Chapters The smell of salt and aged fish mixed with my breath as it clung to the early winter mist. I sat at the edge of my Sire's old fishing dock. The creaking wood was older than me by quite a stent. The sun had barely crested an hour before, for whatever that was worth. I shifted from hoof to hoof. I'd been staring into the gently flowing river that crossed through the center of the somber little town I called home. Bogwood was south of Baltimare, a dingy community of fishers and sea rats. A place that seemed damp no matter the time or season. A state that left my mane hanging limply across my brow. The dark blue, nearly black hair was completely unkempt as I flicked my bangs out of my vision. I was wondering exactly how long I've been sitting on the dock. I shifted and fluffed my wings as a sudden gust made me shiver. A pale blue limb gently rubbed my temple.
It was almost funny. I should be excited, thrilled, proud. I should be, but I wasn't. Yesterday should have been a day to celebrate. For any normal foal, it would be. Yesterday, I got my cutie mark. I looked over my shoulder, the proof of my achievement. A sword hilt and pommel pointed toward the ground, a gust of ice surrounding it. It was still there, and so was my headache. My cutie mark wasn't all I'd received yesterday. Or were they there all along? The memories. Hal, the human, his every life experience, played out in my head. Or did Hal wake up in the body of Glacial Zero, the little pegasus who lived in Bogwood? The same questions played on repeat in my head. Who was whom, who was real? My head throbbed again. I winced and tried to blink away the pain.
"What does it mean?" I asked.
"Does it mean anything at all?"
I jumped, letting out a helpless meep as I stumbled back from the dock's edge. No sooner had I realized what I'd done than the voice clicked in my frazzled mind. I turned to my left. Where they'd been sitting since I wandered out in the early morning chill to the dock. Freya had followed. I let out a sigh and shrugged.
Freya hummed, not having looked up from her spot on the dock. To say she was sitting wasn't quite right. Freya floated just above the wooden dock. I could almost see through her to the shallow waters that flowed by below, as far back as I, as Glacial Zero, could recall. Freya had been there, an imaginary companion, 'somepony?' 'Someone?' to count on. Whichever, it didn't really matter. Freya was a filly I'd conjured up, white as the fresh snow, eyes so bright blue they glowed, and a smile that could melt permafrost. That wasn't to say I, Glacial, was lonely. I, he, we had friends in town. Bogwood might be small, but it wasn't barren. Yet here she was all the same.
"Shouldn't it?" I asked.
"Do you feel different?" Freya asked. She'd finally looked up from the water and cocked a brow in my direction.
My head thumped again. Visions of a world far away, in a different universe, reality, wherever played out in one non sequitur after another. Hal felt real. Hal's death felt even more real. I could see the blood, his heart racing, and the taste of iron in his mouth. I shivered in place. This time, the weather around me bore no account.
I wanted to cry and laugh at the same time. It was almost too outlandish. Memories of an alien who had memories of Equestria, memories from nearly a thousand years in the future. A time when Nightmare Moon returned and was redeemed. A future of a near utopia, a vision that clashed with the dreary, paranoid world I knew.
"I don't know."
"Glacial Zero, you forget yourself. You claim a life outside the pony before you, reflected in the water beneath you. You claim to blur which life is the truest you, yes?" Freya asked, leering at me, her eyes growing brighter as she did so.
I drag my hooves down my face and groan. "I guess so."
"Yet here you sit before me, the same colt from yesterday and tomorrow. The flesh remains. All that struggles is your mind."
"I feel like we're talking in circles," I said, throwing my hooves to the sky.
"That we are, as we have been for hours. So, I ask again. Does it matter, can you not be both? Can you both not be one and the same?"
Could I, us, we? Would it matter? Does agonizing over it do me any good? Whoever was first was real; we are both here now. It was a lot to take in. Too much to explain in one go, in one day. I took a deep breath and felt the bitter chill sting my throat. Freya was right. She often was. My head still hurt. I'd laid awake all night, struggling with the same questions. I was tired, my head pounded, and I was fed up with all of it. Even if Hal was the real one, the one to simply consume the life of an innocent colt, his memories were so far off in the unknown that they may not be confirmed. It had only been eight years since Nightmare Moon was banished. It was the same year I was born. A fact all foals born that season would recall for as long as they lived.
"I don't know, but for now. I'll just let it go. I don't want to think anymore. Besides, there is something else to consider."
I looked back down at my cutie mark. It was still there, where all this insanity started. I chuckled and looked to the bank of the river, not far from where my father and I lived. It was just the two of us who had been out here for some time, out in a little alcove between the river bank and a charred tree stump. I was thankful that my Sire hadn't noticed yet. The broken lantern that had sat on that same stump for moons was missing. I'd cleaned up what I could if only to buy time to collect my even more jumbled thoughts. My hooves had been so cold that even the oil fire that had danced atop the stump had not warmed me as I flailed about. When I'd finished, the scene came back into focus. The first thing Glacial Zero and Hal had seen as one. It was the doused fire and the slush that was oil moments before. I'd always liked the cold, but now, the cold is a part of me. Even between all three of us, Glacial, Hal, and Freya, what had happened was confusing at best. A pegasus had done something that pegasi didn't do.
"You should tell your sire. He deserves to know, deserves to celebrate with his only son," Freya said, reaching over and letting her ghostly white hoof punch through my shoulder. I couldn't help a small smile.
"Yeah, you're right."
Freya nodded. "As always."
He'd be awake by now. Sire, as always, would be preparing a warm breakfast for the two of us. He'd sway in an invisible breeze, humming a sea shanty as he prepared the meal. He'd expect me any time now before he left for the main docks in Bogwood proper.
I stood and shook the dampness from my rump. It was time to face the piper. I plodded back to our home. I chewed on my inner cheek as I went over yesterday again in my head. I decided, at least for now, I'd keep Hal to myself, Freya, and myself. Which was the same thing, I guess.
No sooner had I opened the front door than I heard the shuffling of hooves in the kitchen. My home wasn't all that impressive—two bedrooms, a living space, and a kitchen—but it was small and cozy. Though Hal's memories of indoor plumbing weren't sitting well with me now that I thought about it.
"Son?"
I took a deep breath and headed towards the kitchen. "Yes, father."
I entered the kitchen, where my sire looked towards me, brow knit tight.
"You were out this early?" he asked.
I nodded. "I was."
Weathered Horizon was not a soft stallion. Years on the docks, in the river, and in the seas had ill afforded such luxury. He was a pegasus, but the salt of the earth had never described another stallion better. He was gray with an autumn mane that contrasted against his stalwart gaze and sharp teal eyes, the same eyes I shared. The same eyes that now bore into me with pinpoint focus.
I sighed and turned to the side. It took only seconds for my Sire to put it all together. However, I will admit to taking some pleasure in seeing the surprise, if only for the briefest moment, race across his face. Sire's own cutie mark depicted a wave crashing over a waning sun. I'd never asked what it meant. Though I'd never thought I needed to, Father was strong enough to survive anything, to weather any storm. Even if that wasn't what his cutie mark meant, it was what defined him, at least to me.
"It seems you have a tale to spin during breakfast, Colt."
That was that; my Sire returned to his pot of oats, and I took my place at our homemade dining table. A table with three chairs. The wait wasn't long, but the quiet seemed to stretch for minutes longer.
Freya floated over my shoulder, smirking at my discomfort. "Are you not the portrait of a colt in trouble? Oh, the youthful guilt," she whispered. I chose to ignore her. No reason to feed the beast.
When the pot was placed in the center of the table, reality set back in. My father deftly scooped some of the heated oats into a bowl and sat it before me. He scooped his own and sat across the table, eyes staring through the steam of the food. My ears splayed back as I wilted under his gaze.
"You look distraught, Colt."
"True," I agreed.
"And?" he asked.
"Well, I got my cutie mark," I half-heartedly said.
His unimpressed stare could curdle the very oats between us.
"Right, sorry. It may have cost the lamp by the docks."
"The stump?" he asked. I nodded. "And this pertains to your cutie mark?" I nodded again.
"I'd refilled the oil, as you asked. I caught a hoof on a stray root. The lantern smashed on the stump and burst into flames."
My sire leaned forward, looking me up and down. Seeing nothing, or perhaps everything he'd been searching for, he hoofed me to continue.
"I panicked and flailed about. I just wanted the fire to stop. I kept wishing it'd been snowing, even if it was a bit early. I just wanted the fire to stop, and then I stamped my hooves over the fire, and it did."
Weathered Horizon, in all his glory, rose from the table and, in two stomps, had rounded it. He grabbed hold of my own hoof and pulled it up. He inspected it for a moment and then grabbed the other. I found it hard to look at him as he looked me over. He let me go when he finished but did not return to his seat.
"No burns."
I shook my head. "No burns, just cold."
"Cold?"
"When I did, whatever it is, I did. The fire went out. I'd closed my eyes. But when I opened them, the oil was slush, and my hooves were fresh with frost. I cleaned it all up, though. I'm sorry, Sire." My gaze dropped to the floor.
Seconds later, my father's massive hoof reached down and lifted my face towards his. He scoffed. "You believe the lantern is that important?"
I blinked in confusion. "You aren't mad?" I asked.
He scoffed again. "My son has become a stallion. Though foolish, your fate revealed itself to you. That is nothing to belittle."
"But, what is my fate?"
I didn't expect him to know. It was muddied at best. Since when can a pegasus freeze things with a touch? If that is what I did at all.
My father shook his head. "I do not think what you describe are the natural magics that we pegasi command," he said, lifting a wing to add to his point.
"I didn't think so."
My father left it at that. He returned to his seat, and we ate in silence. The trepidation had abated for the moment, though the headache remained. I was missing something that was clear. I looked down at my hooves once more.
"Perhaps while in town, I may ask the other dock-hoofs of your plight. Or, perhaps that unicorn filly you visit may know of such things, yes?"
I attempted to respond but found no words. Maybe Azure would know something or her mother. This reeked of magic; if it were pegasi magic, then Father's friends might learn something.
"It is better than hoping the answer might fall into your lap." Freya floated overhead with a titter.
"Ha, ha."
My Sire hummed. "Beg pardon?"
"Nothing," I said, adding a cough. I returned to my oats with forced gusto while watching as Freya tittered. When we finished, the bowls were collected and scrubbed clean. I wasn't big enough to reach the counter myself, so I was hoisted up and made to dry the eating bowls, the larger pot holding the oats, and the accompanying spoons. I let the chore pull me from my thoughts, if only for a few minutes. My head could use the break, lest it break itself.
Once that was done, I was again hoisted onto my Sire's back, and we were ready to leave. Weathered added his own equally weathered saddlebags onto his back, and thus, we departed for Bogwood's square.
"Perhaps the mares in town can fathom up an answer to what is eating you, Colt," Weathered said with a hum.
"It is that obvious?"
"You look ready to jump at phantoms."
I looked over to Freya. The apparition stuck her tongue out at me. "Not phantoms, but something equally vexing."
Weathered nodded along, though they seemed uninterested in what sorts of things I was referencing. It was for the best, and nopony deserved to be privy to Freya and her snark.
"Have you attempted to reenact your first attempt?"
I lifted a hoof and glared at it. "I did, but no luck."
"Then we have all the more reason to discover what your fate has in store for you. Don't we, son?" Weathered looked over his shoulder and offered a tired smile. I offered one back. Our teal eyes met, and I couldn't help but relax if only a little.
I almost nodded off as we made it to Bogwood's center and market. It is a simple place with no grand architecture or immaculate highlights. The ground was too soft, meaning foundations were planted along with any buildings made. A simple fountain marked the town square for nothing more than directional details. Go past the fountain to get wherever the few outsiders we had passed through might be going. As the sun had roused, so too had the warmth of this dreary little day in our humble little town.
The locals were either working or preparing for work. Some foals ran about, doing whatever they pleased, under the watchful eye of nearly every mare within and sometimes not even within sight, which was all the easier with the stalls and tents placed in a half circle around the space. The rest are either benches, weeds, or the occasional turtle or toad. The likes of which were plentiful in these parts. To the point where we locals could wander up to anyone and offer them a snack or a friendly pat, and they’d barely acknowledge we were there.
I was hefted from my father's back and placed beside him. "Be mindful."
"Right." Thus, with a wave, my father was off, and I was left to my own devices.
"You didn't tell him of your plight," Freya said. She gave her own dainty wave after Weathered.
"True, I didn't."
"No trust even for your father?"
I shook my head. "Not an issue of trust, but an issue of ignorance. If I don't understand what is happening in my head, how could any sane normal pony?"
Freya relented. So, first stop, Azure Brew, in all her glory. Azure Brew was one of the only ponies besides my father, whom I trusted completely. The first friend I'd made, we were nearly inseparable, even if it did earn us some less-than-friendly stares. However, Azure may have simply never noticed if she hadn't been outright ignoring them. At this time of day, she'd most likely be with her dam, opening the apothecary. Ever since she discovered her own cutie mark a few months ago, she'd been tailing her dam near every chance she could. Like mother, like daughter, it would seem.
The path to said apothecary, ‘What Ails You,’ sat west of the main road heading out of the center and toward the muddy well, used streets that lead to Baltimare. If I were lucky, Azure's older sisters would be out. I needed those two like I needed a broken wing. Speaking of. I lazily flapped my wings and took to the skies as high as I could get before one of the shopkeepers would yell at me. It wouldn't do to have a foal, especially a young colt, go and break his neck flying all alone. I could practically hear the busybodies say, even if I was only a few meters up.
The flight across the town center wasn't long, but it gave me just enough time to come up with a few ideas about what Azure and I could do to test these new skills—if I could get them to work again at all.
The front door to 'What Ails You' was open, and the endless parade of potions and spices was always welcoming. It was even more so on chilly days like today. No sooner had I stepped hoof into the shop than the familiar greeting of the shop's owner reached me. The apothecary was one of the more recently built businesses. The wood had yet to smell of mildew, and the floors didn't have as many scratches as most. It did, however, have a warmth that only a hearth in winter might rival. A warmth that mirrored its owner perfectly.
"Good morning, welcome—Oh, who have we here?"
I rolled my eyes. Home Brew smiled down over her counter. The plump unicorn mare wore an unshakable smile, one complimented by the bright range of purples that made her up from hoof to mane. Even her eyes were pink. It gave off a unique, if not blurring, effect when not looking at her directly. How anypony could be as happy as her from dawn to dusk will forever elude me.
"Good morning, Mrs. Home Brew. How are you today?" I asked.
"Better for seeing you, little colt. Azure is in the back if you're wondering. Give her a minute, if you please."
"I don't mind. Makes the surprise even better," I said, stepping to the side with a toothy grin and a wink.
Home Brew smiled and winked back, her eyes flicking to my cutie mark and back. "I take it you have plans for this fine day, I do believe."
I nodded. "Something like that."
My wait was short. A moment passed before the door leading to the storeroom flew open, and out strutted Azure Brew. While Home Brew was every shade of purple imaginable. Her youngest foal was a pale purplish white with a bright pink mane and a stripe of her namesake right through the middle. She marched in with a broad smile and a jar of some ingredient on her back. Ever since she'd gotten her cutie mark, she'd been spending most of her free time that wasn't with me or her other friends helping her mother run their shop. Her cutie mark was like her talent, similar to her dam's. Home Brew had a sloshing pot of some unknown mix. Azure's was a similar pot, but instead of liquid, a smoke or mist pillowed out from the top. One is for the craft, and the other is for the reagents. A pair blessed by Faust above.
"I found the jar. Dam. Where did you want it?"
"Just set it aside, dear. You have a guest. You do. One that might need you more than I, for a bit at least."
"Huh?" Azure blinked in surprise, mouth set in a pout. The gears in her head chugged along right before her rose-red eyes landed on me. I was braced for impact and even still was nearly flung to the ground by Azure's tackle hug. "Glace."
I chuckled and returned the hug. "Morning."
"Now, you two. Don't get too excited; my shop doesn't need to be destroyed. It does not."
"Sorry, mother," Azure said and stepped back, scratching a hoof idly through her mane. "So, Glace, come looking for me, or what?"
I scoffed and shoved Azure idly. "I come looking for you? Never."
"Now, children, all is well. You two have your fun, but please don't block the store entry. We can't have that."
"Sorry, Mrs. Brew," I said, motioning for Azure to follow me outside. Home Brew was a very nice mare, always happy to help. But I pity anypony who tries to make folly in her store. Even the sailors and fishers know to be polite in 'What Ails You.' So out Azure and I went.
"Mom said you needed help?" Azure asked.
I tapped a hoof on my chin." Kind of. I came looking for advice if you have any."
Azure's ear flicked as she bobbed her head in thought. "Advice for what?"
"Cutie marks."
"Cutie—"
Her eyes trail down to my flank, and she gasps. I suppress a sigh, and I'm pulled into another hug before I can respond. This one is far harder than the first. I can barely sputter before the rest of my breath is ripped free of my lungs. I struggle vainly in Azure's vice grip. I can hear Freya cackling behind me. The traitor.
"You finally got your mark. I can't believe it. I was starting to worry you'd end up markless forever. That'd be awful." Then, I was released, gasping and wheezy.
"Yeah, so would dying," I said between gasps.
Azure waved a hoof in dismissal. "Oh please, you've only passed out one time. You'll be fine, you big baby."
I leer at my friend. "One time is one too many."
"She is right, Glacial. You do sound like a baby. Freya circled over Azure, and she grinned like a shark. "Or am I to believe you dislike Azure Brew's affection?"
I cross my hooves in mock defiance. "The two of you will be the death of me."
"Two of us?" Azure asked.
"Never mind."
Azure nods and points back to my cutie mark. "Right, well, let's hear it. What'd you do? What's your talent?"
I motion for her to follow as we make some room between us and Home Brew's shop. "That's what I wanted to talk about, actually."
"Oh?"
"Yeah, you see. I'm not actually sure what my talent is. I mean, I know what I did. But I have no idea how I did it," I said. The two of us made our way due south toward a pathway, where several makeshift benches sat looking out towards the sea. I took a seat and let out a deep groan. Azure joined me, smiling like all was right with the world.
"So, what did you do?"
"I put out a fire."
Azure's stare fell to an unenthused glare. "And?"
"With my hooves," I added.
"And?"
"By freezing it or the oil from the lantern, either way, really."
"While learning, you might be a body-stealing monster from another world and time," Freya said, leaning over me and chuckling darkly.
Azure's despondent look had been replaced with curiosity as she tried to steal a glance at my magical hooves if they had anything to do with what I did at all.
"Not your wings or clouds or something?" Azure asked.
I shook my head. "Nope, I panicked, waved my hooves, wished the fire was out. Then my hooves were freezing, and the fire was gone."
"That is odd."
"Sire said the same thing," I said, looking up to the still gray skies. "I don't get it."
"Could you show me?" Azure asked.
I shrugged. "I can try."
Azure leaned forward. "Try, you haven't done it again? You didn't show your sire?"
"Can I tell you a secret?" I asked.
Azure leaned in even closer. "Of course."
"My hooves are still cold. Like frigid, but not normal cold."
The look I got back was more or less expected. I offered a hoof, to which Azure prodded gingerly. It was like she'd expected to be frozen the second she did. After a few pokes, she looked back at me. She wanted answers, and so did I.
"They don't feel cold."
"Yep, like I said, it's not a normal cold. They aren't cold on the outside, but they feel frozen solid on the inside. I'm kinda scared of what it might mean."
"What about a mender? Maybe they can help?" Azure jumped off the bench expectably. "I didn't follow."
"The mender doesn't like my father."
Azure's brow knits. "So?" She said with a pout.
"She doesn't like me either."
Azure took a step forward. "And how do you know that?"
I took a deep breath and scowled at Azure. I snorted. "Because she hated my dam. Now my dam is gone, and she still hates me and my Sire."
I hadn't realized I'd raised my voice quite so loud. Azure looked around as if expecting a mob. I took my own idle look around. I didn't see anypony, but that didn't mean they couldn't see us. I licked my lips and shuffled in place.
"Sorry, sorry, I didn't mean—"
Azure shook her head hard. "No, no, I'm sorry. I know that. I mean, sorry." Her words died in her mouth. Her ears lie flat against her skull. She peered at the ground, her eyes sparkling with unshed tears.
I hopped off the bench and nuzzled Azure softly. "It's fine. I know you didn't mean anything by it. I just, it still hurts. You know?"
Azure nodded against my shoulder. "Adults are just dumb like that." On that, I could not argue. After a moment, Azure pulled free, tears gone and replaced with a spark of fury. "Now, back to your cutie mark. Maybe we could ask my dam or my sisters. Or…” Something clicked in Azure's look. A smile spread wide, and she pointed off back into town. "...It has to be magic, right, like how each tribe can use their own type of magic."
"Magic, sure, but it isn't pegasus magic or weather magic. Sire was convinced of that. I've been on clouds and have seen some of the weather teams use magic to make it rain. But all the pegasus magic I know of needs something else to use it. I froze stuff all by myself."
"Well, maybe if we can get it to cast again, we can figure out what type of magic it really is. Then, we can figure out even better ways to use it."
Before I could respond, Azure had already grabbed me by the leg and dragged me into the nearest grove of trees. The manic excitement on her face was enough to send a spark down my spine. This would end poorly.
When we stopped, Azure released me and motioned to the trees around us. "Now, let's see. What do we freeze first?"
I threw up my hooves. "Woah, hold on, we're doing what?"
Azure approached and tapped the nearest tree. "How else are we gonna get your weird freezing hooves figured out? You froze that lantern oil before, right?"
I slowly nodded.
"Then, we'll just do that repeatedly until you can do it in your sleep."
I recoiled. "I'd rather not freeze things while I'm asleep, thank you."
Azure leaned against the tree beside her and arched a brow. "And you have a better plan?" she asked.
I sighed in defeat. Freya took a spot on the other side of Azure's chosen tree. "Practice is key to excellence, is it not? You need to master your magic to become greater still."
"I don't like it, but you're right. Regardless of my talent, it won't be useful if I can't even do it on command."
"Good, glad you saw it my way, like a good colt."
"What was that?" I said, swatting Azure's muzzle. "Watch it, or I might end up freezing you instead."
I turned to the tree and exhaled slowly. I wasn't really sure where to start. Yesterday had been a blur. I tried to concentrate on how I felt then. Fear, nervousness, confusion. Not all of that was due to the fire. Hal hadn't made this easier. I cringed as my head pounded. My earlier headache is just waiting for me to spiral again.
"Feel anything?" Azure asked.
"Nothing magical."
"Perhaps you should get mad. Let it all out. Magic is known to flare during intense emotions. Right, Glacial. It couldn't hurt," Freya offered, waving a hoof in and out of the trunk of our chosen tree.
It wasn't the worst idea, but it was kind of annoying that most of my best ideas came from my imaginary friend, of all places. I placed a hoof on the trunk and took a deep breath in. Was I mad? Was that what having all these memories was doing, what having a weird talent was doing? I didn't like it. I didn't want my head feeling full to bursting. But was it anger?
"I'm not angry," I said. I hadn't realized I'd said it out loud. I believe Azure said something, but I wasn't listening. It was something more profound. It hurt not knowing, and it hurt more when I thought about it. I wasn't angry; I was afraid.
Afraid of my memories, my talent, and the future. My head was throbbing. My hooves were so cold they ached. I just wanted to go back. I just wanted to be expected. I didn't want to be afraid. I breathed out. My hooves stopped aching.
"Glace."
I opened my eyes. I blinked once, and my hoof dropped from the tree. No, my hoof hadn't been touching the tree. Where I'd been touching was frozen over. A wreath of ice is wrapped around the tree. I'd done something, but I still had no idea why my hooves froze the tree. This time, I was sure it was correct.
"So, what happened?" I asked.
"You don't know?" Azure said, falling on her haunches and motioning to the partially frozen tree. "Really?"
I shook my head. "Not a clue."
"Your hooves were glowing, and then they got frosty and then ice. Ice everywhere."
"Huh, well. All I can do now is try to do it again, right?”
"Hay yeah, this time, try it with your eyes open," Azure said, pulling me into a side hug and tapping a chunk of frozen trunk.
"Well, here goes nothing."
I spent most of the day repeatedly freezing trees. The more I practiced, the easier it seemed to happen. Even watching it, the glowing hooves and spouting ice blasts did little to explain what was causing it. It felt like something other than magic or what I thought magic should feel like. Neither Glacial Zero nor Hal could explain it. The more I practiced, the more afraid I became. By the time I'd stopped, Azure had already retreated back to 'What Ails You.' She still had chores to do. I understood I didn't like it, but I understood. By the time I'd grown tired and was shivering in place, my hooves stained in frost. It was late afternoon. I didn't know why I'd kept going, but as afraid of what I was doing, I was more fearful of stopping.
When I did stop for the day, my hooves were numb, and my entire body shook in a phantom chill. I made my way back into the town square. Where I waited for my Sire, it must have been an hour later before he returned from the docks. The sun had already set, and I was still shivering. I don't remember falling asleep between Sire picking me up and getting home. But I did all the same. A cold and empty sleep.
Author's Note
I would first like to thank authors like LiveFreeOrDie and Aiwhisper for their incredible stories and the worlds they've built with them. They've inspired me to creep out of my comfort zone and try my hand at something a little denser than I'd normally write. So, I decided to go back to where the series we all know and love began.
The story will start slowly but speed up as we progress. I hope you enjoy it and have a wonderful, magical day.
I barely slept a wink and was up by dawn, the first rays warming the mist, and I returned to the dock. Only two days passed, and I saw myself lost in dread, frozen regardless of the winter winds and shaking hoof to head. No, the chill I felt now was of my own making. The dancing creeping ice in the veins of my forelegs. I'd spent the hours before bed rereading what I could from the books I'd borrowed. Most of it could have been a different language for all the terms I couldn't recite, much less put to practice. I would be on my own today, and while it would have been nice for somepony like Writ to be here, some things one can only learn through a trial of fire. Well, ice, but the point remains. I focused solely on my breathing, my breath clinging desperately to the air before fading only for another to take its place.
Freya skimmed over the river's water, lazily reclining as she watched me. Her unnaturally straight white mane silently dipping into the waters. It was more haunting than a companionship and had been since yesterday. A silence neither one of us had any desire to break. On top of my crash course through magic and learning to use mine. I also still had yet to learn what, if at all, any of this had to do with druids. After my talk with Home Brew, I'd at least learned others dabbled in magic and powers that sat outside the norm. My paranoia had settled at a manageable, but all present tick in the back of my head.
Since Nightmare Moon's fall, the same paranoia seemed to settle over everypony, like that of the sun itself. I'd heard my sire call it a fissure, a tear in the very nature of pony kind. I didn't get it then, and I still don't. Hal made something more apparent, and some were far less so. My desire to learn my cryomancy wasn't the only reason I hadn't slept. My dreams, or memories, Hal's life captured in blurry, noisy snapshots. Each is distinctly important but only loosely connected. If Hal hadn't been in each one, most would have looked entirely unconnected.
The only thing consistent was his voice. The others, those he called friends and family, were afterthoughts, broken up by static and whispers. The chasm between where Glacial Zero and Hal began and ended twisted in on itself the harder I tried to piece them together. I shuddered and blinked away the memories.
"Let there be ice," I muttered. The wood beneath my hooves had already begun to frost over. The more I concentrated on the cold, the easier it became to sculpt. The lines of the icy spiderwebs zigged and zagged like thread. I hadn't noticed I'd spread my wings, yet there they were, flexed wide as the ice danced.
Then, as suddenly as I'd begun, I relaxed, and the frost went still. "I should probably leave the dock alone. Sire would kill me if I broke it."
He'd be awake soon, and I don't think he'd appreciate the first thing he heard was that the dock he'd crafted by hoof crumbling away. I shook my head and turned about, departing the dock and wandering off to the riverbank. It was probably safer, and the gentle current could toss any leftovers away.
"First, freezing and thawing," I said, eyes trailing the river water, which bubbled and churned. The two things I seemed to do with nothing but willpower. The rules of such magic were simple. A disposition to a fundamental, or what the book said, was an essential element that broke down the world itself. Any such magic was known as a 'mancy', Thus my own being cryomancy. To do, or undo, to make of or mold, the books used many terms to describe it, some I'd never seen in either life. The simplest it ever got was embody. My hooves were in a state of unending chill, my breath catching in every breeze. I controlled the cold itself by becoming the cold itself. I can only imagine what something like pyromancy must feel like.
I tapped a hoof into the river. The water around my hoof froze almost instantly. I lifted and took in the chunk of ice that encased my hoof. Even then, my hoof felt no colder than it had before. I returned my limb to the water and watched all my work come undone. My hoof rose again, and there wasn't much of a flake left amidst my fur this time. I frowned and dipped my hoof under the moving waters again. This time, I let my desire wash over my entire body, a tingle of something almost warm. No, that wasn't right. It was the opposite. It'd become so cold it's started to burn. It was a spindly leg of magic that took shape in its own imaginary path, from the tip of my hoof to the sands and stalks at the river bottom. I could feel it inch by inch, crawling deeper. As if the spell was my own leg.
It was midmorning before I'd even noticed the sun above. Father had left some time ago, and I vaguely recall him waving goodbye. I was transfixed by the ice that clung to my fur like paint to paper. I was peppered in flecks of frost and homemade snow flurries. I was damp but barely felt it when I was not actively trying to. I hammered a hoof into the dirty slush beneath me. A stalactite, about half a hoof at its base, rose like a spring in front of me. I tapped it, and the brittle structure cracked and fell to pieces.
I chuckled. 'An Elementary Guide of Elements.' had made it clear that the more surface area the harder it was to make structures durable. It rang true. This had been my fourth such stalactite and the fourth case where the taller it was, the more quickly it collapsed. "I guess I need to work on density," I said.
The same book also gave a brief essay on how to train one's magic. Of everything in the book, the first set of those instructions might have been the easiest to follow. It broke down into two ideas. The first was so simple that a foal half my age could follow along. Magic was like a muscle; the more you used it, the easier it was to use without tiring you out. The more you used a spell or affinity, the easier that affinity was to use. Thus, my repeated failed attempts at stalactites. The second set of instructions couldn’t have been more complex. One of the first rules established in both books I've been reading is one of the most complex. The use, understanding, and power of Thaums. However, most knew it as mana. The pool of energy one used to control magic. That part I did understand. It was everything that followed that left me floored.
While 'An Elementary Guide of Elements.' mentioned Thaums often enough, it rarely dove into the mechanics. It simply suggested ways to use them better, which might have been helpful if I'd been taught this stuff before. That was the price of not being a unicorn. I was expected to pay little attention to magic beyond pushing clouds. I wasn't exactly a typical colt, regardless of my special talent. The voice living in the back of my head, or two, both Freya and Hal, left me wondering if I'd lost it completely. As if reading my mind, which she probably could, Freya tutted in my direction while looking at the sky above. She couldn't even bother looking at me in dejection.
'A Dissection of your Magic Affinities' had no such issue with throwing out elongated torrents of words that left me drooling. "Thaums regulated the flow of neuron networks in one's horn that allowed for, so on and so forth." I could feel my eyes drooping just thinking about it. I scratched my face idly.
"Guess I'll just try by doing. Might have to find a unicorn-to-normal pony translator later. Azure or her Dam could give me a crash course. For now, though."
I took a deep breath, closed my eyes, and thought back to the stalactite. I released my magic, and then it cracked from base to tip and shattered.
"Oh, come on, what the hay am I doing wrong," I said. I groaned up to the heavens, but the sky never answered.
"You really shouldn't brute force magic; you'll give yourself a migraine," Freya drifted over and swathed the mess I'd made with a wing. "You've only been doing magic for three days. You really should slow down."
"Not if I want to be useful." I leered at Freya. The phantom rolled her eyes and smirked.
"Will getting hurt help your poor sire?"
I could feel an eyelid twitching. Freya motioned for a response. I squinted hard enough that my eyes began to ache. Freya stared back coolly with those overly bright blues of heres. She floated in a slow backstroke in a circle around me. I slowly twisted in place to continue my glare.
"Exactly, you need practice and time. Something you do have plenty of. So, do the work, learn about your magic, and grow like any other foal."
"Easy for you to say," I huffed.
"It's not much harder for you to say. I bet your sire would agree," Freya said. She chuckled as my twitching eye gave out. I sighed and ran a hoof over my face and down my neck.
"It isn't fair though."
Freya shook her head, hooves and wigs folded as she came to a stop where her rotation around me began. "Nope, sure isn't."
That was that. I turned away and watched the empty path that led to the dock from my cozy, tiny home. A word groove in the earth, one weathered by constant use. My thoughts wandered back to town, to Bogwood, where my friends were working to better their lives and those around them. It wasn't Baltimare, no big city with big city ponies with big city thoughts. My stomach churned just thinking about the crowds and noise.
I kneaded my forehooves into the dirt and relished in my own dread. I had to repress an unfettered laugh. It was supposed to be easy. That was the whole point of a cutie mark. A means to guide you in the dark. But just like when I first used my ice magic, all it did was snuff out the light. The others had been right yesterday. My sire deserved me to do my best. I needed to find a place to repay even a fraction of his effort.
"Glacial, what are you doing?"
I snapped back to reality. Freya hovered above me, face struck between confusion and fear. I blinked and followed her gaze to my hooves. My forelegs up to the knee were encased in a deep blue ice. A color I'd never seen, it was far darker than my coat, too thick to be my fur bleeding through. I slowly lifted one limb to eye level and waved it back and forth. I could barely feel the ice, neither the weight nor the temperature. I lowered it back down gently and repeated my observations with the second hoof. There was more, however. Wherever my hoof touched the ground, the ground itself began to frost over. The grass stood stiff, and the dirt became sludge. I took a deep breath and focused on one leg and the ice that ensnared it.
I focused on warmth, on the blue ice melting away. At first, it tingled. Pins and needles ran up and down the chosen leg. The ice, however, did not budge. My wings twitched as I tried again. I'd melted ice before. It'd be fine. My mouth had run dry, and I couldn't rebuke several shallow breaths. The harder I willed the ice away, the deeper the tingle became. Then, as soon as it came, the tingle was gone, replaced with a searing ache. One that ran from my bones to the tips of my primaries.
"Glacial," Freya whispered. I hadn't noticed her approach. I hadn't watched her pull me into her ghostly hooves as she tried to hug me close. It was like the air itself was holding me close. My hooves were shaking. But as much as it burned, my anger was greater. That was all I could manage. I froze a half dozen trees two days ago, but I let my magic plunge too far from my own grasp, and I all but shut down. I bit my lip, pulling myself back onto shaky hooves.
"No."
"Glacial?"
