how strong the inn felt. She (or at least, Mistral assumed the writer was a “she”) was pretty clearly writing just to fill up space on the page and keep eating up time.

“And that’s it for that bit, right?” asked Griselda. “You didn’t skip over-”

Mistral rolled her eyes. “Griselda, do you really think I’d leave something out that looked important while reading this to you?” (She re-skimmed the second half, just to be safe. Nothing important.)

“Maybe not on purpose,” Griselda said defensively, “but it can happen. I knew a gal who wrote great stories, but she kept leaving words out of her sentences for some weird reason. The mind can, y’know, edit stuff out like that and you’ll never know. Blind spots.”

“If I knew I was skipping over them, I’d try to not skip over them! You want to read or do you want me to?”

“I just-” Griselda sighed and rubbed the bridge of her beak. “You read. Get on with it.”

Cutting off several responses that were forming in her head, Mistral got on with it and flipped to the next page.

Facet wasn’t thinking much. Her brain just kept spitting out oh shit oh shit oh shit- She couldn’t think. Shock had set in. She was vaguely aware of Mistral and Griselda leaving, of Clarity vanishing into the kitchen, but couldn’t react.

Finally, she swallowed. “Y-you killed her,” she whispered.

Desmoda looked disdainfully at Facet. “Congratulations,” she said. “You can state the obvious.”

“You killed her.”

“Oh, great, and you can repeat yourself. Super. Any chance you can get rid of the body, too?”

Clarity came out from behind the bar, draped in a thick robe. “Don’t w-worry,” she said brightly. “I’ll take it out.” She bit down on Thistledown’s tail, opened up the door, and pulled the body out into the blizzard.

“You killed her.”

“We went over this!” groaned Desmoda. “Yes, she’s dead. So what? She was a paranoid botanist in the middle of nowhere. A botanist!” She laughed derisively. “Nopony’s gonna miss her! She just vanished in uncharted territory! We’re not gonna get in trouble, so why worry?” She vaulted over the bar and began looking at the beer selection.

Cassandra coughed and waved Facet over. Still staring at Desmoda, Facet cautiously shuffled over to her. “What?” she asked. She noticed her voice was high-pitched.

“Can you do the thing?” Cassandra whispered. “With the emotions? Calm her down?”

Facet’s mouth hung open as she stared at Cassandra. “What, now?”

“Yes now! I don’t want to be next on her list!”

“I told you, she’s too violent now! Nothing I do will have much of an effect. It might even backfire if she notices!”

Cassandra grunted. “Well, we’ve gotta do something. I don’t want to sit around down here-”

“Go upstairs, then! It’s what I’m going to do!”

Facet attempted to make for the stairs, but Cassandra stopped her. “That won’t do anything, we’re just sweeping the problem under the rug. We need to do something now.”

“Well, if you want me to be able to use magic on her, you better find a way to get her to quiet down a bit first! It’s- It’s the way things work!”

Cassandra blinked twice. “You know what? I’ll try that. Wait for my signal.”

“What signal?” asked Facet. But Cassandra was already gone, heading to the bar.

She took a seat next to Desmoda, who had found whatever liquor she was looking for and was quaffing it straight from the bottle. “So,” said Cassandra. “Good beer?”

Desmoda eyed Cassandra suspiciously. “It’s alright. No, you can’t have any. Get your own.”

“Alright,” said Cassandra. She looked at the bottles on the backbar, drumming her hoof as if she was thinking. “Bummer about Thistledown.”

“…Why are you talking about this?”

“Well, it’s, just, I,” stammered Cassandra, “I just, y’know, wanted to- be sure that- I wasn’t gonna be next.” She giggled nervously and coughed.

“Just stay out of my way,” said Desmoda. She sipped. “Thistledown was screaming her sunblasted head off and she didn’t like she was gonna stop anytime soon, so I quieted her down. Don’t do that, and you’ll be just fine.”

“Allllright,” Cassandra said, nodding vigorously. “Cool.” Once Desmoda’s attention had returned to her drink, Cassandra glanced at Facet and jerked her head towards Desmoda.

The signal, probably. Facet wanted to scream and bash her head in; that was nowhere near enough. It took time for someone to get out of a mood intense enough to kill somepony. She shook her head.

Cassandra frowned and nodded.

Facet fixed Cassandra with her best glare and shook her head.

Cassandra fixed Facet with her best glare (which was considerably better) and nodded.

Gritting her teeth, Facet slowly walked to Desmoda’s other side, trying to drag the moment out as long as possible, trying to figure out what she’d say. She couldn’t think of any good way to lead into what she wanted to say.

Her head was still empty when she sat down next to Desmoda. Desmoda looked briefly at her, although she didn’t do more than grunt in vague dissatisfaction. Facet thought and thought and thought, but couldn’t come up with anything. She couldn’t see Cassandra, but imagined she was biting her hooves off.

Finally, Facet came up with something. She cleared her throat. “So,” she said, “just… stay out of your way, right?” She layered her voice with a bit less calmness than she usually would; maybe, if she put it into Desmoda slowly, she wouldn’t notice. Maybe.

“Yesssssss,” Desmoda said to her. “You were listening, right?”

“I was, but you know, Mistral and Griselda-” Facet gestured up at the ceiling. “They couldn’t hear you.”

Desmoda looked up and shrugged. “So?”

“So they don’t know what they need to do. And Griselda, she’s got claws and a weapon.” She gestured at Griselda’s bow and arrows, still sitting by the fire. “She could react… badly.”

Desmoda shrugged again. “So?”

This was it. Facet added in more calmness. “So maybe, you could, I don’t know, try to be a little less violent? It might stop violence”

After a moment, Desmoda slowly, reluctantly, nodded. “I guess so,” she mumbled, rustling her wings, “bu-”

Her ears suddenly stood up straight and her pupils narrowed to slits as she glared at Facet. In the blink of an eye, Desmoda tackled Facet; they rolled across the floor and Desmoda slammed her against a wall, pinning her by her throat with a foreleg.

Facet tried to push Desmoda’s leg away, but Desmoda was the one with all the leverage. Her best hits to Desmoda’s face (which were still puny) did nothing. Her breaths came shallowly and forced. “It-” she gasped, “it was- just a- suggestion!”

“Oh, yes,” Desmoda said. She nodded innocently. “A suggestion. Laced with crystal pony magic to fuck with my head.” She got into Facet’s face, peeling her lips back from over her teeth. “I don’t like that much.”

As Mistral read the journal’s next entry, she found it feeling eerily familiar to what had already happened to her.

Screw that sunblasted earth pony. Why in Tartarus can’t she just SHUT UP? No, I don’t CARE about your stupid package, I don’t CARE that you’ve got a secret, and I don’t CARE about you at all. LEAVE ME ALONE, SUN BLAST IT!

Celestia.

This probably isn’t doing anything good for my psyche, but it feels GOOD to rant like this and get it out. Like otherwise, it’d just build up inside me until I’d burst. Or do something stupid. It definitely feels that way with the unicorn. Kind of that way with the griffon. The crystal pony, not so much. She just seems really serene, although in an artificial or faked kind of way. Maybe she’s really good at controlling her emotions. I think it’s getting to the innkeeper, too; he always JUST HAPPENS to remember something that needs to be done in the kitchen or the cellar when the earth pony starts up.

Need to get their names again. Why can’t I ever remember names, ever? Somepony introduces themselves, and I’m like, “okay”, and their name just slides right out of my memory until I hear it the fourth or-

Mistral skimmed the next bit. Nothing important there, just the pegasus talking about a lack of memory when it came to names. (Something Mistral really couldn’t relate to; when it came to mailmares, remembering names was kind of Important.)

“What’s wrong with that earth pony?” muttered Griselda. “You’d think she’d get the hint after a while. Nobody’s that stupid.”

“You’d be surprised,” said Mistral. “People can be really dense sometimes.”

“There’s dense and then there’s dense. How’d she even get something like that, anyway? Unless…” Griselda tapped the bed’s blankets. “That’s why she’s so excited. She’s never gotten anything like that before so she’s all giddy about it. And she keeps it under wraps, so it’s probably really valuable. Doesn’t want anyone stealing it.”

“Probably, yeah.” Mistral flipped to the next page.

The earth pony’s dead. The unicorn killed her.

Mistral’s eyes widened and she looked at Griselda. Griselda laughed nervously. “Well, uh, that escalated quickly.” She swallowed. “Ten bits says it’s gonna get worse?”

“Yeah,” Mistral said, nodding. “Way worse.”

7 - Looking Back

Mistral stared numbly at the journal, feeling like history was repeating itself. A bunch of people trapped in this inn during a blizzard, tensions running high, one of them getting murdered-

She jumped when Griselda said, “Well? Keep reading!”

“Yeah,” Mistral said. She swallowed. “Yeah, okay.”

The earth pony’s dead. The unicorn killed her. She was going through the usual when he suddenly grabbed the package in his magic and just started hitting her with it. I thought it was reasonable at first, but he didn’t stop for MINUTES. By the time he was done- Celestia, I think half the bones in her body were broken and she was so bloody she barely resembled herself.

The unicorn took the package and went up to his room without another word. The griffon drew the short straw and dragged the unicorn’s body outside. Nobody said anything, so I went back to my room to write again.

If the storm wasn’t so strong, I’d be long gone, but it’s not, so I don’t know what to do. There’s a killer down the hall and everyone’s tense. I should probably just sit tight in here until the blizzard’s done, but I can’t SIT here that long unless I start writing hourly. (Well, if it works…)

“Geez,” said Griselda, “was it really that bad? Or was the unicorn just crazy?”

“I don’t know,” said Mistral. She tried to sound casual, but only barely managed it. She flipped back a few pages. “The writer doesn’t mention anything about that, and you’d she would if she’d seen it…”

“Maybe the unicorn was good at hiding it and the writer didn’t notice?”

“Look, I don’t know. All I’ve got is what’s here on the page.”

“I know that, I’m just putting forward theories. Or were you not gonna think at all?”

“It’s- I-” Mistral slammed the journal shut with a sigh and glared at Griselda. “Why is it so important? Do you want to spend time speculating on the hows and the whys?”

Griselda put up her talons in a ‘hey, now’ gesture. “Well, kinda, yeah. There’s a reason the innkeep used to be a stallion but they’re now a mare. And not only that, but that mare’s lying. You do wanna know that reason, right? ‘Cause I do. And that means speculating on-” She tapped the journal. “-that.”

With another sigh, Mistral ruffled her mane. The annoying thing was, she and Griselda were after the same thing: finding out what was up with Clarity. They just disagreed on how to get there; Griselda wanted to speculate on things that might not hold any information, but Mistral wanted to read to the end, find whatever secrets this journal held, since there’d almost definitely be something on the old innkeeper there. But, to play the draconequus’s advocate, that was still “might not hold any information” and “almost definitely be something”. They had no way of knowing until they got to the end of the journal. “Okay, fine,” she said. “Go ahead and speculate. But if you try using me as somepony to bounce ideas off of, you won’t get much.”

“Fair enough,” said Griselda with a shrug. “I talk to myself a lot, anyway. Ruins can be lonely.” She stopped focusing on Mistral and looked off into the distance. “Wonder if the writer ever saw the package,” she muttered.

Not paying attention, Mistral flipped the book open again.

The innkeeper and the unicorn are yelling at each other. I can’t really make out what they’re saying, but I think the innkeeper’s saying something about a magic dampener. If I can hear him right, he wants to be sure the unicorn won’t go nuts and kill everypony with his magic, and the unicorn’s really pissed about that. They’ve already been yelling for over five minutes, and I only started writing to try to take my mind off of it. It’s not working.

I’ve got no idea how the griffon and crystal pony are doing. I don’t think they’re up here. I haven’t been down since my last entry, so I haven’t had the chance to talk with them. If th

“-and it just stops mid-word like that,” said Mistral. “Not the last entry, though.”

“Hnng. She got interrupted, I’ll bet,” said Griselda. “Heard something, left off writing, decided not to finish it off.” She clicked her tongue. “Also, ten bits says the unicorn killed the innkeeper.”

Mistral looked briefly at Griselda, too quickly for her see. She was being very casual about wanton murder. Maybe it was just her way of dealing with things. Maybe there was something more to her. Well, one way or another, she was definitely more reasonable than Desmoda. Mistral kept reading.

The innkeeper just killed the unicorn. The yelling suddenly stopped, and a few seconds later, the innkeeper stomped down the hall, package in his mouth and dripping blood. It sounded like he went down to the cellar. I peeked into the unicorn’s room and his throat was slit. I don’t know how the innkeeper managed it. I don’t think I want to.

Telling the griffon and the crystal pony right now.

“Damn,” Griselda said quietly. A lot of the bravado had left her voice. “This just keeps getting better, doesn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Mistral said flatly. “Better and better.” And it all seemed to center around that package. The unicorn killed the earth pony because of it and immediately took the package away. The innkeeper killed the unicorn because of the first death, but then immediately took the package away. The obvious questions kept running through Mistral’s mind: what was that package and where was it now?

Griselda whispered again. “…D-do you think it’ll happen to us?”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

Facet would’ve been shaking, but she was paralyzed with fear as Desmoda pinned her to the wall, leering. The bloody stench of Desmoda’s breath washed over her; she gagged. She pushed weakly against Desmoda’s legs, but between Desmoda’s strength and her own lack thereof, she might as well have been poking a mountain with a feather.

“You really think you can do that to me?” Desmoda asked, amused. “Try to make me feel what you want me to feel? Yeah, no. I’m onto you.”

Facet fought to get a breath down. “How-” she gurgled. “How did- you- know about- my magic?”

