Knight of Equestria - Gabriel the Wanderer

(Entry 19)

The skies had already darkened, but bright flashes lit his vision. A bolt of lightning streaks past him, launched from a cloud just below him. A burst of flame from his mouth cut through the clouds, revealing the form of an off-white dragon whose body crackled blue with more electricity.

Another bolt cut through the blackness of the night sky as he narrowly dodged it and began to close in.
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Gabriel suddenly woke at that moment. His head hurt and he was unsure why. This dream had been haunting him the last few nights. It played out the same every time, and he had always woken up as whatever it was his eyes saw through prepared it's counterattack.

His right eye had been slightly aching for days. This pain that plagued him now, however, was new. He knew he wouldn't be able to get back to sleep. Glancing around the tent, he spotted Amethyst still soundly asleep. They had been traveling together for three days already, and she had decided to setup camp close to a nearby village, which she would approach the next day and try to find any leads on local monster dens or fabled treasures.

Not wanting to wake his sleeping friend, he tried his best to quietly maneuver outside, deciding fresh air might help his sudden head pain.

Upon taking in the landscape, he was surprised it was still dark out, yet he could see rather well. When they setup camp it was nearly pitch black, but now he could see much better even without the sun. Since he could miraculously see in the dark, he decided to change the bandages on what remained of his left arm.

As he did so, he was surprised to see his wound had almost entirely healed. He had known it was making excellent progress, but this sudden lurch in recovery somewhat worried him. In the small time since he first saved Amethyst in that cave, strange things had been happening to him. Nightmares so unlike his usual ones. His wounds sustained while fighting the dragon had all but vanished near instantly. He had begun to think he was imagining things, but even Amethyst had noticed the burns he should've gotten weren't there.

Now, he had woken up to intense head pain and apparent night vision. He racked his brain thinking about what could possibly be different. Amethyst joining him was all he could think of and he knew she didn't have a hand in whatever was happening to him. The young mare was quite inexperienced in magic and besides that, the human body would reject any magic used on him.

He lost track of time as he pondered and the sun began to peek over the horizon. His train of thought derailed as he watched the twilight sky turn a familiar shade of purple.

Twilight Sparkle immediately invaded his thoughts. Though he had been gone for just over two months, it felt like an eternity apart from her. He wondered if she'd have some insight into what is happening to him. Regardless, just her presence would soothe his nightmares.

He stopped himself from going any further. He knew his old life was gone. He wasn't welcome in his home anymore. He had to make a new life, forge a new path.

He would travel with Amethyst for as long as she would have him. He knew she felt indebted to him for saving her life, but the truth was he felt indebted to her as well. She relieved him of his loneliness and made him feel like a person again, instead of the monster he was treated as before meeting her. Staring off into the horizon, he noticed that Amethyst had almost the same color coat as Twilight, though Amethyst was a bit lighter in shade. Her mane was much more wild and unkempt than Twilight's, however. It curled into small violet drills all around.

The similarities made him chuckle. Aside from them both being purple unicorns, they were nearly exact opposites, especially when it came to magical talent. He wondered if he could somehow help her improve her talents, if she wanted to.

The thought of improvement sent him down another thought tangent. He quietly dug through their possessions until he gently pulled out the massive sword he had been carrying since the cave. Finding such a decisively human weapon in this strange world still confounded him. Exposing the blade to the sunlight, he admired as it shone, now clean of the blood that had coated it a few days earlier.

Should something threaten them, he knew this weapon was his best deterrent. Despite the size of the sword being quite large, he was certain it was heavier than it should have been. The strange warmth it seemed to emit was also out of the ordinary. No matter how strange it was, he decided he needed to learn to wield it better. It's unwieldy size and weight along with him only having a single arm would make that a challenge.
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Amethyst awoke a few hours later, not surprised to see Gabriel was already up. She had known he had been suffering from night terrors for some time. As she made her way outside, she found the human swinging his sword around, a task which seemed to be quite tiring.

She didn't know how someone was supposed to use a sword, but she imagined that throwing around something so heavy with a single arm couldn't have been easy.

“You look like you've been at it for awhile.” she said, gaining the human's attention.