I turned, tears still fresh on my cheeks, a new spot of blood trickling down my chin. "It won't stop."
Freya shook her snow-white head and reached out towards me. "You can't force it, Glacial. You could get hurt or worse."
I turned and growled. I stared back into the water and watched a fuming colt stare back. "I've melted ice before. I know I can do it."
Freya sagged, phasing into the floor as she attempted to sit while already at floor level. My tears had stopped and been replaced with a deep scowl. I didn't have the time to fall to pieces. The conversation I had with my friends yesterday emphasized one thing. I couldn't and wouldn't let Sire carry the weight of him and me in silence anymore. I almost wanted to smile, thinking through Hal's own life. He'd been nearly double my age when he first went to work when he first carried his own future. Step by step. The fire that lit in his eye, through the stinging heat of the auto shop, the grease stains of a diner's kitchen. He worked and worked and worked himself right into the grave. I could taste the copper, the cold sting of steel as it buried itself in Hal's, my chest.
I gasped, shaking back to reality. Freya sat, eyes trained on my own. I couldn't look her in the eye. My head felt raw, full to bursting. I was sweating, I was hot, too damned hot. I gnashed my teeth, choking down my own spit. The river, the sweet relief of its water, freedom from this damned heat. I lifted a hoof. It barely rose to my chest before falling back helplessly.
"Glacial, calm down. You need to calm down," Freya waved a hoof against my face. I barely noticed. It was just too hot. I just needed the water, and everything would be fine. I ran my dry tongue over my equally dry lips. It was hooves away, so close I could feel it.
"Glacial."
I shook my head. So, close. I just needed to cool off a little.
"Glacial."
"Enough." Then everything went white. The world around is distorted, refractions of reflections bouncing off one another. I panted, body tensed as I struggled to make sense of it. The heat faded, my vision swam, and all I could see was me or slivers of my face at every angle. "Ice?" I mused. Frozen spikes spouted from below me, swallowing me in a wall of ice. I was still sweating, even as my body returned to a reasonable state. The chill in my hooves returned. I stepped back, bumping my flank into the nearest barrier. It didn't make sense. What had I just done and why, now?
"I think it's time you took a break," Freya said. She offered a phantom hoof. I smiled and swiped through her offered limb.
"What are you gonna do, carry me back to my room with those ghostly hooves of yours?" I asked.
Freya laughed. "As likely as I am to strangle you with them."
"Then I think I'll stay here."
I nestled my back into the pillar behind me. Freya scoffed and motioned to the wall I'd encircled myself in. The Blue ice looked just like my hooves. I blinked and looked down at said hooves. Even now, they remain frozen over. I sighed. I'd worry about it later.
"In a bed of ice?" Freya asked. My ear flicked, and I cracked an eye open. Freya smiled down like an angel rung in daylight, bathed in a pale blue glow. She was almost invisible, with her white mane, tail, and body refracting the same light.
"Yep, right here, in a bed of ice," I confirmed. I closed my eyes and went slack. Wings spread, mind fogged with unmolded questions and concerns for tomorrow. "Right here."
"Glace. Where are you?"
My eyes shot open. I fell forward, ears swiveling as I tried to follow the voice that had just called my name. I'd only managed a few minutes of dreamless slumber before the world rebelled against my peace.
"Who?" I mumbled.
"Who else would come to hunt you down on the day you haven't gone to town this week?" Freya motioned behind me. The light in her eyes returned, and her smile matched in both delight and foreshadowing.
"Glace, are you…" The question was interrupted by a gasp. I flinched and slowly turned in place. A wall of ice between me and my pursuer. "...Is that ice?"
I sighed and pulled myself over the lip of my creation. "Yes, yes, it is."
"There you are. Holy Faust, what did you do?" Azure Brew asked, looking up at me from my vantage. She smiled brightly, swaying in an unseen breeze, a pair of saddle bags full to bursting on her back.
I shrugged. "No idea. It was kind of an accident."
Azure stopped swaying, though her smile grew wider. "Geez, if you keep this up, you'll freeze all of Bogwood solid."
I coughed into a hoof. The very thought sent a chill down my spine. One that was colder than anything I'd made today. If Azure noticed, she didn't say anything. Freya stuck her tongue out at me before drifting down to hover around my dear, oblivious friend.
"A whole new ice age. That is some ambition, Glacial," Freya said.
"I think I'll pass on that, thank you. So, what are you doing here today?" I asked. My teeth ground together as I pointed at Azure.
"Well, Dam was worried about you. She thought those books you borrowed might confuse you, so she wanted me to come by and make sure you didn't hurt yourself."
I had no words. My mind ground to a halt. That, coupled with Freya's howling laughter, left Azure staring up at me as I struggled not to bash my own head in. The ice below my hooves cracked as I gripped them with all my might.
"She wasn't completely wrong. I mean, you have your own personal ice fort. I bet Tally would love this. You could add some clouds and a moat. That'd be amazing."
Azure bound up and started jabbing chunks of the ice wall. I slid back down my perch and groaned. "And why would I need a fort?" I asked.
“Don't know, but it'd be one hay of a statement. I bet it'd even impress Tender Crop. However, if you did it in the summer, you'd completely flood your land. I doubt Mr. Horizon would like that very much."
I could see it now. The piercing teal eyes melt the ice all their own. Not to mention my poor tanned hide. I rubbed my backside in sullen pity. I'd only managed to stand back up before Azure came bounding over the opposite wall.
"Dam, also thought a study buddy might make it easier. You never learn better than with someone to learn with, right?" she asked.
I flicked Azure's nose. "Gee, Azure, it's almost like your mom doesn't trust me."
"What, that's silly. My dam loves you, silly, like her own flesh and blood. That's why she worries. Ever since your…" Azure's eyes went wide, and the words died on her tongue. "Since your sire got really busy. She just wants to help."
Azure flinched, and I raised a hoof. A hoof which even now was still coated in blue ice. "I know, your dam is a good pony. I'm not a unicorn, I get it, but I'm not stupid either. And, before you say anything, I was doing great this morning, before well." I motion to our shelter. "I'm not even sure why this happened at all. It certainly had nothing to do with the books, though."
Azure wrapped a hoof around my neck and pulled me into a hug. "Of course, you aren't stupid. Who said you were. If you were dumb, do you think Dam would have let you borrow her magic books?"
That was a very good point. My ears pinned down as I reflected on Azure's words. She was right, of course, but it was all the same. It wasn't exactly typical for a pegasus to need magic books at all. Well, maybe one or two about weather control and protocol, but that was it.
I pulled away from the hug and tapped a frozen hoof to the side of my head. "Yeah, that's fair. Sorry for all that."
Azure rolled her eyes and grabbed my hoof. "So, what is with your hooves?"
"This happened before the fort; they just sort of did it all on their own. I started small, got frustrated, and then boom frozen hooves," I said. I threw my hooves up in surrender. "Can't get them to thaw either."
Azure's head cocked. She grabbed hold of my hoof in her magic and waggled it around. "That doesn't make any sense, Glace. We saw you melt your ice before."
I nodded. "You did, but these." I glared daggers at the hoof still in Azure's telekinetic grip. "Traitors are almost as stubborn as Crop."
"Want me to get a hammer?"
My eyes widened, and I pulled my hoof away with enough force to stagger Azure. I was against the ice wall, wings wide. I looked up at a nearby cloud and wondered if Azure's magic could reach that high.
"Wow, calm down, you big baby. I was joking," Azure said.
I looked between her and the cloud. "No, you weren't."
She cracked a smile. "No, I wasn't."
"You're a savage, you know that?"
Azure considered it, hoof tapping gently on her chin. "Probably. But, for real. Maybe I can help melt them. If you know your magic isn't working, maybe mine will."
"She's right, you know. It might work," Freya said. The inevitable terror phased through my chest and attempted a jab at my head. The feeling of her entering and leaving my form sent my stomach shooting into my hooves. I could feel bile tickle the back of my throat.
"Maybe," I managed past an acidic burp. "Can't hurt to try."
"Sure it can, you silly colt," Freya said. She'd made herself comfortable sitting beside Azure, who shrugged.
"Okay, let's see what we can do."
The following two hours were spent on an evergrowing list of attempts and regrets. The blunt force had resulted in my hoof recoiling from Azure's grip right into my face. If I had a black eye later, I was freezing Azure's bed solid.
After that was the reverse of blunt force, which was well reversed regarding what was gripped. Azure had made a case that, like a squirrel with a nut, we could break the ice with a solid rock bashing. I was speechless when the rock itself broke in half on the ice.
"Well, at least we know your ice is nice and sturdy," Azure said.
I wasn't sure if I was impressed or horrified by that attempt. Almost all other examples of my ice had seemed pretty average as far as the ice went. However, the rest had not been blue ice either. A thought had occurred as I thought that point through.
"I wonder if the ice is blue because of magic or something? Maybe it is full of mana or feeding off it. Well, the hoof ice, that doesn't really work for the walls, does it?"
"I mean, it wouldn't be the strangest thing magic can do. But, if it was just magically enhanced, wouldn't you be able to cut the magic off?" Azure asked.
That left little else to do but try another of Azure's ideas. This time, Azure went straight for the throat. She'd quickly gathered some thatch in her magic and packed said thatch into a ball of fire. With a slight start I had made good on my cloud plan. There, I peered over the edge of my fluffy protector. Azure glared up at me, fireball still in hoof. "Oh, come on, fire melts ice. It makes sense."
"No amount of logic is getting me anywhere near you and fire, Azure," I yelled back down at her. Azure pouted and extinguished her spell.
"There, the fire's gone. We'll try it as a bonfire. You can melt it at your own pace."
I accepted her compromise and rejoined her on the land of the wingless heathens. As she had suggested, Azure lit a controlled bonfire on a less icy patch of earth. A few things caught us both off guard. One, the fire was working somewhat. It was slow, and even putting my hoof entirely in the fire barely made a difference.
"So, magic ice is fire resistant. That's new," Azure said. She leered at my hooves as they sat, barely dripping in the bonfire.
"Yeah, that's neat and all. But the whole not unfreezing thing is getting a bit annoying." I said, joining my friend in her leering.
"Wait, actually. Are your hooves okay? Does it hurt or anything?" Azure asked.
I shook my head. "Not really, if I wasn't paying attention. I'd barely noticed they were still frozen at all."
"That's a bit freaky."
I nodded again. "Yeah, I'm glad we're not in town right now. I might give some of the elders a heart attack. Like Mrs. Whimsey, that mean old hag." I hissed in defiance of Mrs. Whimsey and all her stuck-up unicorn ways.
"Yeah, she is a bit mean, but you shouldn't wish ill on anypony, Glace."
"Because, of course, the filly who lives in an apothecary is gonna protect that smelly old nag," I said and crossed my hooves. Seeing as that meant they were no longer in a fire, I quickly reversed course and uncrossed them.
"Yes, yes, I would."
I sighed as loudly as I could muster and looked into the dreary, cloudy afternoon sky. My hooves dripped away with the seconds. As it went on, I was left with other points to consider. I was glad Azure had come by. She and Tally are the only ponies I know with a mind sharp enough or creative enough to make up for my otherwise dull imagination.
"Do you have any ideas for where I can put weird magic to work? I know we talked about this yesterday, but I'm still trying to figure out where to go. I could go freeze fish or produce. But that's kind of overkill, with the wicked amount of the stuff I seem to create."
I listened as Azure hummed to herself, my eyes still trailing the nearest cloud. The one I'd sat on before had poofed away when I'd returned to the ground. My mind wandered to the last time Sire had taken me flying. That'd been right after my eighth birthday. I placed a hoof over my heart. Even through the blue ice, I could feel the slight reverb of my heartbeat.
"You could always try the weather team. I bet they'd love the help during winter, at least. If you got really good at controlling your ice, you could do snowflakes and hail, maybe even cold showers."
I huffed. A seasonal weather pony wasn't unheard of. The ones in Cloudsdale or the new capital had part-time specialists. Tender Crop's aunt worked with them enough that every Crop learned bits and pieces. That still circled back to what we'd thought up yesterday. I closed my eyes and conjured a rough view of Bogwood in front of the skies, the muggy swamp and river that created a natural barrier around our humble home. Even in my head, the town was small. A runoff for Baltimare's larger piers. I didn't know for sure; I hadn't even thought about it before, but the town couldn't have more than a couple hundred people living in it. I liked that about Bogwood; it was quiet, and everypony knew everypony else. That did mean it only had so many jobs and workers to consider.
I gave a dry chuckle and waved a hoof over my head, the half-melted limb tracing the line of the cloud I'd been watching drift about overhead. "I might just hold the weather team for the season if they’ll have me. It'd give me time to think up something better. I bet my father would appreciate the extra bits."
Azure grabbed my wandering hoof with her magic and pulled it back over the fire. "Stop moving; you're only making the melting take longer, you know."
I rolled my eyes. "Sorry, just got caught up in thinking."
A jab to my gut pulled my attention back to my friend, who motioned back to the bonfire. My ears ticked back. I'd pulled my hoof back out of the fire. I slowly returned it to the flames and offered Azure a pitiable smile.
"You're hopeless."
I couldn't argue that point. Azure had been keeping my head on my shoulders for as long as I'd known her. She was loud and proud, but it never stopped her from slapping me upside my head when I deserved it. I smiled, and Azure returned the smile. I closed my eyes and let my mind drift to nothing amongst nothing. My breathing slowed, and a tingle starting from the base of my spine ran up through my nape and down both forelegs. A sudden splash and the sputter of a huffing flame.
"Glace."
I opened my eyes to find three things. One the bonfire had been doused. Two, the dousing had come from my now free and drenched forehooves. The third thing was Azure's face, which made me smile as she stared at my free hooves.
"Um."
"You unfroze them," Azure said.
I nodded. "I guess so."
"How?" Azure leaned forward, her eyes squinting as she got a bit too close.
"I have no idea. I just sort of relaxed, and it happened."
Azure sat back and pointed a hoof at me. "You better not have been faking this whole time."
I held up my dripping hooves, waving them feebly. "I promise I wasn't doing anything."
"Stress can do many things to the body. I guess all that panic earlier gave your magic the cold shoulder," Freya said. The wicked phantom smiled, mouth widening beyond that of an average pony. A disturbed gag had me look away. She followed, slowly drifting back into vision. This time, her smile was far more fitting for her size.
"Right, well, that's one problem solved and another at least considered. I could ask Sire to take me to the weather office tomorrow."
"Couldn't hurt. Winter is almost here," Azure said.
"Hey, Azure."
"Yeah, Glace?"
"Thanks for coming by today. I really needed a second opinion."
Freya scoffed. "I'm right here, you know."
"No problem. Dam thought you might need a mare's guiding hoof."
I stuck my tongue out in Azure's direction. "Right, sure."
The day was bleeding away. The afternoon sky foretold the snow and rain that the weather team was no doubt preparing for. If tomorrow goes well, I might be crafting the storms, too, before too long. I couldn't wait to have a bunch of the local farmers yelling at me. If I got lucky, maybe I could get put on Tender Crop's family farm and spend the season driving her mad.
"Every cloud has its silver lining. Magic, talents, jobs. It's all the same, really." I mused. I hadn't even realized I'd said it out loud before Azure grunted in agreement.
"Yeah, even if one of us is a pegasus with weird magic that freezes himself solid for no real reason," Azure replied.
I cracked a smile. "Couldn't have said it better myself."
The Night Guardhouse could have been a much more impressive building. In fact, you could almost mistake it for any number of town-owned storehouses or district-sanctioned housing. It was a simple, plain stone building. A couple windows, a front and back entry, and a sign nailed into the wall beside said entries. The sign read in bold white font. "The Night House". If I had to guess, black doesn't really show up well at two in the morning. It was just past sunset. The light was fading quickly, and the streets were already thin with those trying to beat the solar timer.
The day before my arrival had been relatively peaceful. I slept in and made my way into town myself. If I was old enough to get work, I was old enough to get there on my own. If I was jumping muzzle first into the night shift, I'd have to be. Father seemed rather nonplussed on the subject. He simply shrugged it off and trusted me to do what I needed to. It was so terribly like him. I often wondered if he realized not every job was like the docks. There, you floundered or succeeded on merit. Father was in charge and gave everypony an equal chance to sink on their own. There were even a few griffons that worked the ships and cargo. Imports were manageable in our neck of the woods. With Baltimare being nearby, we were used more for surplus than the big hauls. Father worked his docks like they were the grandest in the whole Alicorndom.
I remember the first time I'd been brought by the docks. The brine and sweat could be smelled a mile away. The noise and excitement made me smile back then. Dam had brought me by on Father's birthday. Back then, the paranoia hadn't made it out to the small towns yet.
I shook my head and returned my gaze to the Night House, named by whoever decided to put a sign out front. I took a single deep breath and knocked on the door. Silence. I knocked again. Not a sound. "Fine," I pushed the heavy iron-barred wooden door. The wood scratched against stone, and the room beyond was awash in the flickering of torchlight.
"How frightening," Freya said. She flew through the wall and waved her hooves in a dramatic flourish. If it had been frightening, it wasn't now.
I slowly made my way into the room proper. It was rather drab, with a single desk facing the door, a couple of lit torches, and a single rough mat in the center.
"Hello?" I called into the foyer. The rustle of paper was followed by a whispered curse. I shook my head. I wasn't alone, at least.
"Give me a second. Blasted courier went and scattered the delivery notes from here to Trottingham," the same voice from before assured. I stifled a laugh and took the chance to close the front door behind me. A typical pony would have felt both out of place and blinded once the creaking door closed with a thud. The dim light played shadows across every wall. The muted sounds of crackling and snaps from the fires left any number of imagined phantoms in every corner. It was fortunate that my eyes weren't so typical. In these conditions, finding a thestral was easiest. Theirs, and my own eyes, for that matter, seemed to glow in the dark. Was it these same eyes that gave away my heritage yesterday?
"Okay," I acquiesced.
"Fussin' mess, I tell ya," my greeter said, rising from behind the front desk with a hard sniff. To no surprise, she was a thestral. A maroon coat with a richer red mane. It screamed monstrous bloodsucker so hard it was almost comical. She looked up from the stack of papers she'd been collecting, planting them on the desk with a slap. Her eyes were silver, so bright they were almost unmistakable from her whites.
"Oh, she's pretty," Freya said with a giggle.
"What can I do for yah?" the mare asked. Her voice was nearly as muted as the decor of the room. Deep enough, it was left ambiguous on its own. "Little colt."
I coughed into a hoof. "I'm here to see Sergeant Foresight."
"The sergeant, aye?" The mare tapped her chin before her eyes sparkled in delight. "You're the foal; he's taken underwing, right? Belfry's little one. Good to have ya, good to have ya little colt."
"Thanks?" I cocked my head, looking over my shoulder at the door and back to the mare. The question was if I was prepared for whatever Foresight had planned. The giddy sparkle in the mare's eye struck an instinctual chord in my soul.
"Aye, the name is Corporal Levvy, by the by," the mare said, offering a relaxed salute and wink.
"Is that…" Foresight strolled into the room, a mug in one hoof and a sack on his back. "...There he is, glad you made it." Foresight smiled and eyed his companion. "Levvy is not giving you any trouble. Are you Corporal?"
"Aye, I mean, nay, not a bit. Just introduced myself, is all."
"I'm Glacial Zero, sorry. You caught me a bit off guard, ma'am," I said, striking a salute of my own. Both guards smiled, but the look they gave one another left some unspoken comment. One I am sure I would not appreciate.
"None of that ma'am stuff here, Colt. I work for a living. If ya need a title, Corporal is fine. But I prefer Levvy if it is all the same."
"Don't mind her. The corporal is just a bit excitable. As I'm sure you could guess, we don't get many recruits." Foresight took a draft of his mug and motioned me along. His mane gained in bounce with every sip of his favored beverage. "Follow me. We'll give you the grand tour. Then, we can get down to the fat of it."
"Right behind you, sir," I said. I fell in line behind the sergeant, Levvy, offering a wave as we entered the next room.
The second equally dark and drab room in the Night House was whatever would pass as the main office. This room had several more desks and a chandelier swinging gently in an invisible breeze. Each candle flickered and sputtered but never entirely burned out. A single window was seen on the wall facing the street I'd arrived from. Among these desks, two more thestrals sat doing whatever it was guards at desks did.
"Oi, Sergeant, that the new blood?" one of the guards asked. Another mare, this one's colors seemed to stand opposite Levvy's own coat as if all the color was pulled from their fur. This mare was a stark white with a raven black mane and tail. A mane and tail that stood on end in every direction. I feared that this poor pony may not have been informed there was a modern marvel known as a comb. Her cobalt eyes trained on my every move.
"Yes, it is, Glacial, meet Private Distant Point. Private, this is Glacial Zero."
Distant Point waved. "Nice to meet you, new blood."
"Nice to meet you too, Private."
"She's an interesting one, isn't she?" Freya said. She attempted a ribbing only to slide too close and leave her nudging leg ghosting through my opposite wing.
"About time we got some help around here. These are trying times."
The other guardmare had her eyes glued to a folder of some kind. Her desk was a mess; papers were strewn everywhere, ink blots stained the wood, and some even bled into the mare's hooves. The mare in question seemed on the brink of toppling over. Her gentle purple coat flickered in odd hues under the chandelier's light. Her long, curly mane was a gray that rendered any guesses on her age nigh impossible. Her eyes, though, were only made more cutting in the dull light. Her slitted amber eyes, much like the Sergeant’s, if he could bother acting with any intensity at all.
"You can say that again, Dossy," Distant Point said with a chuckle.
"Right, Glacial, meet our local intelligence officer on sight, Private First Class Clean Dossier.
We call her Dossy for short," Foresight said. He took another long draft of his drink and waited out the baleful look his subordinate issued.
"I hate that name. You know I hate that name."
"And?" Distant Point asked.
Dossier growled and waved an ink-stained hoof with such fervor she spattered a fresh coat over the papers she'd been looking over. Foresight puckered his lip and nudged me with a wing. "You get used to it, eventually."
I didn't know what there was to get used to. It was clear the group was close, too few to not get some level of intimacy. Still, I had to wonder, what kept them here? They stayed in a town that bordered on hating them. It was vexing. It made no sense.
"Where's Glider?" Foresight asked.
"Last I checked, she got a letter. So, reading it, I guess." Distant Point looked to the door opposite the way we'd entered. "Who knows how far behind the times it is? The snow in those parts doesn't make a courier fleet of hoof, that's for sure."
"Right, too few letters these nights," Foresight said. He walked toward the aforementioned door and waved me over. "This way goes to the cells and my office past that. We'll introduce ya to my number two and then sit down for the orientation. Faust be damned before I lead anypony on misinformation. That includes…" Foresight leaned down. His obfuscated nonchalance was replaced with a dire severity. It was enough to startle me rigid. "...the nonsense the daywalkers have going around in those empty heads of theirs."
"Oh dear, do I smell a hint of tragedy and heartache?" Freya asked. She took an exaggerated sniff and nodded. "Yep, that's sorrow, alright."
You didn't need empathic abilities or tulpa smells to see the dark peeking out from behind the sergeant's shining eyes. I offered a silent nod, and Foresight stepped back. Freya tittered in rapt attention, floating around Foresight like a buzzard over a starving deer.
"Mostly the horned ones, if you ask me."
From behind, Foresight walked, whom I can only guess was Glider. The mare looked ready to run a marathon. She bounced from hoof to hoof, eyes darting between Foresight and my own. She flexed her wings and smirked.
"Corporal First Class, Night Glider, at your service, Mr. Belfry Spawn." She offered a crisp salute while still bouncing in place. Foresight stepped aside, and Glider was off at a trot. She zipped through the office and was out the main door in a flash.
"Always on the move," Foresight said. He led me back to the single separated office in the back corner of the Night House. His office. It had a plaque to the side and everything. He strolled in without a second thought and took his seat behind his desk. A desk that was too large for the relatively small, closet-like room it occupied. A stool sat in front of the desk. The plain wooden three-legged seat was there for my benefit. Much like me, it felt small and out of place. Having me stand would have been fine. I like the feel of the cold floor under my hooves. It would have been a preference even if I wasn't a third Foresight's height and eye level with the desk's lip. I climbed onto the stool. The seat wobbled under my weight. "She's on first sweep tonight. I'll have to introduce you properly later. If you don't mind."
I shook my head. "Not at all, sir."
"Good, so that was the team. Dossy was right earlier. We desperately need the help. Only a few thestrals were left in the area and fewer who'd want to be in the Night Guard. The Nightmare may have ended for the daywalkers, but not ours, not yet."
There it was, simple as could be. It made sense. The Night Guard was the prime and easiest target for any anti-thestral sentiment. It was not a lie to say thestrals sided with Luna's new persona. It was, at best, a half-truth. The Night Guard did not side with Nightmare Moon, but that fact seemed to escape most other ponies. I offered a gentle smile. The sergeant sighed and offered a sad smile of his own.
"Not trying to scare you, Colt. But the facts are the facts. Most thestrals have been making their way east to escape that nonsense."
The part was common knowledge. Even if it wasn't, it hit a little too close to home for my liking. The Thestral Colony in the mountains to the east was where Dam had gone. That's what Father said. He'd said as little as he could back then. The mountains were prone to a nearly eternal blizzard. It made it hard for a mob of peasants with pitchforks and torches to go thestral culling. That and the cave systems were, from what little I've heard, a labyrinth. So, for the most part, those who left for the mountains were allowed to leave. The crown was unaware of how many survived the exodus. The worst of the mob relished in the fantasy of total eradication. Those of us with any sense left thought better.
"I know, sir, and I appreciate it."
"Right, well, on a similar note, I wanted to go over what I saw yesterday and answer any questions you may have about the guard or thestrals at large. I realize my offer was a bit unorthodox and rather sudden."
"At least Foresight is being forthright. Isn't that a breath of fresh air these days?" Freya said. She encircled the office as a casual breaststroke, eyes glued to the ceiling.
She was right. It was a relief to some degree. Foresight seemed the honest sort. He didn't have to get involved yesterday. He could have simply rolled over and gone back to sleep. Yet he’d made his presence known. He’d met the situation with amber eyes on target and navy wings spread wide. Dirk certainly wasn't being all that pleasant at the time. Breach was nice, though. I hope she wasn't out of line when she went to find my father.
"I have a few, but this is an apprenticeship interview, so maybe we start with that?" I had questions, too many if I were honest. I'd take the chance to weed out the ones that could wait while I heard out what Foresight had offered. I'm sure he had a few of his own on top of everything else.
"That seems fair. So, as you've seen and have been mentioned. The Night Guard is understaffed, underequipped, and mostly left to fend for ourselves. That isn't to say the crown has forsaken us completely, but the further you go, the fewer eyes there are to keep track of what is and is not happening."
"Are the cities better?" I asked.
Foresight breathed in through his teeth and gave a flimsy shrug. "Depends on what you classify as better. Her Highness intervenes more in cities like Baltimare, but the denser the population, the more chances for things to go wrong. I have to wonder if I should be telling a colt so young about such things to begin with?"
I shrugged. "Not sure. I appreciate the honesty, though. Princess Celestia can't be everywhere at once; it can't fall on her to make everypony get along."
Foresight coughed out a laugh, hoof rapping against his chest as he dissected my thoughts. That is what he gets, underestimating me, Hal, and maybe Freya. You get enough crazies together, and we are bound to say something clever occasionally.
"That's true enough. So, tell ya what I'm gonna do. I'll be as honest and forward as I think Belfry would have been. That does mean there will be things I won't or can't tell you, junior Night Guard or not. That sounds good?"
I shrugged again. "I wouldn't expect to be told everything. That would be incredibly irresponsible. I might even have the gall to send a letter straight to the top. Let's see the sun glare down on Bogwood that day. Oh, woe is Sergeant Foresight. I'd leave flowers on your grave." I added a flourish, covering my face with my forehoof. The sergeant tutted but let my dramatics go.
"That is all one could ask, young Glacial Zero. That is all we could ask."
Foresight scowled over my shoulder. I turned to find a grinning Private Dossier. "Something you need?" Foresight asked.
"You told me to tell you when I found those forms you wanted," Dossier said, waving the form in question. "Found it, sir."
Foresight waved her over. Dossier complied and hoofed over the form. She then gave a crisp salute and left without another word. Foresight scanned the forms, mumbled under his breath, and set the papers aside for the moment.
"Everything okay, sir?" I asked.
"Forms for local apprenticeship approval, appraisal, and submissions. We can't rightly have you working under the governance of Equestria without a paper trail," Foresight said dismissively. He made a face between despair and boredom. I'd be hard-pressed to replicate it even if I tried.
"That makes sense."
"It does not make it any less gross," Freya bemoaned.
"With that settled, let's get to the parts we're both here for. The position in question is rather simple. A junior position apprentice shadows, assists, and learns from any and all guards willing to teach. This includes laws, paperwork, aerial positions, procedures, and especially, with your talents in mind, detaining possible felons. Normally, that one is for somepony other than new blood, as Private Point had put it. But after yesterday, it'd be an utter waste to make you sit there and watch when and if you can assist. Though, and I say this, knowing what your parents can and would do to me, that is in no way suggesting you play hero and never act without the permission of a senior Night Guard. Has all of that made sense so far?"
I nodded along. It all fell into what I'd have assumed. The last bit was interesting; I left some impression that he was already waiving tradition for me. However, that could also be due to the lack of pony power. It did leave me with a clawing concern. "You know my magic isn't exactly normal, right, for pegasi or thestrals?"
That earned a smirk as Foresight leaned over his desk. "That's what I'm counting on, actually. I've never seen a non-unicorn pull off what you did yesterday. So, ice broken, pun intended. What exactly is your talent besides freezing ponies to the road? I mean, its limits and overall core tenets."
My ear flicked." Tenets, sir?"
"The rules that dictate your special talent, your mark, and where it begins and ends. Every pony's special talent falls within four major tenets…" Something in Foresight's amber eyes sparked, and he slapped a hoof to the desktop. "...Gah and I just realized the only reason I know them is because of E.U.G. classes."
My other ear flicked. “E.U.G.?”
"Equestrian United Guard. The collective name for the Day Guard, the Night Guard, and the Royal Guard. I took classes a couple of years older than you when I was a colt. I always knew the military was my place, but getting a command without certain studies and experiences is almost impossible. You'd be surprised at what you learn."
"Including tenets?"
"Yes, including tenets." Foresight took an exaggerated breath. "The four tenets are Purpose, Form, Element, and Method. As far as anypony that's looked into it can explain, every mark and talent falls into each."
"Huh, that makes sense," I said. In all honesty, cutie marks having rules of some sort should be expected. I'd have thought it would be a bit further in the timeline. Almost one thousand years before Nightmare Moon returns, and the scholars already knew this much? It made me wonder just how slowly certain areas of study move forward, but those magically based jumped in leaps and bounds at seemingly random if I believe what Hal remembers.
"Right, so, firstly, we have a Purpose. If you ask me, this one is the easiest, even for foals. It is often the one that triggers your mark for the first time. It's the why of your talent. Why did blank happen? For you, that'd be?"
"The lamp fire I put out." It may have been rhetorical, or it may have been fishing for insight, but I didn't have a reason to hide it either way.
Foresight nodded. "The fire, in this instance, was the catalyst and your desire to put it out was the Purpose for your talent at the time."
"That's quite the way to pigeonhole a poor pony into the future. Oh, I chopped down a tree. I must be a logger. It turns out they're just good with an ax in general. Poor silly ponies, when will they ever learn." Freya swooned, twisting in a ragdoll's dance over the desk.
It took a lot not to wave her away, even if she made a good point. Purpose is often defined by those around you. That is what stimulated a culture to do this or that. Hal wasn't the best at history, but he knew enough that I now knew enough to know that knowing was dangerous, which was ever the mental tongue twister.
"Second, we have form. If Purpose is the desire, the form is what you perform, act on, manifest, or fulfill the Purpose. Are you still following me?"
I nodded along. "Yeah, I wanted to stop the fire, So I created ice to solve the problem."
Foresight seemed to be leaving out things, whether on purpose or not. The tenets would have to have more to them than simply willing things to happen or change. Magic could not be that simple. If it was, then my talent wouldn't be seen as strange. The question was, what separated the magics of each tribe, and why could a horn distinguish the array of magic one could perform? Neither Hal nor Glacial could answer such questions. The books I'd been lent were almost as vague, and those were meant for unicorns.
"Thirdly, we have the Element. If you ask me, the name is misleading.
I cock a brow. "Oh, so my ice isn't an element anymore. That's a bit disappointing. I was beginning to like the whole mancer thing." I said with a grin. Foresight snorted. And I cracked into a fit of giggles.
"It seems fate conspires against you, Colt."
I swung my pale blue hoof in mock annoyance. "Well darn."
"But to get back on track. Element is the classification of one's talent. There are lists of various rules the ponies up in Canterlot use to define each talent for everypony. It all goes over my head. I work for a living, after all. Though if any of that nonsense seemed important, it'd be that most are either active or passive, and action or inaction. So, just remember that some pompous scholar thinks they know you better than you." Foresight leaned back in his chair and threw up his hooves in pedantic surrender. He emulates the action with gusto.
I looked around the room. Each shadow, every rustle of the air, where any of these so-called scholars might be hiding in wait. "I didn't realize that was new?"
"Smart colt, your dam teach you that?"
"I wasn't aware somepony needed to teach you that."
Foresight seemed to consider something before ultimately dismissing it and offering a constrained pucker of his lips. "I'd hope no foal would need to learn that at your age. But these are strange times we're living in."
"I miss Dam." I'd thought I'd only said that in my head. I could still remember the day she'd left. Everypony tried to bury it, not forget, just… move on. Both before and after Hal appeared, I'd never bought it.
Dam left, and it wasn't her fault. Ever since Luna snapped, Equestria has been veering into anger and grief with frightening speed. I might resist the cold in the air now. But that thought chilled me to the bone. I only noticed I'd said something when Sergeant Foresight, head of the Bogwood and local area Night Guard, jolted in place. It'd been nearly too quick to catch, just the briefest look of hurt and anger.
"So do I, Colt, so do I."
We sat in silence for an unknown length of time. In the background, you might see one of the other guards wander by, but they left us be. Even Freya took the time to wrap me in an ethereal hug and simply be there. I didn't cry. I didn't feel any need to. I'd wailed back when she left when Sire told me she wasn't coming back. I didn't want to believe him. I didn't want to understand why she left. I'd crumble under the weight of the situation. I still hated everything before and after that morning. That day had been bright and sunny, and there was not a cloud in the sky. In hindsight, the trope of rain to pair with my anguish feels almost as bad as the opposite.