“You- Oh, Luna, you really need to ask that question?” Desmoda turned to Cassandra and laughed. “Ha! Listen to her. She needs to ask that question.”

“Yeah!” Cassandra forced out. “Ha! Ha! Ha!” She backed away and attempted to smile.

Desmoda turned back to Cassandra, still grinning. “I’ve been listening to you and her talking all this time. You weren’t doing a thing to keep your voices down, and this isn’t the place to keep secrets, y’know? Way too small. Real easy to listen in. Besides…” With her free hoof, she pointed at her ears. “I’m a batpony. I’ve got good hearing anyway.”

Facet quickly nodded, trying to get on Desmoda’s good side. She didn’t even know what she was nodding about, just that it was a good idea to do so.

“Now, listen,” said Desmoda. Her voice was light and casual, as if they were chatting about the weather over tea. “Here’s the deal. You will not magic me again. You won’t even think about it. You won’t even look at me funny. Because if you do, or if I just think you did, I’ll rip your sunblasted throat out the same way I did the whiny bitch’s.” She ran her tongue over her teeth and leaned forward until their muzzles were touching. “Got it? Capiche?” She eased up on Facet’s throat by about an inch.

“Got it!” gasped Facet. “Capiche!”

“You dig?”

“I dig!”

“Groovy?”

“Groovy!”

“Groovy.” Desmoda threw Facet to the floor; her jaw snapped shut again the hardwood and her teeth rang. Her legs were shaking so hard she could barely get them under her, and she still had to lean against the wall for support.

Cassandra cautiously took a few steps forward. “Facet? Are y-”

“You stay away from her,” snarled Desmoda. She put herself between Facet and Cassandra. “You’re talking with her and you’re the one coming up with the plans to mess with my head.” She began advancing on Cassandra; the latter backed up, but Desmoda kept coming. “And if you think I’m going let the two of you keep that up, well.” She cocked her head. “That’s so stupid I don’t have anything to say to that.”

“But- but if-” Cassandra hit one of the corners and quailed down. “If we don’t do any ma-”

“Don’t care. You two were talking. Stop talking.”

“We will!” yelled Cassandra. “W-whatever you say! You want us to stop talking, we’re done talking! Pfft! Done! Got it capiche groovy I dig!”

Desmoda squinted at Cassandra. “You’d better,” she whispered after a moment.

Cassandra whimpered and mashed her face into the floor. In spite of their past, in spite of her previous intrusiveness, Facet couldn’t help feeling sorry for her.

But the moment Desmoda turned her back on her, Cassandra changed. She shook herself off and rolled her eyes as she stood up, as if she’d only been pushed into a pool by a bratty foal. She wasn’t shaking. She wasn’t breathing quickly. She didn’t look scared or nervous. She actually looked a little bit angry. No, not angry. Something close, but different. Maybe… frustrated? It was hard to tell. Facet stopped feeling sorry and started feeling intrigued.

Facet could understand being frustrated. She herself was frustrated right now. But for her, fear was completely overwhelming the frustration. Cassandra didn’t seem to be scared at all. She examined Cassandra, trying to see why, but Desmoda noticed her and drew a hoof across her throat.

For once, Facet actually wanted to talk to somepony, and this was the one time she wasn’t able to.

She went back to her table and resumed reading her book. But she couldn’t focus. She kept looking up at Desmoda and Cassandra. Desmoda sat at the bar, downing her beer without a care in the world. Cassandra hung back in her corner, licking her lips. She took a few steps forward. Desmoda didn’t respond. She took another few steps forward-

“Hey!” yelled Desmoda, turning and pointing at Cassandra. “Stay away from her!”

“Sorry!” Cassandra said quickly. “It’s just, I, yeah, sorry.”

Desmoda’s gaze flitted back and forth between Facet and Cassandra. “I’m watching you,” she whispered. “Both of you.”

“Um, c-can I at least go upstairs?” Facet asked tentatively. “I wo-”

“Oh, noooo, you’re staying right down here where I can keep an eye on you.”

Facet opened her mouth. Nothing came out. She just nodded instead.

The door banged open and Clarity staggered back into the room. “All set!” she said cheerfully. “It j-just took a-a little bit longer than I was expecting, since I needed to get it far away. You’d think it wouldn’t m-matter, but it could poison the well, and then the water o-of this place would be undrinkable.” She laughed. “I can’t go out all the t-time to get water!”

“Yeah I get it totally,” Cassandra babbled. Facet nodded like a bobblehead in a storm.

Clarity brushed some snow from her mane. “Anyway, you all doing alright?”

“Yep,” said Cassandra. “Great.”

“Great!”

Facet and Cassandra looked at each other. Ha, ha. Yeah, right.

Mistral turned to the next entry of the journal, only to see the ragged edges of three torn sheets of paper pointing up at her. She tilted her head. “Huh.”

“Huh?” asked Griselda. “What huh? Is it a good huh or a bad huh?”

“Someone tore some of the pages out. Look.” She showed the book to Griselda.

Griselda blinked. “That is indeed huh.” She held the book open so the covers were pointing up and fanned the pages out. No spare sheets of paper fell out. “Weird. You didn’t see any paper lying around and throw it away thinking it was trash, did you?”

“No, definitely not.”

“I say we take a quick look around the room for them. Just a minute, okay? There might be something important in them.”

Unfortunately, that quick look was fruitless. There weren’t many places sheets of paper could hide, and all of them were empty, even after being triple-checked. Resigned to missing those pages, Mistral started reading the next entry, hoping she wouldn’t be missing much.

The barricade’s still holding up-

“Wait, what?” squawked Griselda. “A barricade? When did this happen?”

“Shh!”

The barricade’s still holding up, but she’s still trying to smash down the door.

“Smash down the door?!”

“SHH!”

-still trying to smash down the door. I’m getting hungry; if worst comes to worst, I’ll starve in here. There’s still plenty of food outside for her. The furnace is still burning. The window can’t open and I don’t think I can smash it with my bare hooves, so I’m not going out that way.

I never imagined it’d end like

(“-but that line’s scribbled out-”, added Mistral.)

No. I WILL NOT die in here. I WILL survive this. I just need to think.

Things in room:

bed (in barr.)

mattress (in barr., mbe not nec?)

pillows

blankets

coat hangers

my stuff (mostly clothes, no weapons)

end table (small)

“And then there’s a lot of rough sketches for stuff,” said Mistral, “but I can’t tell what that stuff is.” She leafed through the pages. Three of them — both sides — were completely covered in diagrams that looked like the writer was planning something. It kind of resembled the room.

“So that’s the point where it stopped being a journal,” said Griselda, “and started being a military playbook. Think she was a visual learner?”

“A- a visual-”

“She was trying to figure out how to defend herself when- when whoever broke into the room for whatever reason! I mean, lookit this. They’re totally pictures of the did we ever find out the sexes of the griffon and the crystal pony?”

Griselda’s segue was so abrupt it took Mistral several seconds to realize there was a segue at all. “I…” Mistral shook her head and barely managed to figure out why Griselda had asked that. “No, I don’t think so. But the person breaking in was a mare, right?”

“Or a hen,” said Griselda. “A ‘she’, either way. I was just thinking, maybe we’d heard that one of them was male, and… ah, well. Anyway, look. The writer’s trying to make some defensive position with what she has. Why do you think she made that list? For fun? She was cataloguing the stuff she could use.”

Mistral wrinkled her nose and looked down at the list again. “Why did she need to write it down? I don’t need that kind of thing. I just remember stuff.”

“Well, you’re not everypony!” yelled Griselda. “People do things differently!”

It still seemed to Mistral that simply remembering things was easier. But Griselda was getting antsy (hopefully not Desmoda antsy), so she just said, “Fine.” She knew that they were almost to the end of the journal; she just had to hold on a little bit longer. She went to the next page.

The difference between this entry and the last was immediately noticeable: where the writing had once been cleanish and crispish, it was now messy and uneven. Lines wavered across the page, words were packed together, letters had no consistent size, and there were no paragraphs — the letters simply ran across the page, starting on a new line the moment the old one ended. It ran all the way down to the bottom of the page

“Oh, mare. Look at the writing.” Mistral showed the journal to Griselda. “Why’s it so jagged like that?”

“I can barely make it out,” Griselda said, squinting. “Can you?”

“Yeah.” Years of delivering letters with poorly-scribbled addresses had given Mistral better-than-normal reading skills. “It says-”

cant keep it out can feel it barely move must keep it out so cold must let others know write it down hide this cant let them find it have others find it so cold-

“Slow down!” interrupted Griselda. “You’re reading it way too fast!”

“That’s the way it’s written!” said Mistral. She gestured at the page. “It’s all one big run-on sentence, and there’s no punctuation or anything. And it-” She flipped ahead. “Shit, it goes on for at least two more pages. Celestia.” A quick look at the content wasn’t much better; it was all incoherent, unstructured rambling. “It’s like she was going crazy.”

“It looks like she already was.” Griselda’s wings were beginning to twitch and she dragged one claw along the floor.

“Yeah. Maybe.” Mistral scanned the words a bit more intently, trying to find some meaning in them. But it was the same kind of mess of the first few lines: vague references to the writer feeling something, trying to let others know (somehow), trying to keep “them” out, and a strange chill. The room didn’t feel any colder than usual to Mistral, but that didn’t mean much.

Griselda tapped a claw on the head of the bed. “So,” she said thoughtfully, “who do you think ‘they’ were? The griffon and the crystal pony? I’m betting the crystal pony was Clarity.”

“I dunno. Maybe.” Somehow, the griffon and the crystal pony being “them” didn’t seem right to Mistral. It just didn’t really click at all. Clarity being the crystal pony made more sense, though.

“But,” Griselda muttered, clearly more thinking out loud than talking, “if she was Clarity, why did she…”

Tuning her out, Mistral flipped to the next page. The scribblings stopped about halfway down. Just to be safe, she skimmed it again, and was rewarded. “Hang on, hang on,” she said as she squinted at the words. “There’s something different in this last line. Listen.”

cant hide walls cant remove walls must tell know when see walls

“-and then it just trails away into a smear,” said Mistral. She flipped forward a few pages. “There’s no more entries after that. Just ink stains.” At least there wasn’t any blood. Mistral wasn’t sure she could handle that.

“The walls?” Griselda asked, looking up. She scanned the room’s walls, with their blank, mark-free wallpaper. “But they’re blank and they’re covered… with…” Her eyes slowly started widening. “…They’re… They’re covered…”

“I-I’d always wondered what that w-wallpaper was for,” Mistral said breathlessly. Her heart began pounding. “We’ve got to take it down.” She scrambled to one corner of the room. Pointing at the adjacent corner, she said, “You take that side, I’ll take this side.” She began working her hoof into the biggest gap between sheets she could find.

Unfortunately, that gap was still fairly small, especially for blunt hooves. “Sun blast it,” growled Mistral as she accidentally pressed she sheet down again. There was no way she could get her hoof in there, not on her own.

Good thing she wasn’t on her own. With her claws, Griselda had a much easier time, and was soon pulling sheets off easily. She ripped them off her side like a griffon possessed, and Mistral was able to bite down on some of the loose edges (even though the taste was absolutely horrible) and pull them down on her side. As the wallpaper fell away and the wall was exposed, Mistral sucked in a breath. “Oooooh, Celestia,” she whispered.

“By my mother’s egg,” swore Griselda.

Across every square inch of stone, top to bottom and wall to wall, words were irregularly scratched. The same words, over and over and over and over and over. Several of the scratches were smeared with a dark red stain.

QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES QUENCH THE FLAMES

Mistral and Griselda looked at the wall, then at each other, then at the wall. They stared at it in shock for a few moments, trying to take it in.

Eventually, Mistral spoke up. “Fuck this. I’m leaving.”

8 - Into the White

“Either help me,” Mistral snarled, pushing around Griselda with one last legful of clothes, “or get out of the damn way.”

“You’re leaving?” asked Griselda, shuffling to one side.

“Fuck yes I’m leaving!” Mistral began jamming her clothes into her saddlebag. “I know when shit’s going to go down!”

“There’s a blizzard out there! You really gonna risk it?”

Mistral whirled on Griselda. “Oh, I’m sorry,” she whispered, “did you miss that somepony gouged words into every open space on that sunblasted wall with their bare hooves? Or how somepony went and deliberately covered it up? Or the journal describing the last group murdering each other? Or Thistledown going crazy the moment she looked at the magic around here? Or Clarity barely caring when somepony was murdered in front of her? Did you miss those?” She laughed bitterly. “No. I know where this is headed. Fuck this place, fuck this room, fuck this place, fuck the creepy innkeeper, fuck this place, fuck the dysfunctional wackos hanging out downstairs, fuck this place, fuck this entire sunblasted forest, and, above all, fuck this fucking place.” She yanked the drawstrings on her saddlebag tight. “Oh, and did I mention? FUCK. THIS. PLACE.”

Griselda clicked her beak nervously. “But it… it…” She looked out the window, where the blizzard was still raging strong as ever. She gestured outside. “Look at it…” she said weakly.

“Don’t care,” Mistral said as she adjusted her traveling cloak. “Are you coming or not?” She hitched on her saddlebags.

“N-no…”

“Then goodbye. I’m leaving.” Mistral turned on her heel and scrambled down the staircase. Griselda yelled something after her, but she didn’t couldn’t it out and wouldn’t’ve listened if she could. With no words to any of the other ponies, she yanked open the door, putting up a leg to block out the wind, and left. She was about to shut the door behind her, but the wind caught it before she did. She had to yank her hoof away to keep the door from slamming down on it.

