Author's Note
Let me know if there's any mistakes.
Rebel Witho̶u̶t a Cause
Twilight Sparkle loved to study. This was a well known fact within Celestia’s school for gifted Unicorns, and indeed outside of it as well. Seeing her wandering the winding streets of Canterlot, head buried in some ancient tome, had become so common, many citizens of the capital had taken to a new sport aptly dubbed ‘Sparkle spotting’. 10 points if you managed to catch her walking headlong into a lamp post: 50 points if she walked headlong into you. Twilight's voracious appetite for knowledge meant that it would often take nothing short of Princess Celestia herself to coax her away from her studies and sometimes even then, a few dozen attempts were needed.
Her studious nature was something she took immense pride in, which is why it frustrated her to no end that she couldn’t, for the life of her, concentrate on her current lesson.
Outside the classroom window, the Sun began a slow dip below cloud cover, and the only thing keeping Twilight’s eyelids from following suit was the thought that she would never live it down. The Twilight Sparkle, the queen of pop quizzes herself falling asleep in class? They’d tell stories for years. Still, there was something about the stifling summer haze mixed with the tedious nature of a lecture on ancient tribal politics that had Twilight contemplating playing hooky for the rest of the day. She briefly allowed her mind to wander to her favoured reading spot, a pillowy soft patch of grass down by the school's lake, where the shade of an old oak provided a reprieve from the heat. There she could be lazy for the day. Well, if you could call reading an endless stream of literature, ‘being lazy’ at any rate.
“...consequently, Clover the Clever drafted a treaty which put a stop to the hostilities between the two sides.” Mrs. Inkwell concluded her lecture by snapping shut the book held aloft by her magic, the sharp sound bringing Twilight harshly back to reality.
“Can one of you give me a major outcome of this treaty besides an end to the fighting?” Twilight's mental whiplash faded just quick enough for her to realise that her irate teacher was staring right at her. “Miss Sparkle?”
“Umm uhh well…s-sorry what was the question again?” Twilight's head sunk, red cheeked from the classwide giggling that followed her floundering.
Mrs. Inkwell smiled (or atleast, what counted as smiling for her, a slight crease at one corner of her mouth) no doubt pleased to have caught Celestia’s prized pupil so thoroughly off guard. “Not like you at all dear, something bothering you?” she asked, somehow managing to sound simultaneously concerned and condescending.
Twilight shook her head “No Ma’am, just daydreaming is all,” deciding that honesty was the best policy in this instance. Mrs Inkwell clearly didn’t agree with this, otherwise she wouldn’t have raised her eyebrow quite so menacingly. Twilight gulped.
“Well, I suppose everypony has off days, even prized students,” she turned back towards the class blackboard and began writing “Try not to make a habit of it, Miss Sparkle,” she said. Twilight sighed in relief, suppressing the urge to whip around and throttle the colt behind her who hadn’t quite stopped giggling at her expense yet.
Mrs. Inkwell had been a teacher at Celestia’s school since before Twilight's dad had been a student and she had a reputation for being tough. Twilight supposed that every rumour had its limits, even ones about fierce schoolmistresses.
As if reading Twilight’s thoughts, the austere teacher sent a piece of chalk spinning through the air at frightening speed. It whizzed past Twilight's ear, catching the colt behind her on the tip of the horn. The cobalt blue colt yelped in surprise, his face turning a rather deep shade of red after being the one on the receiving end of the class's mirth. “Blue Dawn, back to work if you don’t mind,” Mrs. Inkwell said in a saccharine voice. Not once had she taken her eyes off of the blackboard.
Maybe not that one though. She wriggled in her seat and straightened her spine to rouse her attention span lest she incur the wrath of her teacher twice in the space of thirty seconds. Shortly after, she slumped forward, melting into her chair without the permission of her conscious mind.
Even after her brush with academic death, the young unicorn still found her mind drifting to the distant corners of her imagination, thoughts roaming for something, anything, to keep her from going insane. What in Celestia’s name is with me today? OH I probably shouldn’t sa- think something like that. What if the Princess can hear me? Can she read minds? I’ll have to ask her the next time I-
The sharp crack of Mrs. Inkwell's voice cut through Twilight’s musings once again and for a moment, her life flashed before her eyes at the thought of being called out twice in the same lesson. “Well that should be enough for today,” Twilight almost yelled in relief. “Please pack your things away and do remember to turn in your assignment on Commander Hurricane before next week's lesson, I’m looking at you Miss Bristle,” it didn’t take long for her voice to be drowned out by the ever increasing fervour of excitable colts and fillies, eager for freedom. Twilight couldn’t judge, she was the first one out the door.