I'd had my fill of silence. I coughed into a hoof and pointed to the Sergeant." There's one more tenet, right, sir?" It took a moment for Foresight to gather his thoughts. He didn't let it show. Not a single muscle on his face so much as twitched. It was apparent all the same. It was the same thing Father did whenever he started thinking about Dam.
"Method, that's the last of them. It's the how of it all. How does your talent affect you, others, and the world around you? It's also the one your talent seems to spit in the face of. Both because the how doesn't fit into what we know pegasi can do and how it manifested even ignoring the tribal attributes."
"Every rule needs an exception, don't they?" I asked. My throat was raw, and the words were clumsy and slow. It fired a bolt of irritation down my spine. My tail whipped about in accordance. "Whatever that means, Method or not."
"If I may give my own theory?"
Foresight did not need to ask permission. The fact he did felt comical. He was one of the highest authorities in town, even if the nag like Bright Whimsey begged to differ. I appreciated it all the same.
"Of course, sir. Any ideas are welcomed because I'm just about out."
"In the case of your cutie mark, I believe the Method is backward. It wasn't how your talent affected the world but how the world affected your talent. Pegasi can already manipulate the weather. This simply removes the secondary requirement of clouds and such. Your talent is no more impossible than spellcraft is for a unicorn." Foresight leaned back in his chair. "Or, maybe not."
I wasn't sure I followed the sergeant's logic. I also had only just now learned about the tenets as a concept. It was more than enough to take in all at once. The idea that the rules were molding me to their design was not a thought I relished. However, it might explain why a foal gets an unorthodox talent every so often. I need more information, time, and a meeting with Celestia. If anypony could make sense of this nonsense, it'd be the nigh immortal ruler of Equestria. Even if she is a bit younger than the memories in my head knew. I hope that if I did meet her at some point, her youth wouldn't get me bisected. If I told her the truth, or if she could just pull it from me via alicorn powers.
"That sounds confusing."
Foresight nodded. "Yes, it does. Now, let's wrap this interview of ours up, proper like. I don't think it needs saying, but I'll say it anyway: I'd like you to join us here at the Night Guard. Both because we need the pony power and because I believe that your talent could do some real good. It won't be easy, but it is honest work."
We'd hardly done an interview at all. I had to wonder if he'd have taken any other foal so readily. I'd hate to think I got the offer through nepotism, but it wasn't beyond belief. Foresight clearly missed my dam a lot. I doubt she was the only thestral who'd left he misses. Bogwood wasn't exactly flush with thestrals before they left, at least to the best of my memory. But, it was clear the town was just that much more empty. A small town like ours could feel even a single empty home.
"I hope Father doesn't mind the whole night shift thing. I know he said I should take the job if it felt right, but still."
Foresight tapped a shaggy navy hoof to his cheek. "I'd wager he knows better than you might think. He was married to Belfry, after all."
"But she wasn't a silly little colt," Freya said. She attempted to pinch my cheeks, to no avail. Both because her snow-white appendages could not touch anything and secondly because pinching with hooves is a lot harder than with fingers.
"That won't stop him from worrying."
Foresight frowned. "I'd be far more worried if he wasn't."
I'd find out tonight one way or another. Father meant what he said and said what he'd meant. He'd not have encouraged me the day prior if he had adamantly opposed the work.
"I assume there is some sort of training I'll have to go through?" I asked.
"There is, though at least part of it will need to be on patrol. I'm sure you could guess why."
That made sense. The Night House was depressingly bare. Though at least those still here are lively. Some guard training would be helpful even if, in the future, I moved on to something completely different. An apprenticeship wasn't a decree of fealty. Ponies may be bound to destiny, but destiny is not so cut and dry that the first try is always a perfect fit. I offered a smile and reached a hoof toward the desk. Foresight smirked and tapped my smaller hoof.
"Welcome aboard, Glacial Zero. Oh, and thank you."
"Happy to be of service."
"Good, so, as you might recall, Dossier dropped those forms off a few minutes ago. Some of those will need signatures from you, your father, and me. We'll have you take those with you tonight to get signed. After that, you'll bring those back, and we'll begin your training and duties. The first week or two will be spent learning the rules and verbiage. Once we have that settled, we'll have you shadow patrols. Maybe even get a feel for how we can use that ice of yours. As a last resort, of course, we can't go around freezing every pony that seems up to something."
I pointed a hoof back towards the door. "I'd have to freeze this place solid if that were the case, sir."
Foresight laughed and waved absentmindedly in his comrade's direction. "That is most likely true, yes. Try not to freeze the others if you can help it."
I saluted. "Of course, sir."
Foresight stood and stretched. "Good, that's settled. Let's get you everything you'll need and get you home. I'm sure Weathered is waiting with bated breath.
He most likely was. That thought made me happy as much as I hated the way the thestrals in town were treated. How I was treated when the busybodies thought I couldn't hear them drove my Sire crazy. For every one Mrs. Whomsey, there was a Weathered Horizon, Home Brew, and Bramble Breach. Ponies like them were worth protecting. If all goes well, they won't need my protection. Those three were far from helpless. I'd have the Night Guard to count on if things went wrong.
I wondered if this is what Dam felt when she left—this desire to protect others, even if it wasn't easy. Maybe Foresight had a point when he said my talent's method was backward. Destiny molded me for the trials, not life's trials for me.
If nothing else, at least I wouldn't be leaving Father to carry all the burdens by himself. That had me smile. Foresight led us back to the primary office. Dossier and Point were still at their desks, doing whatever it was they did when not in town. I'm sure I'd become all too aware in the coming nights.
"So, did he take the post, Sarge?" Point asked.
"I did," I answered. The toothy grin Point offered was not reassuring.
"But first, he's got forms to sign and a sire waiting for him at home. Tomorrow, we'll do proper introductions and the like. For tonight, though. I'll be seeing young Glacial home."
"Aye aye, Sarge," Point saluted.
"Good night, Glacial Zero. Maybe tomorrow you can show us that talent the Sergeant was so interested in."
"Oh, that's a great idea, Dossy," Point said, clapping her hooves together. Her already manic grin grew wide enough for me to worry she might hurt herself.
"Privates, I do not recall offering up our young cadet here like some sort of jester. I expect a professional work environment, am I clear?"
"Yes, sir," both mares affirmed. Though Distant Point's grin remained firmly in place. A wild expectation mirroring her mess of a coat and mane. While far more stoic, the look in Dossier's eye did not promise anything less than her devious companion.
"I'm doomed, aren't I, Sarge?"
Foresight grumbled, eyeing his underlings dangerously.
"They're mares, Colt. You were doomed long before today."
"He's right, Glace, we are a wiley bunch," Freya whispered.
"That's what I thought." That said, Foresight ushered me out of the Night House and back towards home.
A directionless haze of shadows and wind. The billowing skies were painted in a dark gray that blotted out the night above. I leaned heavily on one arm; the rain had slicked the brick and mortar to a near-frictionless surface. I coughed and wrapped my shoddy windbreaker a bit closer. I could have lived with the rain, the wind, and the darkened skies. They were helpful tools for not wanting to be seen or heard. It was the stinging cold that had my head spinning. I couldn't catch my breath, no matter how long I idled.
A single neat split creased my bloodstained shirt. The length of my arm is barely an inch wide. From which, the red seeped out and mixed with the flooded alleyway. It felt so familiar. The sense of deja vu stuck fast no matter how hard I tried to focus on my currently less-than-pleasant circumstances. The rest was a blur; why was I running, and from what, from who?
"It doesn't matter," I told myself for the fifth time in as many minutes. The wind pitched and fell silent. A shiver ran down my back. It wasn't the rain this time. My tongue ran a thin line over my lips. The quiet left me with the sound of my heartbeat and the faint sloshing of running water beneath my feet.
Drip! Drip! Plonk! My breath caught, and I was off. I didn't, couldn't look back. The howl had returned, but it was more beastial, angry, and hungry this time. I stumbled on a sewer grate as I exited the alley and back into the two-lane road, which was empty except for the occasional bit of trash being blown about in the storm. I scanned both sides of the road. The streetlights offered no assistance in making out what might be waiting in the dark.
"Where are you?" I whispered. As if in response, another plonk echoed behind me.
My hooves pounded against the asphalt hard enough to echo in response. The chase was on once more. I was hopelessly lost. The hospital was a pipe dream at this point. I hissed hard as my cut writhed. My coat matted against the wound, wrapping it in a blood-made triage. The howl stopped once more. The quiet returned. I idly flexed my wings. They were too wet to fly, not that it'd help much in the dark.
I turned left hard into a new alley. I barely had time to note the path before the chain-link fence reined in my mad dash. "Damnit," I turned around to find myself face-to-face with my pursuer. My back was to the fence, so I raised a hand palm to the shadow at the alley's threshold. I blinked, hand, no hoof, hoof to the shadow.
"Glacie," the shadow hissed. The word was slow. A lilt strangled the line between song and screech. The shadow's form warped. It became smaller, the limbs cracking and bending in unnatural directions. The eyes shrank to pinpricks, glowing in the dark.
"No."
I pressed harder into the fence, only to find it was no longer there. I tripped, falling on my back. My hooves frantically tried to find leverage on the slickened concrete. I pushed hard and scrambled back, eyes glued to the shadow. It had begun to approach on its warped limbs. It moved like there was nothing beneath it that the limbs were for effect and nothing more. It was a stark mimicry, a marionette attempting to copy the walk of the living. It knew the motions, the mechanics. It was off, but try as it might, it was surreal. Each of the legs took steps at differing directions and speeds. The gait is far longer than the limbs operating it.
"Glacie, please," the shadow begged.
I gulped hard. My vision had blurred. The rain had stopped, though the dark clouds remained. My stomach burned in response to my frantic retreat. The shadow was close enough to make out details. Stark white fur, untouched by the wind or rain. She, I was sure it was a filly. The form was too small to be a grown mare.
"Help us."
Then it clicked. The voice, the filly, I knew her, but why, what was this?
"Freya?" It was a question, one neither of us needed an answer for.
Freya paused and swayed in place. Then she lunged. It was cold and dark. The screaming, the anger—I couldn't place it. It wasn't mine; it hurt, adrift in the dark, so much. I struggled to move, to speak, to run, but there was nowhere to go, nowhere to hide.
"Glacie, please."
Freya's voice called from the dark. The screaming grew louder, and a single icy cold eye opened in the dark and swallowed me whole.
I thrashed, all but leaping out of bed, blanket wrapped around my legs as I hit the floor with a start. I was soaked in cold sweat, or I assume cold. I was so numbed to the feeling I'd begun guessing when something was supposed to be cold. I stared unseeing at the ceiling, heart pounding at a rocket's pace. The eye from my dream? Nightmare? Memory? At this point, I couldn't tell the difference. It was imprinted in my mind. Every time I blinked, I could see it again.
"Good morning or afternoon, I guess?" Freya said, floating into view, eyes sparkling in delight. Her limbs were normal, her eyes still bright and alive. It sucked away some of the adrenaline, leaving me merely painting and lying in a heap.
"Is it?" I whispered.
Freya shrugged. "Probably."
I sat up and pulled my forelegs out from my quilted prison. They were frozen over once more. It was becoming a habit. I let out a deep sigh; my breath vapor hung in the air. It hadn't been a one-time thing, the first dream, the hound and the man in the alley. This new one was different, but the city remained, the rain continued, and the dark eclipsed everything.
"I need a cleaning."
"Sure do, Mr. Sweaty Flank. You'll need to look your best for the talk with the girls."
Whatever I'd meant to say next died en route. Freya was right, which was bad enough on a good day. "The girls, dang it." I'd forgotten, but my dream was still fresh in my mind. It was hard to recall anything else. It replayed even with my eyes wide open. I struggled to my hooves and grumbled.
"Someone had a poor sleep, didn't they?" Freya asked. She sidled up next to me and smiled. The face of the dream Freya bled into view like a mask over the real thing.
"Yeah, bad dream," I agreed. To the river I went. Perhaps a dip in the gentle waters and a bar of lard soap would wake me up. I couldn't handle the load of my worsening dreams and the potential nightmare of my friends learning what happened to me the day I earned my mark.
Freya's smile softened. "Care to share?"
I shook my head. "No, I really don't."
I skipped the kitchen. I didn't have much of an appetite. I think only a few would. Father had habitually kept the bathing soaps, oils, and brushes in the kitchen. The closer it was toward the door, the less likely he would forget as much. With soap in one hoof and a brush in the other, I was prepped for a nice, long scrubbing. To that end, I also noted that my feathers would need some tidying, too. Nothing to preen, but if I am going on nightly flights, I'd need to keep an eye out moving forward.
The moment I opened the front door, the midafternoon sun peeled down in rays of golden warmth. It was juxtaposed nicely with my dream, as if the day itself had weathered the storm along with me. The river twinkled in the light, clear to the gravel. It was enough to earn a smile. I waded into the waters, letting the refreshing marshland's river water carry away what it could. What it couldn't would be kindly asked to vacate my coat via vigorous lard and brush persuasion.
While the bathing did help calm my frayed nerves, it didn't rid me of the stray thoughts, and I doubted there was much that could ever erase the eyes. The piercing, all-devouring hunger in those eyes, the sheer terror they commanded. I'd never seen anything like them before last night, which begged to wonder. Where could my combined minds come up with something like them? I was not likely to believe it was a foal's whimsey or a cynical man's dread.
"Equiss to Glace, you alive in there?"
I snapped back to reality. Freya had jammed a hoof through my head and pouted at me with a vengeance. "Sorry, what?" I asked.
"Not getting cold hooves, right?"
I scoffed. "No, just thinking. Sorry."
"So, now that you're all cleaned up, are you ready to march into Bogwood and reveal yourself on an intimate level that a foal should neither understand nor ever be a part of?"
There were no words; my brain simply shorted out, and I was left with the lingering worry that Freya was proof of my own insanity, and even now, whether Glacial or Hal, I was locked in a padded cell in some asylum far away from society. It would be the humane thing to do.
"What is wrong with you?" I asked when the neurons in my head finally rebooted.
"More than I care to share," Freya said with a smile and cheeky wave.
So, here is where I left that brain worm for now. Instead, as Freya had made clear a moment ago, I was very much cleaned, and that left the hard part. Tender, Azure, Tally, and Wayward would no doubt be waiting, and at least half of them were very eager to learn what could be a life-ruining secret about their friend, one that could, in an age of paranoia, get him quietly disappeared in the middle of the night. Well, morning, I guess, since my new job was nocturnal by design. It would be a bad time regardless of the time.
So, with the enthusiasm of a snail with chronic insomnia, I plodded out of the river, back to the house, and dried myself off. I lingered, staring at the kitchen, where I'd secured the bathing supplies I'd taken. I stared longingly at the dining table, the three chairs, one rarely used. The simple things were oddly lonely, looking back on what it was like before.
The face of Mrs. Whimsey, then Captain Freezy, the hushed crowds in the market. Perhaps it was all the more noticeable due to my mixed breed. The few thestrals in town were looked at with a weary distrust. I was watched with utter disdain. The scorn in their eyes crawled across the skin like ants.
I could only wonder what that scorn would become if they knew what was in my head now. I could only hope my secrets didn't turn my friend's eyes on me with the same venom, the same tainted sap, of which so many had drowned with rapturous glee.
"Ready?" Freya's voice had lost her regular cadence. Flat, dry, and to the point, this Freya was worrying and relieving in equal measure.
"Yes, yes, I am."
I turned on my hooves and left the kitchen behind, the empty table, and the unused third chair. I locked the door behind me, replaced our lovely hidden key, and reveled in the afternoon sun warming, the cusp of winter's already frosty winds. I ran a hoof through my mane. I'd only just dried it, and it was already damp. I chose not to fly. I doubted my wings would be all that pleased if I tired myself out before heading to the Night House this evening. I appreciated the practice. The patrols would be an excellent way to shape up.
As Bogwood came into view and the town square sat waiting, I could already see a particular filly sitting at my usual spot. Azure Brew swayed back and forth, humming to a tune only she could conjure up. She may have been the first to the bench, but she was not the first to greet me. I'd barely crossed the town threshold before somepony pulled up beside me.
"Your schedule is a problem," Tally said. She sniffed in distaste. I wish I was surprised, but I wasn't, and oddly enough, I found that comforting.
"Not even a hello, tsk, tsk, shame on you," I said. I flapped a wing into her side. Tally stumbled but otherwise made no move to retaliate.
"Hello, Glace, how are you today?"
It was my turn to stumble. I hadn't noticed as Wayward, in a very 'her' fashion, manifested from the void to play the comforting reminder that not every pony was Writ Tally. A fact I praised Faust every day was true.
"Were all of you waiting to ambush me?" I asked.
"Yes," both fillies answered together. I planted a hoof to my face, though even that couldn't stop the smile that followed.
"And Tender?" I asked.
The others shrugged. Well, at least my ambushers weren't coordinating. By this point, Azure had noticed our approach and was waving in our direction. She looked disturbed by how frantically she attracted attention. Some of the shoppers and passerbys were giving her odd looks and a wide berth.
"She can't go a single day without making a scene, can she?" Tally asked.
"No," Wayward and I said. Tally did not seem to like the turnabout, even if she was smiling along with the rest of us.
"And just look how easily all that angst vanishes when little Glace is with his fillies. How cute can you be, hm?" Freya asked.
"Hey, girls and Glace. Everypony ready for some super secret, secret sharing?" Azure asked no sooner than we entered conversational speaking levels, which still meant Azure was several octaves too loud.
"Azure, please."
The filly giggled and hopped off the bench. She wrapped me in a hug quicker than I could manage a protest. "I'm just kidding, Glace. I promise to take whatever it is you want to talk about seriously, for real."
I returned the hug. "I know, Azure. Tally will tan you if you don't." I nodded at the filly in question, who in turn nodded. Azure pulled back and sheepishly kicked at the dirt.
"That's so mean," Azure said.
"If it helps, I won't tan you," Wayward offered. Azure stuck her tongue out in response.
"Has anypony seen Tender Crop?"
Azure rolled her eyes. "No, only got done with Dam a few minutes before you got here. I know you like this bench for some reason. So, I came straight here."
"Only been waiting a minute or so before Azure got here," Tally said, motioning to the bench. "Wayward?"
Wayward shook her head. "I just got here myself. I saw you, Glacial, and well."
"Should we go looking?" Azure asked.
"She knows where we'll be, or at least where we'll meet up. There is no point in wandering off blind."
"Oh, look."
Wayward was pointing down the street to a very flustered filly who was all but sprinting in our direction. The rest of us shared a look and waited for Tender to join us. The look on her face was mildly amusing and more worrying. While yes, she looked annoyed about her own tardiness. There was also the lingering wild look of fear. The eyes from last night crept into my vision. The exact contrast to the look in Tender's eyes, one the effect, the other the trigger. It sent a shiver down my spine.
"Sorry, I'm— it was," Tender said between gulps of air. The second she came to a stop in front of our little group, she waved about in frantic charade to whatever had her spooked.
"Breathe, Tender, breathe," Wayward said, gently patting the larger filly's back.
"Poor thing looks ready to faint," Freya cooed.
"Border toad was sitting on the main path. It just sat there, and the muck around that part, it's bad. If it saw somepony passing by, it would have moved." Tender's face fell at the implications.
Border toads were a nasty local fauna. They were lumpy, gray, oozed mucus-like sweat, and otherwise gave any sane pony the willies. They could eat a whole pony, and their tongue was a local terror. I always thought the way it looked at anything it saw was the worst part. It only saw three things: food, not food, and predators. It did not have many of the latter. They were sedentary creatures that loved mud baths, so they rarely came near town.
"So, what happened?" Azure asked. She'd taken a position on Tender's opposite side from Wayward. Tender squirmed between the two, reassuring warmth of the other fillies.
"It saw something. I don't know what, but it leaped away after it. If Dam was the one bringing me to town, she'd have sent me back by that point. Dad has a stubborn streak."
"Of course he does; look at his herd," I offered, giving Tender a greeting nuzzle. She glowered at me in return. "Am I wrong?"
"No, but that's not a bad thing," Tender said lamely. Her pout gave way to a small smile.
"Never said it was. I like your sire. He's the most welcoming pony I know."
"Yeah, he's always so nice when he comes by the shop," Azure said.
"Whatever."
That was that, which led to the real meat of the talk.
"So, we're all here," Tally said, turning to me. I nodded. I wasn't getting out of this either way. The fillies would tie me up and throw me in a cellar before letting me chicken out.
I had started chewing on my inner cheek without noticing. "I'm glad you're here. This talk is already going to be…" I trailed off, and the words escaped me. I'd put as little forethought into this whole afternoon as possible. The ramifications always won out over any other thoughts. At the very least, my confession wouldn't sound practiced. "...Difficult."
"So, should we… go somewhere a bit less listen-inny?" Azure asked.
"Most likely," Tally affirms.
Tender scanned the market. A glance from one passerby, another from an older mare as she bought groceries. The fact that the townsfolk were giving our group some side eye wasn't itself suspicious. The mares in town were expected to. It was the elders who paraded around the town like clucking hens who left every pony a bit too alert.
"So, where to?"
"I bet Dam would let us use the back of the shop for a bit. As long as we don't make a mess or bother any customers," Azure said. She waved in her home's direction. The bounce in her step was infectious. The talk had clearly left her a bit antsy since the theft incident.
"Any objections?" I asked.
There were none. So, Azure leading the way, our humble herd of totally not suspicious secret-having foals would find sanctuary in the trusting bosom of Home Brew's shop of wonders. Each step sent a shock down my spine. Azure wasn't the only antsy one. Tally had given me several odd glances when she thought I wasn't looking.
'What Ails You' stood as it always did, not a thing out of place. The scent of various flora and oils wafted out the front door, holding ajar and inviting all to come in. It was a beacon in the sodden mildew that was Bogwood. Every time inside was like the first. Azure pranced in like she didn't know the sneaky tactics her dam came up with to draw in the passerby. The rest of us followed at a leisurely pace. There was no rush. I certainly wasn't racing towards potential disaster. There was a place for a "stopping and smelling the roses" analogy lost somewhere in my mind, but where it started and ended was uncertain.
"Dam, I'm back," Azure announced.
Home Brew sat behind her counter, sorting vials of powder of various colors into neat little stacks. She didn't look up from her work but smiled all the same. "Back so soon, are we? You seemed sure you'd be gone a while longer. You did." Home Brew shifted an eye in our direction, and her smile grew. "Oh, brought everypony back here. I take it your outing isn't quite over then. No, not quite yet."
"No, but we kind of need to borrow the sitting room for a bit. If that's okay?"
Azure armed her ace, the dreaded pout and tearful eyes. A bane to the weak-hearted, used only in the most grievous situations or when you wanted extra dessert. It was truly the most potent attack a foal could wield. Home Brew held her daughter's gaze with impressive fortitude. She only looked away once. Her defenses were strong. No pony could ever claim Home Brew was spineless. But, like the tide erodes stone, so did Azure's assault wear down her mother's walls.
"Whatever for?" Home Brew finally asked.
Azure's grin claimed victory. "We just want to talk, is all. I promise there will be no mess or trouble."
Azure was not one who should ever make such a promise, and everypony present knew it. Tender rolled her eyes so hard that I worried she might get them stuck. Wayward mouthed an apology. One Home Brew acknowledged with a giggle.
"Very well, but no stomping around back there. This is a business, and you will treat it as such, young filly. Yes, you will."
Azure nodded eagerly. "Thank you, Dam." Azure rounded the counter and gave her mother a hug and nuzzle. One Home Brew returned readily.
As Azure called them, the backrooms were the family's living quarters. I'd been back plenty of times, though very rarely in the middle of the store's open hours. It was like the storefront wrought with smells most couldn't name. The sights very much matched the scents. The hall was garnished with an array of colored fabrics. Projects Azure's oldest sister dyed herself. Bright Brew had a knack for dyes and fabrics. She could rattle off every flower and root in the marsh and what color came from what. The Brew herd seemed to interweave their talents with an unnatural grace. Outside of the plants and fabrics that took up almost every available surface, the rest of the herd's specialties were present. Azure's other sister, Dark Brew's various stouts, and even her sire's flower arrangements sat on display for all to see. A place where every herd member was represented in all their glory. It made me smile, even if Azure's sisters were a bit too much most of the time.
"I will never figure out how you find space for all this stuff," Tender mused. She jabbed a roll of fabric, nearly as tall and broader than herself. The rose red fabric did not so much as wrinkle in response.
"It's not that much, silly. Just enough for everypony to shine."
"I like it," Wayward agreed. Azure bumped the pegasus filly with her flank.
"Sitting room, right?" I pointed to a doorway to the far left of the entry foyer. Azure nodded and skipped around the gallery of familial pride.
"There should be plenty of room there, even for fillies as big as Tender Crop. I promise no big scary fabrics to offend you there." Azure winked back at the older filly, who huffed, cheeks pinkening in response.
"I just think it's a bit much, is all," Tender muttered.
The sitting room was, as Azure assured, far less cramped. As was the kitchen. The bedrooms were stocked with the sleeper works but did not evasively parade between the three bedrooms. It was only natural, to some extent, that if your business and home were one and the same, both would bleed into one another to some extent. The fact none of this even came close to the two storerooms in the far back was amusing.
The sitting room itself was cozy. Plush and scraggly stuffed pillows sat spread around a stone fireplace, doused at the moment. Compared to the other rooms, it was almost spartan, with a few knick knacks on the walls and mantle and a single portrait of the family hanging across from the fireplace. We each found a seat to our liking and moved them into their own little circle.
This was it, time to get everything in the open. The girls watched me with open curiosity and an unknowable glint in Tally's golden eye. Freya had taken to sitting on the mantle, kicking her hooves about with eager anticipation.
"So, where to begin."
"At the beginning of whatever 'this' is," Tender said. Her mossy brows seemed stuck in a complex dance of frustration and curiosity. That was when you could see them through her thicket of a mane. I had to resist a toothy grin. I could already feel the cold clock if I did.
"It is okay to be nervous, Glace," Wayward said, reaching out and patting my hoof. Well, there goes my poker face.
I brushed my as usual slightly damp gangs ro the ise and clapped my hooves together. "Okay, okay, so it started when I got my cutie mark. Which is its own pain in the butt. One each of you has seen to some degree."
"Sure is," Azure said. "The ice fort was fun, though."
"Ice fort?" Wayward asked.
I waved the memory away. "I was having a bad day. Ice everywhere. Sire was a bit upset. I will not be doing any cryomancy practice in the yard again."
"Poor Glacie had a bit of a panic attack," Freya added to no pony's benefit.
"So, back to the point. At the same time, I got my cutie mark. I was given something else too, or, more, someone else."
The looks that ran across every ponies' faces was telling. Confusion, contemplation, annoyance, and back to blank. It took less than a second for each expression to come and go. It matched up to the knots forming in my gut exactly.
"You've had to notice. I don't exactly act like I did before. I haven't exactly been subtle. I've tried, but it never really sat well with me, lying to you, pretending to be someone I'm not, someone I'm not anymore. Or someone's?"
"What are you bucking talking about?" Tender asked with a sharp breath, her eyes dilated to pinpricks. "What does any of that mean?" she asked. She was angry. She trembled in place, breathing out in snorts of hot air. An urge to run struck me, but I found myself unable to move. "Do you think this is funny?"
My head cocked to the side, ears pinned flat against my head. "Funny?"
"Glacial, I don't get it. What do you mean by someone else? Who, and what does this have to do with your cutie mark?" Wayward stumbled over her words as her sight traveled between the seething Tender and myself.
"I don't know. It just… happened at the same time. I was just Glacial Zero, and now, there are other memories, feelings, someone else."
"So you're crazy?" Azure asked. Unlike Tender, Azure seemed lost, her eyes scanning a distant horizon beyond me in the vain hope of spying on something she didn't even know she was looking for. It stung. I'd known they could get upset, angry, or confused, and it still stung.
"Can you prove it?"
I felt like I'd been slapped. Four simple words, a fair request. Tally stared unwaveringly at me. If only it were that simple.
"Hal."
Tally's blonde brow rose. "What?"
I shook my head and earned a face full of mane. I really need to stop pushing it aside like it won’t pendulum back. "Not what, who, the not Glacial Zero? His name is Hal."
"And just what is Hal? That's no pony name," Tender asked. Her anger had quelled to a passive annoyance, but an improvement of any kind was a thin chance at salvation.
"Not a pony, no, a human," I said. I offered a limp shrug. Neither Hal nor Glacial had anywhere near the knowledge of Equiss history to know if that meant anything to anyone at all. That was discounting Starswirl's mirror.
"A human?" Wayward asked. She said the word slowly as if easing into it. She was giving it a chance. The look of shock had passed for her, and now, a quiet curiosity led her to think about it.
Azure Brew's gaze had failed to find her answers. "Glacial. If this is a joke, please just tell us. None of this makes any sense," Azure said. She looked on the verge of tears. She was trembling much like Tender, but this was no fury.
The issue was, no matter what, all of the girls were fillies, children. Tally was smart and Azure resourceful, Wayward offered a hoof to everypony, and Tender was braver than most. But they were still foals, and even with Hal in my head, I didn't understand any of it either. I was living it. They were just thrown into this mess. They deserved to be confused, angry, and upset. I was, too, even days later, and it still made no sense at all.
"It isn't a joke."
Foals or not, they deserved the truth. I promised I('d tell them, and I wasn't stopping until they knew it all. I could feel the ice crawling under my skin. All my hooves, forehooves, and back were frozen to the knee. If anypony noticed, they didn't say anything. Freya had taken the chance to land beside me. She wasn't smiling. There were no snide comments. She was eerily silent. The eyes from this morning reflected in her own. It was enough to turn my stomach.
"Then what is it?" Tally asked.
I took a single deep breath, as hard and as long as possible. I wished the fireplace was going. The frost had moved from my hooves and now danced in the air. Once again, nopony said anything. The silence was painful and grating; I hated it.
"I don't know. I don't know if Glacial was first, if Hal is fake, or if either is or was ever real. I'm scared, I don't know what to do. Hal has shown me things. Things from a long time in the future. Things I don't know are real either." I'd begun to cry. Begun only because the tears had frozen on my cheeks.
"From the future?" Azure whispered.
I nodded.
"Stop it, Glace, this isn't funny." Tender had stood. She glowered down at me. She was scared; the look in her eyes and the hurt made no sense. As much sense as Hal made at this point. "Stop."
I shook my head. "Like Nightmare Moon."
There was a gasp. Tender towered over me, hoof raised. But whatever she'd planned to do, her hoof never came down. Tally had taken it and pushed it away. Tender looked dumbly, not understanding why she'd been stopped.
"What about Nightmare Moon?" Tally asked. She'd placed herself ahead of Tender and looked ready to bolt. The panic in her face, the way her wings flexed.
"On the longest day of the thousandth year, the stars will aid in her escape, and she will bring about nighttime eternal." I recited it from memory. Hal recited it.
Tally plopped onto her haunches and blinked blearily.
I reached out, placing a hoof gently on her shoulder. "Tally?"
"I see her," Tally said.
"What?"
"Nightmare Moon. She's trapped, yelling down at Equiss. She screams, but nopony can hear her. But she knows I'm there. Then the moon shatters."
It was my turn to be baffled. The others didn't seem any more inclined to laugh Tally's words off, either.
"Then all the stars all go out one by one. Until only six remain."
My hoof dropped from her shoulder. "I don't—"
"Tally, are you—" Azure's own words faltered.
"What is even going on?" Tender growled. She fell back, toppling onto her back, and flailed in frustration.
"Does that fit whatever you've seen? Does that fit?" Tally asked.
"I don't know. The prediction I gave is a prophecy for the future, so they may be one and the same. Maybe not."
The prophecy was a single line, a bit to move the plot. Its history was vague at best. For all I knew, it could have been mine. I learned it from when Twilight read it, and then by knowing it, I made it real. Maybe it was Tally's? Maybe it wasn't true, Hal's memories or the prophecy. It could all be fake.
"Is the human a seer?" Wayward asked.
It was a fair question. In a way, it wouldn't be inaccurate to say he was. It was a memory of a far-flung future. "Maybe."
"I give up," Tender said. She rolled onto her barrel, and all of that pent-up anger, fear, and confusion just withered up and died. "So, you have weird magic and see the future now?"
"It's like a fairytale. A voice comes to a foal and guides them to a brighter tomorrow," Azure said. She cracked a faint smile and pointed at me. "Glacial Zero and Hal, heralds of tomorrow. Here to stop the big bad Nightmare Moon."
I opened my mouth only for Azure to clamp it shut.
"No, sorry, Glacial Zero, Hal the human thing and Writ Tally. Stop the big bad Nightmare Moon." Azure's smile had begun to grow.
Azure certainly had an optimistic take on what should be considered total insanity. Just moments ago, I had the whole lot confused and angry. That was a rational response. It made my heartache, a deep sense of regret fill my lungs, and bile creeps up my throat. Then, as if a switch was pulled. Azure was making jokes, and Tender was tired and done.
I couldn't help it. A tickle in the back of my throat, then a chuckle, a guffaw, a manic hysterical laugh. My ribs hurt as I rocked in place. The others were staring. Wayward looked ready to flee for help. She would too. Tally seemed to get it. That twinkle in her eye was still there. A knowing but wary fluffing of the wings. It all made it funnier. It was truly bizarre. A gentle warmth that promised a raging inferno if pushed too far.
"I think you may have driven the poor colt insane, or more insane there, Azure," Tender said, throwing a lazy hoof in Azure's direction. One Azure made a conscious effort to ignore.
When I finally regained control of myself. I found that the tension I'd had clawing at the back of my mind had lessened. The ice had retreated from my back, though all my hooves remained frozen.
"Sorry, sorry, I—" I took a very deep breath. "I really needed that. I know what I've said; most of it sounds crazy anyway. Trust me, I know it does."
"These human, oracle things, what are they?" Wayward asked. She paused, enunciating 'human' and 'oracle' with weight far beyond their scope.
The question made me wince. Humanity was a very complicated and loaded question. I breathed in through my teeth, ruminating on just how much I truly needed to know. Humanity, at best, was a thousand years away and one magic mirror away from mattering. That didn't mean Wayward and the others deserved anything less than the facts. The frost had returned.
"A species of highly advanced apes that have a pension for war and invention. That and apparently gazing into other worlds. If Hal is anything to go on. I think it's called isekai?"
It was incomplete, a fundamental, simple view of things. Tally had leaned forward. Her mind must have been whirling pretty hard. I could almost see the smoke billowing from her ears. She was, it seemed, very capable of a blonde moment. The poor filly, what a way to go. Tender hadn't even sat up. If her ears weren't twitching like mad, I'd have thought she was ignoring me altogether.