Turning away from the door, she raised a hoof to block out the worst of the snow and squinted into the blizzard. Nothing but dirty white, broken up by a few dim bars of trees. The sun was beginning to set somewhere and everything was darkening. Not something she wanted to go out into, but it was still better than sitting around in that damned inn. Just to check, she opened her wings a little. The wind ripped every last shred of warmth from them and pushed them apart to the point that she had to fight to close them again. The chill seeped from her wings into her trunk, into her blood. She shivered and tightened their covering as best she could. She hated the feeling of her wings being suppressed like that, but she hated the chill even more.

Mistral took a few steps off the porch and immediately clamped her eyes shut. Snow was peppering them, almost freezing them over. Then she had to start blinking to keep the snow from freezing her eyelashes shut. This was not going to be pleasant.

She fought her way through the drifts to the road and looked up at the signpost. Luckily, the writing was easily legible, even in these conditions. North was pointing right. South was pointing left. East was behind her. West was in front of her. Which way, that was the question. She’d been heading north, but the closest town wasn’t going to be anywhere near her if she went that way. It’d be a fine hike if the weather was clear, but not now. South was… debatable. It was quite a distance, but at least she knew when she was going to reach her destination. East? She didn’t know a thing. West? She didn’t know a thing.

She wiped some snow off her face and turned to face away from the wind when an idea struck her. Coming to the inn, the blizzard had come from the west. If she went to the west, she’d be heading straight into it, but she’d also be heading towards the other side, towards clearer skies. At the same time, the blizzard would be coming towards her, making the trip that much shorter. It had come down pretty quickly, which meant it was moving pretty quickly, which meant the other side was coming pretty quickly, right? Maybe. Then again, maybe not. And, still, she knew how far away she was from whatever town she’d last left if she headed south.

With both options looking equally okay-ish, she eenie-meenie-miney-moe’d and came up with… south. She set off, forcing her way through the knee-deep snow. To call it cold and wet would be like saying the sun glowed; the snow rapidly soaked its way through her boots, soaking her fur to the skin and tearing the warmth from her flesh in seconds. Mistral barely noticed; she kept her eyes on the path ahead, such as it was. She wasn’t even sure she was following the path, the drifts were so uniform.

When the wind permitted it, she looked around. She’d hoped she could get something unique, but it was like trying to find a needle in a stack of needles. There were trees and there was snow. That was all she could see; the inn had been swallowed up by the blizzard. Her visibility wasn’t much more than ten feet at best, everything else dissolving into a dirty white haze. Trees loomed from the gloom, blurry bars that all seemed identical to each other.

Mistral kept walking briskly. Time seemed to blur and her head started to throb from the chill. She had no idea of how long she’d been walking, but she didn’t really care. She was leaving the crazy place; that was all that mattered.

She looked to one side on the off chance she’d see something and her hoof smashed into a hidden rock. She tripped and tumbled headlong into the snow, rolling over and sliding. Flakes promptly found their way down her collar, chilling her neck to the bone. Wincing, Mistral pulled herself back to her feet and shook the worst of the snow off. She put weight on the hoof she’d hit. A mild twinge, nothing too serious. She walked in a circle a few times. The twinge was still there, but it didn’t worsen. She could walk on it, no problem. She looked up, ready to continue her walk.

Then her heart stopped when she realized she didn’t know which way she was going. Her tracks had already been blown over.

She turned around and around, trying to orient herself and wishing she had a compass. Nothing but mottled white and dim trees. Everything — everything — looked the same. Her heart and breathing started back up and went into overdrive. Okay, she thought, okay. I can do this. Her words weren’t remotely convincing.

She squinted, trying to make out shadows. The sun was setting in the west, so if she could see those, she could tell which direction was what. But no luck; everything was too indistinct and what shadows there were blended into the snow. She tried to look for larger-than-usual gaps between the trees, where the path would go. But the trees were too far apart for that; a path could go between any two trees.

Okay, don’t panic. Okay, don’t panic. Okay, DON’T PANIC. Okay, DON’T PANIC.

Fat fucking chance.

A particularly violent gust reminded Mistral of one thing: if she didn’t start moving, and soon, she was dead. End of discussion. With the wind still too violent to risk flight, she started turning randomly, trying to pick a good direction. One bearing felt good for some reason, and if she was going to blunder blindly into a blizzard, she might as well feel good about it. Mistral started walking.

She couldn’t tell she’d changed direction from before. If she hadn’t remembered stopping, there was nothing to say she’d stopped at all. The sheer lack of landmarks, the absolute sameyness of everything, was disconcerting. She walked and walked and walked for, once again, she didn’t know how long. It could’ve been minutes, it could’ve been hours. Her muscles began to ache, but Mistral forged on, determined to keep the blood flowing and stave off frostbite.

Eventually, she saw it. A short, squat shape, looming from the whiteout. Definitely a building of some kind. Perfect. Even if it was just a wreck, it ought to provide some shelter without any psychos.

Her spirits lifting, Mistral approached it. The shape loomed more. Looked intact. Even better. It even looked like another i-

…No…

Her spirits sinking, Mistral approached it. Familiar shapes coalesced from the snow.

It couldn’t be…

The porch. The road sign. The crossroads.

She’d gone away from it…

Mistral took another few steps. It was enough to read the sign above the door.

Please Stop Inn.

Tap taptap-tap.

Facet tried to focus on reading her book.

Taptappity tap tap-tap.

But habit made her rest one hoof on the table.

Tap-tap taptap-taptap tap tap.

And that one hoof wouldn’t stop twitching.

Tappity-tap tap tap.

Between Desmoda’s actions and threats, Facet couldn’t focus. Her ingrained equine fight-or-flight instincts were screaming bloody murder at her. But neither one was an option. She had no chance of fighting, not against a former member of the Lunar Regiment, and outside was the blizzard. Only a complete imbecile would go out into that weather.

Taptaptap-tap-tap.

One of the inn’s resident imbeciles, Mistral, suddenly tumbled down the staircase and shot out the door. By the time Facet had realized what was going on, the door had been shut again. She glanced up at Cassandra, still sitting quietly in her corner; in spite of the distance, Facet could tell that she also had a “what the heck?” expression on her face.

Tap-tap-tap-taptaptap tap.

Facet forced her twitchy hoof down with her free hoof. It didn’t stop the twitching completely, but she wasn’t beating out the world’s worst drumline anymore. She jerked her head at the door and made a questioning expression: What was that about?

Cassandra shrugged helplessly and made a cuckoo motion with her hoof. I don’t know! She’s crazy!

Facet wasn’t sure staying here wasn’t the crazy part, not with a murderer sitting casually at the bar.

She wanted a drink. Not just something liquid, a pint or eight of some good hard liquor. She wanted it bad. But Desmoda had staked her claim at the bar, and there was no way in Tartarus Facet was going anywhere near her. And that was assuming Desmoda didn’t start yelling at her again for approaching Cassandra. She couldn’t ask Desmoda for a drink, and yelling over to Clarity for one just felt… strange.

Facet eyed Clarity. That wasn’t the only strange thing about her. The more Facet thought about it, the more Clarity seemed incredibly uninvolved in everything going on around here. Not just the obvious, where she brushed off a murder in front of her like it was nothing. She hadn’t intervened in earlier arguments, no matter how beneficial it would be for business. She had never been seen doing any sort of work besides making dinner in the kitchen. She just sort of stood behind the bar and looked busy.

What was up with her?

Griselda came down the staircase, looking around the room. “Did Mistral…?” She sighed. “Yep,” she muttered, “she really left.”

“Did she say why?” asked Cassandra.

“Who cares?” Desmoda said loudly. “She’s gone, she’ll freeze to death in a few hours, that’s all that matters.”

“Well, y’see,” said Griselda, taking a spot on one side of the fireplace, “we… What happened down here?”

“Nothing happened,” Desmoda said. She grinned. “We just had a talk, is all.”

“Says you,” said Griselda, rolling her eyes. “Cassandra?”

Cassandra blinked twice, then coughed and said, “Desmoda said she’d kill us if we looked at her funny.”

Facet twitched. That wasn’t what she’d said, not exactly. Desmoda had asked — well, demanded — the two of them stay apart and said that she’d kill Facet if she thought crystal pony magic was being used. Yes, that was aggressive, but Cassandra was making Desmoda sound even more psychotic than she already was with a lack of context. All this would accomplish would get Desmoda angry at Cassandra.

And, Facet realized suddenly, maybe turn Griselda against Desmoda even more.

…Not actually that bad of a plan. Assuming it worked.

“I did not say that!” yelled Desmoda, whirling on Cassandra. Her voice quivered with rage. “I sa-”

“You said that!” Cassandra yelled back.

“Don’t believe her,” Desmoda said to Griselda. “She’s lying. She’s fucking lying!”

“Forgive me if I don’t believe you,” Griselda replied. “You killed Thistledown for being noisy, this isn’t that much of a jump for you!”

“You! Crystal pony!” Desmoda fixed her eyes on Facet, who immediately froze. “Tell her the truth. Tell her I never said that. Remember our talk?”

Facet looked at Griselda, who knew nothing and was looking to her for confirmation. She looked at Desmoda, who glaring daggers at her with all the rage she could muster. She looked at Cassandra, who somehow looked determined and pleading at the same time and was nodding vigorously.

Facet made her decision and swallowed. “She said that,” she said. “We never even did anything to her.”

Cassandra immediately smirked. Desmoda’s face twisted in anger even more; she flared her wings and advanced on Facet. In a deep voice, almost a growl, she said, “I told you to-”

“You’re doing it!” said Griselda. She looked almost darkly please with herself. “If you say they’re lying, how come you’re doing it?”

“Because they’re liars!” yelled Desmoda. “They’re trying to- You-” She looked around the room, her eyes slowly narrowing. “You’re all out to get me, aren’t you?” she whispered. “You think I can’t control myself, just because I killed Thistledown.”

“And for a bunch of other, equally good reasons!” added Griselda.

Facet chewed her lip and opened her mouth to say something, now that Griselda was on her side, but Cassandra began shaking her head and making “no” motions with her hoof. Facet figured the message was Let Desmoda and Griselda duke it out. It wasn’t hard to see why; in spite of her dislike of Griselda, Facet did have to admit that she was probably the best-suited to talk back to Desmoda, with her dangerous and physically-demanding “job”. Facet returned the “no” motion to Cassandra and closed her mouth.

“I am perfectly capable of controlling myself,” continued Desmoda, “and I only react when I’m pushed too far-”

“Like when someone tries to take a drink of your hot chocolate?”

“Shut up! SHUT UP!” screamed Desmoda. She bared her fangs. “If you don’t quiet down, turkey, I’ll de-”

Griselda moved almost too fast to see. One second, she was squatting on one side of the fireplace; the next, she was rearing on her hind legs on the other side, an arrow nocked and drawn on her bow with her talons. She was aiming right between Desmoda’s eyes. “Say. That. Again,” she whispered.

Mistral stared at the sign, jaw agape, heart pounding. No. This wasn’t possible. She’d gone away from the inn. She hadn’t left the road. How had she arrived back? She… she’d been going straight. The whole time. Right?

No, wrong. She’d been turned around that one time. Mistral looked at the direction she’d arrived from. South. At least she’d come from the right direction.

She looked over her shoulder. Tracks: already gone. Great.

Okay. Not a problem. She just needed to set off again. Walk straight, and only straight. No turning around, not for anything. Then she’d get out of the blizzard (eventually… somehow) and get away from the inn.

But as soon as Mistral set off (heading west, this time), the wind reminded her just how “easy” that was. The air was just as cold as ever, clawing its way into her and stabbing her lungs with spears. Breathing became hard — painful, even — and it felt like her lungs were freezing. She almost had to force herself to keep breathing, but with each breath she took, she got colder and colder.

She kept walking. The snow seemed to cling to her boots, trying to drag her down into it and sap the warmth from her. It was like walking through mud in a swamp. Worse, even, because at least mud wasn’t this cold. She almost wished she was an earth pony; they had the strength and stamina to push their way through the snow more easily. For everything about pegasi being able to handle hotter and colder temperatures than other ponies, when the extremes hit, they hit hard.

As much as she tried to keep straight (she refused to even look back), the wind kept buffeting her, forcing her to change her tack every now and then. She tried to keep track of the way she turned, but between the cold and her pounding headache, she couldn’t. For all she knew, the wind was blowing her in a circle. It was hard to tell, with all the samey-looking trees around. No matter how many she passed, more identical ones stood straight ahead of her.

She kept walking. She slowly became aware that her pace was flagging. The cold was getting to her, no matter how hard she pushed. If she didn’t get out soon, she knew her legs would just collapse beneath her, she’d drop into the snow, and the blizzard would cover her. Nopony would ever know what’d happened to her. She tried chewing her tongue to get some adrenaline running. It didn’t help.

Finally, it was too much. She had to rest, if only for a few seconds. Mistral staggered up and leaned against a tree, panting heavily. It wasn’t a physical tiredness that slowed her down so much as burnout from struggling through this white Tartarus for Celestia-knew-how-long and getting nothing to show for it. She couldn’t tell if she’d walked ten miles or ten feet. For the moment, she just wanted to rest…

She immediately bit her tongue and shook her head. No. She couldn’t rest. Not here, not now. Not until she could see the sky. Mistral took the biggest, deepest breaths she could; the cold tore at her insides, but the pain was the point. It woke her up a little, a shock to her system. Not perfect, but it’d do for now. She shook her head again and set off.

She kept walking. Whether it was the rest or the pain, she didn’t know, but Mistral felt almost rejuvenated. Not quite as down as she’d been. She still felt like her bones were freezing, she could still barely see ten feet in front of her, her head still felt like shit, she still had to force her way through the snow, but she could do this. She could do this.