In all her life Twilight had never found liberation from academia so refreshing. She jaunted down the vast halls of Celestia’s school for gifted unicorns, barely taking the time to admire the centuries old architecture as was her norm. No, today the high marble columns and the painstakingly carved diorama of the school's history plastered at the tops of every archway held no beauty in the eyes of Twilight Sparkle. Today she found the carpeted halls to be stuffy and overbearing. She barely spared a glance for the stained glass windows of the building's entry as she practically pranced down the steps leading toward the road to the castle. Really, her mother would have thrown a fit had she witnessed her daughter's flagrant disregard for such artwork. At this thought, Twilight giggled openly, reveling in her new found rebellious streak and eager to test its limits.
The purple ‘troublemaker’ came to a stop, remembering belatedly that the book on equestrian folklore she had borrowed from the castle's archives would be considered overdue tomorrow morning. Sure, she was hardcore now but she wasn’t some crazy anarchist. Overdue books were important, so exploring her rebel spirit would have to wait.
“Ahh what the hay, might as well pick up some light reading while I’m there,” she said to herself, giddy at the prospect. “Something fun though, like Starswirl's advanced magical principles”. Grinning from ear to ear and only slightly embarrassed at the fact that several ponies had spotted her talking to herself, the young unicorn set off for Canterlot’s grand archives.
As it often did during long walks through the narrow streets, Twilight fondly recalled her first few ventures into the wilds of her home city. The labyrinthian sprawl of Canterlot was famous for many a reason, not least of which for being impenetrable to the unprepared newbie.
As an even younger fillie, she had lost countless hours in the back streets that spread from the main thoroughfare like the roots of some enormous tree, each connective alley and dead end littered with unique, hole-in-the-wall locales that fascinated her beyond belief. In those days, she felt like a daring explorer, braving the unknown of some exotic country with equal parts treasure and danger around every corner! Of course, years later she had found out that her big brother had shadowed her on her ‘expeditions’ for safety reasons... but darn it, the magic was still there!
Now, a not quite all-grown-up Twilight was a veteran of the great maze and knew most of the shortcuts like the back of her hoof. It was this experience that made Twilight’s trip a relatively short one, cutting through a backstreet she knew led directly to the boulevard that held the Archives stately stairway.
Once there, she vaulted the alabaster steps two at a time, overtaking the slower ponies, ignoring indigent yelps of protest and bemused glances aplenty. Slightly winded, she crested the final steps with a flourish and kept up her excited pace, until she could see the entrance to the archives in all its glory.
Canterlots (and probably the rest of the countries) largest collection of knowledge could be found in the royal gardens, somehow managing to maintain a sense of prim and properness amongst the cacophony of colour. It was a massive slab of sensibly carved limestone that dominated the northeastern corner of the gardens and its muted grey/white stone blending in with the environment about as well as a minotaur in massage parlour, only with a lot more rigidity. Frankly, it stuck out like a sore hoof, much to the eternal chagrin of the royal gardeners no doubt. Twilight didn’t care though, to her the wealth of information stored within its intimidating walls made it more beautiful than any flower in sight.
Once again, she made quick work of the steps in her way and trotted through the open oak doors, greeting the flanking pair of Royal guards with a shy smile. They didn’t so much as blink back but Twilight knew they were glad to see her, if the stories from Shining were to be believed anyway. According to him the rest of the guard had all but adopted her as their own collective little sister.
Wasting no more time ruminating on the logistics of having 1000 extra siblings, Twilight made a beeline for the solid marble reception desk currently occupied by perhaps her favorite pony in the whole of the city, Quick Scribe (Actual big brothers and Princesses not included of course).
The Chief Archivist was somepony that Twilight had gotten to know rather well over the course of her apprenticeship and well before that as well seeing as he had been good friends with her father for years. With the great library practically her second home, Twilight had spent a lot of time learning from him in between bouts of groaning at his terrible humour.
As she approached the desk, Twilight noticed that the librarian was engrossed in a broadsheet, a half chewed quill floating lazily in the air, wrapped in his verdant magic aura. He mumbled to himself, unintelligibly.
“Hmm…6 letters...that can’t....”
Twilight didn’t really want to break his concentration but she couldn’t stifle the giggling that bubbled up at the sight of Quick Scribe attempting to ferry his gnawed-upon quill back into his mouth, but miss and poke himself in the nose. He startled somewhat at the noise but relaxed at the sight of the young filly, amusement rippling beneath his outwardly stern facade.