"That's a bit—" Wayward said. She shrugged hopelessly. Wayward was confused, but they had been the least perturbed of the four. It, in some ways, made me happy. I'd known her so long that we were practically family. She gave me the benefit of the doubt without so much as a second thought on the matter.
That did not mean she believed it; the scrutiny of her scrunched muzzle was proof of that. She struggled with words because the ones she was thinking stood in contrast to what she believed was right. I scooted over and wrapped Wayward in a side hug. It didn't dissuade her plight, but she seemed happy to return it all the same.
"Crazy," I agreed.
"I'd like to get back on point," Tally said. She turned to Azure with a scowl. "I'm not so certain Glacial's and my 'visions' are one and the same, perhaps not related at all. But, the fact they happened in the same time span is strange."
"I'd be hard-pressed to think they are either. It doesn't fit. Tally's dreams might just be that, bad dreams. My 'vision' is far less metaphorical. Mine knows where she arrives, who she meets, what she does, everything. If mine are to be believed, that is."
"You're not sure?" Tender asked. She sat back up but still seemed rather done with the whole conversation. I couldn't blame her.
"One thousand years is a long time. So much could happen in that time. So many things could change the future completely. But, I don't think the 'visions' are fake."
“Oh, maybe it's a thestral thing. Princess Luna was the Princess of the Night and Princess of Thestrals. So, maybe she sent the visions. You know, all secrety, so Nightmare Moon wouldn't know. Maybe she had visions about your visions," Azure said. The filly was practically buzzing in her chair.
"Why send them to a foal?" I asked.
"Why disguise them as these 'human's’ memories?" Tally asked.
"Why not send them to her sister?" Wayward continued.
Azure deflated with each question. She was left muttering to herself. "Maybe Luna wanted to let a colt be the hero for once."
There were no words, not one. There was the overwhelming desire to either scream into the pillow I'd been sitting on or beat Azure with said pillow, maybe even both. Tally simply shook her head in defeat. Wayward looked baffled, and Tender laughed. Of course, she was.
"No, shame on you," I said with a growing groan in the back of my throat.
"She might be onto something, Glacie. There needs to be more stallions who get to play hero. Oh, to be coddled and weak. What tragic creatures stallions are."
I wished I could hit Freya with a pillow, or at all if I were honest.
"She might be right, Glace. You and your sire aren't exactly the portrait of a normal colt. Not that that is a bad thing. But all of Bogwood knows, your sire is something else entirely," Tender said between giggles. She wasn't wrong.
"True." Tally nodded distractedly. Her thousand-yard stare was becoming a bit concerning at this point.
"Maybe you should ask the Night Guard. That is if thestrals have visions."
It was something to consider. If anypony is going to be able to commune with our Princess, it would be a thestral. That or somepony who could learn to dream walking. As rare talent as that is, I certainly had about much chance at dream diving as using magic beyond my tribe.
"I intend to look into it, regardless of Glacial's efforts. I swear this, on top of druids, this colt is going to work me to the bone," Tally tutted. The sly smile she had only left me rolling my eyes in response.
"So, you girls believe me, or am I going to wake up in a cell tomorrow?" I asked. I motioned to the group, my eyes pleading, even as I smiled coolly.
"Believe? Not so sure on that, Glace," Tender said with a head shake.
The pit in my stomach gargled. The fur on the back of my neck tingled.
"But, you've never been much of a liar. Not much the creative type either."
I pressed a hoof to my chest tuft in mock displeasure. It didn't last. Tender had been the more erratic of the four so far. If she was willing to at least give me a chance, I wasn't going to dismiss it. Tally vouching for me, if unintentionally, was a lifesaver.
"Oracles have happened in the past," Wayward said. She offered me a hug, much like I'd done a few minutes ago. I happily accepted. The contact was a kind of warmth that even my ice could not chill.
"You have my support, you big magical confusing dummy," Azure said, offering a mock salute. "Besides, if it is true, who knows what other things you might see."
I had yet to consider the other adventures Hal could recall. Nightmare Moon was the first and one of the more memorable, but she was hardly the only monster hiding or locked away. "I mean, sure," I said.
"You've already seen others, haven't you?" Azure was in my face, hooves wrapped around my shoulders before I knew she'd moved. "Haven't you?"
I couldn't meet her eye, which was rather hard, with her face nearly pressed flat against my own. "Maybe."
Azure released a startled eep as she was pulled back from me. Tender had the unicorn filly hooked and cuffed by the neck as Azure vainly tried to pull herself free.
"Calm down," Tender said, eyeing her captive. Azure stopped flailing and crossed her hooves in dejected offense.
"Any of note?" Tally asked. She'd taken the side opposite of Wayward. She spoke softly, pressed just barely against my side, and leered at me. Her ears twitched in eager anticipation, her ponytail bobbing to and fro. The filly couldn't decide if she was excited or frightened. Both were equally fair responses.
"A few, all of them after Nightmare Moon."
"That oracle of yours is quite the seer. A bit too good at seeing if you ask me," Tender said, eyes still glued to Azure, who had at this point recalled she had a horn. Each time it lit up, Tender would flick the appendage, shattering the charge and leaving Azure even more upset.
I nodded. "Agreed."
"Maybe we should take a break?" Wayward offered. "This has been a bit much. Not that I don't want to hear more. It's just… been a while, and you still have some work."
"Glace." Azure had calmed down and had been plopped into Tally's old pillow. "I have a question before we stop."
"Yeah?"
"Shouldn't you tell Princess Celestia?"
Chilled to the bone, dead silent, the air harsh on the lungs. My heart had stopped, time slowed, and I felt sick. Not an ounce of magic is involved from me or any other pony. The thought sent a wave of nausea through my everything.
In Hal's memories, Princess Celestia was a wise, kind, loving ruler. The type of ruler any nation would be lucky to have. That Celestia, I'd have already been on a train right to Canterlot. If that Celestia was here. The wandering eyes and jump at the tiniest creaking of wood proved my point thrice over. The only pony in the room not preparing to duck and cover was the same filly who'd asked the question in the first place.
Glacial Zero's Princess Celestia was not Hal's, not at all. Ever since Luna was banished. The remaining ruler of Equestria had been nothing short of disillusioned. She had little patience for any noble of the court and barely any more for the ordinary pony who sought her aid. No pony could blame her. Celestia did not take to regret or grief with any grace. She took it better than most, but even then. It had been eight years, and there was no sign of her pulling herself from the faunt of angst she'd tried to drown herself in, with mixed success.
"I don't think that is a good idea." Tally was the first to regain her wits.
"But, doesn't she deserve it? If she knew, she wouldn't be so sad."
"Prophecy is never that simple," Freya said. She floated up behind Azure and tried to pat her on the head. I blinked; maybe I was seeing things; this afternoon had been a wild ride. But, for just a second, I thought I saw Azure's ear twitch.
"Her knowing could affect the outcome," Tally said.
"She learns it at some point," I said with a sigh, "I have no idea when or if it is me who tells her. Maybe I do, at some point, but I don't think that's now."
"But, she's so sad, it's not fair."
Azure was right. Celestia was heartbroken. She may very well find peace in knowing Luna will eventually come back. Or, in her grief, she may see the prophecy as some twisted insult and deep fry the messenger on the spot. It was a gamble. Celestia had already dealt with several skirmishes on the Griffon border herself. If rumors were true, it was not pretty.
"Who claimed fate was fair?" Freya asked, her voice scornful. Her look mirrored Azure's, one of compassion and the other of rage. I felt neither.
"It isn't fair, but neither is asking her to wait a thousand years in the hope that the 'prophecy' is true."
"That'd make things a whole lot worse if you ask me," Tender said.
"What if it didn't happen? What would the Princess do?" Wayward shook in place.
"Break," Both Freya and I said at once.
"That settles that," Tender said. Azure made to say something but found a hoof covering her mouth. The look she gave Tender was enough to wilt flowers.
"For now. But, girls, for real. I know this has been a bit much. But I want to thank you for at least hearing me out. I felt terrible keeping all of this to myself. So, thank you."
Tally grabbed me from the side. "Thank us, he says. You really are a big colt dummy."
"He sure is," Wayward said, latching to my other side.
"I don't know if any of this oracle stuff is true, but if anypony I know would see the future, it'd have to be the colt who broke his own magic," Tender added to the hug pile.
"We're not done talking about these prophecies, you know?" Azure said and jumped atop the group.
"No, I doubt I am."
On some level, it was a relief not to be the only one who knew the truth. On the other hand, it was a new type of anxiety. I was putting a lot of faith in the girls in a time of paranoia and fear. It may not have been the most innovative idea. But I think I could live with that.
Author's Note
This chapter was an utter beast to write. I hope it laid the foundation for where I want to go in the immediate future.
Comments and Critiques are welcomed.
I woke with a gasp, my heart pounding in my ears. I looked around my room in a vain attempt to track what had left me breathless. The vague shape of somepony or something slowly closing in. A shape that became more bleary by the second. The stalker vanished back into the subconscious where it'd come from. After several minutes, I'd relaxed enough to flop back into bed. The sun's light was already shining through the small window that sat not a meter away, the only means to tell night from the day in my bare room. It was a place to rest my head and nothing more. I didn't really need anything. I didn't spend much time around the house, and neither did Sire, for that matter. For a minute, I simply lay on my back, staring up at my wooden ceiling. While the nightmare had faded, the feeling it left behind was enough to make my stomach churn.
"My my, you look like you've been visited by a specter."
I lazily followed the voice. Freya had taken to floating by my bedside. Face struck with a gentle sorrow. If incorporeal ponies could cry, I'd almost believe she would. I shook my head and sat back up. Father would no doubt be calling for me anytime now, and I didn't want to sour him over a bad dream. I hadn't gotten to talk to him last night. I didn't get to tell him what happened in the grove and the half-dozen frozen trees. I hope they thawed. I didn't need the town conjuring some folk tale about ice monsters or anything.
"That'd be just great," I whispered before sliding out of bed and slowly plodding my way towards the kitchen. I could once again hear Sire whistling as he made breakfast. No matter the time of day, my Father always had time for a jaunty tune. I smiled. It was something I always enjoyed waking up to. A reminder that things could still be okay.
"Morning, Colt," Father said as I sat at our dining table. He didn't even look back. I grunted in response. The flick of Sire's ear had me straighten in my seat.
"Morning."
"You sleep well?" he asked.
I nodded. "Better than the night before."
Father turned to me and quirked an eyebrow. Without a word, he placed our breakfast on the table and offered me a plate. The silence that followed left me wishing I'd stayed in bed. When it did break, it was almost worse.
"Did you and Azure Brew have any luck discovering your talent? You were barely awake when I gathered you in the square. The tired only somepony who worked hard can earn."
He'd know more about working hard than most. Now that it was just him and I. He worked three times harder just to keep us comfortable. Even before I got my cutie mark, I'd always known that the docks were not a place for the lazy. Even before it was just the two of us, I'd always known my Father was anything but weak. In a sense, I felt proud that my Father acknowledged how hard I'd practiced yesterday. But that didn't stop it from hurting, even with someone else's memories. Some things could never be forgotten.
"I know how I stopped the fire now. But it doesn't feel right. The magic feels wild."
"Wild, how so?"
I plopped my spoon into my breakfast and met my Father's gaze. He sat nothing given away, face like slightly perturbed granite. It'd been a habit the two of us had as far back as I could recall. Teal eyes lock with teal eyes. It was no fight for control, no act of defiance. It simply was as it'd always been. A way to see behind the mask.
"It doesn't like doing what it's told," I said before lifting my spoon back up and shoving it into my muzzle.
"Does any foal?"
I shrugged. "No, not really."
"Then why would a foal's magic be any different?"
I snorted, choking on my meal, which also earned a smile from my Sire. When I managed to pull my spoon from the back of my throat, I pointed at him. He snorted and swatted at the utensil. I barely managed to pull it back in time before he swiped it, either for himself or across the room.
"That's not fair," I said.
"Was it supposed to be Colt?" I tsked and crossed my hooves. My Sire rolled his eyes and returned to his meal. "That reminds me. I managed to ask about your talent. Or, I asked about any such similar magic."
I sat up straighter. "Oh?"
My Father nodded. "Some interesting tales. Most of it was manure. But one or two seemed suspect."
"Don't most sailors tell bunk stories, anyway?" I asked.
Father took a second to consider my question before nodding. "Fair. But, the one that stood out was more than simple fancy or delusion. It was ancient."
Well, that had my attention. I honestly wasn't expecting much from the dock hooves, fishers, or sailors. They were my Father's friends. They weren't bad ponies. They just liked a good yarn. Even my Sire had told a few fibs. I could recall a few with a smile. It wasn't often that he had time, but when he did tell a story, It was worth the wait. But telling stories and solving mysteries weren't really the same thing.
"The story was about pre-unified Equestria. You don't hear many stories about those times anymore. I haven't heard one since I was a foal. Those days were dark, bleak times. Yet, hear one, I did. A strange day for the both of us, I'd wager."
"Very true," I agreed.
“As it went, the tale was about a band of druids, not all unicorns, even back then. Outsiders, shunned by all. These druids came together, even amongst the cold, the windigos, and the uncertainty of war, which would, for most, be enough to dismiss it outright. I'd have, too, if not for the description of the magic."
"Druids he says. How interesting, wouldn't you say Glacial? So very enchanting," Freya said, gushing as she danced around the table. I struggled not to roll my eyes.
"They said those druids could conjure great magic, power to command nature. They made pacts with fae spirits and could be any tribe. All it took was one of those pacts to do it. Though even among these supposed druids, nothing was said of their cutie marks and talents. Though I was guessing, one can be as liable to learn druid magic as any other."
My fur stood on edge. None of this was in Hal's memories, even if almost all of those memories were of the future. The idea, the fae, had something deep inside me retracted in disgust. Sire must have noticed as he leaned forward, eyeing me as I writhed under his look.
"Doesn't feel right, does it?" he asked.
I shook my head. He leaned back and scoffed. "Didn't sit right with me either. It goes against nature. Such pacts would be rife with prices no pony should ever need to pay."
On that, he and I agreed. I was not too keen on selling my soul, cutie mark or not. That was if the fae were even real. Though, the magic did sound similar. I looked at my hoof. After yesterday, my hooves still felt cold, but it wasn't as bad as before. I'd hoped wearing myself out would have warmed them up. But there they were, still on the edge of stomping through a fresh coat of snow, a deep numbing chill.
"Do you think maybe I—"
My Sire held up a hoof. "Recall Colt, it is a story. Even if true, I wouldn't know a thing about it. If it is druid magic, then I will be as proud of you as I'd be of any other. I advise asking someone smarter than me and a bunch of salted sailors about it all."
I didn't realize it at the time. Not until Father stood and pulled me from my seat into his embrace. I was crying. I was smiling and crying and held tight against my Sire. I didn't know if he knew just how much I needed that: his unconditional pride and the fierce fire hidden behind his sharp gaze. He was right. Maybe the druid story would lead somewhere, maybe not. But I wasn't alone either way. I had Sire, Azure, and even Freya. I had friends, and I had more than enough time to figure it all out.
When he finally let me go, I felt lighter. My sire offered me a pat on the head before moving me onto his back. "We're running late. We can talk more later if you want. Maybe you can ask somepony in town about druids or other ancient magic. If it is ancient magic at all."
"Yeah, okay," I said. I wiped away any stray tears. And settled in as we left the house and headed back into town. The walk was quiet. I was left with a million different thoughts, but none of them made any more sense today than they had yesterday. Could you even get a cutie mark in magic if it was from another race or from the fae? Were the druids even real? If anypony would know, it'd be the Princess. Celestia would no doubt be able to make sense of my talent. I bet she could even explain Hal, or Glacial, or both.
When we got to town, I glided off Sire's back and looked around the square. Nothing in particular caught my eye. I hugged Father goodbye and made a stop at a nearby bench.
Unfortunately, Celestia isn't really an option right now. So, we'd work with what I could get. Maybe Mrs. Brew would know who to ask about old magic or druids or something. There had to be some books or scrolls somewhere. Books a pegasus could get their hooves on.
"Do you think they're real?" Freya asked. I rolled my eyes. "Oh, come on, if ponies like that existed, where are they now? Where did they go?"
Freya hovered over me, her ordinarily amused face left in a pondering pout. One I was probably mirroring. Bogwood is a small town. If I were in Baltimare or Canterlot, I bet there would be all sorts of resources that could help. But, in Bogwood, I might just have to teach myself and hope for the best.
"Not here. Who knows? Maybe they aren't even real. What if they are, and they're illegal?" The thought hit me like a ton of bricks. There might be a good reason they're just stories. They might have been hunted down and left to disappear forever.
"Glacial, calm down. You're overreacting."
I glared up at my imaginary companion. "What if I'm not?"
"You are. Think about it: why would Equestria outlaw special talents? That would be crazy. Not to mention, cutie marks are up for interpretation, so how would you prove the intent behind it? It makes no sense."
I blink and grumble to myself. She had a point. That wouldn't make a lot of sense. At the very least, you'd think they would supply a breakdown of what would qualify for such laws. My head was starting to hurt; this time, it wasn't lack of sleep and panic. No, it was me, just being dumb. I needed to get it together. I had some kind of adult in my head. I could at least pretend to be one.
"Why does everything have to be so complicated?" I asked no one at all.
"Look, there he is."
My ear swiveled to the approaching hoof steps. Azure marched up beside me. If there were anypony who would be looking for me, it'd be her. Though judging by the hoof steps, she wasn't alone. I pulled myself from staring at nothing to staring at a bunch of somethings.
Sure as sunshine, there came Azure Brew in all her smug glory. With her, were the rest of our group friends. The amount of foals our age was few and far between. That season wasn't exactly the most loving and carefree. But, with the war for the heavens, one can hardly be blamed. The seasons after were better. This meant our friend group had a few foals, either late bloomers or a bit young for their cutie marks.
Three others besides Azure'd decided it was Glacial hunting season. The whispers were a bit off-putting, even if they tried to be subtle about it.
"Glace, running a bit late today?" Azure asked.
I waved her away. "We can't all be as perfect as you."
"I know," Azure said, pounding a hoof against her chest tuft.
"So, is it true?"
So, it began. To be fair, Wayward Sky hardly meant anything by it. Even now, she was trying with all the subtly of a stampede to look over my shoulder at my cutie mark. Wayward was one of the few born alongside Azure and me, a bright orange pegasus filly with a mane and tail like an ocean sunset. She was also the oldest of my dad's best friends, Wayward Breeze. That meant I'd known her since birth.
Wayward was curious, if not a bit shy, filly. Even as I stood and let the others see for themselves. My cutie mark was on full display, under the scrutiny of everypony present. Wayward was already humming to herself as she leered at my flank. Her seafoam green eyes trailed every line in my fur. She was no doubt writing up a list in that sharp mind of hers. Her attention drew my own to her cutie mark. She’d only got it a few weeks back. A cloud lit in light from a sun just hidden behind it. It suited her. She had a way of seeing things so easily missed. She was so lost in her examination her muzzle fell perhaps a bit too close to it for her own good.
"Brew wasn't talking out her plot after all. Glad you've finally caught up."
"Yeah, yeah, I know, a late bloomer. You won this race, Tender Crop."
Tender Crop pulled Wayward back by her scruff. The earth filly smiled victoriously, all teeth, which would be fine if she didn't have a chipped front tooth leaving a hole in her otherwise pearly whites. She was also the oldest of our group, a whole season older, to be exact. That meant she was both bigger and bolder than the rest of our herd of friends. A lead mare if there was ever one.
"I always do. It's hard work tending the fields, ya know. The marsh is even worse. I didn't get these by sitting on my hooves." Crop flexed a well-toned leg. Her argument was sound, and her heavier frame was proof enough for me. It didn’t hurt her cutie mark, a mossy trowel didn't scream marsh pony.
"Actually, why aren't you tending the fields today? You don't normally get many free days, now that I think about it," Azure asked.
The farm filly laughed. Her wild green mane almost consumed her whole face. Her only slightly lighter green coat didn't help. Yet wild or not, there was a certain attentive presence in the one brown eye that found freedom for her tangled curls. "Ma had to come in to wait on some tools coming in from the docks. She said I could go if I helped her when the boats came in. It should be about an hour or so. I figured I'd come to check in on you a lot before I go.”
The rest of us nod along. Crop's family worked at one of the bigger local farms. One of the more enormous herds, too. Six siblings, her two moms, and her pa. I hop from the bench and give her a quick nuzzle.
"Glad to see you care," I said. Crop blinked, a tinge of pink coloring her cheeks, even if it was lost in her bobbing locks.
"So, wassit for?"
"Wassit to ya?" I asked.
Hailing from the city of Manehatten, or just west of Manehatten, Writ Tally groaned. Her accent had always been a bit of a sore spot. That and her sire, but Writ was alright for city folk. She'd already found herself a job to boot. The new junior auditor. A job that not many wanted, but one Writ took to like the skies. Her cutie mark a set of tally marks with wings, setting THE pace for her destiny with reckless abandon. As a fellow pegasus, it was almost paramount that I tease Writ for being such a bookish number addict.
Writ jabbed an off-white hoof at my flank. "Quit stallin'. Wassit do, ya cloudhugger."
Both Wayward and I winced. The two non-fliers shared an unamused look. "Here they go again," Crop said. Azure nodded in agreement.
Writ snorted. "Just because it goes over your head does not make it less true,"
"I'm no cloud hugger. I've been flying right for almost as long as you," I said. I took a step closer, and the two of us were just shy from muzzle to muzzle. My teal eyes stare right into Writ’s own golden glare.
"Okay, that's enough," Azure inserted herself between Writ and I, pushing us apart. "We're here for a reason, and starting fights is not it."
"Brew is right. We're here because Glace finally got his cutie mark. That means everypony is finally a proper adult now," Wayward said. She offered a shy smile, and the tension broke.
I fell back on my haunches and sighed. "You're right, sorry Writ. I was just teasing. I didn't mean anything by it, I promise." I offered a hoof in surrender.
"Yeah, I know. Sorry for almost biting your head off," Writ tapped her hoof to mine. And a new age of peace was forged, for now.
"So, what is your talent? Brew said you can make ice. So like snow, and such?" Crop asked. She pointed to the mostly empty sky. "Bout time for winter, ain't it?"
I looked to Azure, who'd looked nowhere in particular. "Not really, no. What did…" I pointed to Azure. "...She actually say?"
Azure harrumphed. "I just said. You make ice. Am I wrong then?"
I shake my head. "No, I do, just not that kind of ice."
"A talent in hail, then?" Wayward asked, pouting as she leered even harder at my mark.
"It's not weather magic at all." I motioned over my shoulder. "You fillies should see what I did to a few trees off the park path."
The girls shared a look and then followed my lead. Azure took the back of the group. It seemed she was adamant about seeing and believing. She appeared all smiles when they were looking for me. A sneaky traitor to the end. The walk back to the park and then off the beaten path only took a few minutes, but the energy trailed us like a lost dog.
The cooler days and far colder nights meant that the trees, as I'd left them, were primarily as they were when I made my way back to the market. Three separate trees, all in states of frozen. The first was wrapped in a wave of ice that started several hooves away and ended several hooves beyond by going out and away from the trunk properly. The second was far cleaner. The bark from root to eye level was frosted over but already thawing. The final tree was caught in a double helix that wrapped around but barely made contact with the tree at all.
"Wow, Glacial, that's, well, what is it?" Wayward asked. She'd approached and was running a hoof over the helix tree. Her eyes shone with rapt attention.
"Ice mostly," I said.
"That was horrible," Tally said. Her eyes were glued to the tree held by the wave of ice.
"Isn't it cool?" Azure asked.
"That was worse," Tally corrected.
"I thought you said it wasn't weather magic?" Crop asked.
Here was the hard part. I chewed on my inner cheek and looked from tree to tree. When it came to origins, I was still gripping at straws. The evidence of what I could do was there for all to see. That was all I had, though, frozen trees.
"He does it with his hooves," Azure said, shouldering up to me and pulling me into a hug by the withers. "No clouds or anything."
"Excuse me?" Tally said, sputtering as she looked between Azure and me. "How does that even happen?"
"Like earth ponies, clearly." Crop smiled wide as she took a post on my other side and managed to wrap Azure and me into a side hug with one leg.
"Can you show us?" Wayward asked, scuffing a hoof across the dirt. She managed a cough into a hoof before she begrudgingly met my eye. "Please?"
Fillies were traitors and scoundrels, the whole lot of them. Crop released me, and I stumbled forward, nearly running muzzle-first into the waiting Wayward. The others laughed, and I tried not to test just how well my ice-preserved live ponies.
"Sure. I mean, I'm still new with it and everything. But the more practice, the better."
I walked up to the helix tree and placed a hoof on a spot in the middle of one of the open points of the helix itself. I took a deep breath in and felt my hoof tingle in response. The cold bubbled up under my skin. The biting chill of deep winter. I didn't even shiver this time. It felt good, a fount of peace and power. I was cold. The cold was me. I could feel it even as the ice bled through from the point of contact outward in a shapeless, creeping wave. The bark beneath became brittle, and flakes peeled off, dusting the dirt beneath me in a micro snowfall.
I heard a gasp from behind me and the whispers of the girls. I couldn't make out what was said and, for the time being, didn't care. I was free; it felt exactly how I'd felt the first time I'd flown with my own two wings, not gliding, not zipping around a cloud under hoof. It felt just like this like everything was exactly as it was meant to be.
When I pulled my hoof free, the cold retreated, and the splotch of frozen bark spread two hooves wide. I smiled. It was getting easier to control. I could at least conjure it on command now, for the most part.
"Holy Faust," Writ said. I hadn't noticed her walk up beside me. She gingerly reached out and tapped the frozen spot.
"You weren't kidding. That wasn't pegasus magic at all, was it?" Wayward asked. I wished I'd actually had an answer. I hated this nagging thump in the back of my head, the headache that wouldn't quite go away.
"See, I told you girls. Glace's talent is crazy."
"It's different; I've never seen anything like it. But, and I don't mean anything by it, but what good even is it?" Crop asked.
"What?" I asked.
"You got it. You got your cutie mark now. That means you'll have to get a job soon, right? We all have to pull our weight. So, the question is, what can freezing things do for work? It isn't like making snow, right? So, then what?"
You could hear a bit of drop across Bogwood. My jaw was slack, and I'd fallen onto my haunches without noticing. What good could I even know? I'd been so stuck on the how and why that I never thought up what I could actually do with my ice magic at all.
"Faust, damn it."
"Seriously?" Writ and Freya echoed, even if Writ was none the wiser.
I planted a hoof hard into my face. Writ and Crop were right. The girls silently watched me as I struggled to cobble up an honest answer. Ice, what could you do with just ice? Where could I use it and not just make a mess? I shook my head. "I got nothing."
"Dang it, Glacial, are all colts as clueless as you are?" Tally asked.
"Yes." All of the fillies said as one.
I crossed my hooves in mock rage, muzzle pointed toward the sky. "Gee, thanks, girls, glad to know how you really feel."
"You know we are kidding, ya big baby."
Azure nodded. "Tally is right. You know we love you."
I huff and turn away from my supposed friends. "Gross, maybe I don't want your stinky love. Ever think of that?"
"Nope, not even once," Azure said, crossing her own hooves. She was grinning so hard I wondered if she'd pull a muscle. The others backed Azure, nodding along with her.
"So, if you don't have any ideas, maybe we can help." Wayward spread her wings and waved at the frozen trees. "There has to be something you can do."
"You could always join your sire," Freya said. She waved off vaguely in the direction of the docks. "Plenty of jobs there, right?" I chose to ignore her, even if she wasn't wrong.
"Might help if we knew what he was doing." Tally sat off-white hoof, tapping away a tuneless beat on her chin.
"You mean freezing stuff?" Crop said. She leaned in towards Tally, brow raised behind the shrub she called a mane.
"He's not just freezing things. He shouldn't be able to freeze things like that at all. It makes no sense. He makes no sense."
"Does any colt?" Crop followed up.
"Nope," Azure added. This earned a giggle from the others, even if Tally had to hide her smile behind a hoof.
"She's right, though. Tally, I mean, not Azure." Azure muttered about me being rude, but I did my best to ignore her. "I don't even think unicorns can do magic like this. Earth ponies use their hooves but can’t make things cold and hot whenever needed. They would never have needed pegasi to control the weather at all if they could, right?" I looked to Crop, who shrugged.
“Maybe Ma would know. She and my aunt Bramble are the ones who talk with the weather ponies. Perhaps they'd know something."
I smiled and nuzzled up to Crop, who ran flush again. It was too easy, really. But she deserved it. I didn't have many leads, so any help was welcomed.
"I could ask my dam, too. She has to read up on all sorts of magic to make her potions. I bet she'd even let you borrow a book or two if we asked."
I smiled at Azure. "I was actually thinking the same thing earlier. My Sire mentioned some old stories that might mention magic like mine. Maybe your dam would have something on that, too."
"What stories?" Writ asked.
"Uh, druids, why?"
"Wait, aren't those foal stories?" Crop asked.
I shrugged. "No idea, but according to my sire, they could use magic no matter what tribe they belonged to. Even magic their tribe can't normally use."
"Hmm, couldn't hurt to at least look," Tally said. The filly was still deep in thought. Nothing short of an earthquake would pull that filly from her head now. I was surprised she'd heard the talk of druids at all.
"Well, in the meantime, while we're all still here. Any ideas for what Glacial's special talent can do for work? Or, maybe somepony he can apprentice with? He can't go on and be a mooch forever, can he?
I hissed. Crop knew how to stomp my worries harder into my strained brain space. Something made worse by the manic grin Freya was wearing. She'd been strangely quiet this morning. However, with every pony around, she really didn't have much room to get a word edgewise. Instead, she mostly floated around the alcove of trees and watched everything play out.
"I've only had my cutie mark a couple days, it's not like I'm just lazing about, you know."
Apparently, Crop realized what she'd said and went so red I worried she'd burst. Azure pulled the bigger filly into a nuzzle. Of which Wayward joined.
"She didn't mean anything by it, right?" Wayward asked.
"No, I just—"
I raised a hoof, silencing. The stuttering farm filly.
"I know, I was just kidding. You're not even wrong. I really should take some time to consider what good my magic can be. Hay, even if it is just preserving fish down on the docks. I could at least do that until I think up something better."
I smile and join the group hug. There was always time for a good hug. Crop relaxed, and we let her go. That being said, any ideas would be welcomed outside of keeping fish on ice. I mean, I'd do it if I had to. Sire could always use an extra set of hooves and wings.
"If you can also melt ice, I bet cleaning up after snowstorms would be a job any weather team would be grateful for," Wayward offered.
"True, but that's pretty seasonal, isn't it? I could just be a normal weather pony outside of the colder months, but that doesn't reflect my talent much."
I had considered the weather team already. There were, of course, plenty of ponies who had jobs that didn't have a perfect match with their cutie marks. Sometimes, you just had to do whatever it took to survive. That didn't mean I'd want to if I could find something better.
"Can you melt your ice?" Tally asked. It seemed we'd roused the beast back to the land of the living. She was eying me intensely enough, and I felt myself shuffle my hooves in place.
"I don't know. I've never tried. I was more focused on getting my talent to work than worrying about whether I could undo it."
"Well, no time like the present."
Azure pounced, shoving me back to the tree I'd worked with a few minutes ago. I flail my hooves with little success, trying to deflect my attacker. When she did let go, I was nearly muzzle to tree with the frosted bark.
"Geez, okay," I said, taking a solid step back. "Let's see.” I planted a hoof back on the icy patch I made before. I closed my eyes and focused on the ice, the chill on my frog, the feel of the bark beneath. When I froze something, I felt the ice channel out, so instead, I imagined sucking it all back in like a deep breath before plunging myself underwater. A shock ran down my spine. I gasped and opened my eyes. The ice was gone, mostly. What little remained could barely be considered condensation. Ice or no ice, the cold on the tree remained.
"I guess that answers that," Crop said.
"Wow, that was amazing," Wayward said with a clap.
"You make less and less sense by the day, Glace."
I turned and looked down at the still-seated Tally. She looked back up at me without so much as a single flinch.
I shrug. "True."
"So, everypony wanna come back to my dam's shop? I bet she could think up some jobs Glace could do. We could even ask her about the druids." Azure asked.
"As fun as that sounds, I should probably head over to the docks. No clue when Ma will need me. 'Sides. Like I said, I can still ask my folks back home. They might surprise ya."
I bump the older filly's side. "I'd be a moron to underestimate Mrs. Hard Forage or anypony in your herd."
"You better believe it."
That said, the group left the trees behind and returned to the park path. As we arrived at the market, Tender Crop peeled off and headed toward the docks. The rest of us made way for 'What Ails You.'
"Welcome to, oh, honey. You're back early. That you are," Mrs. Home Brew greeted her daughter. The two shared a nuzzle before Azure motioned to the rest of us.
"Dam, do you mind helping me and the girls with something?"
"I can spare a minute. I can, indeed. What do you need?"
"Well, we're trying to help Glacial with his talent. Because it isn't pegasus magic, and his sire was talking about druids…" Azure said, rushing through each topic with the reckless abandon of a bat out of hell.
"Honey, slow down. You're going too fast. I don't follow."
I rolled my eyes and pushed Azure out of the way. "What Azure is trying to say is that my talent is a bit odd, and we thought that with all your magic know-how, you might have something that could help."
"And what kind of magic would that be, Glaci, dear?"
"Druid magic," Tally finished.
"And why would you need something on that?" Mrs. Brew looked on the verge of a pout and a flinch. I felt an ear flicker as I tried to pinpoint what she was thinking. Mrs. Brew had never been a terrific liar. Hiding stuff was the opposite of everything she said or did. Whatever she was feeling was conflicted, which did not sit well.
"Ooooh, the plot thickens," Freya whispered into my ear. I had to bite my tongue to stop myself from squeaking. This earned a side eye from Wayward, who drew in a bit closer and pulled me under her orange wing. It also resulted in Freya cackling like a hag as I sat in my own personal feathery sunset.
"It'd be faster to show you. If you don’t mind?" I asked from my soft, feathery blanket. I pointed to a splintered piece of dogwood. "Mind if I use that? I promise I'll give it right back."
Mrs. Brew's look grew more conflicted, but she nodded all the same. She scooped the wood up in her magic and offered it to me. I smiled and took the wood, which pulled me free of Wayward's protective wing.
I took a deep breath, and wood in my hoof, I let the cold out. Deep in my hooves, the same cold that sat just below the surface ran back up and through my spine. The dogwood never stood a chance. In seconds, the whole of the wood was frozen solid. My task was complete, and I offered it back to its owner.