“This damn thing doesn't even feel like it was meant to be swung...” Gabriel said, huffing for breath. “I should honestly just let gravity do most of the work...” he added, setting the weapon aside and resting on a log.

“I'm sure it'll get easier with time. If not, maybe we could pawn it off.” Amethyst replied with a chuckle. “I'm gonna be heading to the village soon, try and get some leads on more loot.”

“Right, right. I'll just... sit here and do nothing, I guess.”

“Yeah, I hate to say it, but just the sight of you would probably make the whole place go on lock-down.” she said, laughing again.

“True. Be careful on the way there, I won't be around to save you. Again.”

“Ooh, very funny. I doubt there's anything as dangerous as another dragon or giant spider around here.”
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Far, far away, high up in a mountain cave, a gathering was taking place.

“We've recovered the body.” said an older female.

“Thank you, Thestalos should be able to rest peacefully now.” replied another, male voice.

Interrupting their meeting, a white dragon entered the cave, drenched from the storm outside. The dragon tried to shake itself dry and its white scales glimmered, almost as if reflecting the light.

“Raiza!” the first voice called out, clearly upset. She was a larger dragon dwelling in the shadows of the cave, her form hidden except her glowing green eyes.

The white dragon Raiza flinched at her tone, understanding she was clearly upset with him. “I just got here, what could I have done wrong?” he replied.

“You and Thestalos got into a fight a few days ago, yes?”

“Yeah, he didn't take kindly to me being in his territory. I didn't go there to beat him down, I just wanted to look around, is all.”

The other person present, a large red dragon, began to sob and flew out of the cave.

“What? I just hurt his wings a bit so he couldn't follow me, he should be fi-” Raiza tried to explain before being cut off.

“He's dead.”

Raiza was immediately halted from his explanation. “O-oh.”

“It would seem that he had taken his frustrations from losing out on a nearby town. When we went to retrieve his remains, the townsfolk claimed innocence. They described a dark, two-legged creature wielding some kind of weapon. It killed Thestalos.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because you're the reason he was bested so easily. It's your responsibility to hunt down this thing.”
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“Any luck?” Gabriel called out with a wave to his returning companion.

“Yep! But also, nope.” Amethyst replied. “There aren't any famous treasures in the area, but I did bump into a merchant begging for help. He said a pack of Timberwolves made off with most of his stock.”

“Timberwolves? Why would they want his stuff?” Gabriel inquired.

“No clue, but he said if we could return his stuff he'd pay us handsomely. Whatever they stole must've been really valuable. Maybe instead of returning it, we can make out like bandits if we sell it.” Amethyst said.

Gabriel chuckled in response. “Now there's an idea. So, does he know where they went?”

“Sure does!” she pulled out a map from her cloak and spread it open. “He gave me this nice looking map and marked the area. Just a bit west.” she said.

“Great, then let's head off and see what we can do. I've never actually seen a Timberwolf before, so this should at least be interesting.”
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A short time later, they had arrived just outside the territory marked down on the map.

“So I don't know much about these things, but they're made of wood, right?” Amethyst asked.

“Their bodies are comprised of twigs, sticks, and leaves. So yes, they're made of wood.” Gabriel confirmed. “A friend of mine back in Equestria had problems with them, she told me a few stories.”

“I hope those stories mentioned a way to make them less vicious.”

“Not specifically, but I have an idea.”

When Amethyst looked up from her map, she saw her human friend trying to ignite a small fire.

“What, are you gonna invite them to keep warm?” she said with a giggle.

“Since we're still in winter, they probably won't burn easily. I'm hoping they don't know that and the fire should scare them off.” he said, pulling out a larger stick from his backpack and lighting it on fire. “I thought about this before we left, so I made this makeshift torch using some of my ruined clothes and some oil from one of those little lanterns you bought.”

“Aww, how much did you use? I use those for mood lighting...” said the unicorn, apparently distraught.

“Not that much, I'm sure you'll be able to replace it by the time we're done.” Gabriel replied with a smirk.

“Yeah, I had better. Or I'll... be very upset with you.” she replied, trying her best to look more offended than she actually was.