“And just what is it that you find so amusing, Miss Sparkle?” He narrowed his eyes behind the thin reading glasses perched atop his muzzle and raised one brow. The whole look might have been quite intimidating, were it not for the fact that he continued to prod himself in the face with his magic suspended quill. Fitful snorts of laughter escaped Twilight, despite her best efforts and Quick Scribe grinned at the sound.
“Hey there Sparkler,” he began in a much softer tone “I thought you might be by today, already filled out the return form for you,” a single sheet of paper, also wrapped in a translucent green drifted from behind the librarians desk and landed in front of Twilight, who wasted no time retrieving the book in question from her saddle bag.
“Thanks Quick!” She smiled at him, sunnily and Quick Scribe did his level best to stop his heart from melting at the sight. Twilight plunged on, evidently unaware of his plight. “What are you working on?”
“Hmm? Oh! Just the Equestria Daily crossword, nothing too exciting. You know how us old stallions can be,” he gave her a knowing wink but frowned as he looked back at his paper. “I must be losing my touch though, this ones throwing me for a loop,” his brow ruffled in concentration and mumbled to himself again “6 letters...a cold that lasts for years on end,” just barely loud enough for Twilight to hear.
“How about ‘ice-age’?” Twilight asked.
Quick Scribe stared at the paper for a long moment. Then, quicker than one might expect from a mild-mannered archivist, he slammed both paper and quill onto the desk with a whoop of triumph. “Ice-age! Genius!” A grin large enough for several ponies split his face “Sparkler, I suspect you've just saved me a few hours of frustration,” his manic smile was infectious and Twilight couldn’t help the pride that swelled in her chest. “Go on through, I’ll get the return all sorted,” Quick said, satisfied at having overcome his roadblock, or rather, having it removed for him.
Twilight placed her book alongside its return form and gave him one last smile before skipping past the great white desk, preparing herself for a long dive beneath the waves of the academia. Briefly, she wondered how Quick Scribe had known that she had wanted to pick out even more books but chalked it up to good guess work, as if she wasn't the most transparent pony on the planet when it came to the need to read.
The young prodigy strolled, trancelike, through the gargantuan library, and was far too enraptured by the several hundred lifetimes worth of books to pay any attention to trivial matters such as time and space. What felt like mere moments of walking was in actuality about 45 minutes and eventually, Twilight was so deep in the bowels of the archives that Quick Scribe, along with everypony else, might as well have been in another dimension.
Back when the archives had had its first major expansion, the Princess of all ponies had allegedly spent three whole days navigating her way back to the entrance from the Rom-com section. The country had been in full blown panic mode searching for her when she sheepishly emerged from the shelves with the third instalment of her favourite guilty pleasure series. From that day on, it was mandatory for a mass locator spell to be active at all times within the vast building. Now, no matter what area of the Canterlot athenaeum one finds themselves in, they will instinctively know where the entrance hall is, something that had brought Twilight no small amount of relief upon hearing for the first time. She tried to imagine what it must have been like before the spell's introduction and her impressive imagination led her to fanciful stories of lost tribes of library aids banded together in order to survive the hostile wilds of the stacks.
She plucked books from the shelves at random as she walked and idly flicked through each with a speed reader's glance. Anything that seemed particularly interesting she crammed into her already overflowing saddle bags for further study later. Around the 10th thick, unwieldy hard back that Twilight really began to notice the change.
Most other ponies probably would have seen it in the shift in lighting or felt it in the sudden weight of an oppressive atmosphere not typical of a simple library, but Twilight Sparkle being Twilight Sparkle picked it up through the contents of the books. Practical Use of Teleportation had been the first and was one that most learned unicorns were rather familiar with. Then came Spells for the Aspiring Doctor followed by A Study of Modern Flight Techniques (not that she’d need these but it was nice to know). Twilight looked at the two tomes she currently held aloft, Defensive Magic: 4th Edition and Survival Tactics: A Royal Guards Best Friend. She furrowed her brow in confusion and slight concern as clearly somewhere along the line, the material had become a tad...serious for somepony her age and not in the scholastic sense. At this revelation, she pried her attention away from the pages and took stock of her environment.