Then she saw it, that blocky shape slowly appearing from the whiteout, and what little energy Mistral had regained began draining away. It couldn’t be. It just wasn’t possible. She’d made sure she was going in as straight a line as possible. But there it was. She screamed in frustration.

She finally reached the building. She didn’t need to look at the sign outside the to know what it said.

Please Stop Inn.

Facet shook as she looked between Griselda and Desmoda, waiting with baited breath. Cassandra suddenly looked nervous; maybe she hadn’t intended it to go this far? Whatever the case, the can of worms had been opened.

Even Desmoda seemed shocked; her eyes widened and her wings flared. “Do… Just what do you think you’re doing?”

“What’s it look like?” said Griselda. “Or are you really that stupid?” She slowly uncurled and recurled her talons around the bow, one after the other. “Take it back.”

A pause, the silence filled by the howling of the wind outside. Then Desmoda slid off her seat and chuckled, sure of herself again. “Look,” she said, flaring her wings, “do you really think you have it in you to take a life? You’re talking a big talk, but most ponies, I don’t care how big they talk, what do you think happens when they’re actually challenged to do it?” She grinned. “Yeah, they fold. Ten bits says that’s what you’re gonna do.”

Griselda didn’t respond, but the tip of the arrow didn’t waver one inch.

“So do the world a favor,” continued Desmoda, “simmer down, and put that bow down before you hurt somepony.”

Twang.

Desmoda recoiled, screaming through clenched teeth at the arrow embedded in her wing joint. Facet and Cassandra both jumped. Griselda leisurely notched another arrow. “But that’s the idea,” she said innocently. She drew the new arrow. “Also, you owe me ten bits. And take what you said back.”

Desmoda didn’t respond. She stared at the arrow in her joint, chest heaving, legs shaking, pupils shrinking. Her ears slowly folded down. Her attempt to back up brought her up against the bar. When she looked up at Griselda, her eyes were as wide as Facet had ever seen them.

And yet, behind her, Facet was drawn to Clarity’s reaction. More precisely, her complete lack of one. She kept wiping down the bartop, again not the least bit interested in the physical confrontation between two of her customers.

Facet was brought back to the standoff when Griselda’s bow creaked. “Last chance.”

“Wait!” yelled Cassandra. She scrambled between Griselda and Desmoda. “Don’t- Don’t kill her!”

Griselda blinked and lowered her bow. “What? Why should I-”

“Because you’re better than that!” said Cassandra. “If you kill her, you’ll be bringing yourself down to her level an-”

“Don’t care.” Griselda raised the bow again, this time pointing it at Cassandra. “What I do care about is that she’s been nothing but trouble ever since we came here and I can get rid of that now. And if you’re between me and her, as far as I’m concerned, you’re on her side.”

Even from across the room, Cassandra’s swallow was visible. She twitched, but she didn’t step aside. She glanced at Facet; Facet shot her a dirty look and shook her head. The time for crystal pony emotion tweaking was long, long, long gone.

“Besides,” Griselda added, “all she needs to do is take back what she said. That won’t be too hard. Right?”

Finally, Cassandra took a step aside. She was biting her lip so hard Facet was sure she saw blood. “Don’t,” Cassandra muttered, “don’t kill her. Please.”

Griselda ignored her, pointing the arrow back at Desmoda. “Well?”

“Look, I, I, I, I didn’t mean it like that.” babbled Desmoda. She was smiling, but there was no way for it to look less forced. “Just a, just a one-off slip of the tongue, right?”

“Get down on your knees and say you’re sorry.”

Desmoda dropped like a stone, slamming her face to the floor. “I’m sorry I called you a turkey I swear I won’t do it again I’m sorry!” she yelled quickly. She lifted her head up to look around. When Griselda didn’t shoot her, she slowly rose back up. “Good?”

Griselda’s deep breathing echoed through the room, even over the storm. The tip of the arrow wavered as her chest heaved.

Suddenly, Clarity spoke up. “P-please,” she said, her voice incredibly bland. “Could you two p-put all this behind you? We’re not going anywhere, and y-your actions aren’t helping us not stress out.” She pointed at Desmoda and Griselda in turn. “You shut up, you put the b-bow down, and we can all move a-away from this.”

Griselda blinked and her breathing softened. “Apology accepted,” she said, and shot Desmoda between the eyes. Desmoda’s head snapped back and her entire body spasmed. Griselda had another arrow notched, loosed, and embedded in Desmoda’s skull in barely a second. Desmoda was dead by the time she hit the ground.

Facet gasped and looked between the body and Griselda, shuffling away from her. Vandal or not, Griselda had never seemed violent; at least Desmoda had been obvious. She wasn’t sad to see Desmoda gone, but it looked like she’d just exchanged one psycho for another.

“Heh,” Griselda said, smirking. “I always wanted t-”

“I-I needed her alive!” Cassandra screamed.

9 - Very Bad Things

Mistral stared at the sign of the inn.

Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic.

How had she gone in a circle? She’d been going as straight as possible. Whenever she’d been turned aside by the wind, she’d made sure to straighten out as much as she could, and she’d been blown in both directions. Her course was a bit jagged, but it was straight. Ish.

Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic.

Right?

Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic.

But although her blood was this close to freezing, she didn’t enter the inn. In fact, she avoided entering the inn with all her might. If there was… something keeping her from leaving, there was no way she was going to go back in. Not without one last try.

Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic.

Mistral began pacing to keep her blood flowing as she thought. Her joints ached and her head kept pounding, but she needed to keep moving. If she stopped moving, she might never start up again.

Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic.

Okay. She needed to go. Where, though? South was a bust. West was a bust. She could try them again, but she wasn’t feeling optimistic. If she couldn’t get away by simply heading straight, where could she go? Even if she went east or north, she’d probably only get a repeat of her last trip. No, walking almost definitely wasn’t an option.

But that left…

An especially violent burst of wind made Mistral stagger, forcing her to brace herself against the inn’s wall.

No. She wasn’t going to fly in this weather. She was not going to fly in this weather. It was idiotic. It was beyond idiotic. She was an endurance flier, not a hazardous conditions flier. The winds were far too strong for her to keep a course. She’d be dashed against the ground in minutes, and that was at best. That wasn’t even getting into the near-complete lack of visibility from the snow in the air. She wouldn’t be able to tell which way was up, which was rather important in flight.

She looked at the door. But if the alternative was going back in there…

She looked up at the sky. Or tried to. The sky was completely obscured by the haze of snow, a dim, uniform gray. She couldn’t even see the tops of the trees. There was no way of knowing how high the blizzard was. But it was her only option.

Cringing, Mistral freed her wings from under her cloak. What little heat they still had was stolen by the snow almost immediately as the wind tugged violently at her feathers. She shivered, flapped them a few times to get the stiffness out. It froze them even more, but she’d rather have capable wings than warm ones.

She spread her wings and kneaded the ground once, twice, trying to psych herself up. Not flying in bad weather had been the lesson her mother had drilled into her when she was just a filly. But her she was, about to fly into some of the worst weather she’d ever seen. That didn’t portend well.

Deep breath in. Deep breath out. Deep breath in. Deep breath out.

Mistral crouched, took one last breath, and leapt into the air, beating her wings furiously to climb as fast as she could. The wind howled and screamed, pulling her this way and that and throwing off her sense of direction; she grit her teeth and persevered, doing her best to just go up. Her route was cooked and messy, but it was definitely up.

For one second, maybe two, Mistral let herself grin. It was hard, but she could do it. She could keep climbing. It wouldn’t even be long before she’d be above the trees. She could do this. She was going to get away.

Then another gust of wind came suddenly from above, slamming her in the face with frozen air. Mistral instinctively put up a hoof to block it and twisted away from the wind, but in that moment, her dedication to her straight path faltered. The blizzard grabbed her, and soon she was tumbling through the air, completely and utterly lost in the haze of snow.

Griselda reacted before Facet could, swinging her bow around and drawing another arrow, aimed straight at Cassandra. “You…” she whispered, “needed her… alive?” She drew the bow an inch further. “You got ten seconds to explain yourself.”

“The bounty! On her head!” yelled Cassandra. “It was only good if she was alive!”

“What’re you talking about? What bounty?”

“She’s-” For a second, Cassandra looked like she was choking on her words, then she exploded. “She’s a former royal guard because she got dishonorably discharged after killing two other soldiers a few moons back. She managed to escape before they could arrest her and she’s been on the lam ever since. She had a fifty thousand bit bounty on her head!”

Griselda didn’t slacken the bow at all. “And you?”

“I’m a bounty hunter. I’ve been tracking her for over ten weeks, and then- then you- Son of a bitch!” Cassandra screamed and hurled a chair across the room. It shattered against the wall. “All that work, fucking wasted because you wanted to indulge yourself!”

“Careful, now,” said Griselda quietly. “I’ve still got this bow and a will to use it.”

“I had her!” bellowed Cassandra, not listening at all. “Fifty thousand bits! Fifty thousand sunblasted bits! All of that, gone, because of you!”

Griselda blinked and slowly released the tension in the string. Facet figured, with some disgust, that the large amount of money must’ve gotten to her, being a treasure hunter. “Fifty… thousand…” she muttered. She sounded almost apologetic. Almost. She looked at Desmoda’s body. “Can’t you bring her in dead or alive?”

“I wish,” said Cassandra. “That just means I was allowed to kill her. I don’t get a bounty if I turn in her body.” She groaned. “Motherfucker.”

“Ah.” Griselda twanged her bow, looked awkwardly at Facet, and collapsed back onto her front legs. After a second, she walked over to Desmoda’s body, pulled out her arrows, and began patting the corpse down.

“Really?” Facet asked flatly. “I know you’re a tomb raider, but… really?”

“She owed me ten bits,” Griselda said. She pulled out a small bag from the folds of Desmoda’s cloak and began counting out coins. After she had the amount she needed, she threw the bag at Cassandra. She had plenty of time to dodge, but she kept glaring at Griselda; it hit her in the face with no change in expression. “Sorry,” said Griselda. “Hope that begins to make up for it.” She looked between Cassandra, Facet, and Clarity for another moment, then scurried up the stairs.

Cassandra blew a lock of hair from her eyes. “Bitch,” she mumbled.

“Yyyep,” said Facet. She fixed her eyes on Cassandra. “So. Bounty hunter.”

“Yeah.”

“If y-you don’t mind,” Clarity suddenly said, as if nothing had happened, “I n-need to go downstairs. I have t-to check on the furnace. I’d hate for it to die on us while we can’t l-leave.” Without glancing at Desmoda’s body, she vanished down into the cellar.

Facet paid her no attention. “Why didn’t you tell us? About you? About Desmoda? Knowing she’d already killed somepony would’ve been nice to know.” Her voice was this close to dripping with contempt.

“I didn’t want to cause a panic,” Cassandra. “Can you imagine? ‘Hey, you know that batpony? Totally a killer.’ I thought she’d lie low.I didn’t think she’d go and kill somepony now, because- Well, look at what happened to her! Because of that!”

It might’ve been the fact that Cassandra had already spent the entire stay lying, but Facet wasn’t buying it. She suspected Cassandra had her own reasons, maybe just not thinking of it, to keep those secrets. Unfortunately, she had no way to prove that. “And why didn’t you enlist us to help us restrain her?”

“Because keeping somepony secured is harder than you think. Especially a batpony. Do you know how fast they can gnaw through ropes? And before you say hoofcuffs, I lost mine somewhere along the line. I had them, but-” Cassandra groaned, flicked her tail, and ruffled her mane. “Look. It was a mistake. I know it was. Can we just drop it?”

Facet thought dropping it had less to do with guilt and more Cassandra not wanting to answer questions. But if Cassandra wasn’t going to answer questions, this wasn’t going to go anywhere. “Whatever.” She rolled her eyes and did her best to go back to her book while Cassandra retreated to the bar.

But out of the corner of her eye, she could still see Desmoda’s body. It bugged her, got under her skin. She couldn’t focus. She couldn’t concentrate. She tried moving, but the idea that a body was right there still stayed in her mind.

Eventually, she grunted and pushed away from the table. “You’re helping me take the body out,” she said to Cassandra.

“Wh-what?” protested Cassandra. “But I-”

“-neglected to tell us about the psychopath we were sharing an inn with,” snapped Facet. “This is your fault. Help me.”

“I-”

“Help me.”

Cassandra glanced at the door. “Do we need to go outside? I don’t think we’d make it ten feet.”

Facet almost pointed out that Clarity had done just fine. “Then where do you want to put it? And I’m telling everypony that this was your idea.”

Cassandra chewed her lip, then her ears went up. “She has meat. There’s gotta be a freezer or something in the kitchen. That’ll at least keep the body from rotting until the blizzard clears up.”

There were many, many reasons that was a terrible, terrible idea. Facet didn’t care. She just wanted Desmoda’s body gone. “Fine. Come on.”

Cassandra bit on Desmoda’s mane, Facet on Desmoda’s tail. Between the two of them, the body moved easily. Cassandra nudged open the door behind the bar and they tugged the body into the kitchen. It wasn’t much, a small room with mostly cabinets, cutting surfaces, a stove, and some food still lying out. An unmarked door was at the back. Perfectly serviceable, but not much else. Unfortunately, it was missing something important.

“Don’ see any freeser,” Facet garbled around the tail.

“In de bag,” said Cassandra. “Frew da’ door.” She nudged it open; a blast of cold air hit both ponies in the face. Cassandra brushed aside something Facet couldn’t see and peered through the doorway.

“OH, FUCKING CELESTIA!” she screamed, dropping her half of Desmoda. She scrambled away from the door and pressed herself against the wall, muttering, “Oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit…”

“What?” Facet dropped Desmoda and looked through the doorway. “What’s-”

She saw what. Revulsion overcame her and she fell away from the door, retching.