He ignored her faux-offense and began to walk deeper into the territory, Amethyst following closely behind.

He held up the torch, expecting to see or hear anything out of the ordinary by now. Strangely, there was nothing. No sounds or hints of danger anywhere. They did eventually come across what looked like tracks, and plenty of them, all heading in the same direction. As they followed the tracks, they came to a large clearing, a large pile of overturned goods in the middle.

“Oh, this was way easier than I thou-” began Amethyst, before Gabriel quickly got lower to the ground. “What? What's wrong?”

“Look closer, the spots with less snow covering the ground.” the human whispered.

She narrowed her eyes at the spots he mentioned and noticed the gentle breathing within the snowy grass. The Timberwolves were asleep among the clearing, at least five different bodies were slightly visible.

“Oh. Why are they asleep out in the open?” Amethyst asked.

“No idea. I guess we could try to get the stuff and sneak away...” Gabriel mused, before getting an idea. “Why don't you grab the goods with your magic? We should be close enough.”

Amethyst appeared flustered for a moment. “Oh, uh... I'm not so sure that's the best idea. I told you before, I'm not exactly 'gifted' with magic.”

“Well, not with that attitude. Just try and move them over here one at a time. You can take as long as you need to.” he replied.

Amethyst sighed. “Alright, I'll do my best.”

She began to shakily lift the smaller crate from the top of the pile, gently raising it upwards and then towards them. As the crate got closer, Amethyst gently let it down and took a breath.

“See, there you go. What's in it?” Gabriel asked.

Amethyst opened the crate to find it nearly empty, filled mostly with what seemed like empty bags of fertilizer. “Uhhh... didn't know Timberwolves were into gardening.” she said.

Gabriel noticed that the bags were torn asunder by what looked like fangs. “I think they're asleep because they have full bellies. I guess, in a roundabout way, gardening supplies would be something they want.” he said. “Alright, next one. There's three left and hopefully they didn't eat everything.”

Amethyst began using her magic to gently float the next crate over to them. “Ooh, this one is way heavier.”

“Hopefully they didn't get to whatever is inside it, then.”

As she let this crate down slowly, Gabriel used the butt of his torch to pry open the lid. He was greeted by numerous small knickknacks and what seemed like jewelry. “No wonder they left this one alone.”

“Is it me or is this a weird group of things to be transporting together?” Amethyst inquired, lifting up the third crate. She hesitated for a moment as the small tarp stretched over it slide off. When she was sure she didn't wake any wolves, she continued.

As the third crate landed, Gabriel opened it as well. He saw a framed picture as well as some other things within. He gently placed his torch down and picked up the photo, taking note of how old it had to have been. It was a picture of two earth ponies, seemingly just married.

“Interesting...” Gabriel said, piquing Amethyst's interest. He turned the photo over to show her.

“Oh hey, that's the stallion who asked me to get his stuff back.” she said. “Although he's much older now.”

“Interesting thing to have in your market inventory...” Gabriel trailed off.

As he continued to look through the crate, Amethyst had begun to grab the final crate, seemingly with much more confidence than before.

Gabriel noticed something that perturbed him. A small porcelain container in the crate with the photo looked suspiciously like an urn. Upon removing the lid, he discovered that he was right. He began to wonder; just why were they sent to get someone's ashes? And who's were they?

Nearly halfway through levitating the final crate, the contents within it had shifted ever so slightly, creating a small metallic noise within. With that, the ears of some of the Timberwolves had twitched. Amethyst noticed this and it had quickly destroyed her concentration. The crate she was floating fell quickly, waking up the group of wolves.

Gabriel grabbed his torch and stepped ahead of her.

“I-I'm sorry, I-I-” she stammered.

“Later, get ready.” Gabriel said as he waved the torch ahead of him, making the wolves wary immediately.

The beasts began to circle them as Gabriel slowly walked away from Amethyst, hoping to bring their attention with him. His plan had started to work, as the five wolves apparently perceived him as the threat.

“Amethyst, do you know how to project magic forcefully?” he called to her, keeping his head on a swivel.

“No?! Maybe?!” she replied, clearly panicking.