It was dark. Way too dark to be of use to any prospective scholar at any rate and Twilight could see why. The crystal-like sconces that normally dotted the gaps between shelves at regular intervals were strangely absent in this dim...wherever she was. Instead they were replaced by scarcely lit torches that burned a dull sapphire, bathing Twilight and her surroundings, in an eerie, almost arcane light. Her first instinct was to panic about an open flame in a hall of dry parchment but she figured that the fire gave off a magical feel for a reason. The shelves were different too. Gone were towering walls of alabaster, carved into the shape of alcoves and gone were the brightly coloured and clearly labeled treasures that filled them. In their place were ancient looking oak brackets that barely reached the ceiling, teeming with tattered, spine faded books that could more accurately be described as ‘grimoires’ than anything else.
It didn't take long for Twilight’s mind to catch up with her feelings of unease. After all, the restricted section was not something the average pony should play around with.
She’d only ever set foot within the ominous wing a few times before and never had she been alone. Celestia had impressed upon her the dangers that the books from these shelves could contain and the ever faithful student that she was, Twilight had made sure to listen. Even if the thought of such powerful and secret magic made her almost vibrate with excitement. It wasn’t as if she was scared of the place itself, but rather the potential disappointment on the face of the Princess should she be caught wandering around without permission.
With Celestia’s stern face locked firmly in her mind Twilight closed her eyes to concentrate on the building-wide tracking spell to find the fastest route out. Or rather, that's what she had intended to do. Instead, in the split second before she could match her own magic with the rather simple wavelength of the spell, she felt an inexplicable tugging that began at the tip of her horn. She thought nothing of it at first, perhaps a reaction from one of the old tomes being exposed to direct magic but, once the sensation spread down her horn and into her mind she was forced to take notice.
A warm, inviting sensation filled her brain, spreading like the cracks of a broken mirror only without the sharp edges. It made her happy in an indescribable way and she felt a smile creep its way across her face. It was more than simple elation however, and Twilight wasn’t entirely sure how to explain it. A sort of...sense of purpose filled her to the brim and now, the last thing she wanted to do was leave. What was she thinking? Here she was at the centre of the country's knowledge, surrounded on all sides by books that had possibly been untouched for generations and she had wanted to leave for the fear of being reprimanded? Nonsense. She had to stay and absorb as much information as possible, the Princess would understand. Rebel Twilight was back!
She took a deep breath, new aspirations in mind and stomped purposefully deeper into the foreboding depths of the restricted section.
In Which Several Pieces of Wood Ruin Twilight's Day
“A Tale of Two Sisters…” Twilight rotated the ancient looking text slowly, as near to her snout as she dared, trying to take in every last detail. It was old and worn of course, all the books within eyesight were. It had sat on the shelf wedged between a manual for dangerous flora and a guide to lesser transmogrify, simultaneously innocuous and the most intriguing thing in the world. The faded leather of its spine held no text but the surprisingly preserved cover depicted two unicorns with crossed horns set above a breathtakingly intricate crown stamped with six jewels. An expert piece of calligraphy at the bottom, gave Twilight it’s title.
Without even needing to touch it, the thing had her on edge. After all, not just any old book could maintain its own spell after so long, let alone one powerful enough to ensnare a mage as well versed as Twilight.
It had taken her an embarrassingly long time to notice in hindsight but eventually the steel trap that was her mind began to piece together the clues. The unshakable drive to carry on, the renewed sense of interest and, most importantly, a predetermined destination that she had seemingly plucked from thin air. The tell tale signs of a strong compulsion spell. Twilight silently thanked Celestia for having lectured her on said spells some weeks before, not wanting to think about what would happen if she hadn’t been able to recognise the signs.
After shaking off the shackles of the compulsion, she realised had a bigger problem on her hooves, one that couldn’t be blamed on any external stimuli. Burning curiosity. Was some pony playing a trick on her? Was it some sort of bizarre security system that diverted attention away from the more dangerous text? She had to know and, with a sinking feeling in her stomach she mentally prepared herself for the ire of the Princess she was sure to be on the receiving end of later. So on she stalked through the dry, lifeless expanse of the only library she knew of to be off limits, justifying her trespassing as something that wouldn’t take too long anyway. She’d find the source of this eerie spell and be off before the sun went down. Easy-peasy. In fact if she was lucky, the Princess might never know! Her head sagged, knowing full well that she would tell her mentor every word, unprompted regardless of what happened.
It wasn’t that hard to find it. All she had to do was relinquish some control of her mind to the will of the spell. In many ways it was not so different from the tracking spell of the library, if somewhat more sinister. Either way, Twilight was confident in her ability to maintain her own mental faculties without handing over the reins completely. The ambient magic of the surrounding books had complicated things a little but whatever the source of the spell was, it was more than strong enough to cut through the background noise.