A skinned pony was hanging from a meathook.

The world spun wildly as Mistral corkscrewed through the air. She flailed her wings, her legs, her tail, trying to hit something to orient herself.

She hit something. Hard.

She slammed into a tree trunk, knocking the wind out of her as her body twisted around it. She scrabbled at the trunk with her hooves, but the wind had already whipped her away again. And by the time she’d registered that she was in the air, she smashed into another tree trunk.

Mistral managed to wrap her hooves around a branch, clinging to it before the storm yanked her away. The world reeled around her. Her breathing was strained and ragged. Her entire body ached. Her heart pounded in her head. She clamped her wings close to her body; she was not going to open them again.

Flying in this weather: bad idea. Good to know. Good to verify. Not wanting to fly again and desperate for some respite, Mistral stayed clamped on the branch, no matter how much the wind grabbed at her, waiting for the aches in her body to die down.

But in her desperate grab for the trunk, the front sleeves on Mistral’s traveling cloak had gotten bunched up, exposing her legs to the elements. As she stayed right where she was, her legs began cramping up. Sooner or later, she’d have to go down.

Not wanting to open her wings and get thrown away again, Mistral decided to climb down rather than fall down. She peeked down. Only a few feet below her was another branch, perfect for her to brace on. She swallowed and cautiously lowered one of her hooves onto the branch. It held. She put weight on it. It held. She lowered another hoof onto the branch. It held. She slowly unwrapped her front legs from around the upper branch.

Her hoof slipped. She dropped like a stone.

Mistral twisted and tried to throw herself over the bough. It hit her hard in the stomach, knocking the wind out of her as she slid off it. She plummeted to the ground, more and more branches snapping as she fell through them. Some of them poked through her robes, nicking the skin below, even drawing blood. She didn’t even have time to open her wings.

One of her wings was beneath her when she landed. The bones snapped like twigs and Mistral screamed. She quickly rolled off it, but the blizzard chewed at her broken wings and even more pain lanced through her body. Biting her lip and terrified of she might see, Mistral looked over her shoulder at her wing. Luckily, no bones were sticking out, but her wing hung at a disgustingly limp angle.

She might not’ve been able to help Thistledown, but Mistral knew a thing or two about this sort of first aid. She needed to splint the wing. Luckily, she had the supplies for it. Breathing painfully through clenched teeth, she slowly removed her saddlebags and opened up one of them, the one with the spartan first aid kit. It had enough supplies for a primitive splint, at least until she got out of the blizzard. Mistral dug the box out, opened it-

-and immediately slammed the lid shut again, just in time to prevent the storm from whisking her supplies away. She was almost too late; a long bandage, caught in the lid and trailing away, whipped around the wind. Mistral almost screamed in frustration. She couldn’t do any work, not in this weather. She replaced the first aid kit and put her saddlebags back on.

Her whole body ached, from mane to hoof. Her head felt like it was getting compressed in a vise. Her wing burned and throbbed. And to top it all off, every single remote scrap of warmth she’d ever had was gone, and she felt sure it wasn’t long before her body just shut down from the cold. She needed to walk.

She didn’t know which way she needed to go, but Mistral walked. She knew it was pointless, but Mistral walked. She knew where she’d end up, but Mistral walked.

It was only a few minutes before she saw it slide out of the snow. And with that, Mistral simply stopped caring. It was pointless. She’d never get away. No matter which way she went, she’d always wind up back here. She was doomed. Thistledown was right.

Well, might as well die warm.

By now, she wasn’t walking so much as putting one hoof in front of the other, she was so tired. It seemed to take way too long, but eventually Mistral staggered up the steps, opened the door, and entered the room beyond, leaving behind nothing but a sign swinging in the howling wind.

Please Stop Inn.

Facet was definitely not looking into the back. Nope. Her stomach was still churning, and if she had to look back, she knew she’d vomit.

“Oh, Celestia,” muttered Cassandra, “it’s dry, it’s been here a whi-”

“Stop poking-” Facet gagged. “Stop poking the body!”

“And it’s got chunks cut out of it, like-”

Facet heaved and clapped a hoof to her mouth. A few drops of bile crept up her throat before she forced them down. “What are you doing?”

“I’m trying to figure out why the fuck there’s a dead pony hanging like a slab of meat in here! I’m trying to examine it!”

“Do you need to think out loud?”

“It helps!”

Facet shuddered and shielded her eyes. She wanted to know what in Celestia’s name was going on, too, but that would require looking at the- thing.

Her mind turned over and over as question after question came and went. Why? Why would Clarity have a dead pony hanging like this? Who were they? What was wrong with Clarity? How long had she been doing this? The idea that she’d been lodging under the roof of a killer — perhaps worse — made Facet sick to her stomach. She didn’t want to spend another second in this building, but the only other option was heading out into the storm. That other pony, what was her name, Mistral, had probably frozen to death already.

“Oh, geez,” muttered Cassandra, “she’s got stuff carved into-”

Facet lunged out and slapped Cassandra on the back of the head. “Shut up! Just- shut up! We need to get Desmoda into- Shit, if we dump Desmoda’s body back there, Clarity’ll know we were here and- Shit shit shit…” She started pacing. “We need to take her outside. If, if we don’t, Clarity’ll know and- Sun blast it!” She kicked at a table, took up Desmoda’s tail in her mouth, and did her best to drag the body. “Help me, dammit!”

“Where’re we gonna-?”

“Right outside!” Facet said, dropping Desmoda’s tail. “Just a few feet from the door! And if Clarity cares about it, she can move the body herself!” She grabbed the tail again and went back to pulling. After a moment’s hesitation, Cassandra joined her.

The blizzard was like a nail-filled slap to the face once they got the door open. Facet and Cassandra rolled the body to one side of the door and quickly shut it, but Facet was already feeling too cold. Forget freezing. Out there, it was probably fifty below, maybe more. If she tried to run away, she wouldn’t make it twenty feet.

“Cold,” muttered Cassandra, shaking. “Cold. Cold.”

“Yeah,” mumbled Facet. “Cold. Duh.”

“Look, at least we won’t have to go out there again. Desmoda’s gone, right?”

With a grunt, Facet indicated that she wasn’t in the mood for debates.

Griselda stuck her head down the staircase. She was looking moody. “Hey. I thought I heard someone scream a while back. Everything okay down here?”

Facet opened her mouth, but Cassandra quickly said, “Nothing’s wrong. Just venting my frustrations. Bitch.”

Griselda’s mouth tightened and she disappeared back upstairs without another word.

Facet folded her ears back and stared at Cassandra. “I don’t want her to panic,” Cassandra whispered. “If she heard there was a dead pony being carved up in the back, she’d freak. She’s already killed somepony, who’s to say she won’t kill somepony else when she starts going nuts?”

“Do you really think-”

“Yes I really think!” hissed Cassandra. “Things are tense enough in here as it is! Do you really want to add in her knowing that Clarity’s a killer? Look, I can keep quiet if you can. Just to keep everything less violent. Okay?”

Facet tightened her jaw. Cassandra kind of had a point. But it was still keeping quiet about something important, and keeping quiet about something important had already gotten Thistledown killed. (And, arguably, Desmoda, but Facet didn’t care about her.) It all felt wrong to her. But between her only company being a murderous innkeeper, an impulsive grave robber, and a lying bounty hunter, she had no one she could say anything to.

She was as good as on her own.

“Okay,” she said eventually. She mimed zipping her mouth shut. Cassandra looked suspicious, but evidently decided that was good enough; she turned away from Facet and shuffled towards the fire.

The door to the cellar banged open and a grimy-looking Clarity exited. “All set!” she said cheerfully. “Good thing I-I’m good with furnaces. S-sorry about that, but I-I needed to check the fuel supply and c-couldn’t leave it for much longer. If I did, it might just s-stop running one night. I’d never forgive m-myself if I let one of my patrons die from the cold!”

Yeah, right. Facet examined Clarity through new eyes, but still had a hard time imagining her as the one who’d killed the pony in the meat locker. She just seemed so… unassuming, if you discounted her earlier non-reactions. But then, that probably helped her kill the pony in the first place. Who’d imagine that kind of pony as the sort who’d kill you in your sleep?

“And…” Clarity quickly glanced around. “Did you move that batpony out? Thank you! Was it bad outside? Where’d you put her?”

“Yeah, we were fine,” said Cassandra from her spot next to the fire. “We moved her a ways out.” Not at all, but Facet wasn’t in the mood to correct her.

There was a blanket draped over the back of the couch. Facet stumbled over, lay down on the couch, and wrapped herself in the blanket. She bunched up some slack in her ears, trying to shut out the storm. It didn’t work, and the storm’s howling drilled incessantly into her skull.

Facet suspected it would be one of the last sounds she’d ever hear.

10 - Everything's Eventual

The inn was warm. Mistral didn’t care. She couldn’t.

She didn’t look around when she entered, even though she figured all the other ponies were staring at her. She slowly loped towards the fireplace, her broken wing hanging at her side, twinging with every step. She still had her supplies. She could splint the wing. But, really, what was the point? It was only a matter of time before she died. Or worse. She still didn’t know what the hay was going on here.

One way or another, might as well focus on the now. Now, her wing hurt. Now, she could fix that. Now, she needed to splint her wing. Her legs gave out when she reached the hearth and she began digging out her first aid kit again. With the exception of that one bandage that had been caught in the wind, everything was still there, more-or-less in order, and dry. Good. She picked out the wooden splints and all the bandages she could find. This was not going to be-

“Hey.”

Mistral looked up. Facet was standing over her, looking nervous. Facet swallowed. “Do you, uh, want some help?”

“Sure,” grunted Mistral. Facet hadn’t seemed the helpful kind, but now wasn’t the time to complain. “You know anything about splinting broken bones?”

“N-not really, no.”

“That’s fine,” Mistral said with a sigh. “I’ll walk you through it.” She could feel her good wing tensing a little in anticipation. She nudged the splint and bandages over to Facet. “Okay, first…” She slowly opened her bad wing as best she could. Not biting her lip was an immense effort. “Grip this and slowly pull it out for a minute or so.”

“W-what? You-”

“Yes! Pull it out!” Mistral took a few deep breaths. “It’s traction. It’ll give enough space between the two broken halves of the bone for them to slide past each other and snap back into place. Yes, it’ll hurt like Tartarus. No, there really isn’t another way. Just do it. Slowly, remember.”

Facet opened her mouth, paused, then simply nodded and gripped Mistral’s wing between her hooves. “Sorry,” she said, and slowly began pulling.

The next minute was one of the most agonizing of Mistral’s life. She’d never — never — felt something like this. Burning, searing pain beyond description nearly eclipsed all other sensation, to the point that she could barely see, even with her eyes open. Reflex kept telling her to snap her wing shut and out of Facet’s grasp; it took all of Mistral’s effort to keep it as limp as possible so her muscles wouldn’t yank the bone together and make the fracture worse. She bit her lip until she drew blood, breathing loudly and deeply and constantly praying that it would soon be over.

After what felt like an eternity, Facet began to release the wing, slowly letting it slide back into place. As the pain receded, Mistral noticed that it wasn’t quite as bad as it had been before. Hopefully, Facet had gotten the bone back in place. “Does it look swollen?” she asked. “I mean really swollen, not just a little puffy.” She could’ve looked herself, but twisting like that might’ve unset the wing, and she did not want to go through setting it again.

Facet examined both of Mistral’s wings. “Uh… No. Kinda, but not very.”

“Okay,” Mistral said, mostly to herself. “Good. No internal bleeding. Now, see those stick things? Just put one on top of my wing, one on the bottom, and wrap it all up in the bandages. And make it tight; my wing needs to be immobilized, remember.”

“Um, okay.” Facet began following Mistral’s instructions. This part was simple, so Mistral didn’t say much besides the occasional “tighter” or “looser”. Facet worked quickly, and soon declared Mistral’s wing immobilized. Mistral tested the assertion; it wasn’t perfect, but she supposed it was good enough. Not like it’d matter long, anyway.

Unless…

The warmth of the room got Mistral’s brain whirring. If the inn was at the center of whatever was going on, then there was something here. There had to be. If she got back together with Griselda, the two of them could do some snooping around, find something out. Question Clarity, maybe? They were both capable, they could defend themselves. And if they stopped whatever bad shit was going down, then maybe… Just maybe…

Something for another time, though. Facet wasn’t the kind to do stuff like this out of the kindness of her heart. Letting her wing go limp in its splint, Mistral asked, “So. What do you want?”

Facet twitched. “I, I just-”

“You’ve been antisocial this whole time. Not that that’s a bad thing, but the only reason you’d volunteer to help me now is if you wanted something from me.” Mistral tilted her head and flicked an ear. “Right?”

“Well, it’s-” Facet swallowed. “Yeah.” She looked over her shoulder at Clarity behind the bar. She pulled Mistral close and whispered, “Griselda killed Desmoda and there’s a dead pony in the back room who we think Clarity killed.”

Um. Well. Okay.

Facet had twitched when the door to the inn first opened, fearful of some other crazy pony coming in, but to her surprise, it was just Mistral. Apparently, the weather had gotten to her and driven her back here. She looked much worse for wear; Facet didn’t know much about pegasi, but she was pretty sure wings weren’t supposed to dangle like that. That suspicion was confirmed when Mistral dug a first aid kit from her saddlebags.

At first, Facet was prepared to let Mistral deal with Mistral. But then she realized: she had someone else she could talk to in this sunblasted place who wasn’t involved in any other deaths. She might be able to get Mistral on her side and do something about whatever was going on. Step one meant doing something for Mistral, to try to gain a little bit of her trust. And Facet had a pretty good idea of what.