"Oh my."
That was not an inspiring response. Though a certain err of confusion and intrigue dotted Mrs. Brew's knit brow. The girls seemed to see it, too. I swallowed hard and stretched my smile a bit thinner. The door was starting to look rather inviting.
"I'll admit, that was quite unexpected, Glaci, not expected at all."
"Is that a bad thing?" I asked.
"No, not as it is, no. It is rare and rarer for non-unicorns to be given a talent in elemental magic like yours. I promise I was just surprised."
I cocked my head to the side. "So, it isn't pegasus magic?" I asked. The question was rhetorical for me, but having somepony more aware of the subject confirm it was a bit relieving. It also means it isn't unheard of, which is even better.
"No, this is a more specialized magic. I won't lie; no, I won't. I'm no scholar, but keeping tabs on magic is half of an alchemist's job. As I understand it, the little I've seen. Such cases are usually passed through blood."
"Oh, So I won't get in trouble for my cutie mark?" I asked. I put on a pout and leaned into the naturally adorable nature of foals. If I was going to learn the truth, I'd need every advantage I had.
"Not from the Princess or guard," Mrs. Brew answered.
"What a way to phrase that. The Princess may not come for you, but somepony else might. You may want to refrain from telling any uppity unicorns then," Freya said, hissing in reference to the horned tribe. Did I have some built-in resentment going on? I don't feel like I secretly hated unicorns. My pout was no longer fake.
"That does not bode well," Tally said with a shake of her tightly bound blonde locks.
"No, no, it does not," I agreed.
"Are there any books we have that could help, Glace?" Azure asked.
Mrs. Brew tapped away on her counter. Then, without a word, she turned and wandered into the back rooms of her shop, which doubled as her home, after a moment in her personal space. She returned after with an unsure silence, floating along a pair of books.
"These two may have some useful bits, they may indeed. I don't mind you borrowing them as long as you return them once done. Okay?" Mrs. Brew floated the books into grabbable reach. While I happily nodded all the while.
"Of course, I'll return them without a scratch."
Mrs. Brew took a long breath and smiled back. "Good colt. Now I really must get back to work, Azure as well, we do. So, please be safe, children, and have a wonderful day."
That was that. Wayward, Tally and I left Azure to work and made our way to the nearest bench. The afternoon waned on, and both Tally and I skimmed the two books I'd been given. The first was 'An Elementary Guide of Elements.' a simplified book about how the elements work. It offered little in explaining how a non-unicorn could get or use said magicks, but understanding ice magic, or if all else fails, learning necromancy could be helpful in making my magic useful. The second book, 'A Dissection of your Magic Affinities' was a bit more advanced to the point where even Hal would struggle. It didn't help that neither Hal nor I had any knowledge of magic or how it works. I might need to find a beginner's guide on magic as a whole. That would be a future me's issue. Tally at least seemed to understand most of the terms used, which aided in giving me some ideas on the topics. 'A Dissection of your Magic Affinities' was still a bit of a nightmare even still.
Wayward and Tally eventually had to get back to work or do errands. This left Freya and me browsing page after page. My head felt full to bursting by the time Sire came to get me. The light had faded to the point I couldn't have read much more, even if I'd wanted to.
"What have you there, Colt?" Sire asked as he joined me by the bench.
"Mrs. Brew had some books to help with my cutie mark. She let me borrow them for a while. Even if they are hard to read," I said. I hopped from the bench and put the two books on my back. I smiled up at my sire, who chuckled in return.
"Well, that was very kind of her. Learn anything else today?"
I nodded. "Well, my magic is not, as we thought, pegasus magic in any way. I also learned others have had magic like it before. So, that's good, right? I'm not alone, at least."
I was hoisted onto Father's back, who hummed in agreement. "Could be worse then. Now, if only we could put it to good use."
"I'm working on that actually. I learned I can melt ice and not just make it. So, that is one more use than I had since yesterday."
"And the druids?"
I let out a deep sigh. "Mentioning druids made Mrs. Brew upset. No, not upset, maybe scared. I'm not sure."
"Odd."
We fell into a gentle silence. Hal knew what cryomancy was back before he, I? Died. I don't know how much carries over, if any did. Hal's world didn't have magic, so it was all imaginary. Tomorrow, I'd start experimenting. It was the only natural way I'd know for sure. Once I know where my limits are, I can get a bit more creative.
"Father?"
"Yes?"
"If you don't mind, I think I'd like to stay home tomorrow."
That earned a snort followed by a deep belly laugh. "So much like your dam."
"Is that a no?" I asked.
"You plan to mess with your magic, don't you?" Father asked.
"Yes, I do."
"Well, I'd prefer it be on our land than shattering some shopkeep window."
I laughed along with my father. When the laughter stopped, I wrapped my hooves around my Sire's back as I could manage. "Love you, Sire."
"Love you too, Colt."
Tomorrow was going to be interesting. I just prayed to Faust that I wouldn't break another lantern. I don't think Sire would be so forgiving of a second one.
The early morning breeze sent a pleasant chill across my coat. I couldn't help a gentle smile, even as my spit clung like glue to the inside of my throat. I'd woken early, though less early than the day before. Breakfast had been quiet, quick, and unsatisfying. Father seemed almost as eager as I was. The clicking of his hooves as he trotted into town, perhaps faster than needed. The subdued glint in his eye spurred a particular pride in my chest. I puffed out my tuft as I glided beside him.
"Excited?" I asked my father. The grand lead of Bogwood's docks. A face anypony in town could suss out in a heartbeat. My Sire smirked, wings fluffing as he sped up more.
"And why would that be, I wonder?" he asked.
"I have no idea, Sire, not a clue." I dipped a wing and veered over his back and to his opposite side. He took a deep breath of the early muggy air. It was humid enough that I'd gotten damp just walking out our front door. The sticky salt and moss that clung to everything made flapping more painful than most pegasi would admit. Most pegasi in Bogwood ended up grounded during the winter. The weather team and the docks were the only real exception.
If you went high enough and the sky cleared away. When all there was you and the open air. And the winds rushed by. That was when Pegasi was genuinely free. I coughed into a hoof and pointed into town. The weather center was deeper into town than I usually went, close to the docks. Since the docks were priority one, having every able-winged pegasi they could get as close as they could manage made sense. You wouldn't find any unicorns coming down this way. They called it the 'Fish and Feather' district. I'd always liked that name. It fit Sire to a tee.
"You better be on your best behavior. Freezy Breeze might be a bit old for the job these seasons, but she knows how to keep the team in check."
Sire had spent most of the dinner making sure I knew who and what I was getting involved with. I'd met Freezy Breeze before. She wasn't really that old. Sure, she was past her glory days. The scars across her chest reminded every pony in town of what happens when you think you're invincible. I must have been three or four when Freezy picked a fight with a pair of griffons who were hunting in Bogwood fishing space. The griffons had been run off, but the state they'd left Freezy was enough to scare the whole town.
Father was right, though. If I wanted to avoid getting booted by an irate mare, I'd have to go in smart and bring up my talent at the right time. Could I make it from the grounded building to the cloud storage above before I make my move? I was less likely to freeze something vital if I was in the air. I tapped my chin and hummed.
"Nervous?"
I nodded. "A bit, but it's not every day you try to find your place in Equestria."
That earned a tired chuckle. Sire's hoof shot out and ensnared me before I could react. I was pulled to my father's side and nuzzled. "A sight every Sire wants to see. Even if their son ruined their yard, freezing everything he touched." Sire's grip grew tighter as I struggled.
"I already said sorry."
"I believe your exact words were. It'll melt, eventually."
I relented and slumped in his grip. "That's the same thing."
Sire didn't respond and instead let me go. I landed on the road butt first. I glared up at my father, who showed little concern. "Don't go freezing anything valuable, Colt."
I blanched, hooves held up in surrender. "I wasn't gonna."
Sire pushed me toward the building door. "Well, Colt, the rest is in your hooves."
"The ones that froze the yard, you mean?" I asked. That earned me a more brutal shove and a chuckle. That was two.
The actual Weather center was two separate buildings. The rest of the town uses the grounded one. If you needed to schedule something or complain, that was where you went. It was also the place I'd need to enter to ask about work. The building was old, one of the oldest in town. It was a dull, worn wooden cabin, smaller than my home. It was only there for the rest of the town's sake. The larger, more functional half, the sky-bound cloud center, was the actual place of operation. Clouds, snow, rain, it all came from up there. The path around us and the side roads around us were deserted. My ear flicked as I tried to make out any noises from the weather center altogether. There wasn't so much as a peep. I took a heavy gulp, and my front legs twitched. In the best case scenario, I walk in, the nopony is in, and I wait. It'd give me a chance to run through my pitch.
"I'm off."
Then Father was off to the docks where he belonged. I shook my head and pushed the door open. I was not mistaken. As far as the grounded center was concerned, it was eerily empty. I stepped in and let the door close behind me. I approached the counter. A basic wooden design that stretched across the whole room, with a simple hitched gate at one end. The only things of note were a stack of blank paper, a quill, some ink pots, and a single brass bell. The type you dinged for service. The device had the fur on the back of my neck stand on end.
"Here goes nothing," I said and dinged the bell twice. The response was a bit too quick as if summoned from the depths of Tartarus itself, and a pegasus mare sprung up from behind the counter. I reeled back as the mare rubbed a hoof over one eye. I didn't recognize the stormy grey mare, eyes like sunset, mane, and tail like a golden fleece. She was pretty or would be, if she wasn't half asleep and failing to hold back a full-bodied yawn.
"Who's there?" The mare asked.
"Good morning."
The mare scanned the room before pulling herself over the counter's edge and looking down at me. The mare looked a bit more awake if the unamused murmurs were any indication. I offered a smile, and the mare stared back silently.
"I'm here to see Freezy Breeze."
"What for?" The mare asked.
"I just got my cutie mark and thought it could be useful for the weather team. If that is alright with you."
The mare was starting to get under my skin. She blinked slowly. All I could muster was to return the look in kind. After several seconds, the mare sat back and delivered a heavy sigh.
"So, little colt, what is your special talent? It looks a bit like a snowy sword or something?" the mare asked.
I looked back at my cutie mark and shrugged. She wasn't entirely wrong. The fact she could see it from her position, leering over me, was impressive, if not a bit creepy. I pulled myself up on the counter and stood on my hind legs. We weren't exactly eye to eye, but at least I could see more than her face and forehooves.
"I can manipulate ice, so since winter was right around the corner. The weather team might have something I could do to help. So, is Mrs. Freezy Breeze available?"
The mare hummed to herself, head bobbing from side to side. She gave another sigh and nodded. "I'll check, but I don't promise she'll be free."
"That seems more than fair, thank you." I offered another smile. That said, the mare stood, stretched her wings, and departed through a door behind her. Thus, it was quiet again.
"She was quite the headache, wasn't she?"
I jumped in place, wings flapping in retaliation. Freya snorted and circled me lazily. I scoffed and watched the ghost backstroke through the air.
"I hate when you do that," I said.
Freya stopped in place midstroke for a brief moment before continuing. "I know."
A ghostly filly who was secretly my personal brick wall. Oh, how I enjoyed running face-first into my tulpa. I continued to pout and wait. Freya seemed all too happy to leave it at that. The wait wasn't that long. It couldn't have been more than ten minutes or so. It was challenging to keep track without the sun or a timepiece. When the counter mare returned, she looked more alive than when I'd roused her from her nap.
"So?" I asked.
The mare pointed to the door she'd come from. "She said she could spare a few minutes. She'll be down to get you when she can. She always has a soft spot for the colts," the mare said, more to herself than me. That didn't mean I wouldn't store that tidbit away for later.
"Thank you, miss."
"Tidy Tassel."
"Oh, okay, Ms. Tassel."
A silence fell between us as I waited for Freezy Breeze. I found a spot against the wall and searched my answers for any surprise questions. That'd be the easy part, though. What would matter was the practical. That's how Pegasi did things. It was funny; I knew that without a word, there was no passed-down work ethic, no forced drive. I just needed to do what I set my mind to. Even if I was often jabbed into action by Freya, Azure, my dad, or my other friends, it might be a slow start, but I only stopped once the job was done. I smirked. That wasn't a half-bad answer for any ambition questions. That was one thing Hal, and I had no similarity in. Glacial Zero was a slow start and hard finish; Hal was a burn-the-candle-at-both-ends type. My smirk fell away. He might still have been alive if he'd slowed down a bit.
My ruminations were silenced by the sound of a door being flung open. The stomps that followed were no less disruptive. I barely had time to turn before I was muzzle-to-muzzle with the same mare I'd come to see. She eyed me like a starving dog might eye a steak. I swallowed hard and tried not to back as far into the wall as possible. Freezy Breeze was exactly like I remembered, except for a pair of spectacles balanced on her muzzle. She was a paler variant of my colors: dull blue coat, darker blue mane, and pale violet eyes. A pair of eyes squinted harder down at me.
"You're Weathered's colt, right?" Freezy asked.
I nodded. "Yes, ma'am."
"Got yourself a mark now, too. Good for you, Colt. Tassel said you might be helpful with the weather. She said something about ice?"
I nodded harder. "I'm good with the cold. You can ask my Sire if you need to."
"Not needed; Weathered's a good stallion; I trust he raised you right."
I pursed my lips and restrained an eye roll. "Thank you?"
"That's Good, so let's see what you can do, Colt. If you want to work with the team, you must contribute."
Freezy was marching to the front door faster than her words could leave her mouth. I looked at Tassel, who smirked and waved toward her boss. So much for there being an interview part of the job. I guess expecting a weather pony to care about words was unrealistic.
So off we went. No sooner had I stepped into the morning air than Freezy waved over her shoulder and shot into the sky. I could feel my hooves shaking, but I followed as best I could. Freezy was one of the best fliers in Bogwood, heyday or not. She circled up to a pair of clouds and sat down, waiting for me. The amusement in her eyes did not match her frown when I joined her.
"You could use some flight practice, Colt. Weathered doesn't have the time, though. A pity that a stallion is pulling a herd's weight."
I looked off toward the docks. You could see them even in the boggy mist. I didn't see my Sire, though the dockworkers were more shapes than ponies at the distance Freezy and I sat. I could feel Freezy's eyes on the back of my head.
"It ain't your fault, Colt. That said, we got work to do." She was right on that point. I turned, tossed on the brightest fake smile, and waited for my instructions. Freezy looked at the docks behind me before standing on her cloud. "Well then, Colt, tell me about your talent so I can best assess your skill level. Good with the cold is a bit vague."
"Right, yes, ma'am. My talent focuses on ice and cold. I can freeze things really well and shape ice, even if I need some practice. I can unfreeze things, too, so I even clean up after myself. I've only had my talent for a few days, but Sire could use the help well."
Freezy's frown gave just a bit. She waved her wings at the clouds around us. "So, let's see it then. I should be able to tell what you've got best if you give me an example." Freezy pointed to the cloud I was sitting on.
My mouth ran dry as a quiet horror filled my every pore. My eyes pierced the cloud as I restrained a groan. It occurred to me. At no point in my time practicing my magic had I ever tried using a cloud.
"Now, this should be good," Freya whispered in my ear from behind. Add to that the very real dull gaze of Freezy Breeze, and I'd found the perfect storm of my own making.
"Freeze," I whispered. My hooves tinged and wrapped themselves in a gentle blue aura. The cloud shifted beneath my hooves. My nerves frayed. I felt my throat close as I pushed my will into the cloud harder. I closed my eyes and tried again. The air around me misted in a chilly aura. My hooves glowed a bit brighter. I ignored Captain Breeze's boring glare. I took a second deep breath. "Freeze," I said a little louder. The cloud obeyed, and what was once a fluffy gray Nimbostratus was now a block of ice, a hefty falling block of blue ice. I let out a yelp as I joined the cloud in a freefall. Instinct beat rational thought as my wings shot open, and I went from a total crash to a gentle glide.
When I landed, my first reaction was to stare down at my still-glowing hooves. One day, my hooves freeze; the next, they act like a unicorn's horn. I fell to my flank. Wings still spread, hooves held up in dread.
"Oh my, Glacial, you certainly did it this time."
Freya landed beside me, resting a spectral white hoof on my shoulder. She tutted and cooed as I remained in place. Then, the sound of gentle wingbeats behind me sent me into a different terror altogether. I slowly turned to see a blank-faced Freezy staring at me. The fury in her eyes was enough to melt anything I could conjure up. The fire, a writhing silent dare to approach lest you were burned away into nothing at all.
"Um," I said, only for Captain Breeze to silence me with a shush.
"What are you pulling, Colt?" she asked.
My ears flattened against my head. "Pulling, ma'am?"
"Answer my question now, Colt."
"I don't understand."
"Whose idea was it?" Freezy Breeze had stomped forward and was now standing over me. A snort had me shrink onto the ground. "Well?"
"I don't—"
Freezy Breeze stomped down harder and barred down on me further. "Which unicorn wanted to waste my time today?"
I blinked away tears. "Unicorn?"
"That!" She pointed at the shattered cloud nearby. "Was no pegasus magic. So, what else could it be? Those damned hornheads think they can use a colt to mock me."
"But I did that," I said. I felt a bubbling rejection of the mare's accusation. How dare she, how dare she think I was a joke, a liar. If she heard me, the raving captain didn't bother responding. She was scanning every building, side street, and alley for the culprit at that very moment.
"You hear me, you little shit. Come out and face me."
"There isn't a unicorn." I scrambled to my hooves. I ran in front of the red-faced mare. She didn't even look down. I took a single deep breath. Where once the deep chill ran through my veins, a new heat boiled away beneath my skin. "I froze the cloud."
Captain Breeze looked down at me, brow knit, eyes smoldering. "Don't lie to me, Colt. No pegasus just freezes things. Now, move." the captain pushed me aside.
My legs had gone numb. My breath escaped in clouds of mist. Freya leaped in front of me, waving her hooves in silent protest. I stepped through her. My wings flared. I brought my forehooves over my head. "I said…" The captain tutted and looked back at me. "...Freeze!" My hooves stomped back down, and the ground beneath them erupted in icy spires, cracking the earth and cratering it hoof-deep. I was no liar. This. Ice. Was. Mine.
I huffed and puffed. My chest burned as I tried to breathe. The world danced around me. Freezy Breeze was no longer glaring. Staring yes, but the fire in her pale purple eyes had burned out. Behind me, Freya was muttering to herself. When Freezy blinked, her eyes were full of something far more intense. The utter disgust on her face was enough to break my resolve. Her mouth warped into a grimace as she took a step back.
"What the Tarturus are you?"
My mouth opened, but nothing came out. My throat ran dry as I struggled to place the tone in her voice. Before I could answer, the fear and disgust became a rage far deeper and colder than any ice I could conjure.
"What the Tarturus are you!"
This time, it wasn't a question. If she planned to say anything else or do anything at all. I wouldn't, couldn't hear her, to think this started out so well. To think I'd trusted her, trusted Captain Freezy Breeze to relate to my unique abilities. I just wanted to help my Sire. Freezy Breeze took a single step forward. So, I turned tail and ran. I hooved it as hard and fast as I'd ever done. I didn't look back; I couldn't; tears spilled over my cheeks as I ran blindly down the main road, past the knee-high wall that played the border of Bogwood and out into the marsh beyond.
The muck clung to my hooves as I slowed my escape. The longer I ran, the harder lifting my hooves from the muddy soup beneath was harder. By the time I came to a complete stop, I'd found a more solid space to sit. My breath came in ragged gulps as I sucked in the thick acrid air. My tears had stopped some time ago, but my brain still rattled on replaying the scene repeatedly in my head. The look in Freezy Breeze's eyes stirred something vile in my chest. The heat had died, leaving me numb inside. I could taste the bitter taste of vomit in the back of my throat. My mind was racing faster than my legs could manage. A minage of thoughts, Glacial's and Hal's, played out mixed and matched into a somber pit where all of my emotions were leeched away.
When I finally came to a stop, I slowly looked about. The mud I'd stopped on wasn't the only solid mass around. In fact, there was an excellent path cutting a twisting road between trees and thicket. A makeshift fence planted bounds between the path and the muck beyond. It was a common trick in the area. The further south you went, the worse the swampage became. Markers like fences and stakes saved ponies a lot of trouble.
I scanned the area, and one thing stood out: the closest markers on each wooden pole plodded an incomplete path through the sludge. Each one possessed a tuft of pink ribbon—a very familiar pink ribbon. I sat, my mind racing as I tried to put the ribbon in its place; by then, my mind caught up with my racing heart and sluggish breath. It struck like lightning.
"Forage Farms."
I bit my lip and jogged in place. At this point, I'd lost track of which way the town even was. The markers pointed to civilization but did not directly indicate which way. I could taste iron. Spinning in the direction of the closest post, I started a jog in the next direction.
The trek was quiet, just me, my thoughts, and the complete absence of a particular incorporeal entanglement. Freya's words, not mine. I wasn't even sure what it meant. There was also the ever-sloppy sound of hooves pulling out from the mud. Even the more solid path was still messy at the best of times. It was a wonder any farms existed in the area at all. I played out the scene with Freezy Breeze over and over in my head. I couldn't piece together what I'd done wrong. I expected some of the elders to make a fuss if my talent made the gossip trail. I hadn't expected the captain of all ponies to explode. No matter how many times it repeated, nothing stood out; no point of no return. It was just my talent, a talent that defied the norm.
"There are other ponies with weird talents. Why is mine a problem?" I whispered to myself. At this time, the posts ended, and with them, a much larger gate with a worn wooden sign announced my arrival at Crop's family farm.
Even as one of the larger farms in Bogwood, it was still compact, the foundations as fleeting as the solid ground from here back to town. I looked back over my shoulder. I could make it back to town. All I'd need to do is retrace my steps. I shook my head. A little space might do some good. Who knew if the weather team would wait for me or what they'd do?
I had yet to make it ten hooves past the gate before a voice jolted me in place. The owner came trotting in my direction from one of the farm's larger sheds. Hard Forage, a mare that could bench the same shed on an off day. Bright orange, she radiated presence like a second sun. In that same vein, her always smiling cyan eyes glinted in recognition.
"That you, little Zero, what brings my Tender's favorite colt around?" she asked. I choked back a wheezing laugh. One she took full advantage of. "Come to court, my Tender, have you? By the Princess, foals these days." My choked laugh evolved into a coughing fit, even as I waved at the mare in surrender.
"Forage, please don't kill a colt on the farm. Ponies might think ill of us and our produce." From the opposite direction, completing a pincer movement left me nowhere to run. The stallion of the house strolled up, a smile to match his wife's.
"But, he came to steal our daughter away."
A look passed between the two, and Forage groaned, having given up on her attempted murder. I owed Solid Crop a thank you later. The stallion in question closed in and kissed his mare on the cheek. Solid Crop was a name that perfectly summarized the stallion. He wasn't quite as big as Forage, but I don't know a single pony who was. But he was still more significant than most. A murky green and a grey mane and tail, his somber tones blended into the very swamp he lived in. A true native in every way.
"I'm sorry," I said, drawing the attention of the two farmers. Solid flicked a look between me and Forage. A hoof to the side had his wife blinked in recognition.
"Oh no, you did nothing wrong, little Zero. I was only teasing. I'm sure Tender and the others would be happy you came by. A very neighborly thing, even if you're from across town and, for that matter, in town to begin with," Forage reached down and patted my back gently, which was enough to all but flatten me.
I sighed and righted myself. "No, I'm sorry that I troubled you at all. I didn't even mean to be here. I just kind of did."
"Beg pardon?" Solid asked. The couple mirrored a gentle look before ushering me further into the farm. "You look like you could use an ear or two, Colt. I'm sure Tender would want to know you were here all the same, accident or not."
Solid wasn't wrong; Tender indeed wanted to know I was here and, more precisely, why I wandered out of town into the dangers of a swamp I rarely ever set hoof in by myself. If I was honest, I wanted to know that too. Even now, I am sitting in the main house of Forage Farms, where Solid and Tender had sat me down and listened to my morning adventures.
Forage had too much to do to stay for the story, and Tender's siblings barely knew who I was and thus had little reason to care. I bid them no anger for that. I wish I could not deal with my day that easily, too. Neither of my listeners seemed all that pleased with my story. Tender looked one word off from flipping the family dining table. The glint in her brown eye as she stared out the window behind me was reassuring. I even managed a wry smile. Solid also looked displeased, though his emotions vanished behind a mask of somepony with too much to do to spend time not doing something about it.
"She just ran you out of town like some thieving rat. That stupid airhead didn't even care how you could freeze stuff, just that you did it at all."
Tender snorted, crossed her hooves, and turned to her sire. Solid shook his head, and his daughter wilted. He had the right idea. Starting a fight in town wasn't going to do me any good. It's not like they needed a reason to spit vinegar in my direction. Freezy Breeze wasn't the first, though she was the first to make my talent the cause of anger and not everything else.
"Glacial didn't deserve the weather captain's spite. But, it isn't our place to fight his battles for him, Tender. You know that."
Tender glowered harder. "Somepony needs to."
"Meaning?" Solid asked.
"Glace didn't do anything wrong."
Solid sighed and nodded. "No, he didn't. That isn't going to stop it from happening today, tomorrow, or weeks out."
"True," I agreed.
"Glace, why aren't you mad?" Tender asked, slamming a hood into the hoofcrafted wood of her family table.
"I'm more tired than angry."
Tender wasn't wrong; I should have been angry, but I wasn't. On some level, I'd expected this. I knew from day one that whatever my magic was, it wasn't what a pegasus should be using. I wasn't modeling clouds or wrangling clouds. I was turning things to ice with a hoof. If I were a unicorn, nopony would have given it a second thought. I bet even as an earth pony, I'd only get a few weird looks. But I was a pegasus, the proud, the bold, the adventurous. But I wasn't any of those things. Most of Bogwood knew that. Between my friends, I was lucky that any other foals would interact with me as anything but a necessity to play with the rest of the group. I felt a deep, cold lump in the pit of my stomach. I should have been angry, but I wasn't. I should have been sad, but I wasn't. If anything, I was exhausted.
"Hey, now." I was wrapped in a hug before I'd even looked up. Solid had pulled me close, Tender joining only seconds later. "It'll be okay. You're a good foal, Glacial. Things will work out. Tell you what, once Bramble returns to the farm, we'll have her fly you home. Even Freezy Breeze isn't dense enough to tangle with Bramble, especially once she hears what that mean old Nag did. Okay?"
"Pa's right. Aunt Bramble could take half of Bogwood with both wings tied," Tender puffed out her chest. The earth filly never looked braver than when somepony brought up her aunt. Bramble Broach was a local legend, the type even Freezy Breeze got overshadowed by. She was the only pegasus in a long line of earth ponies. But could out earth pony most of them all the same. Strong, fast, brave, and undauntable. Bramble Broach was a mare to awe.
"Right, if any pony could, your aunt would be that pony," I said. Tender tightened her hug around my side. Between father and daughter, It was almost like I was being hugged by the marsh itself. Which was a bit more perturbing than I meant it to be. All there was left to do now was wait. "If your aunt doesn't, my sire sure will. That's for sure."
Solid chuckled. "There is no terror like a father protecting their young. I'd tango with a whole pack of swampbears before I would get between your sire and Captain Breeze."
"Mr. Solid."
The stallion hummed. "Yes, Glacial?"
"Thank you."
Solid ruffled my mane. "No trouble at all. It's what we do, Colt. We protect our own."
"Pa is right, nopony bullies my friends," Tender said.
"Even Tally?" I asked.
Tender blinked hard. "Even Tally." She added while earning herself some serious side eye from her father.
I may have ended up out at Forage Farm by chance, but that didn't mean I should be anywhere else. At least here, no pony would turn a blind eye only if they wanted a Bramble Broach brand scolding. I'd seen it several times, but it wasn't pleasant.
Author's Note
This is the first wave of chapters. I try to give readers a chance to really grasp what I am developing. I seek to neither confuse nor mislead those who are willing to give my stories a chance. If I can help it, I will be posting in a similar format going forward, several chapters at a time.
Thank you, and have a fantastical day.
The waiting was easy: just sit at the table and pretend Tender wasn't plotting a particular mare's death. Solid had left us be, returning to his work. The hard part was the explanation after the waiting was done. When Bramble Broach returned to the farm, she was met with a certain somepony needing her help getting home. Tender made it very clear how poorly she thought me going back to town would go. I, for one, did not need an envoy. If I flew home, I could avoid any bog-related mishaps. Even if we all knew the bog was the least of my worries
Thus, I was ushered away by a very unamused mare. Bramble hid her disgust well; if one didn't know what to look for, it would have been nearly impossible to spot at all. I'd never have seen it if I was just an average colt without a human living in my brain.
"Don't worry, Glacial, I'll have you home in no time at all. No rain jockey is gonna get you while I'm on duty," Bramble said. She offered a rigid salute and a bright smile. It took all I had not to roll my eyes.
Bramble was an enigma to most of Bogwood. A pegasus with a penchant for finding trouble, and when she didn't seek it, somepony was all too happy to bring it to her. So, more often than not, when Bogwood needed a hero, it was Bramble Broach who saved the day. It wasn't hard to imagine; she was tall, with broad shoulders and well-toned legs. You could definitely tell she was born to a pair of earth ponies. Her grounded colors, various browns from mane to fetlocks, screamed farmer for all to hear. I'd caught more than one pony around town comment on how brave and plain Bramble was in equal measure. If Bramble knew what the gossip around town had to say, she never let it get to her. She smiled and laughed away disaster after disaster. It was the kind of contagious joy not many had to spare. Her eyes were the only thing on her that wasn't a shade of brown. They were a glistening silver like the light shining through a rain cloud.
I offered a salute of my own. "If anypony can get me home, it'd be you, Ms. Bramble."
Bramble reached over and ruffled my mane. "Firstly, drop the Miss if you would. I am not some old crone, you know. Secondly and more importantly, I have no idea what got into Freezy, but it's not right to scare off a foal, especially a colt. Might need to have a chat with her myself later."
"No!" Tender and Broach looked at me in a mix of confusion and perturbed senses of decorum. "I mean, please don't."
"Glace, you can't be serious. All you did was—"
Bramble placed a firm hoof on Tender's shoulder, and like a switch being pulled, Tender's words died in her throat. Bramble offered a tut and a wink. "It's fine. We don't go spreading rumors or stirring up trouble, do we, Crop?"
The farm filly huffed but shook her head. "No, Aunt Bramble."
"I have one question, though, if you don't mind humoring me, Glacial."
My ears fidget as I wiggled under Bramble's earnest, all-seeing stare. It was uncanny, really, like the very power of Faust herself was being conjured forth from a single mortal's unflinching gaze.
"Yes?"
"As you and Tender explained, you have some sort of ice magic. I get that part. I can even confirm that Home Brew, the silly mare that she is, isn't wrong. There's a foal born every so often whose magic is a bit unusual. So, my question is, why not go talk to the mender in town? They have resources for such cases. You don’t have to do it all alone, you know?"
I caught myself grinding my teeth. Bringing up the mender was like a hot iron. My chest was heating up. It was enough to have me shake in my seat. "The mender and I don't get along," I growled. Bramble didn't react outside a single raised brow.
"I suppose your family wouldn't, would you? I'm sorry, Glacial. I didn't mean to upset you. Sometimes my mouth runs away, and I don't realize what I've said till it is already said." Bramble reached out a single wing and dragged me against her side. It was soft and warm, and I struggled to hold back a yawn. All my anger just floated away.
"I know, I'm sorry I snapped."
"Well, that said, we'd better get you home. I'm sure when your sire hears about this, he'll be planting his hooves somewhere no foal should ever see, on or in poor Captain Breeze. May Faust have mercy on her soul."
"That won't make things any better, though," I said. I leaned back in my seat and stared at the ceiling. I could see Bramble cringe. She meant well. They all did. But, humbling Freezy Breeze would only make things worse. All I'd done was deviate from the norm, and it sent the normally respectable weather veteran off. If my cutie mark had been the issue, I doubt the captain would have bothered with the test at all. The same went for my talent as a concept. Ice isn’t exactly an unheard of talent when referring to weather. She'd also had nothing but high praise for my father. Whatever I did, it hit Freezy harder than I could understand.
Sire never said anything; he never really had the time to explain it all. Ever since Dam left, I'd hoped it'd all work itself out. The looks in town were subtler than Freezy Breeze. The whispered comments were possible to ignore if you tried. It wasn't everypony, not even the majority, but they were there all the same.
"She deserves it, though."
Bramble and I looked at Tender Crop, who was shaking in place. She seemed angrier than I'd been a moment ago. It made me a bit happy that she'd feel that offended for me. That alpha mare thing was on full display. One could almost taste the ire blazing in that filly's one visible eye. Tender might be a bit dense, but she made up for it with enthusiasm. On the other hoof, Bramble snatched up her niece with her free wing and tucked her against her other side.
"At the end of the day, that is all Weathered's decision. If he chooses to act or not. So, Tender, my dear righteous little filly, please simmer down. But if he does pursue Freezy, and he just so happens to ask for my help. Well then, as an upstanding mare, I'd be obligated to help a stallion in need. Now, wouldn't I?"
Bramble gave us an exaggerated wink, actually saying it aloud as she did. I snorted. Tender choked a chuckle. Then, as if on cue, both Tender and I started laughing. The tense smog that seemed to bathe the farmhouse in bad vibes vanished in an instant. Bramble pulled both Tender and me tight and laughed along. When we calmed down, I felt better. The worming fear in the back of my head was still there, but now, I was in control instead of letting it drive me from one headache to the next.
"So, what do you say, Glacial, ready to go home?" Bramble asked.
I stifled another long yawn and nodded. The chill in my hooves returned. I hadn't realized it'd gone until it came back. Days of nonstop chill, and then, for a moment, it had simply vanished. It didn't feel right. The chill felt comforting, more so than even the feathered prison I was in. The warmth just lacked a certain sincerity.. My mind was lost to the sudden epiphany. Maybe on some level, Freezy Breeze had been right to be angry, to fear something that fell so diametrically opposed to the normal. I numbly nodded at Bramble's request
Bramble released Tender and I. Then, silently guided me out of the farmhouse. Tender followed behind. Tender’s orange eye on the back of my head. I resisted the urge to turn and glare back. The afternoon had come about and was already passing us by. We'd ended up waiting for Bramble longer than I'd expected.
"Okay, Tender Crop, I think your break has been more than over, yeah?"
"Oh, right, sorry, Aunt Bramble," Tender apologized, and then she was off.
"Sorry for all this," I said, offering Bramble a wry smile.