Almost inevitably, the magical source had turned out to be a book.
She sounded the title of the book out once more, racking her brain for information. She knew what the title referred to of course, most scholars did. Almost a millennia ago, Princess Celestia ruled alongside her sister Luna until the Nightmare Moon incident brought about the downfall of younger Alicorn. What was perplexing to the young filly was the specific wording.
“Two Sisters…” Twilight mumbled again. She had seen that name before, she was sure of it. She just couldn’t quite put her hoof on where. Almost ubiquitously referred to as the Sun and the Moon respectively, very few academic texts used the phrase ‘Two Sisters’ to describe Celestia and Luna, something Twilight had always found strange. After some pestering, the Princess simply told her that the term was outdated and left it at that. Twilight didn’t push the matter after that.
After some time, she reluctantly filed the thought away for later and instead focused on what was in front of her. The next logical step was, of course, to open the thing but even her inquisitive nature couldn’t mask her nervousness. Well, you’ve come this far, you may as well finish it she thought to herself.
Steeling her resolve, she snapped open to the first page before her cautiousness could get the better of her and immediately yelped in surprise when the aged text took on a life of its own. It lept from her the embrace of her magic yet still hung in the air as if supported and slowly, very slowly, began to unravel itself. The tight lace that bound the spine slithered from its confines like a lethargic serpent and spooled in suspension, separate from the rest while numerous yellowed pages spread themselves before Twilight in a seemingly random fashion. To her disappointment (and some degree of relief) the dried text upon the pages was written in a language she had never seen before. She was mesmerized by the display, the sheer fascination of it all completely overshadowing any apprehension she had felt, replacing it with a desire to know the secrets of the book. Eventually, the contents of the tome gathered into a rough circle, and coalesced into an uneven, solid accumulation of paper that glowed ever so slightly in the dull light of the sconces.
Twilight held her breath, not wanting to disturb the entrancing magic on display. After a few, long seconds of stillness, she took an unsteady step toward the once-book, hoof outstretched. Before she could make contact, the paper mass contracted in a manner eerily similar to a live creature, the rippling pulse of skin. Once the motion was complete, a new symbol adorned its surface, one that stood out with a pale iridescence and moved ever so slightly in a simple animation.
Two winged unicorns, identical in all but colour, crossed horns at the centre of the circle, one the bright white of a summer's day and the other the deep navy of a moonlit night. They circled each other, swaying too and fro in a perfect harmony that was wondrous to behold, balancing each other out like some grand celestial scale in a fluid dance that Twilight could not keep her eyes off of. Only belated did her enraptured brain recognise the tell tale tugging sensation behind the navel that heralded teleportation.
She tried her best to fight, casting every counterspell a student as young as she should know (and then several others beyond that) but it was all for naught.
Her world turned upside down as she was forced into the spell but that was mostly because she came out the other side 5 hooves off of the ground. The quick meet and greet with the floor knocked the wind out of Twilight but she was fortunate enough to land on a ratty, moth-eaten rug rather than the unforgiving stone that it covered. Not that that's much consolation given that I’m now hopelessly lost and potentially miles away from home but... y’know ... optimism she thought to herself as she dragged her dazed body to its hooves.
Okay Twilight, think. You have no idea what just happened OR where you are but it seems like it’s safe… at the moment. She rapidly blinked to get her eyes used to the oppressive dark, only to mentally facehoof once she remembered that she was, in fact, a unicorn. A shimmering glow emanated from the tip of her horn and she squeezed her eyes shut to concentrate on shedding some much needed light on the situation. The glow grew steadily, until the faintly magenta radiance revealed the room in its entirety. Once she opened her eyes again, she glanced around the space to get her bearings and almost lost her concentration immediately at the sight before her.
Thick, razor sharp shards of glass jutted out from the dozens of apertures that lined the carved stone walls on both sides, stained a multitude of colours by design but brown with age. The very top of the high, vaulted ceiling reached just beyond the range of Twilight's illumination but she estimated it to be at least 100 hooves tall and carved in such fine detail that she doubted she’d ever make out it’s intricacies even if she stared at it for hours. At one end, farthest from her, the largest set of double doors Twilight had ever seen sat resting, with one having its hinges sheared off enough that the weight of the thing must have brought it crashing down. Both of the carved doors had been reclaimed by nature, wrapped tightly in choking wines and rough leaves: in fact, the wilds had re-taken a lot of the floor too, with vibrant looking weeds sprouting from between the cracks of the ruined stone. All of these strange and interesting details that the room contained were wasted on Twilight however, for her attention was drawn solely by what she found mere inches from where she first lay.
