Sweetie flashed her badge dangerously at the supernatural threat. "Surrender!"

"And if I'd rather not?" He spilled some wine in the grand wave of his hoof. "Oh dear, look what you've made me do." His lower jaw dislocated into a jeering mockery of an expression. "I do hate wasting good spirits. I'll just have to get some replacements."

With a thrust of his hooves, ghostly figures rose all around him. "Good spirits for everyone," he shouted as the images surged forward, knocking Sweetie back in a wave of spectral fury. "Drink up. Drink deep. This is a night for celebration, to remember, to forget. Drink until there's no more room, and drink a little more."

As sinister spirit revenants swirled forth heeding their profane master's call, Sweetie swiftly spun out detonation vials from her bandolier. The blessed silver-nitrate mists burned swirling holes through the phantasmal ranks even as more arose to replace them.

"We'll see who drinks last when I bottle your own essence, specter!" Sweetie growled through clenched teeth. Her head rang from the earlier blow but she stood her ground. This monster had to fall tonight lest the dawn see more innocents dancing themselves direly towards death's door under his machinations.

Glancing over her shoulder through the melee, Sweetie spied Luna struggling to shield them both from the grasping briars still hungering to drag them into the thorn-laced revelry. Time for a new angle before they were both overwhelmed through attrition...

Firing another volley of anti-undead vials skyward to afford scant breathing room, Sweetie called loudly over the orchestral din, "Luna! This bog reeks of sacrificial death magic - likely his anchor binding him nightly to renew torment! We must consecrate whatever fetid relic sustains this creature come dawn!"

She could practically taste iron in the air as more ghastly poltergeists pressed the attack. But a glimpse of fierce resolution in Luna's eyes heartened Sweetie's spirit for the confrontation ahead.

Luna brought her wings down in a powerful flap, dodging the grasping vines and rising above them. The act left Sweetie to defend herself, but it gave Luna the vantage she desired. "A relic, A relic..."

Sweetie barely parried a thorny vine, hissing in pain as it cut into her, leaving fine lines. "I don't like this," she understated, pulling out a fresh vial. "Let's see how you do with some weed--Ow!" Another vine lashed her hoof, making the bottle fly and shatter. Its contents spilled out and the vines near it screamed in torment, withering rapidly away.

Sweetie winced at the stinging lacerations but defiance blazed within as Luna took swift advantage of the brief respite afforded. Scanning desperately about the perimeter of flailing vines and raucous undead, Sweetie sought some profane artifact amidst the cursed bog anchoring their adversary beyond death's liberation.

There! Half obscured within the mud rested a bleached pony skull, vines threaded through the sockets like macabre marionette strings. The bone appeared carved intricately with runes no doubt signifying vile purpose. As Sweetie watched, the pony specter gestured and another enthralled village dancer collapsed sightlessly nearby...

"The skull, Luna!" Sweetie cried, ducking a brutish ghost's wild swing. "Destroy it and his binds likely shatter!" She raced headlong between the briars, boots spraying consecrated oil to clear a smoldering path as phantom minions howled outrage.

Sweetie and Luna both zoomed for it, hooves outstretched for that grisly skull.

"No." The spectre clapped his hooves, spilling his drink as a small gazebo of crystal rose up defensively around the skull. "I think not. As if I'd surrender so easily. No, the dance will continue until we're pleased." He took a deep drink. "Which will be never. I hope you're ready."

Luna landed on top of the gazebo. "As if this can stop us." She stomped around the edge to find a bubble keeping her out. "What sorcery?!"

"Yes, sorcery." The spectre nodded with a matter-of-fact look. "No creature of the day can get through that, and you still count, little pony."

"But I don't!"

"We don't!" Rarity and Bright came flying in out of the darkness, wry smiles on their faces and body tense with readiness to battle.

The bedraggled specter hissed in outrage through jagged teeth as the bat-winged vampiric duo made their unexpected grand entrance swooping with fangs and daggers bared towards his protected fetish anchor.

"You night-kissed traitors dare defy my domain?!" He loosed a bolt of virulent violet energy towards the interlopers, fury creasing his insubstantial features. "I shall drain you hollow!"

Rarity banked sharply, the necrotic blast missing her by inches. "You'll forgive my rudeness of interrupting your little soiree, darling--" Her magic deflected a hurled rose heavy with blood. "But we simply couldn't resist joining in once the dance got interesting!"

The skeletal ritual focus lay directly below, beckoning. Rarity's horn blazed, shielding Bright as he tucked into a ball, rolling with impossible velocity towards the crystal dome. He struck it fiercely, his compact frame reinforced by eldritch energies.

The barrier shuddered but held firm. Rarity cried out as a vicious thorn snapper her past defenses, gouging deeply. Vitae trickled as she wheeled away hissing. "Plan B then!" Through their shared bond Bright felt her agony and desperate resolve.

Rarity lit up once more as Bright bounced higher, beginning a ricocheting barrage smashing relentlessly against the mystic shield while she intensified her searing magic.

Luna laughed with victory. "Yes, you are weakening it." She stomped viciously at the bubble. It wasn't a delicate solution, but when cleverness failed, brute force was a valid fall-back open. "Burst this fell bubble!"

"On... it!" Bright crashed into it, digging his claws and hissing as it crackled and sizzled under him. With a crash, it shattered like broken glass, allowing him to fall past it. "Score! Grab it!"

Sweetie jumped over a tendril, responding with a fresh vial of weed killer. "One moment..."

But as Sweetie flung wide the vial to exorcise their tormentor's tainted totem, a twisted vine lashed out suddenly, sending the flask ricocheting off-course...