She flicked a hoof in dismissal. "Don't worry about it. If we don't look out for each other down in these swamps, who will?"
Bramble took a single sizable flap and jumped into the sky. She looked down expectantly. I gave my smaller wings a few beats and gauged my lift, primaries catching the muggy breeze, and up we went. The farm fell away as the clouds grew closer. A full-body shudder shook away the worries, but not the cold. Bramble veered down and slowed beside me. It'd have been easier for her to just carry me. I couldn't keep any sort of pace with a natural like herself. Yet, she seemed none too concerned about the speed and let the winds guide her idly.
"Don't get much practice, do you?" she asked.
I shook my head. "Not really, no. But it's fine; it makes those times when Sire and I go flying more special. Right?"
Several seconds passed. And then there was laughing, full-bodied shaking-in-the-air laughter. If we'd been in town, any pony below would have absolutely seen and heard it. I glared, pouting on full display as Bramble just kept on laughing. This was exactly why I don't talk about these sorts of things with mares. They're all so rude.
"You're not wrong. That would make them all the more precious. Even if it means you're missing out on prime experience. Can't be much of a pegasus if you can barely flap your wings."
Bramble knowingly patted my head. Some ponies, I swear . It was like common sense was a rare commodity. I swatted Bramble's hoof away and focused on not looking aerially inept. The next few minutes were a silent glide over Bogwood. Where the folks below went about doing whatever it was, they did. I felt a certain tingle on the back of my neck as I scanned both the skies and land below for a certain weatherpony or her various underlings.
"It'll be fine, little Zero. Even if Breezy was here and did make a scene, do you really think she could get by me?" Bramble asked. Some could have mistook her words as a joke or boast. Those that did would have had to be blind. The look in Bramble Broach's eye at that moment. A fuse ready to light. A certain unnatural danger in the glint that twinkled in her gaze. It was enough to set off every survival instinct in my head all at once. There were, of course, reasons one did not pick a fight with Bramble Broach or those she held dear. It simply wasn't done.
"I hate that nickname." That was all I could manage. These are the only words that came to mind when I managed to look away. They seemed to do the trick all the same. Bramble snorted and assaulted my mane once more. Curse my charm and good looks .
"Well, we're about a minute out from your humble home. I doubt Weathered is back yet. That said, we will need to talk with him before I leave. That means you must tell your father everything you told Tender and us. Is that okay?"
I'd been afraid that was the direction we were heading. Bramble had a point. Sire deserved to know just how poorly my interview went. Between him and Bramble, I began worrying about Freezy Breeze's safety. I mean, regardless of her reaction to my cryomancy, I didn't want her to vanish one night without a trace. We had to be better than that. Senseless aggression would only invite worse from those of like mind.
I nodded. "Yeah, I was going to tell him either way. He has more than enough to think about without me keeping secrets," I said. The words were bitter on the tongue. No secrets besides those I was already keeping if nothing else.
"Good colt, but I do have one question for ya. If you don't mind a little prying."
"Is it prying if I'm the one who came to your farm first?" I asked.
"Right, fair enough. So, now that the weather is no longer a market you can pursue. Do you have any other ideas? For foals your age, finding a mentor can be, well, not very fun. You're lucky if your family already has a business you can take to. But freezing things and fishing are not all that compatible. So, have you thought about asking your Dam's side of the family?"
"I take it back. You are, in fact, prying," I said. This was not a road of thought I wanted to go down at the moment. I had enough to worry about. I didn't need to give any more ponies like Freezy Breeze reasons to doubt me. Eight years, that is all it took. Now, everypony watched each other like every pony was one bad day away from doing something unforgivable. Hal's history had driven that point deep. His people lived on that razor's edge. Now, I couldn't unsee it, unsee what a single moment could do to drive everypony mad.
"Yeah, sorry. I know that's probably a sore spot. It is an option, though, if nothing else is working. You should at least think about it. Even if most of Bogwood has turned their backs on them, on you. You aren't alone."
She meant well. As much as I wanted to be mad, I couldn't. I missed my Dam; I missed a lot of ponies who have or were forced to leave. Before Hal, I knew something was wrong. Now, though, with the endless trickle of memories of a person decades my senior, a lot of my perspectives have changed. But as much as things changed, the more they stayed the same.
"Yeah, I know. You're right, they are."
By that point, my home was in sight. The dock and surrounding area was still a mess. I'd need to find a better place to practice. The mud alone wasn't worth it. I could melt the ice just fine, but all that water had to go somewhere. That, plus the already sodden soil, meant muck two hooves deep. I was lucky; my father hadn't noticed, or at least he had pretended he, hadn't. But from above, it was unsightly if I were being charitable.
"You sure did a number on your land, huh, little Zero?"
We landed by the front door. I huffed and ignored the smiling mare. I went around the side opposite the dock in a divot by a rather gnarly set of vein-like roots. Under which sat a single brass key. It wasn't uncommon for doors to go without locks, at least on homes. However, there were far more locks throughout town these days. I retrieved the key and opened the door, allowing Bramble to enter.
We had some time before Father's return. So, with a hop, skip, and flutter of feathers, I decided, like any good host, to offer some tea. It was one of the few things Sire trusted me to do in the kitchen. That settled, and the two of us fell into a measurable silence. A silence that brought something else to my attention. It had been some time since I'd seen Freya. It wasn't uncommon for her to meander in the background, especially in public, but since I'd been at the Forage homestead, she hadn't just been quiet. She'd simply vanished. It was an odd feeling. Now that I had noticed, It felt all the more off. The silence became heavy. I had trouble sitting still, to the point even Bramble had taken notice.
"Something the matter?" Bramble asked.
I took a moment to acknowledge the question, or for that matter, the mare at all. Every corner, surface, and ceiling, there is no sign of Freya in any way. "Feels like something is missing."
Bramble scanned the room and settled her gaze back on me.
"And that would be?"
I shook my head. "Just something."
I would have to wait on Freya until Bramble had left. While an imaginary friend wouldn't be earth-shaking, the fact that I was worried about where she went might earn more than an odd look. Freya would be fine; how could she not be?
To my relief, Bramble let the subject drop. We both returned to our tea and only minutes later, the sound of the front door opening drew both of our attention. "Glacial?" my father asked.
"In the kitchen, Sire. We have company."
The unmistakable release of a held breath, followed by the closing of the front door, and the suspicion that had clearly earned Sire's attention disappeared. He stepped into the main room and offered us a nod of greeting, to which I returned a wave and Bramble her own nod of acknowledgment.
"Evening, Weathered. Good to see you doing well," Bramble said, raising her teacup and taking a dramatic sip. "Hope you don't mind me stopping by."
"Should I?" Father asked.
Bramble turned to look at me. "Possibly. Isn't that so, Glacial?"
I offered my father a tired look and a heavy sigh. "Possibly."
"Did something happen?" It was impressive the speeds one could obtain from a standing stool when you were both a pegasus and a concerned parent. It seemed to catch Bramble by surprise, judging by her blinking at the spot Father had been, to where he stood in front of me now. He crouched down and met me at eye level. "Speak, Colt."
"Well, you remember my trip to the weather center this morning, right?" Father nodded. "Well, it didn't go quite as well as the rest of us had hoped." I placed a cheek in a hoof, pale blue fur to pale blue fur.
"And what does that have to do with Bramble Broach?" Father asked, looking from me to the mare in question. Bramble offered a wary smile of her own.
"Captain Freezy Breeze did not care for my special talent. To the point of seething anger," I said.
"Oh?"
Thus, the tale of my poor job interview and the fallout that led me to Forage Farms was told, to which Father kept a face like chiseled stone. There was not the barest tell in his eyes, no subtle movements of his wings. He had taken the only open chair as I recounted my day. He listened without questions. Bramble offered her own thoughts as I finished.
Weathered Horizon worked hard. He did not complain, blamed no pony for his struggles, and never gave in to anger. Those statements were what I'd thought made up not only my father but the tenants that any hardworking pony should adhere to. That was not to say he was emotionless or cold. He simply knew how to temper his reactions accordingly. It, in turn, seemed that the tempered response to Freezy Breeze and her outburst was a silent rage that, if it were a fire, would have reduced our humble home to ash in an instant.
"I see." That was all he said. For minutes, neither Bramble nor I sought to fill the silence. We sat, waited, and listened when the time came. "It seems I may need to pay Captain Breeze a visit before work tomorrow. For it would seem my judgment of her character needs some refinement. As does her addled mind if she thought such an outburst would bear no consequences."
"Weathered, wait," Bramble leaned forward. My father ignored her, simply raising a hood in protest.
"Do you disagree, Bramble?" he asked.
"That the captain went too far? No, I don't. I do think that making a spectacle of it will do more harm than good."
I had to agree with Bramble. At this point, starting fights will only worsen the feelings some in town had of ponies like me and Father. There was a reason we lived outside of town. It wasn't as bad when I was little. However, with time, when the slowly creeping infection of propaganda and fear swept across Equestria, it hit smaller towns and cities the worst.
"Then what pray tell would you suggest I do? I care little for what Bogwood or its ponies think of me. I care less for their meaningless shunning and slander," Father's voice rose, though the emotion behind it remained unreadable. It left a sour taste in the back of my throat and an inability to meet his eye. "However, I have no patience for threatening my foal, directly or not."
As uneasy as I sat. Bramble seemed unphased. She rested her chin on a hoof and swatted at an imaginary gnat. The wishy-washy disinterest of somepony who'd heard the same lines over and over. On a certain level, it irritated me, even if I couldn’t put my hoof on why. If it were due to my mind being too young or numbed to its rage, I could not say.
"Weathered. Do you really think I believe so little of you? That the seedy hysteria ‘The War of the Sisters’ caused isn't noticeable?" The longer Bramble spoke, the hotter the flames of her anger grew. By this point, wings flared, and she towered over the table, a hoof pointed at my father's chest. "Do you think I can forgive them for what they did to Belfry?"
There it was. I'd tried to keep that word off my lips. The name of my mother, Belfry. Ever since she left, it has made it easier to accept. Before the paranoia, she'd been a beacon of the community. I could still hear her voice sometimes as I lay in bed. I could almost hear the songs she'd hum when I was younger. I hated that the sting of tears was welling up in my eyes. My chest hurt, a deep encroaching pain that sought to crush me in its grip.
"It was not just her. It was almost all of them, every last thestral. Reviled by those for things they never did. She left Bogwood with the rest. She was hounded and heckled until she and the rest left."
The conversation was over; all that remained were three hurt ponies, three souls who had nothing they could do. Father's mask had shattered. Bramble's coy apathy was erased, and my tears fell without resistance. I missed her, I missed my Dam so much. No pony knew where she'd gone, where any of the thestrals had found refuge. The only ones that remained were in the employ of Celestia, the Night Guard. Though even they were spat upon.
I lost track of what happened next. I was in a haze; I was lost in my thoughts and tears. The next thing I knew, I was sitting in bed. The sun long dipped beyond the horizon. I was exhausted, and my mind, body, and soul were left hollow as I tried to recollect myself, if only to find sleep. I had yet to figure out what to do moving forward. However, one thing was clear: both Bramble and Weathered worried about thestral hunts and rumors. It wasn't my mother that Freezy Breeze judged me by. It was the very origin of power, my cryomancy, that she feared. A fear I was beginning to share.
"It must hurt." It was barely a whisper. I cast my eyes to the foot of my bed. Freya sat looking at the ceiling. Her snow-white visage sparkled in the dark.
Though it wouldn't have mattered even if she were as dull a stone, I could see her. I could see anything. I had never feared the dark as I'd never seen it, truly.
"Freya?" I asked.
"To lose someone so dear to you. I am left wondering where they are, what they are doing, and if they are thinking of you as well. It must hurt."
Less than a week, that was all it took, and I was already falling apart. I cuffed my blanket in my hooves and pulled it tight. "Yes," That was all I could say. Freya fell backward, hovering just above my bed, looking at me; her bright blues swirled like snowflakes in the breeze. It was as mesmerizing as it was unnatural. It seems even my tulpa was not left unaffected by my state. I grit my teeth. "I won't quit. I won't."
"I would never forgive you if you did," Freya said, her eyes returning to normal. She frowned at me as I mirrored her look. There had to be something I could do, a place I could belong. Father and I deserved better.
I fell back onto my pillow. Tomorrow was a new day. As for now, I'd be of little use if I stayed up all night. I hadn't gotten much sleep this week as it was. I was tired, and I was sick of it. The fog of dreams consumed my sight. And as I drifted off, I could almost hear Freya whisper good night. Though if that were real, I could not say.
Lightning lit the sky, and the thunder was almost completely drowned out by the pouring rain. I stood back to soaking wet brick. The alley was quiet and dark. In this storm, it wouldn't have mattered if I were standing in the middle of the four-way, not a block back. No, I stood in the alley, drenched and shaking all the same. It brought a single speck of comfort; it wasn't the first time the alleys of this shitty old city had bought me a moment to breathe away from the hustle and bustle of the millions that called it home.
I swatted a messy tangle of dark curls from my face. I looked down to my stomach. My shoddy, used tee shirt was plastered to my skin. Stained not just by the rain but red with blood. A hand pressed hard into the wound that peeled at least three inches across my skin. It was deep, and the blood hadn't staunched at all. I cursed under my breath, my body shaking as I slid down the apartment wall behind me. I choked back a guttural grunt. I only needed to catch my breath and a minute to think. The nearest hospital was miles away. I deftly patted my pant pocket. No dice, the phone was gone. I already knew that I'd checked at least twice since making it over the fence.
A dog barked. I flinched, eyes darting through the dark and into the rain. There was nothing, not a sound, no running or yelling, no gnashing teeth and growls. I was still alone, for now.
"Damn it, what the hell do I do?" I asked my shadow. My body lurched as the writhing pain of my wound arced up my spine. "Damn it, come on, Hal, think."
No response, no moment of epiphany. My vision swam. The dark teased at the corners of my vision. I pressed against the brick with my back and tried to push myself to my feet. I failed and slid back down. I looked back down to the hand still pressed against the bloody gash. Even in the rain, my hand was splattered red.
Another dog barked; it was closer. I struggled against the wall, using my free arm as an anchor. I pulled myself to my unsteady feet. I couldn't just stay in the alley all night.
I stumbled onto the sidewalk. A path of fluorescent lamp posts bathed the deserted street in an eerie yellow. I managed a few wobbling steps forward. The hospital was four or so miles away. If I hurried, I could make it before I landed back on my ass. If I fell again, I doubted I'd be able to stand again. The pain in my gut thumped along with the rain, the wind, the thunder, and my heart. A symphony that deafened everything but the pain.
"Tonight was a mistake, a stupid fucking mistake."
Another dog barked from back the way I’d come. I stumbled forward a bit faster. I swayed as the wind ripped around me. Everything was a blur. All definition was lost to the obscuring water that stung my skin. I sneezed. Add that to the ever-growing list of problems today. All I had to do was get to the hospital, but it was so cold. I just had to keep moving.
As I pushed forward, my hooves pounded the sodden concrete, my lungs taking in stinging, icy breaths. I leveraged out my wings to shield myself from the torrent. It was getting colder. I looked down at my hooves. Blue ice wrapped them tight, and the sidewalk below them frosted over.
"Come on, Hal, we can make it."
Another dog barked. This time, I could hear voices following behind the barking. I grit my teeth and hobble forward. I swung an arm out like a blind man's cane. I blinked hard. Something wasn't right. It was a wing, right? No, arm, dots played across my vision. I stumbled into a nearby alley. I heaved, spitting icy rainwater onto the dingy path. I pressed my back into the wall behind me. I took a deep breath. The rain poured on.
Lightning lit the sky, and the thunder was almost completely drowned out by the pouring rain. I stood back to soaking wet brick. The alley was quiet and dark. In this storm, it wouldn't have mattered if I were standing in the middle of the four-way, not a block back. No, I stood in the alley, drenched and shaking all the same. It brought a single speck of comfort; it wasn't the first time the allies of this shitty old city had bought me a moment to breathe away from the hustle and bustle of the millions that called it home.
I swatted a messy tangle of darkened mane from my face. I looked down to my stomach. My blue coat was plastered to my skin. Stained not just by the rain but red with blood. I only needed a minute, just a chance to catch my breath. Then, it all went white. It was cold, so fucking cold. I heard footsteps, followed by the whine of a large dog. I whispered out a prayer. My gut was searing. I couldn't see anything. I waved an arm out, desperate for something, anything to grab onto. The footsteps stopped.
"You look like shit, you know that?" The voice asked. A weight settled on my shoulder, pushing me back against the wall.
"You brought this on yourself, you know that, right?" I couldn't speak. I was doing all I could to heave in and out. My breaths are shallow as a hoof rests on the same force holding me in place. "We should have tossed you out with your mother."
Something wrapped around my throat. I clawed at the limb. Everything was going dark. I felt my limbs fall to my side. I just needed a minute. It was too cold. Just a minute.
Author's Note
Greetings friends,
This is a quick aside for those who care. I usually post multiple chapters at once. Life has made the last two weeks a pain, so I decided to throw this one to the wolves and hit back with multiple next time.
Thank you, and have a fantastical day.
I jolted awake, limbs flailing in all directions. I scanned the room. The early morning light trailed lazy rays across my wall. I was drenched in a cold sweat. A hushed swoop behind me was my only warning before a pair of ghostly forelegs wrapped around my withers.
"Ssh, it's okay. It's all going to be okay." Freya whispered.
I was not so sure about that. The dreams were already fading, a fuzzy collage of blood and rain. I had a feeling it would go a lot deeper.
I rubbed a hoof across my matted muzzle. I needed a bath. I'd never cared for baths; the river was too cold, even in the humid summers. The few fish that would be around this early into summer weren't many, but the surprise of one nibbling at your tail was always a bit irritating.
"Thanks, Freya." I offered an attempt at patting her ensnaring hooves. I managed to pat myself on the back, the irony of which sat oddly between us. Only I could manage to impress upon myself while my coping mechanism tried to coddle me.
"You need a bath," Freya said, releasing me. She drifted around the bed and pointed toward the door. I scoffed and rose all the same. A phantom pain jabbed at my chest. I must have made a face as Freya leaned in and looked me over.
I waved her off. "I'm fine." I wasn't. "Baths stink." they did. "I hope it doesn't keep Sire too long. He hates being late." He did. Freya shrugged slowly and floated listlessly toward the door. I hopped off the bed and plodded after her.
My bath was as short as possible. The chilled water barely phased me. If my cryomancy came with one perk, it was that. I even managed to avoid any surprise assaults on my tail or mane as I lathered myself up with a bar of lard soap and brushed out whatever stuck fast. Freya remained silent through my libations; her eyes tracked my every move. She even attempted to hide her staring behind her mane. It was just long enough and just straight enough to block her direct line of sight. A voice in the back of my head pondered just how deep those concerns ran. A second pondered her absence yesterday.
I left well enough alone for the moment and dried myself off. Father had already sat breakfast down by the time I joined him. He offered a tired smile.
"Washing yourself, is the end of the world so fast approaching?" He pointed at the sodden towel on my back. “Well, for the first time in quite a while, your mane may be a tad drier.”
"Very funny," I rebutted. The towel was quickly deposited in the basket we had set aside for rags, smocks, and other dirty coverings Father brought home after a day at the docks. I hopped into my seat and eyed the barley mix Father had already sat out for me. Dam had always been the better cook. She had more time to square away for meals. Father tried his best, but when every recipe you had was brought from the gallery cooks at the docks, you found the lack of hope that those at sea had to go through at each meal.
"Nightmare?" Father asked. No matter how early or late you caught the stallion. Father was never the fool. The etch in his brow asked another question entirely.
"Yes," I said. I didn't meet his eyes. I focused all I could on my spoon and the slop I packed into my mouth. In most scenarios, anypony with sense would tell me to confide in my sire. Most ponies with no sense would second that. Would he believe me, could he? He might hate the mender, but his son claiming to have the memories of another pony, let alone a race that doesn't even exist on Equiss, might set those hard feelings aside. It stung; the thought he'd drag me across town, fearing I'd lost my mind or the rumors of Nightmare Moon invading ponies' minds were true. I don't think I could blame him if he did.
“About Freezy?”
I shook my head. It was as close to the truth as I could be. "No."
Father sighed and went back to his meal. That was that. The stinging didn't stop. I might go insane if the only one I could talk to was Freya. I might go insane with Freya either way, to be honest.
“Sorry.”
"You've nothing to apologize for, Colt. If it bares worth saying, you will say it. If not, then I trust you can carry that burden alone."
Father didn't look up from his food. He wasted no breath and continued eating as if nothing had been said.
"You don't have to sit in silence, you know?" I caught Freya in my periphery. She sat upside down, in mid-air, with a frown to match her grandest grin, one that could be mistaken for the other from her position. She motioned to my father. I offered no rebuttal.
Once breakfast was finished, Father and I hustled out the door and began the short trek into town. I sat on his back; I couldn't muster the energy to fly.
"If you see Captain Breeze or any weather pony approaching you, Come find me. I will deal with it.
Father's stride hitched as he instructed me. I could see the sneer on his muzzle through the back of his head. He seemed ready and willing to make good on yesterday's threat. If he were, then Bramble would be as well. I'd be happy just to be ignored. The shunning was at least peaceful. I raised a hoof to my face. The tip of which had begun to frost over. The harder I stared, the faster and thicker the frost became.
"I'll be careful. I promise."
"Do you have plans today?" Father asked.
That was an excellent question, did I? I'm sure my friends would have something planned, especially if Tender got a hold of any of them. If she weren't in town today, I'd be baffled. She'd taken Breezy's actions, ones she didn't even see very personally.
"The others might. Bramble had an idea for work. So, that may pan out. If I'm lucky."
"It takes more than luck to thrive, son."
I chuckled dryly. "True, though it does not hurt."
"No, I suppose it doesn't. I expect those fillies of yours to keep you out of trouble," Father agreed with a chuckle of his own.
"Except Azure, right?" I asked. I snorted, nudging my father with the withers.
"I believe that went without saying," Father said, looking back and giving a wink. I let out a sigh. He had me worried for a second. Azure and authority did not mix.
By the time we reached the town center, I was feeling a bit better. The struggle with whom to trust in my supposed past warred in silence, a problem for the future me.
"You could always tell your friends. Most, if not all of them, would, if nothing else, hear you out," Freya said. She lulled beside me as I dismounted my father's back. I waved him goodbye before turning to Freya. Who hummed away with no care in the world.
“Most?” I asked.
"I'm not so sure with little Writ. That one would be harder to convince if you asked me. Too clever that one."
I shrugged. "Fair point. Also, Would you if you were in my shoes? Confess to these memories? Is it fair to put that on some pony or something else?"
Freya tutted loudly, enunciating each sound with apparent diligence. "Unlike some ponies, I know. I am capable of trust. I trust you, don't I?"
"Do you trust yourself?" I mused.
"I trust you, silly colt."
Talking in circles wasn't getting us anywhere. So, I did as I'd done all this week when I wasn't being run out of town. I found myself a seat on a nearby bench and waited. Azure or Tender would find me no matter where I went. However, I kept a pattern to make it easier for the others. I'd been finding myself a bench to wait for at least two years. Nearly as long as Father would let me stay in town alone. Well, not counting the mares around town who kept an eye on the local youth. When you lived in a swamp, it wasn't like there was anywhere else to run off to, not counting the main roads.
Yet somehow, I'd not only gotten out of town yesterday but ran in the only direction that wasn't an endless sprawl of mud and poisonous, venomous, or toxic creatures. I really owe that one to Faust.
"To your left, Glacie," Freya cooed, waving a white hoof unseen at a fast-approaching filly. Tender Crop looked simultaneously irritated and relieved at the same time. The two feelings were in a stalemate on her face. Her tangled mane looked to be trying with all its might to stand on end. Resulting in the look of a pony who really needed an outhouse. Tender's gaze locked on as if her target was the only thing separating the two. Freya rounded the bench and patted the spot beside me.
"Must you encourage her?" I asked.
"Oh please, she can't see me. It isn't like we planned this or anything. I mean, imagine how that might work?" Freya said. She winked, and I was left trying not to think up just how Freya could or would do such a thing.
"Glacial, you're late," Tender said.
I blanched. "Since when am I on a timer?"
"Since somepony went and riled up a certain weather nag."
I let out a full-bodied sigh. "Right, of course."
Freya sidled up beside Tender, nodding fiercely. "She has a point. The more ponies around, the less likely you will be spirited away. Oh, the horrors that might await a poor, disenfranchised youth. I will mourn for you, my sweet colt. I shall mourn."
"And the others?" I asked.
Tender looked about and shrugged. "Can't say. I know Brew was out and about. She was less happy than I was, that's for sure."
My powder blue brow made a grand escape from my face. An attempt only wardened by the unforgiving curse that was physics. Such information could only mean one thing. "You told her?"
Tender stomped. She pressed a mossy green hoof to her chest, head held high. "Course I did. Told everypony I could find. Tally and Azure, I couldn't find Wayward. Mrs. Brew was there, too, when I told Azure. So, she knows too, I suppose."
I planted an icy hoof to my face, hard enough that I regretted it. I shouldn't have been surprised. If anything, I should be grateful she didn't have posters up around town or have been shouting about it on a box in the square. I'm more surprised that Azure hadn't burned the weather center to the ground.
I hopped off the bench I'd only just got comfy on. I waved a hoof across the horizon. "Okay, so, what exactly were you planning to do? You know, once you found me?"
"You mean once the others had their say?" Crop asked. I rolled my hooves over one another for her to continue. "Don't know, I didn't plan to do anything nasty. I just didn't want you getting cornered or anything. We don't know what Freezy Breeze was thinking after you ran off and such."
And with that, I deflated. It goes to show what I know. Reading a filly's thoughts was beyond even the wisest of colts. Of course, Crop wasn't planning anything insane. That was Azure's job.
"Right, sorry about that. Guess I wasn't giving you enough credit," I said. I offered the farm filly a nuzzle and watched her freeze in place. I smiled and motioned to the bench. "Well, the others know my go-to once I get in town. Care to join me?"
Tender grinned. "Well, if you don't mind. It'll save me the roll in the mud once the terror we call Azure finds you." She had a point.
"She has a point," Freya parrotted in agreement.
The wait was a short one. You could feel her long before one saw her. The earth would shake, and the sky would run red. Time and space unraveled with her every hoof fall. All that amounted to a tingle down my spine and the rattling battlecry of an angered purple and pink unicorn.
Tender nudged me and pointed down the way. There she was in all her fury. Freya snickered beside me. Tender also seemed pretty amused about it. Then her eyes snapped to the humble little corner of the town square I always occupied. I considered running or flying away as fast as my legs and wings could carry me. If I got home quickly enough, I would have the chance to batten the hatches before her siege began.
Then I remembered that I wasn't her target, not really. She was mad for me if Tender was anything to go on. She wanted Freezy's head, not mine. Right, I was a victim in all this, please?
It took seconds before Azure stood before Tender and me. She looked between the two of us and hummed as loudly as she could manage. A hoof tapping away at her chin.
"You found him," Azure said.
Tender nodded. "I sure did."
"He knows, Tally, and I know?"
Tender nodded again. "Yep."
Azure smiled. She smiled a devious, madness-consumed grin. I reevaluated my escape plan once more. "Good, then, if you don't mind Tender. I have a few things I'd like to tell Glace. Some of which are not very nice."
Tender shrugged. "I don't see why you need my permission. Unless you plan to get physical, you do what you need to."
Tender was correct, and Azure did not need to ask. But need and should aren't always one and the same. Tender was the first in the know, the one to tell Azure what happened, and the oldest of the group. In a herd, be that familial or social, the oldest filly or mare was expected to be the lead. Tender typically fit that role to a tee. She was the most stalwart and sure of herself. When she wasn't caught off guard anyway, Azure, as a social butterfly, had deferred as any mare would in a social setting without needing to. Both fillies come from bigger homes, but etiquette and pony nature were split in differing amounts between the two families. I only knew as much as I did through osmosis. Which, thanks to Hal, I now knew was a word.
"I know you're just worried, but there isn't much anypony could have done about it," I said. I scooted towards Tender and patted a spot beside me. "Let's talk."
My compliance took the wind from Azure's sails. The filly's mania drained away, and without a word, she hopped up beside me and pulled me into a hug.
"You could have gotten hurt. You're lucky Freezy didn't do more than yell at you." Azure whispered. I felt something damp drip onto my neck. I tensed, feeling like Tender in the moment. I gently pulled Azure closer and let her get it all out.
"I know. She might be the first to lash out, but Freezy isn't the only pony in town who's given me looks. I guess I got used to it. So, I just figured everypony else had to. I'm sorry I worried you, girls. Ever since Mom left, I just had to keep to myself. Now, with my weird talent, that's not an option.
A second pair of hooves wrap around my other side. These have enough force to pull both Azure and me off balance. Tender, not wanting to be left out, had decided to join the hug pile. All I could see were greens and purples. It was an odd contrast.
"Silly colt. That's what we're here for," Tender said.
There was a finality to those words that left a deeper impression in my head than I could explain. It was like a memory you couldn't quite recall in the moment. You know the memory is there, but the details were mist in your hooves.
"Crop is right, and not just for you. There are others in town, the Night Guard, and plenty of good ponies who haven't gone crazy, too." I couldn't help but chuckle. Azure sure had a way with words. I don't think she quite got why it was funny or that I was laughing at her expense, but she pulled away all the same tears, having stopped.
"No, you're right. Even if I don't show it, I am grateful," I said with a chuckle.
"Also, if you ever run off into the swamp alone again, I will glue you to the wall. Dam showed me how to make some super sticky goop yesterday, and I've been dying to test mine."
"Don't you three just look so cute? Precious, really," Writ Tally, standing in front of my favored bench, smiling even if she couldn't resist the barbed comment or two. "Azure has a good point, even if she doesn't know why it's a good one."
"And what does that mean?" Azure said, jumping from her spot on the bench. She jabbed a hoof into Writ's off-white chest. Writ met the challenge with gusto, fluffing out her wings. She leered back at Azure with practiced ease.
"That you know little about the inner machinations of a colt's mind. That is what I mean."
"And you do?" I asked.
"Maybe not all colts. But you, you'd better believe it."
It wasn't just I who stared back in confusion. Crop and Azure met Writ's confidence with blank stares. It was an odd thing to confess to. I was also unsure if I should be appreciative of Writ's focus or scared of her obsession. It could be a bit of both. Either way, I was beginning to think Freya's uncertainty to share my secret with her was a founded one.
"And that would mean?" I asked.
At some point in her digesting of Writ's words, Tender had taken some level of affront to them and had joined Azure in standing between me and my fellow pegasus.
If Writ was put off by the other fillies, she didn't let it show. She hadn't so much as blinked in their direction. She met my confused gaze with one of calm assurance.
"You're overthinking it. All you have to do is let the Night Guard know what happened. That shouldn't be so hard. Even if you don't look like them, you're still one of theirs, aren't you?"
"Could you?" I asked.
Tally eyed me carefully. "Could I what?"
"Tell, I was half thestral? If you didn't already know, I mean."
"She shouldn't need to. This all started before we were even born. All because of Nightmare Moon. She started a fight, and you're the one paying for it. You, your mom, the thestrals. It isn't fair or right."
Azure stepped up beside Writ, who herself seemed lost in thought. Azure looked on the verge of tears. Her cheeks puffed out, her tail flicking across the ground in wide arcs. She wasn't wrong, it was unfair, it was terrible, but that didn't change where we were now.
"The fact that most of the Night Guard sided against Nightmare Moon is also something to account for. Something that everypony seems to forget," Tally mused.
"Why do you know that?" Tender asked. The farm filly had been awfully quiet for somepony who'd been so adamant about my situation earlier.
I wanted to dismiss her, to point out how willingly she let the others speak for her. All of them seemed ready to speak for me. This whole week, everything was about me, my talent, my jobs, and Freezy. It was exhausting. Even now, sitting on a bench doing nothing. I could feel the wood under me growing colder. The thing that made it all worse, I didn't care. The cold, the ice, even the cloud from yesterday. None of it should have been a big deal. But according to everypony else, it was.
"I did some research into druids. Which there, as we thought, was little to find. The best I found on druids was an early term for those with elemental affinities or natural mancy magics, separated from the more spiritual or arcane magics. A magical triangle used to distinguish wielders of those magics."
"Uh, okay, but what does that have to do with Nightmare Moon?"
Tender's eyes had glazed over. The poor filly was out of her depths. My attention had been grabbed, and the books I'd been given glossed over the three magical classes, though only to point out that ponies still used them. So, anything new was welcomed. Azure, though, one could hear the gears grinding in her head, so much so that her horn sparked and snapped with her aura.
"It doesn't." I raised a hoof in protest. "But it did lead somewhere," Tally added before I could rebuttal. She smirked as I lowered my hoof in defeat.
"Where'd it lead?" Tender asked. She had rejoined us in the waking world.
"Thestral magic," Azure answered. Tally's surprised squawk earned a few snickers. Azure nudged Writ, who snorted in response. "Right?"
Writ nodded. "Thestral magic."
Tender's ears folded back. She looked to the clouds above and back to Tally. "Don't they use the same magic as pegasi?"
"No!" Tally, Azure, and I said in chorus. A bit too loud if the look we got from a passing mare was any indication. Tender mouthed off in silent regret, like a fish gasping on the hook of a fishing rod. I almost felt bad.
Tender turned to me, eyes pleading for help. "Sorry."
She was lucky I was such a forgiving colt. If she'd said that to a normal thestral, she'd most likely need a trip to the mender. Faust forbid, anypony needing to see that rat. I hopped down from the bench and pulled Tender into a hug.
"You're fine. Most ponies think the same. They are wrong, but that doesn't mean they must stay that way. Right, Tally?" I pivoted to my fellow pegasus and motioned for her to continue.
Writ mumbled something under her breath and dropped the issue. "Right, thestral magic, often mistaken to be similar to pegasus magic, has several distinguishing points." She leaned in pointedly towards Tender Crop, who scuffed a hoof through the dirt, failing to meet the other filly's gaze. "The first and simplest being their ability to see in the dark."
I pointed to my gently illuminated teal eye. "One of the few things I got from my dam."
"That's why we don't let you play seeker anymore. You cheater," Azure said with a giggle. One, I returned with a wink of my own.
"And even though thestrals can manipulate clouds and the weather. Their control is far weaker. Which could be related to what Freezy Breeze got so upset about."
"Oh, that's a good point," Freya said. She waved a ghostly hoof through Tally's dirty blonde maned head. "See, this is why she has me all worried about your second life thing. She's too darn smart for her own good. That's how you get in trouble, knowing too much."