Opposite the ruined entryway, up a few steps draped in once-fine red carpet, two thrones sat, mostly untouched by the chaos that surrounded them and seemingly unbothered by the long fingers of father time. The larger one, a solid mass of ivory carved with the relief of the sun, sat slightly further forward than its partner, catching and reflecting any light that was determined enough to make it through the shattered windows. The smaller seat was pitch black except for small flecks of luminescent white and seemed to be made from the deepest obsidian. It’s tall backing was etched with what looked like all of the phases of the moon. Belatedly, Twilight noticed that the same symbol from the book that had brought her to... wherever she was, also happened to be engraved upon the wall behind both seats of power.
And just like that, she connected the dots. “Of course it was so obvious!” she shouted, caution gone with the wind. “Whenever The phrase ‘Two sisters’ is used, it usually refers to the name of Celestia's old castle! That book must have been some sort of...of fixed teleport or something,” The egg-head had forgotten all about her current predicament in favour of theory craft. This probably would have continued for a while had it not been for one very important fact that washed over Twilight’s brain like an icy shower, snapping her back to reality. The location of the Castle of the Two Sisters had been lost to living memory: mostly because it was buried deep within the Everfree Forest.
The Everfree Forest. The Great Unknown. The last wild place left in Equestria. Home to beasts and bandits alike and most definitely NOT a place meant for young fillies. Yeh, that Everfree. Twilight deflated like a pink and purple balloon, thoroughly drained of all excitement from her discovery.
From the corner of her eye, something long, crooked and, above all, creepy shifted in the shadows that made up the land beyond the (formerly) great stained glass windows, sending Twilight into a leap she wouldn't have even thought herself capable of. Once she remade contact with the ground she skittered away from the offending silhouette and pointed her horn at the window to at least be able to see her would-be assailant. She was almost glad nopony else was there to witness this however, considering that it was only a tree branch.
“Come on Sparkle, it’s just wood, get a hold of yourself,” she half-whispered, taking tentative steps toward the window and letting out a nervous chuckle when the guilty tree came into full view from her spell's illumination. Yep, just a regular old tree branch, connected to a regular old tree, nothing scary about that, no siree. She took several more steps forward and stood in the window frame, mindful of ancient glass shards. She was surprised to find that the forest floor was only a short hop from the throne room's window and, not wanting to accidentally slip, teleported herself to firmer footing. The wild grass beneath her hooves felt rough compared to the manicured lawns of canterlot but Twilight found a strange comfort in it, despite her nervous disposition.
The outside air was cool despite the season, but it was hardly fresh. All manner of overpowering smells vied for domination of her senses and most were not pleasant. Overhead, the thick canopy kept any trace of her mentor's comforting sunlight from reaching Twilight, even so close to the castle walls the gnarled branches were interwoven in such a way that not very much at all could pass through. The strange, frankly quite alarming, calls of the local fauna filled the air and set her on edge enough that she decided to dim the level of light she was producing for fear of disturbing something less than friendly. The underbrush was as dense as she expected but its weird and wonderful flora certainly had its own ethereal sense of chaotic beauty: a far cry from the neatly organised beds of the Royal gardens. She scanned the various plants with interest and made a mental note to research some of the more intriguing ones in the future. At the far reaches of her vision, unsettling masses of shadow moved restlessly, darting this way and that in sluggish attempts to escape the mild light generated by Twilight's spell which just about managed to highlight the outline of vaguely wolven shaped creatures languidly emerging from the- wait, what?
The young unicorn blinked rapidly to make sure she wasn’t hallucinating and, upon realisation that she was unfortunately not, began to chant under her breath a string of words that would no doubt catch her a firm scolding had any of her teachers been around to hear it.
Rotting muzzles manifested in the gloom, teaming with feral looking chips of wood hanging in the shadows, each just below a set of sickly green eyes, swirling with barely contained malice. More solid looking hunks of wood atop their heads gave the faint impression of horns and a single leaf sat upon both brows. The bodies, twisting heaps of fetid lumbar, moved with the sinuous grace of powerful muscle despite their fractured appearance: all four ferocious looking legs tipped with intertwining roots sharpened into needle-like points. The putrid stench of a hundred dead trees, mixed with Celestia knew what else permeated the space, rolling off of the creatures in waves, spewing out from their ferocious maws and choking the air enough to make Twilight's eyes water, something that made it even harder to keep them in sight incase they pounced. All six of the foul looking faces fixed Twilight with the stare of a predator and she didn’t have to think very hard to figure out that she was the prey.