“I don't know the specifics behind it, but I know Unicorns can project magic into concussive blasts. It would really help if you could do that, right now.”

Amethyst tried to calm herself as she gathered magical energy into her horn. She had never tried to do something like this, and didn't know exactly what Gabriel meant by 'concussive blasts'. As she tried to imagine what it would be like, she pictured throwing a rock, but a rock made of magic. She swallowed hard and loosed her shot.

As her rock-shaped magic hit the back of a Timberwolf's head and distracted the group of them, Gabriel seized this opportunity to smack one of them in the face with his torch. Its face caught fire, causing the wolf to panic and run off deeper into the woods howling in pain. There were four of them now.

In response, a wolf bit at his arm in an attempt to disarm him. The beast's fangs sunk into his arm quicker than he could react; it had been successful and the torch fell to the ground, still lit. Another wolf had decided to focus on Amethyst instead, noticing where the magic had come from.

Gabriel kicked the wolf biting his arm away and drew his sword as the wolf rejoined the other two in circling him. Amethyst, still heavily panicking, began to let loose many more magical rocks to defend herself from the wolf approaching her. Gabriel waited as patiently as he could for any of the wolves to make a move, and as one did, swung at it as quickly as he could. The wolf had not anticipated such a fast response, taking a slash from the sword and being knocked aside. The other two were also surprised, deciding to be less aggressive in their approach.

The wolf that was closing in on Amethyst had let it's mouth hang open, releasing a putrid stench and making the young pony gag. Gabriel had noticed this and stabbed his blade into the ground, picking up his torch once again and tossing it her way.

“Amethyst!” he called out, making sure she noticed his actions.

She saw the torch sail through the air and quickly tried to grasp it with her magic. Although she hadn't fully succeeded, she adjusted its course enough to make it land on the Timberwolf coming at her. It burst into flames, seemingly over its whole body, scrambling around madly before bits of it began to fall off as it rolled around in the snow, desperate to be extinguished. When the wolf had mostly put itself out, it took off in the same direction the other had fled earlier. Now there were three.

The wolf Gabriel had swatted away had picked itself back up and had clearly been agitated, leaping at the human almost instantly. As he swung at it again, it had seemingly anticipated this and dodged to the side as its two compatriots joined it. The three of them clawed at bit at Gabriel as fast as they could as the human kept swinging his weapon to defend himself, finding that the wolves were being more than careful not to get hit by it. The foul stench of the breath of the Timberwolves began to fill the air around him, more than likely an attempt to incapacitate him, he thought. While their attacks certainly cause pain, a different sort of feeling had started to well up inside him. Almost as if his pride had been wounded.

Amethyst had almost begun to panic again, but she noticed a small flaming piece of wood nearby. Was it the torch from earlier, or part of the wounded Timberwolf's body? She had no way of knowing, but used her magic to telepathically lift it and throw it Gabriel's way.

“Gabriel!” she shouted to her human friend, thankfully catching his attention despite being under assault.

As Gabriel watched the flaming wood sail his direction, he quickly formulated a way to make the most use of it. As it got closer, he let loose a swing as hard as he could, completely missing the wolves but striking the flaming object.

A large burst of fire erupted from the impact, for some reason he couldn't quite place. The fire somehow coated itself to his sword, catching the wolves heavily off guard as visibility with their target was lost. Another mighty swing came from the flames, sweeping and hitting all three of the wolves. The scorching wounds left behind instilled fear in the wolves, but before they could react, the large flaming sword had swung through them again; this time, cleaving them in half and setting their bodies aflame.

As the wolves burned, Gabriel noticed the feeling of wounded pride had begun to recede and his right eye pulsed with pain. The mysterious light from his weapon trailed from the smoldering bodies of the fallen wolves without him noticing.

“Hey! You alright?” Amethyst asked as she trotted over to join him.

“Surprisingly, yes. Some minor bite wounds here and there.” he replied, propping his large blade upon his shoulder.

“Yeah, but, you just burst into flames a second ago. How did that even happen?” she asked, catching her breath from all the excitement.

“Beats me. I guess Timberwolf breath is flammable.”
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The pair made their way back to their camp, crates in tow. Gabriel could only carry one with his single arm meaning Amethyst had to carry the other three by herself. As they set them down to take a breather, the human sighed quite loudly.