I rubbed a foreleg down the other. "Yeah, well, I think we've left the plot. We were talking about the Night Guard and their stand against Nightmare Moon."
"Yeah, yeah, yous would be surprised. That's why the Night Guard was still around after the battle at the old castle. It turns out that Eternal Night wasn't quite as appealing as Nightmare thought it was. Even for the night gliders."
I groaned at that ridiculous nickname. It was almost as harmful as Tally's slip back into her native accent. "Seems Nightmare might have gotten the last laugh. Even after her banishment. The thestrals were still labeled her followers."
"Seems so," Azure said.
"Then it all comes back to whether they would even consider me one of theirs."
"Passing or not, a bat is still a bat."
Our group was startled by the nasally response. The girls all turned, and there, beholden to none, was one of Bogwood's premiere elders. A nearly skeletal unicorn mare with a face like she'd spent her entire adult life-sucking a single lemon. Her once pristine plum coat had dulled with age, her mane having grayed out completely. A mare that everypony in and around town knew by reputation first and infamy second. Mrs. Bright Whimsey.
"My apologies, foals. I couldn't help but overhear you. I was on my way to see Wild Pear; she and I get brunch once a week, you see. On my way, I'd heard the bat's foal questioning his place in life. So, of course, as an elder of this fine town of ours. It is my responsibility to remind everypony of their station. Weathered, he is lucky his colt took so much after himself, even if he is a pegasus. I can hardly think what might happen if he…" Mrs. Whimsey pointed a plum hoof to me with a silent loathing, like one recounting a murder. "...took after one of those Nightmare spawn."
There it was, the exact point made only a moment ago and shoved with gusto down our throats by some nosey old prune. Stunned silence. Not a single leaf crunched, not a flower rustled in the wind. The sum of creation was chillingly silent. Even in my mind, I can barely manage a replay of Mrs. Whimsey's words. I wanted to be angry, filled with fervor and vinegar. I wanted to yell and spit and rage. But, as hard as I looked. I could find none of that if I'd done as I wanted. There would no doubt be repercussions. This was Mrs. Whimsey's town. She held more social power than any other herd combined. Not even Bramble could get away with something as brazen as snubbing the mindless old prune. She was the one pony in town my father made clear I was to avoid under any and all circumstances. Here was precisely why.
"I'm sorry?" I offered. I could only hope placating her sensibilities would prompt her to retreat to find Mrs. Pear quickly.
"You shouldn't be," Freya hissed in my ear. I must have flinched because Mrs. Whimsey smiled with all the loving grace of a crocodile.
"As you should be. Especially after the rumors I heard yesterday. It was said, you see, that a young colt got on Captain Breeze's bad side. A poor choice if I've ever heard one," Mrs. Whimsey tutted.
It seemed that a nerve had been struck, and it was not mine. I should have seen it coming after yesterday and this morning. I shouldn't have been surprised. Three very angry fillies glared at Mrs. Whimsey with an intensity that would shame the flames of the sun itself. Mrs. Whimsey didn't notice until it was too late.
"Is that why you've been hovering over Glacial before I'd even arrived? Is Mrs. Pear aware you'll be late for brunch?" Tally asked. Her accent had vanished completely, along with any remote hints about what she was thinking. My ice could learn a thing or two when it came to cold; Writ Tally was a league all her own.
"I'll have you know, we elders look after you young, upstarts. While your herds work tirelessly to provide, we take the initiative to help in no small way keep you safe. So, how dare you take such a tone with me, filly."
"Deflection," Writ said, waving the old mare away like a wayward fly. It worked, too. Mrs. Whimsey's lip began to quiver. Whatever half-formed retribution she had planned was met with a second opposition.
"If we're such a burden, I'm sure we could find somewhere else to be. So, please, I'm sure Mrs. Pear is worried sick," Tender said. She pointed over her shoulder in the vague direction of anywhere else.
"I should have expected such rudeness from one of Bramble Broache’s kin. That mare is nothing but trouble. But to be defending a colt whose mother sought to dethrone Princess Celestia. The whole lot of you should be ashamed."
"So this is about Freezy Breeze?" Azure asked. She took a step toward the older mare. Who turned her nose up to her young challenger.
"It is my duty to ensure this town's safety, from inside and out. If this little degenerate is one such threat, it is my duty to deal with him."
"A threat, really? Glace hasn't done anything wrong." Azure said. Tally had to pull our friend back, lest she be deemed a threat too. Tender was not much better. She'd managed to plant herself firmly, but her entire body shook in silent rage. This wasn't going well; if Mrs. Whimsey had the final say, it would not get any better.
"What kind of threat?" I asked.
The elder seemed almost amused by my question. The smug could almost be tasted as she met my gaze. I felt numb. We'd just been over this, moved past it. Mrs. Whimsey, Captain Breeze, and I'm sure plenty more had their opinions of me. But, even at their worst, they only had half the story. Besides Freya, that was all anypony had. Even Sire was left in the dark.
"If memory serves, which it does. A pegasus colt played some sort of nasty joke on our poor Captain. Thus, I am doing my due diligence in warning any such colts that they tried very thin ice. It would be a shame if they were no longer welcomed in our fine town. Wouldn't you agree, Colt?"
"Did she just—" Tender asked before falling into baffled silence.
"She did," Tally affirmed.
"Ah, that type of threat. Don't worry, Mrs. Whimsey, I understand you completely." My reaction was not what the old mare was expecting. Her eyes narrowed as she gauged me. The fillies looked on in silence.
"See that you do, little batling, for you and your sire's sake."
With that, Bright Whimsey turned with what she considered grace and marched off. On some level, I hoped Mrs. Pear missed the wrath of her brunch date. I had suspected Freezy Breeze wouldn't be the end of it in communities as small as ours. It was inevitable that yesterday's mishap would make the rounds. To think it escalated this far that quickly was foreboding. I had every faith that if and when Mrs. Whiomsey could make good on her word, she would. If I was going to make enemies, I might as well aim for the top.
"Glacie, the bench," Freya whispered as loudly as she could. Volume becomes an afterthought when one does not need to account for others overhearing. Nonetheless, I looked down. To my surprise, I found that the entirety of my seat had frozen. That included my rear being frozen in place as well. I flapped my wings, trying to gain some leverage, only to flop about uselessly.
"When did I?" I asked between wads of damp mane. All I'd managed was to fold myself forward, rear firmly planted in place. "A little help, please?"
"Glace, are you okay?" Azure asked. All the fight seemed to have melted away, leaving a trio of very upset fillies. A trio who were still not helping me. My headache was back and worse than ever.
"I'm stuck." I flapped my wings to make a point of it.
"You're frozen," Writ said. She seemed the quickest to recover from whatever surprise had left my friends gawking. I rolled my eyes and nodded. "Not just in place."
She was right. My forelegs were, once again, encased in my increasingly familiar blue ice. But it did not end there. While being thinner and having a more natural color. The trail of frost ran up my stomach and back down my back legs. If the looks of the fillies were anything to go by, it didn't end there. My wings had been spared if it was any consolation.
“Did she?” I asked.
"No, she didn't. We almost missed it ourselves," Tender said, looking back in the direction Whimsey had wandered off in. "It was like you were holding a breath. The second the old hag turned around, it just." Tender pointed to my current predicament.
“Oh.”
"That's all you have to say after…" Azure wrapped my head in her hooves and shook it liberally. "...After she did that. She just, I mean, Can you believe this?" Azure was pulled away from my still-slumped form by Tender.
“I can,” Tally said.
"As can I." I wiggled in place. "That said, can sompony please help me up?"
"Can't you just melt this ice?" Tender asked.
“Oh.”
As if the sun had bared down on my self-made prison, the ice melted to water and left me sodden. The giggles from the girls did not help. I planted my hooves to the ground and shook hard, spraying my oh-so-concerned friends in a chilled shower, fresh from the source. The giggles stopped in a hurry.
"So, that settled. Do you have any other plans for today?" I asked. The girls all glared daggers back. "Oh, come on, it was just a little water."
"Little water, my flank," Tender groused.
"It isn't our fault you forgot how to melt ice," Azure said. She took a single step forward, hoof jabbing at my head. "Shame on you."
"Catch her!" The shout ended whatever bickering we'd been preparing to dive into. Instead, as any foal would, we turned toward the noise, our ears up, eyes wide, and minds full of possibilities. "Stop her!" a second shout, this one closer.
A mare rounded the bend on a side street as if on cue and headed straight for the town square. Or, more importantly, straight towards or past our little group. That wasn't unexpected. Dozens of ponies had walked, trotted, carted, or otherwise passed us this morning. We were just another group of foals to be minded but dismissed equally. Besides the yelling, I doubt we'd have even noticed the mare in question. A dirty red mare, unicorn, eyes squinted harshly as she ran. Her silver curls spilled out manically as she hoofed it. Nope nothing special at all, aside from the knife. I leered at the mare, doubling, checking just in case. I blinked. Yep, still there, a blade maybe two hooves long. A blade that was pointed in our direction.
"Stop, thief!" a pair of Day Guards rounded the bend after the red mare. They were too slow. Both guards were earth ponies and stalwart, but they were clearly caught flat-hoofed. They would need more time to catch her. She had a knife. A knife pointed at foals, foals, including me, who hadn't moved.
I glanced over at the others. They were as confused as I was. No other pony in the square had moved, either. She was getting closer. Her eyes locked on a spot to my left, occupied by Writ. My head swam, and visions, vague, malleable things from my dreams last night, flashed in my head. My chest hurt; I couldn't breathe. I hadn't realized I'd moved. The thief's eyes widened. She hadn't expected me to move either.
"Glace, move, you need to move." I could barely hear Freya as she shouted at me.
It felt so distant, the world, the ponies, the town. It was all an amorphous dream in a blackened winter. I could still feel the knife, the mare in a desperate sprint for freedom. The taste of blood as I bit down on my tongue. It was warm, in a sense, even as the ice crawled beneath my hooves. The winding trail of ice on the ground. It writhed like a living thing. A serpent all its own, hungry, devoid of rhyme or reason, it was both sickening and euphoric.
"Glacial."
I could remember the rain vividly. Last night's dream was finally revived in my memory with startling fidelity. The last fleeting seconds, the man and the dog. Hal, it all sat like a portrait that only I could see.
"Glacial!"
Everything snapped back into place the moment my ice found its mark. The mare had no time to change course. She had no idea what was coming. My heart thundered in my ears. Then, like the serpent it emulated, it latched onto its prey. The mare gasped, and as quickly as she'd been charging, she stopped.
"What?" the thief asked.
I exhaled, and it all faded away. I wondered if any of that was real or if I was making it all up as it went. My gaze passed from the thief to the knife. To her surprise, the thief had dropped her weapon. The guards were closing in, but their target wasn't going anywhere. Her hooves were frozen to the ground. The mare was a unicorn. If given the chance, she could break or thaw herself in moments. She didn't have moments.
"Well, that was a surprise, huh, criminal?" one of the guards asked. She approached slowly from one side, her partner from the other. The thief didn't answer. She was staring, following the ice trail right back to my hooves, where it all began.
"How?" she mouthed. I shrugged.
The guards had taken notice as well. A hoof jabbed my side. I jolted in place. I turned to find Azure, eyes narrowed as she motioned back to the thief. I shrugged again.
"Glace, you okay?" Azure asked.
"Wrong question," Freya whispered into my ear.
Wrong, what was wrong? Azure's question was a question I was asking myself. I had no clue why everything had snowballed so readily, at least in my head. No, I was lying. I did know, Hal, it was just like the dream all over again. The phantom pain in my gut throbbed in agreement. Azure was still watching me and waiting for an answer. Tender and Tally had taken up positions around me as well. They were all staring: the thief, the guards, my friends. They were all waiting.
"I don't know."
"You stopped that mare, you just…" Tender pointed to the trail of ice that started at me and ended with the still very much stuck thief. One of the guards was stomping at the base of the ice trap. Even if they couldn't wholly unfreeze her hooves, they could at least breathe it off around the sides and simply carry the criminal away. No one else seemed all that concerned. The least of which being the fillies around me, who juggled looks of awe, confusion, and fear in equal portions. That made sense, and I felt I was mirroring them pretty well. "Your hooves started to glow, and whoosh, there the ice went."
I looked at my forehooves. They were once again frozen a solid blue. It was becoming a habit, one I wasn't completely sure how to feel about. I traced the path of my magic. It'd gone a lot farther than when I tried extending it with the river. It didn't hurt or burn; it didn't feel at all. The second I'd come back to reality, the spell, if that was a spell, broke.
"You were scared. You saw the mare and the knife, and something changed," Tally said. She squinted at me so hard, in fact, she'd more or less closed her golden eyes. I wondered if she could even see me when she made a face like that.
"Yeah, you're right. I was scared, and the mare was coming right for us. But I have no idea what or how I did what I did. I just wanted her to stop, and she did."
Tally was too sharp and way smarter than me. She deserved some semblance of the truth. She'd been researching magic and druids for my sake. Tally relented on her blind squint. She stepped forward, tapped one of my frozen hooves, and hummed to herself. I'd count that as a win for now. Freya was still right; if I told anypony anything, Writ Tally would be the first. Freya was right that the others would hear me out. I believed that completely. Sire would, too; I don't doubt he'd believe me. Tally, though, if there was any pony who could help make sense of it, that wasn't a grieving sun goddess; it was her.
"We'll talk later, okay?" I said, patting Writ's shoulder. The filly huffed but otherwise kept whatever thoughts she had to herself.
"I better be included in that talk," Azure said, interjecting herself between Writ and me, only to pull us both into a hug. "Or else."
"Calm down, Azure, before you scare the poor colt worse than any knife ever could," Tender said. Her warning was thoroughly ignored as she forced her way into the hug.
"Foals."
The four of us turned to find one of the guard mares approaching. Forged in iron, much like her gaze, the mare seemed the type to gnaw on lemons and make the lemons pucker. Even her coat and mane were drab and ornery. A placid gray coat like dried coal and smoldering orange eyes to match the theme. We made a line and waited. The mare nodded and came to a stop a dozen hooves out. She looked from one of us to the next and ended up on me.
"Care to explain?" she asked. The guard’s left forehoof shook slightly, twitching to the guard’s disinterest or completely unaware knowledge.
"Glacial Zero stopped the mare in her tracks before she could hurt somepony," Azure offered, hoof raised in a needless request for approval.
"So, he did," the guard agreed. She took another step forward and eyed me up. "Quite the feat, little colt. I didn't know pegasi could do that," The mare said and waved to the ice trail. "Whatever that was."
"I panicked. I wasn't trying to make a scene." I offered a shallow smile and bowed slightly. It was overkill, but a cowering colt would get a lot more eyes on the scene than an arrogant brat. The guard seemed to realize it, too. She looked at the sparsely occupied but not wholly deserted town center. Then she smiled.
"A little early, isn't it?" The guard asked. Her gaze had shifted up, and she was now looking at something directly behind me.
"And how is one to sleep with so much noise? You and Private Breach are always far too loud, right, Dirk?"
The guard mare flinched in recourse. I turned to find a navy blue thestral stallion. I had not expected that, and judging by Dirk's pout, neither had she. The stallion noted my look and winked an exhausted amber eye in return.
"Sergeant Foresight, sir, you're up early."
Private Breach marched up, leaving the poor thief still very much stuck in place. I debated offering to thaw her for the officers, but judging by Dirk, that might not have been too smart. Sergeant Foresight offered Breach a tired smile and waved to the captured thief.
"Unfortunately, Private. But, I am, and having seen a pair of the Day Guard getting beat by a colt of all things, it was perhaps worth the loss of sleep. Any thoughts, gentlemares?"
"I was preparing to question the colt when you joined us, sir." Dirk scoffed in my direction. "He should not have interfered in official business, sir."
"Interfere, Private?"
Private Dirk nodded and pointed back at me. Her limb once again twitched madly. At this point, it was clearly not deliberate. That or the mare was just messing with my head. Both could be true as well. "Yes, sir, a foal should know better than to play hero. His actions could have gotten somepony hurt."
Sergeant Foresight turned to me. "And what say you, Colt?"
"I prefer not to be stabbed, sir."
The sergeant nodded along. His two-toned gray, black mane bobbed along. It reminded me of a broom top, long strands that tangled into a right mess. "And you summoned all this ice, yourself?" Foresight looked back to the still-stuck mare behind us. "Interesting."
I couldn't parse the sergeant. He seemed amused by the whole scenario, something Dirk was not enjoying. She'd tensed her back legs so hard I thought she might turn around and buck Foresight halfway across town.
Freya made a loop around the thestral, her smile growing as she did so. "I like this one. He has some moxie."
"I did, sir."
"Is Glacial in trouble?" Azure asked. Neither she nor the others had moved from their positions 'guarding' me. It was nice, even if they were trying to intimidate Equestria's protectors. Private Dirk leered at Azure with such fervor that I feared the private might strain something.
"In most cases, he'd be reprimanded for interference. Private Dirk is right on that account. The laws are the laws," Foresight sucked in a breath through his fangs. The hiss sent a shiver down my spine. I ran my tongue over my all too-plain pony teeth. "However, I may have a better solution in mind."
Private Dirk became rigid. The sparking smirk of victory fell away, replaced by a stony apathy. I winked in her direction. She made every attempt to avoid looking at me, but her legs were still very much tense.
"Sir?" I asked.
Foresight planted a navy hoof on my shoulder. "Well, if you were brought on as a member of the guard, then there would be no need for punishment. After all, a guard, on or off duty, can act in the protection of others, within reason." I refrained with all my heart and soul not to look at the others. I didn't need to. There was no colt or stallion in creation that couldn't sense an 'I told you so' from here to Canterlot.
"Is that a formal invitation?" I asked.
"Is that a yes?" Foresight hummed.
"Sir, can you do that?" Private Breach asked.
"For the Night Guard, yes, apprenticeships come in many forms, Breach. I have found a colt with a spark of talent. I'd be daft to overlook it. Especially with how understaffed the Night Guard has become."
"Glace." I dared not turn. The 'I told you so' hovered over me like a guillotine blade. I swallowed hard. If I pretended Tally wasn't there, she couldn't lord it over me.
"Sir, you can't be serious," Dirk said.
"He'll do it," Azure said. She offered a white-purple hoof to Foresight. This earned a snort from the sergeant and a barely withheld giggle from Breach. I was less amused, and Dirke less than that.
"My my, so young and already forming a herd. I must say, little colt, you are quite the interesting young pony, aren't you?"
"Azure, stop confusing the sergeant," Writ Tally said with a tsk. The barest of pink tingeing her white cheeks.
Tender nodded agreeably. "I'm the one who should be giving Glace to the sergeant." I'd wager a hint of pink on her, too, if you could see past the tangle of gree she called a mane.
"They don't speak for me," I said, pushing past the fillies and offering my own hoof. "Though I've been told I should join the Night Guard more than once this week."
"Following in your dam's hoofsteps, are we?" Foresight asked. He took my hoof in his and gave it a firm shake. "She was the best this side of Baltimare."
My hoof went limp. "You knew my dam?" Of course, he did, at least, as a thestral and Night Guard. The fact he knew she was my dam specifically wasn't surprising. That he could tell how little of her I carried in my looks was even more confounding.
"Belfry was a good friend and a better leader. I'd need to be blind, deaf, and unlearned not to recognize her foal."
"How?" I asked.
The sergeant leaned down and shielded us on one side with a wing. "Thestral secret. But, even so, that look in your eye is Belfry without doubt."
I wish I knew what look he meant. I wish more that I knew what tipped me off, thestral secret or not. It was also possible he had seen me before and was messing with me. He might have, but I doubted that was the answer. As flippant as the sergeant had been, the chips, scuffs, and tears across his forelegs and barrel painted a different image. He wasn't like my Sire, the stalwart rock on which the world could bear down with no strain. Foresight was more edged, a rock for kindling and torch. He led from ahead and bore a hole through the dark. Both embodied unorthodox auras for stallions. They went against the grain, unphased by the whats and whys of it all.
“Oh, and now he has secrets. Watch out, Glace, this one is almost as tricky as little Writ,” Freya said with a titter. She flew around the sergeant, striking faces at her target in complete ignorance. I had to wonder if Freya’s paranoia ran as deep in me as she let on.
"So, where do I start?" I asked.
The sergeant waved past me to the privates and the thief. "First, I believe you owe the two guards here an apology for acting without consent. As well as upstaging the poor daywalkers. Then you need to talk to your sire. There aren't many in Bogwood, I fear. That stallion, he's top of those few behind your dam."
"I can see that," I said. Sire was a force to be reckoned with; that fact was one bit of pride nopony could take from me. "He's as tough as they come."
Foresight rolled his amber eyes. "Right, then, how about you come to see the Night Guard tomorrow evening? We can get things worked out properly from there."
"Yes, sir," I said. I offered a salute before turning and smiling at the two privates. Breach seemed happy enough to return one of her own. Dirk snorted, turned about, and walked back toward the bored-looking captive.
"Well, then. I believe I am due for a few more hours of rest, good day," Foresight said. He offered a lazy wave and took wing.
The rest of us watched as he vanished over the roofs. I let out a deep sigh and slumped forward. "That could have been bad."
Tender patted my back. "But it wasn't."
"And look what happened. A Night Guard offered Glace a job. Gee, I wish anypony else had thought about asking the Night Guard. What a pity," Azure said. She swooned and swayed.
Tally nodded accordingly. "If only."
"Excuse me, young colt."
We four turned to find a Private Breach jogging in place. "I don't mean to be a bother, but if you could, we're having some trouble with your ice." She pointed over her shoulder. Dirk sat glaring at the ice. The thief had taken to whistling with nothing better to do.
"Oh, right. Sorry." I planted a hoof on the trail of ice that led to the thief. I took a deep breath and let the ice disperse. Having not been paying attention, the thief fell forward, face in the mud, rear to the sky. "That better?"
Breach tittered and waved over to Dirk, who was now jabbing the thief, who seemed to be having trouble getting up. "That'll do, thank you."
"I wonder if you gave that mare frostbite? Or did all her legs numb up or fall asleep all at once? The poor thing never stood a chance," Freya mused. She perched herself atop my head and reached toward the still-prone mare. The incorporeal white hoof like mist in the wind.
"Good question."
Azure jabbed me in the side. "What's a good question?"
I jabbed her back. "Just how much of my ice is magic, and how much is normal ice?"
"Well, your ice is a weird color and is super hard to melt. So, a lot of magic. However, you've also made normal ice, too. Hmmmm," Azure fell into a silence.
"Does it matter?" Tender asked.
Tally prodded one off my hooves. "Probably." She continued to jab me with that off-white Faust forsaken hoof of hers until Tender shooed her ascending hoof away.
"Can you stop?" I stepped around Tender Crop, putting the larger filly between me and the bemused number cruncher.
"Can you quit making your talent so complicated?"
"Can you both be quiet? I'm thinking here." Azure huffed, walking past Tally and making her way towards a bench a bit further from the crime scene. If she was that taken to the task, I feared what results she may achieve.
"What were you thinking?"
I didn't have time to turn before I was tackled to the ground by a sniffling Wayward. Tender had mentioned looking for her. We wouldn't have to catch her up at this rate. Tally and Tender helped pull the two of us from the ground.
"I take it you saw the whole guard thing?" Tally asked.
"I was on my way to Azure's when I heard yelling. The next thing I saw was some crazy mare running right at you, and I just froze. I didn't know what I should do. I'm sorry."
"Sorry for what? Glace took care of it," Tender said. She offered our distressed orange friend a hug, which Wayward accepted without resistance. "Not much you could have done."
"Sorry, Sky, I didn't mean to get you all riled up. I just saw the mare, and, well, the rest came naturally," I said. I joined the hug, and Tally reluctantly followed. Wayward took the chance to collect herself. Azure had sat down on the nearby bench and seemed lost in a self-inflicted daze. I'd really stumped the poor filly.
I hadn't even been really talking to her. Freya had made a point, and I answered without thinking. For her part, Freya floated over Azure, mumbling to herself. Her bright blue eyes gazed past reality, and I doubted she even knew where she was. That left the question: If I knew where Freya was, wouldn't she? That look of hers said otherwise. I had to bite my tongue to stop myself from getting drawn into whatever had their attention. Sky deserved some answers. She'd been busy recently.
"Hey, Sky."
She looked up at me. One ear flopped to the side. It was like looking at a puppy. The slightest tilt of the head, the big, pleading seafoam eyes. It was enough to make one sick. It was enough to plant guilt in the mind of the innocent.
"Yes?"
"You haven't heard much about the last few days, have you?" I asked.
"No, I've been swamped. Sorry, I know you wanted all the help you could get. I haven't been much help, have I?"
I bopped a hoof over her head. "Stop it; you didn't do anything wrong." Sky rubbed a hoof on the spot I'd smacked and pouted.
"He's right, Sky. There is nothing for it. But since you're here. We've got a tale and a half. Yesterday especially," Tender said. The look in her eye, or what could be seen through her tangled mane, glowered in a smoldering anger. The type of heat you get from a slow boil. It wasn't a fire; it was too deliberate and focused. She had a target in mind, and that kept the water hot.
"Was there to tell. Captain Breeze lost her cool," Tally added. Her look took more work to read. It was like she was a puzzle with a piece missing. It was incomplete, complex, and ill-formed all at once. The longer I looked for it, the easier it was to see what Freya meant.
"Captain Breeze?"
"I went in to take an apprenticeship test. It didn't go as well as I'd have hoped," I said.
"It went that bad?" Wayward’s oceanic eyes flicked between Tender and me. Her wings shifted as she gauged Tender's and my reactions. It was like the very sea’s horizon was nervous.
"If by well, you mean she threatened Glace and sent him running all the way to my farm. Then yeah, not so well."
The water was boiling. Tender's focus had been brought down on Wayward's unknowing head. I placed myself between the two. Tender grumbled but made no move to get past me. I offered her a smile. She turned away, hooves crossed.
"Tender isn't very happy with the captain, as you can see."
"She did what?" I fell back on my haunches. Wayward Sky's glare was enough to stun everypony. Even Freya and Azure looked over in surprise. Wayward pulled me into a hug. One might compare to a tight embrace as bear-like in most places. That would be an apt description for most of those situations as well.
In Bogwood, we had a different saying. A hug gone wayward was a saying that was whispered when reflecting on the Wayward herd. It wasn't just Sky who could split a tree between her hooves. No, every Wayward was blessed with an embrace one should fear, even if the closest of friends. The first time Wayward Sky hugged me, back when we could barely walk on our own. She nearly choked me out. It was only due to her dam noticing that I am still around to recant such events.
"Wayward, release," Tally yelled, pulling uselessly at one of Sky's locked-in hooves. Sky blinked twice and relaxed her grip. She didn't let me go, but at the very least, I could breathe again. Her cheeks tinted red, and she finally let go completely.
"Sorry, I just got a bit—"
"Upset?" Tally offered. Wayward nodded. I'd hate to wonder what you'd have done if he'd been hurt for real."
"Buying me a coffin," I suggested. Wayward's cheeks darkened further, her ears flopping down as she considered my rebuttal.
"I wouldn't do that. The Wayward herd helps others, not hurt them. That's what Dam does, what Sire does, and what I do," Sky said. She straightened up, wings pressed hard, seafoam eyes glinting with familial pride. I couldn't help but smile; the fact that her cheeks were still red helped. All the more sunset to appreciate.
"Truer words, never spoken," I said.
"That said, can we get back to things at hoof?" Tally asked. She motioned to Azure. "Let's join Brew and get this all sorted, yeah?"
"Yeah, sure."
The rest of the afternoon trudged by. Wayward was less than pleased about being the last in the know. The look in her eye when Tender emphasized with gusto the scene of me running all the way to the Forage Farm was beguiling. The wap I gave Tender for playing playwright with my story only seemed to deepen the worry on Wayward's face. Tally affirmed that was most of what she'd been told as well. I felt kind of bad. I turned this whole week into 'Look at Glacial Zero' week.
I wrapped a forehoof over my forehead and leaned over the bench side. "This week has been a massive pain in the flank."
Tender let out a grunt. "Well, just look at it this way. It's all behind you now,"
"I'm not all that surprised. Glacial has always been a pain," Tally said. The rest of the girls giggled, their agreement. Why are they my friends again?
"Hey, Glace. Didn't you say you had something you wanted to talk about earlier?" Azure asked. She leaned over and shook my listless form.
I expected Tally to remind me of what I'd said earlier. After Azure got lost in her thoughts, I figured she'd have forgotten completely. That or she'd only recall right after it was done and then be a grump for the next few days.
"I did, but I'll wait until after the Night Guard meeting. I don't want to pile up more drama on top of everything else."
"Too late," Freya said, swooping down and waving an ethereal white hoof through my side like a swooping pegasus through the cloudline. She winked and flew past, turning on a bit and disappearing under the bench and out the other side.
"Not a bad plan," Tally said. She hopped off the bench and spread her pale wings wide. "That said, I still have work to do. So, I'll see the rest of yous later." Tally gave one big beat and was gone with the winds.
"She did the thing again," Tender mused.
"That's what, two or three times today?" Azure asked.
"She must be really distracted if she isn't noticing," I said.
Wayward waved us off. "Or, trying to pretend she didn't."
"Or she is doing it to make you question it. She seems like the type if you ask me." Freya had taken Tally's seat and lounged back far enough to phase through the back and leer out at the shoppers passing by.
"That aside, You think the guards knew about the scene I made yesterday? I must have passed somepony when I ran out of town. That or the weather team could have reported it. You know, if they acted like they cared, it'd be harder to get themselves blamed."
The others shared a blank look. The thought hadn't even crossed their minds. Would it have crossed mine if I had still been Glacial from a week ago? I wasn't even sure I was doing a good job being Glacial. When I tried to play back my memories, the two lives seemed to blend together at the fringes. It left my heart pounding in my ears the longer I tried to pull the two apart. It almost hurt, like something was trying to pull my soul out through my chest. The worst part was, what if the others thought this was due to my mark? If my talent fundamentally changed me, did it? Did it change everypony? Nopony had said anything, but that didn't mean they weren't talking or thinking about it when I was gone.
"That's kind of a strange question, Glace," Wayward said. The others agreed.
I felt like laughing like this was all a bad joke. I bit my lip instead. "Never mind, sorry for bringing it up."
"If you say so," Tender said, turning to Azure. She whispered something to the other filly. I let it be. I meant it when I said I needed fewer issues right now.
I had decided to share my story with Tally, but after Azure made it clear she wanted to know as well, I decided I might as well just tell them all. I wasn't sure what would happen if they didn't believe me or thought I'd lost my mind. I may have, but letting the wound fester under the bandage wouldn't help.
"By the way. If the rest of you are interested in what I was going to tell Azure and Tally, you are welcome to join us. No sense in trying to hide anything after telling Azure. Tartarus, I might as well be telling the whole town at that point."
"Hey!" Azure slugged me in the shoulder. I deserved that.
"That was mean, Glace," Wayward said. At the very least, she made a valiant attempt to hide her smile. Crop made no such attempts. This earned her a sour glare, which only widened the farm filly's chipped smile all the more.
"By the way, we should tell somepony about the thief thing. You know, before the guards do. I won't speak for your parents, but I doubt my sire is going to be all too happy about it, especially after yesterday.
"Oh, Bograt." Tender jumped to her hooves. "He's right. Aunt Bramble would tan my hide if the guard came a knocking."
"Well, Wayward should be fine, at least. She didn't show up until after the whole thing. So, at least one from our season will survive to tell our tale," I said. I did not attempt to leave the bench. Neither did Wayward, cementing my point further.
"Dang it, Glace." Azure was already trotting in place, having leaped from the bench and over Tender. "Why did you have to say something? That's super bad luck, you know."
I shrugged. "I'm stuck here regardless. So, see you girls later. I'll remember you if you vanish in the night or something." I waved at the fleeing fillies.
"I don't think they heard you."
I looked over to Sky and smiled. "Probably."
Sky pointed up the road coming from the port side of town. "But, he might."
I followed her look. I took a single breath and screamed into the void of my mind. Up the road, accompanied by a Day Guard, Private Breach, If I was seeing correctly, was my sire. I looked back to Wayward.
"Run," I whispered. It took a second for the command to register. She offered me a gentle smile and took wing. I was unsure how Sire would respond, and if he was going to flay me, I wished there would be as few witnesses as possible. That was the issue, though. Even as both Private Breach and Father drew closer. I noticed that while stoic most of the time, the layer of marble he'd etched this mask from was a whole new kind of untellable.
"There he is, right where we left him. Not sure where the fillies went, though," Private Breach said, pointing my way. She smiled at my father, who seemed solely focused on reaching me at the quickest pace he could muster without leaving Breach in the dust.
I offered a wave. "Sire, private, pleasant afternoon, isn't it?"
"Sure is," Breach said. The two stopped a hoof length from the bench.
"Ma'am, I appreciate your coming to get me and ensuring my colt was well. However, I'd like to speak to them alone, if I may," Father turned and eyed the private.
Breach seemed only vaguely aware of the storm brewing. She simply tilted her head, a single ear twitching as she hummed. "Of course, and please, think nothing of it. It would be unprofessional for a guardmare to leave a parent unaware." She saluted, turned about-face, and was gone as quickly as she'd arrived.
"She's nice," I said. Father narrowed his eyes. I coughed into a hoof and struggled not to wilt under his gaze.
"Stopping crime now, are we?"
I could feel every hair from my neck down my back stand on end. "Not intentionally."
Father squinted harder, and I buckled completely. I couldn't help but look anywhere other than Father's eyes. Several locals took a single look in my direction before making themselves scarce. It wasn't their problem, so why would they pay it any mind?
"Freezing a mare in her tracks was an accident?" Father asked.
"Not exactly." I didn't know what he wanted to hear. What Weathered Horizon, the unflinching pillar of a pony, the foundation I'd always relied on, wanted.
Hal or not, before this stallion, I was a foal, his foal. I had a feeling that knowing and even accepting the change I'd gone through wouldn't affect his views in the slightest. For neither storm nor night would ever break his gaze from the horizon, he sailed forth to find. But his teal, nearly glowing gaze dared me to think otherwise.
"Colt."
"She had a knife and was running at me and the others. I just wanted to protect them." I was made aware of a stinging in the corners of my eyes. I was crying, and I hated it. The thought of doing nothing made me angry and seething, but leaving my father alone because I couldn't leave the guards to do their jobs made me even more furious.
I had focused too hard on my tears. I didn't notice when Father had sat beside me, nor when he wrapped a wing around me and pulled me to his side. It broke something in me, a wall I'd forged on my own. With it breaking, the tears came plenty. I cried silently, pressed to my sire's side as he sat and waited. When my tears had stemmed, Father loosed his grip, and I managed to sit up, even if I was still between his side and his winged grip.