Facet didn’t know much about first aid, but luckily, Mistral knew enough to make up for that and was a good enough teacher that Facet was at least pretty sure she didn’t make anything worse in the process of splinting the wing, painful gasps from Mistral notwithstanding. At the very least, Mistral didn’t start screaming in agony, yelling at Facet to stop, or cursing.

But she figured out that Facet wanted something pretty quickly. Her reasoning was solid, and she got right to the point. Facet swallowed and whispered in Mistral’s ear, “Griselda killed Desmoda and there’s a dead pony in the back room who we think Clarity killed.”

Mistral blinked. Coughed. “Come again?”

“Look, after, after you left, things got heated and Griselda killed Desmoda. Me and Cassandra were going to stuff her body in the back of the kitchen — no way we were dragging her out — and there was a pony’s body in the freezer.” Facet gagged at the thought. “It was… Cassandra said it was-”

Cassandra stuck her head in, making Facet twitch. “It was carved up, like somepony was cutting chunks of meat from it. And it wasn’t just dead, it’d been skinned.”

Mistral blinked twice, then suddenly paled beneath her coat. She said something silently; Facet couldn’t make out what. She shook her head. “Um. Uh. Okay. And what’d Griselda say?”

Silence. Facet looked pointedly at Cassandra for moments. Finally, Cassandra mumbled, “We… We haven’t told her yet. I didn’t want-”

“Oh, and by the way,” said Facet, “Cassandra’s a bounty hunter who was tracking Desmoda. She knew how dangerous Desmoda was all along and decided not to tell us.”

“You what?” Mistral yelled quietly.

“Look,” protested Cassandra, “I didn’t want to cause a panic! If she-”

Mistral punched Cassandra in the jaw. Hard. Cassandra took a few steps back from the recoil, her hoof to the point of impact. “I’d’ve helped you restrain her,” hissed Mistral. “Do you really think this-” She held up a foreleg, where her dirk was strapped. “-is just for show? Short version, no, it isn’t.”

“I-”

“We’ll talk about this later. Why haven’t you told Griselda yet?”

“She already seemed unstable and I didn’t want to drive her over the edge.”

“Oh, that’s it? What happens if she finds out later and finds out you kept it from her?”

“I just-”

Mistral shoved her hoof in Cassandra’s face. “Shut it, okay? If that’s your best reason, I don’t want to hear it.”

Cassandra rolled her eyes and nodded. She said something, but it was muffled by Mistral’s hoof.

“Alright,” muttered Mistral. She glanced over at Clarity, polishing a glass behind the bar, but she didn’t seem to have noticed them. “Have you two noticed anything off about Clarity?”

“Yeah,” said Facet, “she, she didn’t really care when Desmoda was murdered. Or Thistledown, for that matter. I don’t think you saw it, but after Thistledown died, her only reaction was to drag the body outside so it wouldn’t stay here.”

“It’s worse than that,” said Mistral grimly. “She said she’s worked here her whole life… which is impossible for her, since she’s a crystal pony. And I found a journal hidden in my room, which…” She flicked her ears and ruffled her mane. “Long story short, the previous group here went nuts and killed each other off, and Clarity may have been a part of it.”

In spite of the warmth of the inn, a chill ran down Facet’s spine. She knew the answer to all this was close, so close she could almost touch it, and yet she was missing some critical piece of the puzzle.

“And I didn’t come back because the weather outside was bad,” Mistral continued. She paused. “Well, not just because of that. It’s… I tried leaving, but… no matter where I went, I always wound up back here somehow. It’s like something kept pulling me back.”

Facet was dumbstruck. All she could do was sit and listen.

With a stressed sigh, Mistral said, “There’s something going on here. Clarity’s involved, but I don’t know if she’s responsible or she’s just a victim. Maybe she physically can’t leave and she’s trying to keep up her meat supplies the only way she can. Maybe there’s something compelling her to kill ponies. Maybe she’s just batshit. I don’t know. But she’s involved. And there’s only one of her, but three of us — four if we can persuade Griselda.”

“So, what,” said Cassandra sarcastically, “you wanna beat Clarity bloody and throttle the information out of her?”

“Yeah.”

Cassandra blinked. “…What? No.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

Mistral rolled her eyes. “Fine. I’m exaggerating a little. But I want to know what in Tartarus is going here, and I’m pretty sure Clarity knows.”

“You can’t just attack her!”

“Well, what do you want to do? I want to do something about all of this.”

“But you- you can’t-” Cassandra started staring at Facet. “What about you? You got a suggestion?”

Facet looked back and forth between the two. Sitting back and doing nothing versus brutalizing somepony. Such great choices. Hooray. She swallowed. “Well,” she muttered, sounding guilty to herself, “something’s better than nothing.”

“You want to-”

“No,” snapped Facet, “I don’t want to do it. But I’m with Mistral: if we don’t do something, we’re probably all gonna die.”

“Good enough,” said Mistral. She stood up and flattened her mane down. “You two just sit tight, okay? I’ll go upstairs and get Griselda, and then-”

Griselda poked her head down the staircase. “Get me for what?” She squinted at Mistral. “And I thought you were ditching us.”

Making a “stay here” motion to Facet and Cassandra, Mistral trotted over to the foot of the staircase. “It’s complicated. Listen, Grise-”

“No, really,” said Griselda flatly as she descended. “Why’re you back here?”

Mistral shot Facet and Cassandra a Look. “Does it matter?”

“Kinda.”

“Why does…? Never mind. Long story short, the storm drove me back here. Broke my wing in the process. Okay?”

The look Griselda gave to Mistral seemed off to Facet. Suspicious, almost. But Griselda just nodded, rustled her wings, and said, “Kay.”

“Fine.” Mistral immediately dropped her voice low enough that Facet could barely hear it. “Look, me and them-” She pointed at Facet and Cassandra. “-think Clarity knows something about everything that’s going on here, and we want to question her, and we need help.”

“What,” said Griselda, “you want me to hold her down while you beat her bloody?”

Cassandra fired a smirk at Facet. Facet just rolled her eyes.

“If that’s what it comes to, yes. I do-”

“Liar.”

Facet, Mistral, and Cassandra all stared at Griselda. All Facet could do was wonder where that had come from. Mistral and Griselda were the pair that were always together; what had changed Griselda’s mind?”

“Huh?” asked Mistral. “Griselda, wha-”

“I said you’re a liar,” whispered Griselda. She flared her wings just a little and, tail flicking, began advancing on Mistral. “You’re in league with her, aren’t you?”

“What?” Mistral took a step back. “G-Griselda, you, you’re not making sense.”

Facet’s hooves started twitching. She wasn’t sure if she should get between them and try to calm Griselda down or bolt to the opposite side of the room. On the one hoof, if Mistral and Griselda had a falling-out, it would get nasty, and she didn’t want any more ponies dying (or griffons, even if they were vandals). On the other, while Griselda didn’t have her bow with her — it must’ve been up in her room — she still had claws, which were a guaranteed mess. She looked pleadingly at Cassandra; could she do something with her earth

Griselda’s voice grew louder. “Not making any sense? Sure I am. You know damn well what I’m talking about, don’t you? Don’t you?”

“I-I don’t!”

“Liar!” screeched Griselda. “You-”

Across the room, Clarity cleared her throat. “P-please,” she said, sounding almost bored. “Whatever you’re talking about, d-don’t argue down here. F-fight upstairs. It’ll make things more comfortable for the peaceful ponies.”

“Hey, do you mind?” snapped Mistral, turning to Clarity. “We’re in the mi-”

Griselda flapped her wings, dove forward, and crashed into Mistral. Facet scrambled away as the two rolled past her, grappling and biting. And, as shock began to set in, as two former friends fought for their lives, she realized that her chances of ever seeing another day were growing smaller by the second.

Mistral didn’t have time to react before Griselda tackled her. They fell to the floor together; Mistral cursed as her bad wing was caught between her and the floor. They rolled over and over before Mistral thrust out with her good wing, catching enough air to stop the spin with her on top. She pressed down on Griselda’s throat, not hard enough to choke, but enough to keep her pinned. A correct twist of her hoof would deploy her fetlock dirk, but she kept it stowed. For now. After Clarity’s words, her anger had skyrocketed, and Griselda’s attack had just brought things to a head. She kept the dirk stowed, but she was so close to deploying it.

“What do you mean I’m with her?” Mistral yelled. She craned her neck to keep away from Griselda’s flailing claws. “And which her? I’ve never seen anypony here before!”

“Yeah fucking right!” screeched Griselda. She lashed out, but Mistral’s head was beyond the reach of her claws. “You just happen to find a journal written by a crazy pony in your nightstand? What kind of idiot do you take me for?”

“Think for a second, sun blast it! You’re not making any-”

Griselda changed tactics and sank her claws into one of Mistral’s legs. Mistral screamed and reared; she stumbled backwards as she shook her leg. By the time she realized she’d freed Griselda, the griffon had already sent her flying across the room with a powerful kick from her back legs.

Mistral hit the door to the cellar, hard, and barely had time to get her bearings before Griselda body-slammed her through it completely. Mistral blinked through the dust and splinters, trying to focus her eyes, failing. She saw Griselda swinging at her and instinctively twisted to one side to avoid it-

-only to lose her balance and slip down the stairs. She rolled, banging her head and her body against the steps. The world went crazy. She didn’t know which way was up, she couldn’t control her tumble, her wing was screaming in pain, her leg was burning-

She smashed against the wall at the bottom, hitting it with her spine and sending even more shocks through her body. She blinked; stars filled her vision. She blinked again and again, trying to fix her sight. Above her, she could dimly make out the moving shadow that was Griselda in the light from the common room. Mistral limped as fast as she could away from the stairs, into the darkness of the cellar.

There was a furnace down there, but it didn’t cast enough light to show much, and there were crates of coal and wood stacked around the basement. Mistral slumped behind them, panting, her heart slowing as she finally found a bright side: now, it was much easier for her to see Griselda coming than the other way around. She could hide.

She couldn’t see anything, but she definitely heard the thump, thump, thump as Griselda walked heavily down the staircase. When it stopped, Griselda said loudly, “There’s only one way out of here! You want out, you’re gonna have to go through me!” Her voice echoed around the room, making it impossible to tell where it was coming from through sound alone.

Mistral risked a peep over a crate. In the shaft of light from the floor above, she could see Griselda standing right at the foot of the stairs, kneading the ground with her claws and flicking her tail back and forth. She kept looking this way and that, but she couldn’t see anything in the darkness. More importantly, she wasn’t moving.

Maybe, Mistral thought, just maybe, this didn’t have to end badly. Maybe… “What were you talking about up there?” she asked. “About me working with her?” The same echoes her hid location from Griselda.

“Don’t play dumb with me! You’re in cahoots with Clarity!”

Okay, what? That made no sense. “Why would I even be with her? What do I get?”

“Oh, it’s an easy job!” Griselda yelled. “This is the only inn for miles! You create a storm, drive travellers in here, you and she kill them and take their shit! Easy!”

Shocked, Mistral didn’t answer. Griselda seriously believed that? The weather in the Frozen North was uncontrollable, everybody knew that. Maybe you could shape it if you had some serious unicorn magic, but a single pegasus couldn’t do anything. What would travellers out here have, anyway? Merchants took more well-trod paths. So did wimpy rich people. The only kinds of ponies who came out here were hardened travellers who packed light, with nothing to steal. Besides- “Why did I go out, then? I broke my wing!”

“To make it look convincing! You go outside, hang around the inn for a while, then splint your wing to make it look broken! You get sympathy and ponies start to believe you and do what you say!”

This place was getting to Griselda. That sounded more like a schizophrenic’s delusional justifications than any actual reasoning. Mistral didn’t need to think ten seconds to find dozens of holes in that.

“It started with the package, didn’t it?” continued Griselda. “What was it? A scepter? Some super-powerful sword? A mage’s staff? It’s gotta be something valuable, to make you start killing travellers for other stuff!”

The package. In the journal. Mistral had almost forgotten about it. The previous group had fallen apart over it. Now Griselda was screaming about it. There was something about it. What had it been like? Long and thin, yeah. Think, she told herself. What’s long and thin? What’s long and thin?

Her silence didn’t go unnoticed. “Answer me!” Griselda bellowed hoarsely. “You come out here, you tell me where it is! You don’t deserve it, you thieving bitch!”

Deserve? Mistral almost laughed bitterly. Neither of them “deserved” it. They didn’t even know what it was. Whatever crazed idea had taken hold of Griselda wasn’t going away. Not ever. She’d tear the place apart looking for it. She was a treasure hunter. Wrecking stuff in search of shinies was what she did, no matter what stood in her way.

“Don’t make me come back there!”

“Oh, Celestia,” said Mistral, “are you listening to yourself? You sound like my mom when my sisters and I started fighting in the carriage when we were fillies!” As she spoke, she started creeping towards the edge of the room, under cover of the crates. Maybe, if she could get at Griselda from the side, get out her fetlock dirk…

“You- Shut up!”

“You just have no idea what you sound like! You’re crazy, petty, and immature!”

“Shut up! Shut up!”

Finally at the edge, Mistral peeked around the corner of the crate. Griselda was shaking and taking slow steps into the cellar. She was scanning the room erratically, sometimes looking at something for long moments, sometimes looking at something for barely an instant. Just a little more…

“Is that really the best you got?” yelled Mistral. She pawed the ground and folded her ears back. Anger dimmed the pain from her wing and her leg. “You’re pathetic!”

“I said SHUT UP!” screamed Griselda.

Mistral charged.