The wooden wolves padded towards her slowly, deliberately, trying to get into her blind spots as pack hunters are wont to do but Twilight knew their game, she’d studied the common tactics of hunting mammals before and she wasn’t going to give them a chance to surround her. First, a distraction: she cranked the brightness of her horn to a blinding degree, too quick for the wolves to adjust and snuffed it out altogether a split second later. In the darkness she could hear their yelps of surprise. Not giving herself a moment to hesitate, Twilight squinted her eyes in concentration and teleported directly behind the pack, who for their part were still trying to acclimatise to make shift flashbang that their prey had set off. Blind teleportation was always dangerous of course, but Twilight had made sure to set herself a target before putting her plan in motion, as such she re-entered reality in a safe location: a tiny clearing a few meters away from the rearmost wolf. The next step of her plan was simple: run like tartarus.
Okay so the last step wasn’t the most elegant of ideas but Twilight's fear-addled brain couldn’t really come up with any alternatives to sprinting through an unknown, dangerous forest, running the serious possibility of coming across something even more deadly than what was already chasing her. At the very least, she’d had the sense to reactivate her light spell so that she wasn’t running totally in the dark. It may have painted a target on her back but Twilight reasoned that her pursuers could likely hunt blind anyway, and that being able to see where was running was far more preferable than stacking over some errant root she couldn't see and potentially breaking her neck.
Over vine and underbrush she ran, without a clear direction in mind. She didn’t want to risk another teleport with such momentum, lest she accidentally send herself hurtling off of a cliff or landing directly in front of a tree. So she ran as if tartarus were hot on her heels which, for all intents and purposes, it was. She didn’t dare turn around to look, but the dreadful baying of the pack followed her wherever she went meaning that the wolves hadn’t given up the chase. Through the haze of terror, Twilight’s ears managed to pick up the sound of a creature yelping: in fear or pain she couldn’t tell, but either way she was mostly certain that it hadn’t come from her own mouth. Mostly. She kept up her pace regardless, deciding that some poor creature in the vast woods crying out wasn’t relevant to saving her own fur. She nearly cringed at her own callousness.
She ran until she reached a large cleaning containing a shallow looking pool of water, ruddy and uninviting. What did look inviting however, was the towering tree trunk dotted with low hanging branches that shadowed the pond. The ululation of wolf howls was much further away now and Twilight was so thankful that she didn’t stop to think about how she had managed to out run them. If she could teleport herself to one of the more accessible branches, she might just be able to scramble her way to the top and hide! The dense upper parts would surely hold her weight long enough for her predators to lose interest and then she could climb down and…well she’d cross that bridge when she came to it. Right now survival was most important.
Taking hastened steps around the water and toward the tree, Twilight was almost giddy with relief. Only to be plunged into a pit of despair when she heard the brush behind her rustle violently and the grating growl of a wooden wolf. Three of the nightmarish creatures darted into the clearing and gave Twilight a hungry glare. As before, she kept her eyes on them as best she could, unwilling to give them even a slight opportunity to attack. She hadn’t completely abandoned her plan either, and so moved backward as slowly as she dared toward her possible safe haven. It was at this point that Twilight noticed something strange.
Before, the wooden creatures had locked onto her with an unyielding gaze that was no doubt designed to paralyse her with fear. Now they seemed to barely give her a once over every few seconds before swiveling their heads in all the directions, scanning the tree line of the clearing with wary looks. If Twilight didn’t know any better, it looked as if the wolves were being hunted themselves. When only three of her pursuers had burst into the clearing Twilight had assumed that the others were close behind or hiding in the brush waiting for a chance to strike but now she wasn’t so sure. Fear of whatever thing could harm such horrible creatures clawed its way up Twilight’s spine and she began to panic. From the edge of her vision she could see curls of steam hiss from the surface of the water.
Without so much as warning a flash of green erupted from within the trees. It shot into the clearing with ruthless accuracy and engulfed the wolf nearest to Twilight like a blinding emerald firework, reducing the yowling creature to ash in a matter of seconds. The late wolves contemporaries jumped into action, facing the source of the fire with defensive stances and warning growls. In response, the wannabe pyromaniac prowled into view with a frightening tranquility and Twilight felt her heart stop.