Towards the bazerkly-bouncing Bright mid-pounce...

Rarity screamed in wordless warning but too late, the tumbling vial struck Bright directly, noxious goo completely blinding him. He careened wildly off balance through the narrow crystal maze concealing the focal fetish before crashing painfully into a supporting spire. The entire structure groaned as cracks splintered...

“Bright! His condition—the vision from when transformed..." Rarity gasped in dismay. "Spiritbane alchemics are lethally toxic!” Her partner lay writhing and gasping alarmingly within the dissolving shelter. Every parental instinct flared to life in Rarity's breast. That good soul who befriended a monster would not perish from her weakness!

The vampony dove heedlessly forward just as the failing spire fully collapsed...shielding Bright's seizing body with her own as lethal sharps rained down. Agony blossomed but she only curled tighter even as the specter's triumphant cackling redoubled.

"We must...destroy...relic..." Rarity grimaced against cascading rubble and leaking vitae. The carved skull peered just meters away, defiance piercing her through the pain.

Luna's hoof came down with a great thud as her magic grabbed the skull. "We are a team," she stated firmly, turning to glare at the spectre. "And you, are defeated."

With a bright silvery flash of her magic, she crushed the skull into so much powder, blowing away on the wind. The vines withered almost instantly.

The spectre fell to their knees. "It's not fair..." They scuffled at the ground, voice soft. "Not fair... I just wanted..." They blew away just like the vines. In the distance, the music stopped. The spell had been broken.

Luna whirled on Rarity. "Get your familiar to safety. That is your command."

"Gladly." Rarity took flight, hugging Bright close as she fled into the darkness, tears dotting the ground as she went.

Rarity choked back hot tears as she soared desperately under Luna’s command, the worst of injuries concealed against her breast. So swift, so sudden...yet failure stabbed all the same that her overconfidence, her impulsiveness exposed gentle Bright to such suffering. Never again could she dismiss the call to temper boldness with wisdom...

The meadow’s malevolent miasma lightened just barely enough through the specter’s banishment to navigate back westward toward Trottingham’s outskirts. Exhaustion and enervation dragged at every wingbeat but maternal fear for her charge kept leaden limbs in motion. Surely the village housed an apothecary or nurse still...

Spying the familiar torch-lit lanes at last, Rarity pushed her strained vampire physique to its limits, touching down with echoing clatter on the cobblestones bordering a modest thatch-roofed hut. Desperate pounding stirred an aging bespectacled mare who thankfully showed no fear towards midnight callers in distress.

As the matronly pony examined poor convulsing Bright, Rarity held back little whimpers of worry through her own lingering abrasions and oozing bite. Only once his condition stabilized following tense minutes of poultices, tinctures and prayer did the anxious vampony finally collapse into fitful sleep against his cot-side...

Sweetie let out a ragged breath, wiping herself clean of vine bits and her own. "That was a mess."

"But we succeeded." Luna leaned in closer. "Are you alright? Rarity is seeing to Bright. Consider me available for your pains. If you need a lift to town, I will gladly lend it."

Sweetie smiled gently at that. "Nice of you to offer, but my legs still work." She doublechecked her bottles. "Let's get back and make sure everything's alright with those ponies."

Victorious, if tired and pained, they staggered back into town. There, they found ponies that looked even more fatigued. Thankfully, they were slumped and panting instead of dancing against their wills.

Even Lemon Lime was crashed over on her side, heaving for breath and not touching her instrument. She spotted them coming down the road. "Hello there... I'd stand up, but... Can't."

Sweetie smirked at that. "Entirely understandable. You've all done your part. Get some rest."

"Don't have to tell me that twice..." Lemon forced herself to sit up properly. "Sleep sounds so good right now."

Back in the triage, when azure eyes fluttered open once more, low candle light illuminated concerned faces ringing the a broad bed where Rarity found herself now nestled alongside a softly dozing Bright.

Bright murmured softly in his sleep, but did not stir.

Luna and Sweetie entered, questions dying when they saw what was happening.

The doctor approached with a nod. "Are you with them?"

"I am." Luna nodded to the doctor. "How is he?" She pointed to the sleeping rabbit. "Methinks it poison, if that assists."

The village doctor smiled gently checking on the slumbering duo. “Fortune shines - your swift actions spared true tragedy here. The worst has safely passed.”

She drew Luna and Sweetie Drops aside as Rarity blinks fully awake. “Your friends will make full recovery given proper rest. The young buck did ingest trace spiritbane in the heroics...” She patted Luna’s shoulder. “But you recalled the curative augmentations of his new biology. His unique heritage has rendered him resilient where another would have direly suffered my own failure.”

The doctor fixed Luna with a look of profound gratitude. “Instead your subject will walk home on the morrow, a bit queasy at worst. We are all in your debt for such wisdom...and mercy.” She gazed fondly over where Rarity nestled protectively alongside the snoring Bright.

“You all weathered dire confrontation so our village might see the dawn. Please - be at ease awhile. Allow my humble home to shelter weary hearts and bodies until strength returns enough to journey back.”

She smiled wryly. “I apologize if the linens are rough but prithee make yourselves comfortable here. My hospitality is yours until you all are restored enough to rejoin Princess Celestia’s light.”

Rarity yawned delicately, carefully settling Bright’s head in her lap. Luna and Sweetie joined at bedside keeping quiet vigil as Trottingham’s now freed folk began recovering outside from their unwitting ordeal. Hidden behind quaint walls, six souls in kind took comfort against the shadows without.

Luna chuckled softly. "It was by chance that I brought the right vial..."

Sometimes, luck was enough.

Author's Note

And, end assignment. Victory!

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