Whether it was the sound of her hooves or movement in the corner of Griselda’s eye, Mistral didn’t know, but Griselda turned. She saw Mistral in the gloom. She swiped; Mistral ducked under her claws and caught her in a headbutt in the chest. It was hard enough to nearly flip Griselda over. She reared, staggered on her back paws, fell onto her back.

Mistral seized her chance. A quick hoof-twist flipped her dirk from “sheathed” to “ready”. She jumped and dove at Griselda, bringing the dirk down at her throat-

At the last second, Griselda swung a paw out and grabbed the dirk’s blade, stopping it dead inches from her throat. Blood leaked out around her talons. The tip of the blade shook as the fighters pushed against each other. “You-” Griselda snarled, “-little-”

Mistral swept her wings back, ignoring the pain from her broken wing. The extra force was enough to overcome Griselda’s resistance. Griselda’s arms bent and the blade dipped an inch into her throat.

Griselda screeched. Adrenaline let her push harder. As Mistral refolded her wings, the tip of the blade exited Griselda’s flesh. But blood was dripping down her neck. Her breaths were wet rattles. Her struggles lessened.

Mistral swept her wings back again. The blade drove several inches into Griselda’s throat.

Griselda gurgled. She pushed. The tip of the blade didn’t leave her neck.

Mistral drew her free hoof back and slammed it down like a hammer. The dirk plunged so deeply the tip scraped the stone floor below. Griselda’s head rolled back and, as her breathing finally stopped, she went limp.

Her wings shaking, her breath coming in short bursts, Mistral held the position until she was sure Griselda wasn’t getting back up. As she wiped the dirk clean and the fire behind her flared, she hissed, “What did I say? Don’t fuck with postmares.”

11 - Something Wicked This Way Comes

Ten paces, turn around, ten paces, turn around. That was all it took to go from one end of the inn to the other and back again. Facet was becoming very familiar with that.

She was on the verge of hyperventilating and her limbs were shaking. Something was wrong. Something was seriously wrong here. She could feel it in her bones. It was claiming everybody, one by one. It was only a matter of time before it got her. But if she left, she’d freeze to death in minutes.

Ten paces, turn around, ten paces, turn around…

Okay, she told herself, think. Maybe you can find a way out of this.

So, this place: what did she know? Dinky inn, middle of nowhere, punny name. Apparently, Clarity had worked here her whole life, but that was a lie. She was a crystal pony, and they-

Clarity was a crystal pony.

Clarity was a crystal pony, and crystal ponies could influence other ponies’ emotions.

Okay, that, that explained a lot. At least everybody wasn’t going crazy Just Because; somepony was getting into their head, pushing their buttons in just the right way to make them go crazy.

Maybe.

…And yet, the possibility that someone was fucking with her head didn’t cheer Facet up in the slightest.

Ten paces, turn around, ten paces, turn around…

One way or another, Facet kept thinking. Apparently, there’d been another group here before them. When? Who were they? Mistral had said something about it, but not how she’d found out. There was something in there. Something Mistral hadn’t mentioned, probably because it just hadn’t seemed important. Facet kept pacing. But she couldn’t come up with any more information. She’d only arrived here a few hours ago, hardly enough time to learn anything.

A few hours? It felt like weeks.

Think… Think… Think…

Some quiet scraping interrupted her thoughts. She looked up; Cassandra was pawing through the remains of the door, apparently looking for something. A board, maybe. Facet wasn’t sure she wanted to know what for, but… “What’re you doing?”

“Griselda’s crazy,” Cassandra said without looking up, “and if she’s the one that wins, I want a weapon. Like…” She pulled a particularly thick plank from the debris. “This.” Awkwardly clamping it between her hooves, she swung it a few times and nodded. “Yeah. This’ll do just fine.”

“She’s crazy? You’re crazy!” yelled Facet. “If you’re standing there, ready to smack her upside the head with a board, what do you think will happen? She’ll-”

“It’s better than nothing,” said Cassandra. She didn’t sound like she was convincing herself.

“Not really, no! You-”

“D-don’t listen to her,” Clarity spoke up. “You don’t want Griselda to k-kill you, do you? Defense against h-her is the right way to go.”

Facet almost ignored her, but then she realized what Clarity was doing. She needed to stop this. She ran up to Cassandra and whispered, “Listen, whatever you do, if Mistral comes out of there, don’t hurt her.”

“And I won’t,” Cassandra whispered back. “Mistral’s the sane one.”

“What- No, listen, I know you know that, I’m talking about Clarity. She’s a crystal pony, and she-”

The distinct sound of foot on stone echoed from out of the stairwell. Before she could think, Facet had scurried halfway across the room. One way or another, she didn’t want to be anywhere near that door. Cassandra shot her a dirty look and stepped to one side, awkwardly raising her board over her head with her front legs.

Clump. Clump. Clump…

Facet breathed a sigh of relief when Mistral stepped into the light. She dirty, limping, and bleeding, but she was alive. She looked dazed and blinked blearily around the room. “Hey,” she said to nopony in particular. She rubbed her head.

“Uh, hey,” said Facet. What was she supposed to say?

Cassandra dropped back onto all fours, releasing the board. “Hey. Good thing you’re alive.”

“It doesn’t feel like it,” Mistral said listlessly. She glanced at the board, then at Cassandra. “What was with the board? Why’d you look like you wanted to brain me with it?”

Cassandra blinked and looked down, at the board between her front hooves. “Oh, just, you know,” she said slowly, “looking for defense against crazy people.”

“Don’t bother,” Mistral said dully. “Griselda’s dead.”

“Ah. Okay. Ooookay.” Cassandra nodded.

Mistral moaned and ruffled her mane. “Now, look,” she said quietly, “I think I might know what’s going on. Kind of.” She looked at Clarity. “See, there was this packa-”

Cassandra lunged, scooping up the board and using it to pin Mistral to the wall by her throat. Mistral thrashed, striking out with her legs, trying to dislodge Cassandra, but between the latter’s leverage and earth pony strength, she had no chance.

“Yeah,” whispered Cassandra, grinning, “who said Griselda was the crazy one?”

Facet screamed; Mistral was her only hope at figuring out what was going on here. She jumped on Cassandra and pulled; she tried to weaken her footing, push her away, give Mistral some wiggle room, do something to get Mistral out. But Facet was weak, even for a crystal pony, and Cassandra was strong. She just shrugged Facet’s attempts off without even looking at her.

“You…” said Cassandra to Mistral, “you just go and kill someone you’d supposedly been friends with, and you expect me to trust you?” She giggled. “Yeah, no.”

Mistral kept trying to push the board away from her throat. Her eyes grew bloodshot. She flailed weakly at Cassandra. Her mouth was open in her fruitless struggle to breathe. Her good wing beat fitfully against the wall.

And all Facet could do was watch.

Finally, Mistral’s struggling slowed to a stop. Cassandra released her; the body slumped to the floor. “Serves you right,” Cassandra mumbled. She dropped to her rump alongside the body and stared at it, breathing deeply. Facet didn’t do anything, couldn’t do anything thanks to shock.

The only sound was the howling of the wind outside.

After what felt like an eternity, Facet found her voice. “What did you do?!” she screamed.

“Well, she- I-” Cassandra blinked and looked at Mistral’s body. She blinked twice and her eyes widened slightly, as if realization was suddenly growing on her. “I… I don’t…” Her voice was shaky. Her breathing was loud but shallow. “O-oh, Celestia, w-why?” Her legs gave out beneath her and she shuffled away from Mistral, blinking rapidly. “It’s… I didn’t…” She buried her head in her hooves, smothering the sound of quick, sobbing gasps.

Facet’s legs twitched; she was at a complete loss. Cassandra had just killed the one pony who had her head about her… but she’d been psychically pushed into doing so. Was she still dangerous? Was her regret genuine? How much of the killing had been Clarity’s fault and how much had been Cassandra’s? Crystal pony magic didn’t work without something to latch onto, which meant-

“Do you think we can trust her?”

Facet twitched; Clarity was right behind her, looking scared the way a bad actor looked scared. Don’t listen to her, Facet told herself. She started marshalling her thoughts, hoping to get a word in edgewise before-

“S-she’s just as crazy as the others,” whispered Clarity. “A-a complete nutjob. You don’t want to be a v-victim of her, do you?”

Facet blinked twice and rage began to well up inside her. What’d she been thinking, feeling sorry for Cassandra? Clarity was right.

No, wait, she’s-

Cassandra was a liar. She was faking it. She’d always been faking it.

Stop! Think! You’re listening to-

She spotted a small knife strapped to one of Mistral’s forelegs. A… dirk, maybe? Whatever it was called, it ought to work. Clarity was still sobbing; she wouldn’t notice a thing. Facet crept up to Mistral’s body, took off the dirk, and belted it to her own leg. It felt good.

And before she knew it, she was on top of Cassandra, stabbing the liar in her trunk again and again and again. Cassandra hadn’t seen it coming, didn’t even have time to scream before the blade pierced her. Facet knew she must’ve hit an artery; blood was gushing out in torrents, drenching the floor and soaking her fur. She kept at it. The liar needed to die.

She didn’t how much time she spent, driving the dirk into Cassandra’s body. The seconds all seemed to blur together. But eventually, from the amount of blood and the lack of movement, Facet figured Cassandra was dead, or close enough. She settled back onto the wet floor, grinning. She’d just killed a dangerous pony.

She blinked. She’d just killed a pony.

She’d just killed a pony.

Immediately, Facet felt sick. She’d known it was coming. She’d known Clarity was screwing with her head. And yet, she’d fallen for it hook, line, and sinker. She’d done it just as easily as breathing.

Now, she and Clarity were the only ones left.

Clarity sidled over and poked Cassandra’s body. She nodded. “Good!” she chirped. “That’s that.” She smiled at Facet. It was supposed to be sweet, but it looked more like a smirk. “D-don’t worry. Now that we’re safe, I’ll take care of you as long as you s-stay here.”

“Great,” said Facet dully.

Clarity nodded again and turned back for the bar. Facet watched her go, feeling burned out. Part of her wanted to just kill Clarity and be done with the whole damn affair. But if she did that, she’d never know what was going on here. Facet felt like, as the last mare standing and having gone through all that shit, she had a right to know. She knew it was silly. That didn’t stop her from wanting to know, wanting to question Clarity.

The main problem: how to question Clarity in the first place? She looked nice and strong; it’d be hard to hold her down without having a place where her hooves could hit her and knock her down. Facet needed a “dead zone” where Clarity couldn’t touch her. Somehow.

The vague impression of an idea, one that would give her that dead zone and let her question Clarity easily, attempted to make its presence known in Facet’s brain. Trying to jog her mind, she looked at Clarity’s back as she headed back for the bar. She looked at her still bloody knife. Her ears stood up as the idea crystallized.

Facet knew a thing or two about biology. The origin of the term “hamstrung”, for instance. She lunged out, slashing at the back of Clarity’s leg, hoping to hit a muscle.

Whatever else could be said about the blade, it was well-kept. It sliced through Clarity’s leg with minimal resistance, neatly severing the muscle. Blood gushed; Clarity screeched and fell to the floor, her leg crippled. Facet quickly jumped on top of her, flipped her onto her back, and pinned her to the floor with a hoof. The lack of movement from Clarity’s bad leg gave her plenty of space on that side. She pointed the dirk at Clarity’s neck. “Alright, listen,” she said. Her voice was full of all the tension that’d slowly been wound up in her over the past few hours. “I’ve got questions. You’re gonna answer them. And if I think you’re messing with my head, you’re dead. Got it?”

All composure had left Clarity; she didn’t even try to push Facet off. She lay there, a few licks short of blubbering. “It’s-” she whimpered. “I-I-” She moaned and clamped her eyes shut, as if in pain.

“Answer me!” yelled Facet. She pushed the blade’s edge against Clarity’s throat, coming dangerously close to breaking the skin.

Clarity’s eyes snapped open, her pupils shrunk to nothingness, her entire body shaking from head to hoof. “P-please,” she said, almost sobbed, “r-run. S-save y-yourself. I-it’s n-not t-too l-late.”

And immediately Facet hesitated. Clarity was responsible for this, she knew that. But this was something different. If Clarity had suddenly decided to be forthcoming- “Too late?” she asked quickly. “Too late for what?”

“H-he’s c-coming b-back,” whispered Clarity, “g-gathering m-magic t-to-” She clutched her head and screamed, spasming on the floor. Facet immediately backed away to avoid her hooves. What else was there to do? At this point, Facet felt like she was just along for the ride; all the could do was watch as Clarity twisted and writhed.

Eventually, Clarity stopped striking at the air and calmed down, her breathing slipping back into a normal rhythm. When she opened her eyes again, her sclerae had taken a sickly greenish tinge. “Apologies,” she said as she stood up. “But when stressed, it can be quite hard to keep control of myself.” She laughed. “But I’m better now. Well, except for…” She wiggled her rump, letting her bad leg flop out. “But that’s easily fixable.”

“Easily… fixable?” Facet said slowly. This was making less and less sense by the moment. And what was up with her sudden plea to leave? Where’d her stammer gone? What was wrong with her eyes?

“Yes. That’s what I said, wasn’t it?” Clarity rolled her eyes. “It’s not exactly a hard concept to grasp.”

Facet swallowed. Okay, Clarity hadn’t attacked her and couldn’t get to her, not with that broken leg. Maybe, Facet thought, she could get some answers. “Fine. It’s easily fixable. But…” She lifted her hoof and pointed the dirk at Clarity. The point was wavering a lot. “Why? Why are you doing this? Making ponies kill each other? What do you get?” Facet doubted she’d get a response from such a direct question, but she could at least try.