“Once again, sorry about making you carry most of it.” he said.

“Hey, no worries, I don't expect you to grow your... what's it called again?”

“Arm.”

“Arm! I don't expect you to grow your arm back.” she replied with a giggle. “I need a small break before I take these into town, though. I bet that merchant is gonna be happy to see these again.”

“So, you're returning them to him?” Gabriel asked, taking a seat and uncorking his bottle.

Amethyst seemed somewhat disturbed be his question before smiling again. “Well, yeah. After what you told me was in there, there's no way I could sell them.”

“Eh, I suppose. Doesn't really matter to me either way.”

“Aw, c'mon, it's the right thing to do.”

Gabriel replied with a shrug as he drank from his favorite bottle.
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Some strange things have been happening to my body. My wounds from a few days ago have already healed. The bite wounds from earlier today are beginning to heal at an alarming pace. My eye hurts worse every day, and if the pattern continues, I'll be plagued by more strange dreams tonight.

Now new feelings and emotions are asserting themselves within me before going away. Almost as if I'm being possessed. It's an odd feeling.

Gabriel closed his journal and stared wistfully into the distance. He had no clue who could even talk to about the things happening to him. Amethyst probably wouldn't be able to understand and he didn't want to worry her. He suddenly smelled something akin to Timberwolf breath.

“I'm back!” he heard Amethyst call.

Gabriel raised his glass. “Welcome back. How'd it go?”

“Well, he didn't seem too upset about the gardening supplies getting munched, but I told him I 'just happened' to look inside and wanted an explanation.” she elaborated.

“Oh, this should be good.”

“So, as it would turn out, those weren't his stock at all-”

“Shocking.”

“- but actually his daughters keepsakes of her mother, his wife, who passed away a few years ago. Apparently his daughter is going to be moving back to the village and sent some stuff ahead to make a little shrine for her mom. The Timberwolves were attracted to it because of the gardening stuff.” she explained.

“... I see.”

“He said he didn't think anyone would take the task of retrieving it if it was something that personal, or that they'd ask for more money in return. Oh! Speaking of...” Amethyst pulled out a large sack of gold pieces. “He paid up.”

“Great. Now you can buy back that oil I used.” Gabriel said sarcastically.

“Oh, he gave some of that too when I mentioned we used some to get his stuff back. He also paid me with a piece of advice.” she added, beginning to pull off her cloak. “I smell terrible, according to him.”

“He's right, I noticed it as soon as you got back.”

“Gee, thanks. Apparently the Timberwolf breath lingered on my cloak, so now I gotta wash it.” she said.

He only recalled seeing Amethyst without her cloak once, when they stayed at the inn and she got in the hot tub. Her tail was as curly as her mane, he noticed, before noticing something else that caused him to raise a brow.

“Amethyst?” he asked. “Do you... not have a cutie mark?”

The young Unicorn was instantly flustered and turned her body away from him, causing him to smirk. “I-I have no idea what you're talking about..” she said sheepishly.

During his time in Equestria, he had never seen a pony her age without one. The closest was probably the Cutie Mark Crusaders who had told him tales of being bullied for not having theirs yet.

Amethyst looked down in shame. “Fine, you got me. Being cooped up in the orphanage for all that time didn't really let me spread my wings and try stuff, y'know?”

“It's nothing to be ashamed of.” Gabriel replied, trying his best to be comforting. “If anything, it means your special talent has endless possibilities. It makes you more unique, not less.”

Amethyst's eyes lit up like stars in the night sky and her blush returned. “Aww... that's the nicest thing anypony has ever said to me.”

“And hey, between jobs maybe we could try and find out what your talent is. Even if it's not magic related, some magic practice wouldn't hurt.”

“Sounds good!” she replied, beaming. “Oh, let me go wash this before I forget.”

Gabriel waved after her as she went, noticing a strange feeling roll down his face. He wiped his hand across his cheek, and was then immensely disturbed when he saw the blood that stained his hand. He followed it down and noticed a drop of blood on the journal resting in his lap.