"Thirty-eight days. It’s been thirty-eight days since I was exiled out here, out into the desert of Celestia-knows-where, originally miles from the nearest town... the idea that I could get her home and leave unscathed was ridiculous. Equestria wanted her back, without a doubt, but what they also wanted was me – they wanted me in a prison cell, or a dungeon, or in a torture chamber, or, most likely, in a noose."

"I had to try, though. Wasn’t that enough?"

Sequel to not-as-well-written "The Fire and the Flutter" (http://www.fimfiction.net/story/13386/The-Fire-and-The-Flutter)