“Oh, you know.” Clarity waved a hoof nonchalantly. “Fear, strife, disharmony… Dark magic thrives on it, and I need all the help I can get.”

“What… what are you talking about?” asked Facet. But a cold weight had begun to settle in her stomach. She knew what Clarity was talking about.

“Why don’t I show you?” Clarity asked, almost sweetly. She began limping towards the fireplace. “You’ll be well acquainted with it, sooner or later.”

Then, still smiling, she jumped into the blaze.

The fire seized on her fur like a thousand wicks and doubled in size almost immediately. Heat pulsed through the room, so intense Facet took several steps back and had to shield her face. As the fire kept growing, so too did the light in the room. The fire shone like a second sun and threw sharp shadows against the walls; Facet couldn’t bear to look at it.

Then everything went dark.

Cautiously, Facet looked at the fireplace. It was still burning, and yet somehow muted. Thick black smoke was swirling from Clarity’s unmoving, charred body, blocking most of the light. It felt inky, oily, unclean. It clung to itself, refusing to disperse throughout the room, and it moved far too slowly for smoke. From the way it slowly, irregularly swirled, it almost felt alive.

Before Facet could react, the smoke moved and engulfed her, and her world turned cold and dark, inside-out. Her entire body went limp as something began assaulting her mind, as if it were adrift in an endless sea, being thrown to and fro by the currents and riptides, constantly under threat of being pulled under. She could feel it ripping away at her motivations, flaking off bits and pieces of her memories.

Facet fought, kept her head above the surface. She tried to hold onto herself. She tried to cling to what made her her. But as her will was smothered, no matter how tightly she held on, no matter how much she tried to stay afloat, the waves swamped her. It was only a matter of time before she went under completely.

Still she fought.

Finally, it was too much. The will engulfing her was vast and tireless, and her last reserves had been drained. She submerged-

-and wondered what she was so worried about. No, she didn’t really have anything to be concerned about, nothing that mattered. What did matter was the inn and the thing in the basement. Why wasn’t she taking care of them?

No! some distant corner of her mind screamed. This isn’t me! I’m a historian! I was up here to study small towns! I was going to-

I, I was going to…

Where was she going to?

Facet thought for a moment, but then decided it didn’t matter. She needed to take care of the inn. That was all that mattered.

Think! the corner screamed. It sounded quieter. Remember who you are! Fight it!

Why fight it? Giving in was so much easier.

You’re not his, you’re yours!

Yes, but being his was less painful.

This is not you!

So what if it wasn’t her? She was a useless pony anyway. Now, she had a purpose.

The corner didn’t respond.

Of course it didn’t. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered except that this was her inn. Facet let the current pull away her memories, her motivations, hurling them into oblivion bit by bit. They didn’t matter. They were just taking up valuable space. Finally, when it was all said and done, she was left with two facts.

She was Facet.

She took care of the inn.

Those two facts were all that mattered.

And since she took care of the inn, she needed to do some cleaning up in here. Wow the group was messy. There were bodies to dispose of, blood to clean up, a door to fix… It was quite a lot for one pony to handle. But Facet could handle it. She took care of the inn, after all. She knew that keeping it clean and tidy was her first responsibility.

Well, actually, no, not quite. Before she did anything else, she needed to check up on the furnace. That was the whole reason the inn was here, after all. That pegasus and griffon (what were their names? Oh, well, that didn’t matter) might’ve broken something down there. That wouldn’t do at all.

Facet moved stiffly to the cellar. Her body felt strange, like it wasn’t hers. She stumbled down the stairs, almost tripping and falling. But that didn’t matter. The furnace did.

When she got downstairs and peered into the gloom, although she’d never seen anything before, she knew everything was alright down here. None of the crates were disturbed, the griffon’s body was out in the open for easy access, and the furnace…

The furnace…

The fire produced enough light for Facet to examine it. Nothing had been touched, as far as she could tell. The furnace was safe. Then she looked up at the thing built into the furnace, the thing it sustained, the thing that bound him to life, the thing she was responsible for: a unicorn’s sanguine horn, long and thin, severed at the base, curving to a sharp point. It was safe.

Facet smiled. Everything was alright.

Epilogue - The Inn at the Edge of the World

Facet had worked at the Please Stop Inn for as long as she could remember, which was only a few hours. It was an old place, stuck at the crossroads of two nearly forgotten roads that got less traffic in a year than the average street in Canterlot got in a day. It was squat, two short stories tall, and built well enough from stone to keep it from being drafty. It clearly valued function over form; it was nothing to look at outside, borderline ugly, but inside was wonderfully comfortable. The common room was well-heated by the furnace in the basement, it was almost always fully stocked with food and drink, it had plenty of rooms for guests that kept out the cold, and the beds were comfortable and clean. Not that they were used much; Facet was so far out in the middle of nowhere that entire moons could go by without a single guest, and her staff consisted of one pony: herself. She cooked and cleaned and got supplies and made repairs and did everything the inn required.

But the loneliness never got to her. It was her inn. It was intimately familiar to her, with its creaky floorboards and its strong walls and its smoky furnace, for its layout had been implanted in her brain. She knew every inch of it inside and out, and knew she’d never find another calling if she left, even if she could leave. This was where she was meant to be. It was warm. It was safe. It was home. The isolation didn’t bother her; the inn alone was company enough.

There weren’t any guests at the moment, but more would come. They always did. They had to, with the inn being the only shelter for dozens of miles. Pegasi couldn’t control the weather up here, and travelers were always getting driven inside when the wind changed. Being connected to the furnace, Facet could sometimes tell when the wind would change, which meant guests would be appearing, which meant she needed to get the place cleaner than usual. She didn’t think the wind was due to change at the moment, but Facet knew she could be wrong, and the last blizzard had just blown through. Nopony was around; she might as well clean up the last group’s bodies and trash before they got bad and smelled.

They’d left plenty of bodies and trash around. Even with Facet’s body bags, it took six of them to hold every body and little bit of trash. Not one to pass up the possibility of free fuel, she hauled everything down to the cellar to burn in the furnace (fortunately, there was also one downstairs already; she didn’t need a body bag for that one). And it wasn’t easy for her; as a crystal pony, she was perhaps the least-suited pony tribe for this sort of thing. Earth ponies were supernaturally strong. Unicorns had magic. Pegasi could add a little extra oomph with their wings. All Facet had were her own, normal muscles. She was strong-ish, but she was panting and sweating after the third trip down and decided to stop outside for a bit before she fetched the bodies in the snowdrifts.

She didn’t put on her coat. The chill instantly bit all the way into her bones, but that just made her more alert and cooled her down. Besides, she’d lived up here her whole life; she was used to getting a bit nippy every now and then. She squinted at the trees and up and down the road, trying to see if anypony was coming. She doubted it, but it couldn’t hurt to check. And if somepony was coming, they’d always be reassured by a smiling face and a waving hoof greeting them, even if the body language was faked.

But, no, there was nopony.

Facet hauled the fifth bag down and waved a hoof to ward off the smell. Ugh. Losing bowel control already? That one would be going in the furnace first. Just in case, she opened up the furnace and looked inside. The fire was still strong, but from the way the wood and embers and bones were resting, she could tell it was going to get low in a few hours. She made a mental note to check it again soon.

The sixth sack was special; it was less than half as full as the others, as it had food that was still edible and hadn’t been destroyed. Grains, fruits, vegetables for ponies and other herbivores, meat for the few griffons that passed through. Keeping it cool was easy; laughable, even. Just stick it outside in the drafty room designated the icebox, and the weather itself did the job for you. In spite of it being “trash”, Facet was very selective about what she picked. In fact, less than a quarter of the food that had actually been left was going into the icebox. Nothing that had been bled on was to be eaten by somebody else, for example. She’d even made sure to carve out only the choicest bits of meat from the bodies that were left (she never ate meat herself, naturally, but the compulsion in her head was strong enough that she knew what to look for). Meat was hard to get, so she saved every little bit she could get.

With the food taken care of, it was time to wipe down the floors before the blood stained them beyond repair and attracted unwanted questions. It wasn’t much, considering the floor’s only purpose was to be walked on, but Facet liked to keep the inn tidy and stain-free and unassuming. This was easy; blot the excess, put the rag in a sack to be taken care of in the furnace. Dab the stains with baking soda. Soak a brush in vinegar and wipe it all down. Rinse with water and dry. You’d never see the difference, especially with the dark hardwood hiding the bloodstains. Easy.

Easy, but long and tedious. It was hours before Facet had gotten to all the stains, and her legs and back ached from leaning down so much and applying so much fetlock grease. Still, when she was done, she smiled to herself. It felt good to accomplish something like that. It kept the inn — her inn — looking innocent, even if only a few ponies saw it every year. It’d be a shame for those few ponies to escape because of a stain on the floor.

And that was that. The last group had been disposed of. Now, there was nothing to do but wait. Facet pulled her favorite book from her room and curled up in her favorite overstuffed chair in front of the hearth. Silence. All to herself, until more guests came, as they always did.

As they always would.

It was miles from anywhere, and through the forests of the Frozen North was a cold wind blowing.

Prologue - The Inn in the Back of Beyond

It was miles from anywhere, and through the forests of the Frozen North was a cold wind blowing.

Clarity had worked at the Please Stop Inn for as long as she could remember. It was an old place, stuck at the crossroads of two nearly forgotten roads that got less traffic in a year than the average street in Canterlot got in a day. It was squat, two short stories tall, and built well enough from stone to keep it from being drafty. It clearly valued function over form; it was nothing to look at outside, borderline ugly, but inside was wonderfully comfortable. The common room was well-heated by the furnace in the basement, it was almost always fully stocked with food and drink, it had plenty of rooms for guests that kept out the cold, and the beds were comfortable and clean. Not that they were used much; Clarity was so far out in the middle of nowhere that entire moons could go by without a single guest, and her staff consisted of one pony: herself. She cooked and cleaned and got supplies and made repairs and did everything the inn required.

But the loneliness never got to her. It was her inn. It was intimately familiar to her, with its creaky floorboards and its strong walls and its smoky furnace, like its layout had been implanted in her brain. She knew every inch of it inside and out, and knew she’d never find another calling if she left. This was where she was meant to be. It was warm. It was safe. It was home. The isolation didn’t bother her; the inn alone was company enough.

There weren’t any guests at the moment, but more would come. They always did. They had to, with the inn being the only shelter for dozens of miles. Pegasi couldn’t control the weather up here, and travelers were always getting driven inside when the wind changed. Having been up here a while, Clarity could sometimes tell when the wind would change, which meant guests would be appearing, which meant she needed to get the place cleaner than usual. She didn’t think the wind was due to change at the moment, but Clarity knew she could be wrong, and the last blizzard had just blown through. Nopony was around; she might as well clean up the last group’s mess before it got bad and smelled.

They’d left plenty of trash around. Even with Clarity’s huge sacks, each the size of a pony, it took six of them to hold every little bit. Not one to pass up the possibility of free fuel, she hauled everything down to the cellar to burn in the furnace. And it wasn’t easy for her; as a crystal pony, she was perhaps the least-suited pony tribe for this sort of thing. Earth ponies were supernaturally strong. Unicorns had magic. Pegasi could add a little extra oomph with their wings. All Clarity had were her own, normal muscles. She was strong, but she was panting and sweating after the fourth trip down and decided to stop outside for a bit.

She didn’t put on her coat. The chill instantly bit all the way into her bones, but that just made her more alert and cooled her down. Besides, she’d lived up here her whole life; she was used to getting a bit nippy every now and then. She squinted at the trees and up and down the road, trying to see if anypony was coming. She doubted it, but it couldn’t hurt to check. And if somepony was coming, they’d always be reassured by a smiling face and a waving hoof greeting them.

But, no, there was nopony.

Clarity hauled the fifth sack down and waved a hoof to ward off the smell. Ugh. Going bad already? That one would be going in the furnace first. Just in case, she opened up the furnace and looked inside. The fire was still strong, but from the way the wood and embers were resting, she could tell it was going to get low in a few hours. She made a mental note to check it again soon.

The sixth sack was special; it was less than half as full as the others, as it had food that was still edible and hadn’t been destroyed. Grains, fruits, vegetables for ponies and other herbivores, meat for the few griffons that passed through. Keeping it cool was easy; laughable, even. Just stick it outside in the drafty room designated the icebox, and the weather itself did the job for you. In spite of it being “trash”, Clarity was very selective about what she picked. In fact, less than a quarter of the food that had actually been left was going into the icebox. Nothing that had been on the floor was to be eaten by somebody else, for example. She’d even made sure to carve out only the choicest bits of meat from the cuts that were left (she never ate meat herself, naturally, but she’d served enough griffons that she knew what to look for). Meat was hard to get, so she saved every little bit she could get.

With the food taken care of, it was time to wipe down the floors before the drinks stained them beyond repair. It wasn’t much, considering the floor’s only purpose was to be walked on, but Clarity liked to keep the inn tidy and stain-free. This was easy; blot the excess, put the rag in a sack to be taken down to the furnace. Dab the stains with baking soda. Soak a brush in vinegar and wipe it all down. Rinse with water and dry. You’d never see the difference. Easy.

Easy, but long and tedious. It was hours before Clarity had gotten to all the stains, and her legs and back ached from leaning down so much and applying so much fetlock grease. Still, when she was done, she smiled to herself. It felt good to accomplish something like that. It kept the inn — her inn — looking nice, even if only a few ponies saw it every year.

And that was that. The last group had been cleaned up after. Now, there was nothing to do but wait. Clarity pulled her favorite book from her room and curled up in her favorite overstuffed chair in front of the hearth. Silence. All to herself, until more guests came, as they always did.