Shimmering scales of dark purple formed the majority of its lithe form, except for its pale green underbelly which convulsed with the effort of reigning in its flames and delivering a low, bone rattling growl of its own. The verdant spikes that ran the length of its body which were rather soft looking, all things considered, but the way that they were pinned back along with the light frills on the sides of its head, suggested that it was certainly not in the mood to be stroked or petted. Its eyes, slitted and reptilian, were every bit as sharp as its lethal looking claws and burned with an intensity that rivaled the flames from its maw. Deep emerald flames spilled from between its serrated fangs in flickers and spurts, threatening to burst forth in a cascade of flame that would consume everything like that rather unfortunate wolf.It was surprisingly small, stalking along the ground on all fours just a little larger than as Twilight, and perhaps a shade longer thanks to the muscular tail that it sported, but what it lacked in size it more than made up for in taut athletic looking muscle that shunted beneath its scales in dangerous fluidity: it was certainly no runt. Twilight had seen such a creature before through her studies but this one had stepped from the pages of her textbooks and into her reality with impeccable timing. She couldn’t believe her poor luck, first a pack of hungry walking trees had tried to run her down and now she’d come face to face with an honest-to-goodness dragon.
Twilight thanked Celestia for small blessings that the scaly menace seemed to be focused entirely on her original attackers rather than her, for the moment at least, but she was so shell-shocked by it’s appearance that she’d forgotten all about her original plan of action. Instead she stood transfixed, watching through wide, frightened eyes as the two hunters circled each other.
It happened so fast that Twilight could barely keep track of it. The wolves made the first move, leaping in unison toward the dragon, mouths agape trying to latch onto the scaly throat but falling short thanks to the dragon's lightning reflexes. It coiled its body like a snake, reeling in its exposed neck to just out of range of gnashing wooden teeth and let fly with a bite of its own in retaliation. The first wolf to land didn’t even have a chance to howl as the dragon clamped down upon the rotten bundle of wood that connected shoulder to neck and tore it to splinters in one feral yank. The glowing green of its eyes faded into nothingness, swirling into mist as the body crumpled. The remaining wolf took the open created by its companions' demise with pitiless efficiency by biting down hard on the dragon's forearm and violently shaking its head back and forth. An ear-drum bursting roar resounded throughout the clearing as the dragon fought hard to dislodge his foe, thrashing the wolf with his free claw even as his scales began to dent under the pressure of wooden teeth. After several seconds of this the dragon had had enough and so he lifted the wolf in its entirety in an impressive display of brute strength and staggered over to a nearby tree where it slammed the wolf into the trunk without hesitation, finally loosening the vice grip around its arm. The wolf fell to the ground and did not rise again.
It was almost silent in the clearing, only the pained panting of the dragon breaking the peace every few seconds as it caught its breath. Twilight couldn’t move, frozen in place by the display of brutality and by the fear of being noticed so she watched on, rendered mute and immobile. The dragon sniffed the air as if searching and pawed at the remains of the wolf, scattering its lumbar around the bases of the surrounding trees. Twilight couldn’t help but whimper when the great beast snapped his head in her direction and bore a hole through her frame with his penetrating scowl.
A million thoughts raced through Twilight's head as the dragon stalked toward her, searching desperately for a way out. Her ‘blink up into the tree and hide’ plan didn’t feel so sure fire, not now that a dragon was her hunter, as she was sure those long claws could scale any tree. She decided that the best tricks often worked twice and so resigned herself to another short teleport behind her assailant and a long sprint through the unknowing, scrambling for a way to safety. Twilight groaned. She didn’t have to think too much about the terrible futility of her plan though: the dragon was gearing itself up to pounce.
It launched itself towards her, fangs and claws flashing menacingly in the charging light of Twilight's teleport. She’d have to get the timing just right otherwise the creature wouldn’t be sufficiently stunned by her disappearance and she would lose precious seconds in the chase, it was hooves away now and she could see the sparking green of its internal lighter jolting within its mouth. NOW she screamed internally but she hesitated. At the last moment she noticed that the piercing reptilian eyes were not focused on her directly, but rather just past her shoulder. The dragon sailed right over her head, landing atop a fourth member of the pack, one that had apparently snuck up behind Twilight and was waiting for a moment to strike. Lost in her fear of the dragon, she hadn’t even noticed. The wolf virtually exploded under the weight of the armoured mass of dragon, who stomped the ground several times, perhaps warding off any other potential enemies lurking amongst the trees.
Standing amongst the wooden bones of its kill, the dragon turned to face Twilight once more, its mouth stretched into a grim line filled with far too many teeth as it opened its jaw and...offered Twilight a friendly inquisitive smile “Hi! My name's Spike! What's yours?”