"Better?" Father asked. I nodded. "So much like your dam."
I clearly looked up to Father's face. The mask had dropped at least a bit. I could see the phantom signs of a smile at the edges of his lip. "Dam?" I asked.
"She was the type to throw herself between others and danger. It is why she and Bramble were so close. Those two were trouble incarnate."
I smirked between sniffles. "Really?"
"Faust above, those two were a sight to behold. It's what drew me to Belfry to begin with. A spirit as unshakable at the heavens above. "
I pressed myself to Father's side. "I'm sorry."
"No, you're not," he said. His smile grew just a bit wider.
I blanched. "But I—" Father placed a hoof on my head.
"You wouldn't be Belfry's colt if you were sorry for protecting your friends." Father looked down and ruffled my mane gently. "I'd be disappointed if you were."
"You're not mad?" I asked.
Weathered Horizon looked at me, face scrunched in confused bewilderment. His smile twisted into a bemused smirk. "No, not mad. Scared that my colt could have been hurt, upset I was not there to protect you, sad your dam was not here to see you spit in the face of fear. But no, never mad or angry. You would stand your ground. Above all, though, Colt, I am proud. This week has not been easy for you. Even I can see that much. But still, even when the easiest thing you could have done was run or hide, You acted. I am not happy you needed to do so, nor am I encouraging you to do so recklessly. But, I am still proud, and all the same."
I was crying again, but this time, I felt happy. Father held me close as I shed the last of my tears. I felt better than I had in days, all the sleepless nights and worries with my talent and Hal's memories. They had left me barely stumbling along. This was a long time coming. Freya had been right; I should have trusted my sire from the beginning.
"About the incident," I said.
Father raised a brow.
"A Night Guard saw what I did. He offered me an apprenticeship. He said I reminded him of Dam, too."
Father let out a dry chuckle. "Let me guess. Foresight?"
I nodded. "Foresight."
"He would recruit you if there is one pony in town who would take you on without a second thought. It would be that fool."
"You don't like him?" I asked.
Father shook his head. "He's a good stallion. He has my respect."
It was my turn to raise a brow. "But?"
"But, he's as reckless as they come."
"Sounds like Bramble," I mused.
"And your dam," Father agreed.
"Is that a bad thing?" I asked.
"Maybe for some. I think he might do you some good. Learn to defend yourself and others, and put your magic to good use. Learn about your other half." Father's words petered out. He looked towards the slowly lowering sun in the late afternoon sky.
He was right. "I think I should do it."
Father nodded. "Then do so."
"You're going to tell him, aren't you?" Freya asked. She had sidled in between Father's wing and myself. I nodded.
I'd tell him after the others. Then I deal with the fallout, whatever that might be. It would become more complicated the longer I waited. They all deserved that much. The question was how many more would find out if it climbed the ranks to Canterlot. I wasn't sure what Celestia might do or what she already knew.
"I'm proud of you, too, by the way," Freya said.
"I know," I whispered back.
No sooner had the door opened than I was face to face with Father. He offered a smirk and nod. He turned about, and I followed without a word. Weathered Horizon was undeterred. Even in his eyes, my eyes, there was nothing but a resolute understanding. I didn't need to say a word, he knew. My heart had been pounding on the way back. I'd worried Father might be reconsidering his advice. I'd be filling the same shoes Dam left behind. It hurt not noticing what that might imply.
"It took to you?" Sire asked.
We took our seats at the kitchen table. A single candle sat between us. The wax was worn down to a nub. Father had clearly had it going since he'd returned home with a flickering ember to light my way home. It was like one of his lighthouses when ships needed to make it through the black waters in the moonlit seas.
"I think so. The mares there are nice and strange, but I think that's okay."
I offered a smile. It felt warm, as if I were recalling a bonfire during the winter solstice festival. It felt right, and that gnawing worry in the back of my mind loosened for the first time in days.
Father let forth a chuckle, like gravel in a twister; it made me laugh with him. Father shook his head and pointed to my forehooves. They'd frozen over again. The unnatural blue spread down from the knee but did not stop with my hoof tips. The wood of the table I'd sat them on was spider-webbed with the same blue ice. I yelped and raised my hooves over my head. The ice ceased its progression, but the webs it formed remained.
"Somepony is getting too comfortable with freezing my property," Father said.
I offered an embarrassed cough and placed my hooves back on the table. I concentrated on the ice. The thin spindles obeyed and evaporated into a thin mist, leaving my hooves as they were. I blinked and willed the ice to withdraw; it kindly informed me it would be doing no such thing. I tutted and crossed those same hooves. I'd have to deal with them later when Father wasn't there to tease me.
"How goes your education on magic, Colt?"
I hummed and met my father's gaze. The answer could have been more hopeful. Whenever I think I understand magic, I'm informed how far I need to learn. Foresight's lesson on tenets was helpful. The books I'd been given could have been more present or specific on such things. I couldn't blame that on the books themselves. They weren't exactly meant for ignorant pegasi to begin with. They'd helped, even if a little.
"I'm not sure. Magic is really complicated. The fact my magic is so rare makes it even more so. Foresight taught a few things while I was at the Night House."
Father tapped a hoof to the table. "That stallion is quite the character."
I cocked my head. "Is that a bad thing?"
Sire shook his head. "Nothing ill meant by it. He is simply who he was always meant to be. Same as you, same as me."
"Well, that's esoteric, isn't it?" Freya asked from the open seat beside mine.
"I want to go back if that's okay?" I pulled the papers Foresight had given me from under my wing. "He said you'd need to sign these."
Sire grunted and pulled the papers to his side. He read the first page in complete silence. Some parents might have just signed them and moved on. Weathered, spent all day amongst unrefined seafarers and water-bound merchants. He read a lot of contracts and a lot of shady and seedy documents. I'd seen some of the stranger ones Father kept for proof of just how absurd ponies and even griffons could be.
"Reads like any other apprentice form." Father hadn't looked up, and I guessed he'd been talking to himself more than anything. He stood without a word and retrieved a quill and ink from a side stand by the closest window. "Fine." Father signed the first page before moving to the next. Within minutes, he'd scanned, rescanned, and signed page after page.
When he laid the quill aside, he gave a sharp sniff and blew on the ink. I'd never considered if the whole blowing on ink made much difference. The ink itself was quick drying, from what Mrs. Brew boasted by her in-house brand. Not many complain about Mrs. Brew's anything, honestly. She was a miracle worker on the best of days and most of the worst days, too.
"Everything done?"
"Should be dry in a bit. Don't forget them when you go back. I assume that's tomorrow?" Father asked.
"Yes, sir, I apologize."
Sire's face twitched, and one ear flopped to the side. I'd caught him off guard. I held a restrained smile. It didn't help that Freya was happily chortling to herself beside me.
"Apologize?"
I nodded. "If I'm working at night, it'll mean we won't see each other as much." The words were bitter on my lips. I'd hated saying them out loud more than I'd hated thinking them. The reality was flipping schedules would mean I didn't see my friends as much either.
Foals, my age, didn't work full weeks, especially when starting out. Whoever took a foal on would have to balance productivity with teaching, and many shops and artisans couldn't afford to spend every waking hour teaching a foal who'd just got their cutie mark the ropes. I couldn't blame them for that either. Small towns like Bogwood might not be as cramped or busy as Baltimare, but we were big enough to keep such things in mind. If Azure or Tally's apprenticeships were anything to consider, I'd work three or four days a week, which wouldn't be that bad. However, flipping the sleep schedule is where things get interesting. The girls had already forfeited any complaints when they'd advocated so hard for me to join the Night Guard, to begin with.
Father scoffed and rounded the table before I had a chance to protest. I was under his wing before I'd had the opportunity to protest. In truth, I didn't mind. Father was a big stallion with a matching pair of larger-than-average wings, which he used to pull me taut to his side. It was a cage of soft, feathery fatherly defiance. Human pride fought pony instinct. I surrendered for no reason other than Sire deserving what time I could afford in the near future.
"How cute," Freya said, wrapping Father's neck in a phantom embrace. An embrace that earned not so much as a single hair out of place.
"Work isn't easy and rarely accommodates. It was only a matter of time before you were off doing something, Night Guard or not. I won't complain that my colt is growing up."
I nuzzled into Father's side. The warmth clashed with the icy chill that followed me wherever I went. The contrast was calming, reminding me where I'd come from and where I would go forward. Father's words were a balm upon my frayed nerves. There was so much left to learn. Every step forward led to more questions than I'd like. A future that may be long after I am dead and gone. A present that left me fearing the time I had would only grow more complicated with time. Which it would have been if I had been able to guess. It was clear even now I'd choose the hard way whether I wanted to or not.
"Thank you."
That was all I could say, all that needed to be said. Words were not Father's strong suit, and he'd never needed to compromise that part of him before now. Actions were a currency in these lands, and while bits were the preferred proxy, they'd mean nothing without a strong back and sweaty brows to carry them. I smirked at my thoughts. They drifted in a random myriad of wistful discord. Or I'd simply leave reason and meaning in the cold. I'd have my fair share of the cold and ice. For now, I was content with the warmth of a welcoming home.
"Nothing to thank me for, Colt. That's what family is for, is it not?"
I attempted and failed a wing shrug. Even the weight of Father's wing was enough to rebuff my efforts. "I suppose it is. Even if a certain stallion deserves thanks."
If that is the case, then I have no choice but to accept them, even if the colt giving them does so for no reason at all."
Sire opened his wing and looked down at me, a smile chiseled in contrast to his rugged, tired eyes. He planted a hoof on the top of my head. "Now, I believe it is best we both find some rest. Lest we both shirk our responsibilities on the morrow."
I couldn't argue that point. If I flip my sleep schedule, I'd need to prolong my sleep as long as possible. Judging by the yawn that followed those thoughts, it would be more challenging than I thought it would be.
"I might stay up a little longer. I don't want to be tired on my first night, right?" I asked.
The look Father gave me was a perplexing mix of pain and acceptance. I raised a hoof in question, only to let it fall back to my side. Father patted my head again. "No, we would not. But know your limits, Colt."
I nodded. "Right."
That said, Father wandered off to bed, and I was left with naught but a wax stump lighting the blackened house. It was a peaceful darkness. The shadows danced in a ballet of their own making. Freya floated into Sire's seat and drummed a beat on the table. A beat that only she could hear.
I'd always found the silence in the dead of night peaceful, a sort of natural breath being held. The night was a living thing, drought with unknowns and terrors, beauty and serenity. A fickle beast that should be respected, lest it devour you whole. Perhaps it was the thestral in me, but the rules that so many ponies couldn't understand, such as the laws of the night, were simple to a fault. Luna hadn't been wrong when she thought others feared her and her domain. Ponies were a prey species. A time when the beasts, sharp of tooth and claw, hunted was the time the herd would fear most.
In this darkness, where even now, consumed by her envy, Nightmare Moon would gaze down from her prison and watch us all. Even if Luna was trapped within a monster in her moon, she was still there, watching over her children. In our dreams, we were closest to the Princess of the Night. Thestrals were lucid dreamers from birth. Even those like myself, only half thestral, were far more aware than most of the dreamscape. Before Hal found his way into my head, I could not recount a single time I'd had a nightmare. It was chilling, unnatural, and stewed in paranoia and dread. Father had told me what little I knew about thestrals, what they really were, and what made them who they were as a pony tribe. What he did know was all learned from Dam and her side of the family.
"Glace, you in there?" Freya asked.
I was ripped from my thoughts; Freya smiled across the table, waving merrily. I wouldn't call my trance sleep, but I was left bereft of how long I'd waxed poetically about thestrals and our beloved Princess of the Night.
"Just thinking."
"Thinking, really, Glace? Let's not kid ourselves. Thinking is not your forte." I leveled Freya with a terse look. I'd have been offended if she wasn't smiling wide enough. It barely fit on her ghostly face.
"Really?" I asked.
Freya nodded. "That aside, we have a bit of time before your poor foal body can't keep those glowing eyes of yours open. So, let's get some things sorted."
I motioned in her direction. "Such as?"
"Well, the first thing that comes to mind is how will we relay the changes in your head to your friends and father? You've decided to tell them, right? All of it?" Freya swayed in place, hoof on her chin.
"Right, yes, I have. You're also right about making a plan. I have a feeling it will be a mess no matter what I say. It's funny, though. All these memories, people, and places I have never seen and may never see are as vivid as this room in my head. All of that, and I'm still just a colt, talking to my imaginary friend about if I'll get in trouble over a secret."
"Firstly, I take offense to that slander of my glorious self. So, shame on you. Secondly, did you expect it to become easier to become a wizened stallion overnight? Information without application is as useless as not knowing at all. You silly little pony."
Freya had a point, knowing how a TV works in a world without the technology or means to create one, reducing Hal's knowledge on the subject moot. Still, it felt like my foalish problems should seem so trivial when I have decades of memories to recontextualize them. But that wasn't so. I was still as clueless and overwhelmed as any other foal my age. All Hal's memories did was muddle everything further. If I went to Celestia with the knowledge of her sister's redemption, and by the grace of Faust, she believed me, would it even make a difference? Either way, Luna would be saved by the Elements of Harmony, and Celestia would finally have her sister back. The same could be said for any of the timeline's future problems. Most of Discord, Sombra, Tirek, and so on were inevitable. My warnings, at best, would only slow the threat but not halt it. If any of these events are real and would happen at all.
Start small. Have some definitive memory that would dash any doubts." Freya said. She once again pulled me from the chaotic storm of thoughts rumbling around in my head.
"Hm, that is going to be quite the task. What could I tell everypony that would convince them all at once? Should I aim for a human experience or one of Hal's memories about Equestria?"
Freya leaned back, phasing through the back of the chair and staring back at the kitchen. "Both are going to be hard to prove. If any of it is real, that is. It is one thing to have another set of memories; it is another for it to be something that doesn't exist in Equestria and that then has knowledge of the distant future. No pony could be blamed for thinking you've lost your mind."
I shook my head. "No, no, they could not. The fact is, waiting on telling them, holding on to all of this by myself, it can't be good for my brain."
"I think your best bet is to start with things they can relate to, things about Equestria that not many know but do have witnesses." Freya leaned back up and huffed.
"That's probably the right call. The Crystal Empire, maybe, or Discord? It'd be so much easier if I didn't think Celestia would throw me into the sun for even suggesting some of it."
A sudden flash of inspiration, a wayward memory, brought a smile to my face. It might work. The perfect chance to learn what is and isn't real. Freya leaned over the table, brow furrowed in concentration. A look that earned a raised brow from me in return. Things that were real and things that weren't. All I needed was the right approach.
"Glace."
"Yes, Freya?"
"That smile of yours is starting to scare me." Freya was no longer in her seat. She pointed an accusatory hoof at me. Her straight as lace mane billowing in a nonexistent gale. "Stop it."
My brow rose higher, and my grin grew wider. "I have no idea what you are talking about. It is just a smile."
The moment seemed to ebb on, unwilling to part with Freya and my stalemated stare-down. The seconds ticked by, but neither of us budged. It wasn't until a rather jaw-wrenching yawn escaped my throat that my grin broke, and Freya seemed to relax a bit.
"It is still too early," I said, waving at the window.
"Maybe, but as your dear sweet sire said: 'Know your limits, little Glacie.'" Freya wagged her hoof disapprovingly. A mood she couldn't manage through her amused smirk. I offered the she-devil my best facsimile of a human gesture. She stuck her tongue out in kind.
"If I go to sleep now, I'll never make it through tomorrow's training." I yawned again. I was beginning to regret my schedule change already.
"And how do you plan on fighting back nature, foal?" Freya asked.
"You mean besides night terrors?"
"Besides those, yes," Freya said merrily. The smile she wore was infuriating. She could smile through the end of the world. In some ways, I envied that. I liked to believe I was pretty good at hiding the dread that came with knowing too much of nothing at all.
"I think I might go to the dock and talk to Luna. Even Hal doesn't know how her prison works, or even if she could hear me, would it be Nightmare Moon or the real Luna? But maybe she can hear me. It might brighten up her night."
I hopped out of my seat. Freya didn't follow. I paused and looked back at the ethereal filly. She was staring at where I'd been as if not noticing I'd moved. The thought to call out struck me but was dismissed as quickly. Whatever she was thinking, she'd tell me when she was ready. Of that, I was sure.
The aged wood of the dock was cast in the gentle blues and whites of the moonlit sky. It seemed like the idyllic fantasy of a poet. An ode to Luna from a time before her imprisonment. It sent a pang through my heart. It was a beauty lost on so many. Those of whom were terrified of what went bump in the night. A reflection on the efforts of the enshrouded and unspoken. It was comforting. I wasn't sure if that was simply the nature of the moonlight or the thestral in me seeking its natural inclinations. I stood caught between staring at the dock and wanting to sit upon it and bask in that same light. The stars added a chorus of twinkling strobes that seemed to make the very air sparkle against the river's gently flowing water.
"Luna…" I said. I took a step closer to the dock. The night's ambiance seemed to swell with my approach. I caught myself holding my breath. A second step and the shimmering light welcomed me into its periphery. A third, I was at the edge of the dock. The wood creaked under its own weight. My icecapades earlier that week had not helped steady its boards.
"...If you can hear me. I thought maybe you'd like some company." I stepped onto the dock. The light had wrapped me in its glow. The wood shuddered but held. I didn't weigh that much; pegasi were, of course, lighter than the other tribes. If the dock had given under my hooves, there would have been far more damage than my ice would have done.
I looked to the moon, dazzled by the sparkling spotlight I'd intruded upon. "I know I'm not one of your children, not fully. My dam is, though; she always talked so highly of you. Back before you ended up The Mare in the Moon. She misses you. She did even before she left. Now, I miss her. A lot of thestrals have given up on Equestria. They've taken refuge in the icy caps east of Equestria. I'm sure you already know all of this. I'm sure I'm not the first to talk to you. At least, talk at you or Nightmare Moon if Luna isn't around to hear us. I'm stuck second-guessing everything I do. I've got memories and thoughts that aren't my own. They know things about you, about the future. If that future is even real itself. They know when you'll come home, but even if they are true, no one would be there to prove it. No one but your sister."
I took a deep, shaky breath. I felt so small beneath the moon and the stars. The longer I talked, the smaller I felt. Even so, airing out everything, all that bottled-up fear and confusion. It felt nice, like a pressure being pulled off my chest. My heart seemed lighter, my thoughts clearer. Maybe even now, Luna had taken pity on me and pulled that weight free from my soul. To carry it so that I might find solace. I couldn't say for sure. It might be in my head. Either way, I was thankful.
I looked away from the moon and into the water below me. The moon's reflection gazed up at me in turn. "I'm afraid to tell Celestia what she might do if she doesn't believe me if she takes offense. I don't want to fear her, but I do."
"Fear is natural, you know."
I let out an eep, and the hair from my tail up my spine and to the tip of my muzzle stood on end. I could hear the laughter that followed before I could turn around. Freya sat in her ghostly way in the same spot I'd stood moments ago. I snorted in response.
"Freya."
"It's okay to be afraid. Celestia could take offense, get angry, lash out in grief. She could do all of that and more," Freya said. She held a hoof out frog side up. "She could also take comfort, be thankful, have faith." Freya turned up her other hoof. "We can't know for sure."
I had no words, no comeback, and any irritation from her entrance had dissipated. She was right, but the truth was, my fear was the same as any other creature on Equiss: the fear of the unknown, the fear that if something could go wrong, it would. I rapped my hoof against the dock's planks. A wave of cold air raced away from the point of impact.
"I think Princess Luna would agree. I think even she was afraid. So, a silly little colt in over his head isn't as bad as it may seem…" Freya floated over to me, stopping just out of hooves reach. I shuddered. My breath clung to the air; it, too, bathed in the moonlight. "...But it's not just Celestia, is it?"
I shook my head. "No."
Freya scoffed. In a sudden motion, she leaped forward and bopped me on the nose. "We've been over this. You really need to learn some faith, Glacie. All this paranoia is not good for your development. So stop it."
"Faith?" I asked. The thought wormed inside of me with a fervor I did not like. It was two parts revolution and one part anger. "Faith!"
Freya nodded. "Faith."
"In what?" I snapped. My teeth gnashed as I took a heavy-hooved step toward Freya. Her smile didn't waver; she simply danced around me. She did not glitter in the moonlight. No, her pale visage seemed to ignore the nightlight altogether. She was unchanging, eternal, cold, and alien, which made her words sting all the more.
"Not what, nope. In who? And you know exactly who I mean."
I growled. "Didn't we just discuss this inside?"
Freya shook her head. "We discussed what you should do. This is about whom you should trust. Similar? Yes. The same? No."
"I don't see the difference, you crazy ghoul."
Freya's absurdist claims and her overwhelming need to play with my emotions were beginning to grate on my last nerve. This entire week had whittled down my finite pool of good intentions. I just wanted some peace, something I'd had in abundance before my mark came. Now, in hindsight, I missed it. I missed the daily rhythms, the mundanity of it all.
"That's okay, you will, in time. We'll start with the conversation with your friends. That will be as good a place as any to spread some faith. Azure Brew, Writ Tally, Tender Crop, Wayward Horizon. They're your friends, right?"
I nodded silently.
"So, you silly little colt, start there. You know what you're going to do. All you need is the intent that comes with it."
"You make it seem more complex than it is," I said.
"Do I, or are you the one complicating things?"
Was I? I honestly didn't know at this point. I was tired and confused, and I missed being normal. I could feel the ice creeping up my legs, the rigid frost on my tail. Then there was my magic, cryomancy. Lately, it was the only thing that seemed to have rules. I may have yet to learn all of them, but there were rules, all the same. Ponies didn't have rules.
"I don't know." My heart was beating out of my chest. My face was hot and burning, and I hated it. Freya was so ready to cast it all aside. I was not.
Freya smiled, something twinkling in her eye. It was not moonlight. "And that is okay. We'll work on it."
For Freya, it was as simple as that. We'd work on it because it can all be fixed. I can be fixed, these memories can be fixed, every pony who looked down on me, who looked down on my dam. "It! Can! All! Be! Fixed! It's all that easy, so simple!"
Then, the night went silent. The water, the wind, the critters hiding in the trees. It was all so quiet, and in the silence, the ice was my shield, my shell, my home. It had moved further up, passed my forehooves, and chased lines across my withers and down my neck. My back hooves matched my forehooves. A suit of armor forged from magic and the writhing mass of my own icy fury. There was no enemy, no target, just the cold clasp of ice biting the world. The further it crept, the less I felt. I was numb to the world around me.
"Glacial, you need to calm down. Your magic is going wild." Freya's words were cold, a sentiment accompanied by the pity-stricken grimace on her face. I barely heard them, barely reacted at all. "Glace, can you hear me?"
"Yes."
Freya nodded. She attempted a smile. It didn't fool either of us. "Good, now, you need to relax. Your magic is a bit unstable. I get it; you got a little upset; it's all just reactionary. But it's okay now, so just let go. Please."
It made one think. As calm as I was, Freya only seemed to be driven to push my limits. I did not enjoy making Freya so upset, so beside herself. At the same time, I wanted the ice, the peace, the disconnection between reality and my future. Tomorrow began the next trial, the following weight to crush me beneath it. Freya only wanted to help. I wanted to help as well.
The ice cracked, from withers to fetlocks, and the shell fell away in sheets. The moment they touched the ground, they reduced themselves to slush. As it all fell away, the heat returned to my body, blood rushed like a tide, and the numbness vanished in an instant.
"Fine," I said.
The relief on Freya's face was frightening. The horror gave way to something I couldn't place. She had a haunted look, something unsettling behind her eyes. I felt pulled apart. The numbness, the anger, a battle in my mind. I let out a sigh so deep it touched my very soul. I was at my limit. Father's words tang in my ears. I yawned. Even as the grasp of sleep beckoned. The memory of Hal's nightmare clung to my frail grasp on my sanity.
"Glace?"
I looked over my shoulder to the river, still basking in Luna's light. It didn't feel quite as welcoming now. A spider's web that sought out the nearest fly to snatch away. The Nightmare was more than in my head. My breath ebbed on the borders of panic, the strained irregular intakes matched by the elongated exhales. My vision swam.
"Glace, maybe you should go to bed," Freya said. She'd floated up beside me. I refused to meet her gaze. "Okay?"
"Okay." I agreed.
"You scared me," Freya said. Her voice was barely a whisper.
"I know. Sorry." I was still scared. I cracked, and the ice reacted. It was odd, like a muscle being coiled. I could understand why such talents were rare. It was less the command of ice and more the ice was alive, deep inside. A place I think a unicorn was best suited to control.
The more profound truth, the part that dragged me down, was how right it felt. The ice was Glacial Zero, as much as any other part of me, my hooves, mane, and wings. I shook my wings, flecks of frost falling like fresh snow.
"Glace, it really is okay. You can be scared. We can be scared together."
Freya pulled me into a hug, and for the first time, I felt it. A gentle embrace like the winter breeze. She clung to me, and I wrapped a hoof around where her power white neck should be. It was only for a second, but I could have sworn I felt something solid.
I shook my head and let all of those what-ifs fade to the back of my mind. I had more pressing matters. The first of which was a bed. As Freya pulled away, she offered a gentle smile, one I returned happily.
"Together then. One step at a time."
Freya nodded excitedly. "Together. But Glace."
"Yeah, Freya?"
"If you ever try to freeze yourself like that again. I will kick your butt all the way to the moon. Then, Nightmare Moon can have some company for a while."
I snorted. Freya smirked, and the dam broke. The both of us burst into hysterical laughter. I fell on my back, wings twitching as I grabbed my gut. Freya had slipped partially into the ground as she tried to roll on the ground.
When the laughter stopped, the silence returned. I did not feel better, no longer in control. But, for now, at this moment, that was okay. I struggled back to my hooves and let out a gaping yawn. I rubbed over my eyes. The world was bleary.
"Okay, for real this time. Somepony need some sleep. We can't have you passing out at work," Freya said, gesturing to the house.
I nodded. I have a feeling it is going to be a long day or night—whatever. As I began the walk back, my ear flicked to the side, and my eyes scanned the dark.
"You okay?" Freya asked.
I turned back to the house, a pout on my lips. "I thought I heard humming."
"Humming?"
I shook my head. "Never mind." My ear flicked again. A gentle noise was lost to the breeze.
"This was a terrible idea." The laughter surrounding me did not make it any more right. I took a deep breath, hoof planted so hard against my face I'd have a bruise later as the newest recruit and trainee of the Night House. I had expected training, wing-ups, and even mundane chores no pony else wanted to do. I did not expect this.
"No, no, it was not," Levvy said between howls of laughter. She was not the only one. Freya was almost completely submerged in the ground in her attempts to roll on the floor. Private Distant Point was even worse.
"Didn't Sergeant Foresight say we would not be doing this?" I asked.
Levvy nodded. "Something like that."
"I hate you all."
Corporal Night Glider was, at this very moment, very angry. I would suspect she'd be beet red if she wasn't frozen up to her goldenrod flank in ice. My ice, ice I was tasked to use to freeze an average everyday dummy. The ice shimmered in the night air, the blue bright enough to glow faintly. It accented the windswept pale, nearly gray-blue mane of its captive.
"How did you even convince her to come running out like that?" I asked.
Point waved a hoof wildly. "Said, mail…" Distant Point offered several hiccups between words. The mare cried for Faust's sake. "...She was so, so, easy."
I'd been mid-cast when, like a bat out of hell, pun intended, the corporal sailed through the open backdoor. Neither she nor I could stop in time. Thus, I'd captured Night Glider and a pair of soon-to-be-dead privates.
"I will end you, Distant Point, you traitor." Glider shook in place.
"If I let you out, will you accept an apology and promise not to kill me?" I asked.
The laughter stopped. Well, aside from Freya. She'd just vanished completely. She was very well likely still laughing. Night Glider stopped shaking. A hoof landed on my withers with authority. I looked to Levvy, whose face was stone solemn.
"That's a terrible idea, Colt," she said. Her silver eyes promised a fate most foul indeed. It made my decision all the easier.
I shrugged and turned back to Night Glider. She was now smiling. The fire in her orange eyes would have reduced an avalanche to vapor. I squinted and was also almost certain the ice was sweating bullets—the same ice that had taken a bonfire to melt days before.
"That sounds fair," Glider answered. She enunciated each word with sharp intensity, her eyes scanning each of her comrades slowly.
"Colt, don't you dare," Distant Point warned. If her coat wasn’t already white, I had a feeling it would have been now. The wild mare looked like a cornered beast. Well. She looked that way before, regardless.
She was too late. I tapped my hoof to the ice trail, leading a path straight to my senior officer. It was the duty of any good soldier to follow the chain of command. The ice slushed under the slightest touch and dominoed all the way back to Night Glider, who had begun to shake again. The second, the ice pooled around her. Her wings were wide, and both Levvy and Point were already airborne. I snapped a sharp salute in their honor.
"Good, Colt," Glider shouted as she flew by.
"Those three are idiots."
Clean Dossier had chosen this moment to join the rest of us behind the main building. She gave everypony a single long, amber-eyed look. Her pale purple wings twitched her disapproval. The Night House had a surprisingly robust training area in a cordoned-off yard behind the unsightly block of stone I now work at. Dummies, both on and off the ground, a weapon rack of wooden training swords and spears, and a bejeweled totem in the far back. Levvy had said it was some sort of magic defense training. I tried my best not to get too close. No telling what that thing could do.
"As I recall, you seemed too happy to play along last night."
Dossy scoffed. "Pranks and banter are one thing. Setting up your immediate senior to be frozen solid by a foal is a step too far."
I smirked and followed the wave through the overcast night sky. The three would have to fix that, no doubt. Well, the two with our corporal enjoying the view. Dossy followed my view and huffed to herself.
"What is next on my training schedule? I asked, eyes never wavering from the hole in the clouds. What a way to start the night. I'd managed to sleep just shy of noon. I'll try harder today. Two or three in the afternoon, at least. I'd decided, during lunch, my breakfast of oranges and oats, that I'd save a couple of hours tomorrow to see what the others had free in the following days and report what night guarding was like.
"Filing and definitions." My smirk disappeared, only for Dossy to steal it for herself. I hated school, or Hal did. Formal education in Bogwood is pretty sparse. Outside of the basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic, the rest was left to the community—that and our herd. Father made sure I knew more about the port than any nonsailor would even need to know. That and Homebrew. She was nice enough to fill in some less fish-related common sense.
"Great." I took a deep breath and turned to the still-open door inside. "Lead the way, ma'am." Dossy's smirk faltered. All is fair in war, they say.
"Don't call me that." Private Dossier straightened up, sniffed, and pointed me to the door. "Hop to it, cadet." I snapped a crisp, wavering salute. And marched my way back into the Night House, Dossier right behind me.
At some point last night, I had been given a small space to call my own in the main office. A stool and a makeshift table of a turned-over cabinet sat beside Clean Dossier's desk. She'd been assigned to lead my tutelage. I couldn't argue with the choice, and after the freezing prank, she could not either.
The Sergeant had left only minutes after I'd gotten in. He'd taken my signed forms, read them over, and then tossed me to the wolves. The others had been all too happy to welcome me into the fold. Night Glider had offered a second, less rushed introduction, and the others were pleasant enough. That was around two hours ago. Things hadn't settled much.
No sooner had I taken a seat than my oh-so glorious teacher plopped down a stack of papers a hoof thick in front of me. I blanched, eyes wide, and Dossy had to cover her mouth in a vain attempt to stifle a laugh. I had no idea what was so funny, but oh, how I dreaded what would follow.
"To start, it is important that you are aware of the basic laws that are enforced by the Night Guard and what laws are relegated to Bogwood itself," Dossy said, smacking the pile of papers with a vengeance. "In truth, it isn't as bad as it looks, and a lot of it will be irrelevant in night-to-night situations. But knowing will keep you out of trouble if any less obvious laws are broken. Following me, Glacial?"
A shudder ran down my spine as I eyed up the pile once more. "Yes, I think so. It's better to know now than to not know later."
The private slapped the pile again. "Exactly."
That said, All that was left to do was to get it over with. To which Dossier was all too happy to leave me to do. As the paper junky, she had a pile almost three times thicker that she herself was having to go through. The difference is that she liked this kind of soul-destroying tediousness. I was not of the same mind.
What followed was the longest session of reading asinine legalese I've ever had the forsaken misfortune to experience. Just making it through the six-page content summary was enough to jellify my brain. What was worse was how bad the hoof and/or horn writing was. It only seemed to get worse with each paragraph. I hoped that whoever did write this was fired and/or barred from ever getting such responsibilities again.
The summarization of what I could make out boiled down to a very robust explanation of nothing in general. Oh yes, it did detail the formal system of inquiry and the laws that shaped it. The common ones were all there: no stealing, killing, or public intimate acts. I was surprised I was even allowed to read that one. It feels like the type of detail an adult would want to scratch out.
Yes, there it was, though I suppose if I were to enforce the laws and such correctly, leaving out such things might be inappropriate. It wasn't like I didn't know how such acts worked anyway. I was fortunate that such things had no biological hold on my foal anatomy. I'd have been distraught if such knowledge had a more noticeable reaction. Then, there were laws on money and its facets, such as stealing, bribery, and forgery. Page after page of common sense and whataboutisms. Now, that was not to say I or Hal knew every law that popped up. For instance, laws on 'No Fly' zones and weather manipulation did at least catch my eye. On a technicality, my talent could have fallen squarely into such bureaucratic fines and trouble.
By that point, the backdoor was nearly ripped from its hinges. The strain on the wood and iron protests was enough to press my ears taut against my skull, and my forehooves wrapped tightly in an attempt to dull the shriek and scraping. The sounds were followed swiftly by both Levvy and Distant Point. Neither looked very happy. It turned out the prank was not worth it. It had been over two hours since they'd flown off at that time. The lathering foam of sweat and matted fur showed it had not been an enjoyable two hours either.
The slam of the door closing had me leap at least two hooves off my stool; even Dossier was startled and looked about in a confused daze. She'd been so consumed by her reading that I was surprised she reacted at all. She'd even doubled my own stack of finished reading at the same time. Which was all the more impressive since she had to stop every other page to do write-ups on whatever she was reading. The stack of notes and such was nearly as large as the stack of finished content. I'd taken a few notes myself, but even with those, that was barely three pages to contend with her dozens.
"Look alive, ladies."
Following the door being shut, a very satisfied Night Glider trotted into the office. She looked among all present and nodded to Dossier, who seemed otherwise nonplussed by the results of the corporal's earlier ire.
"How is the training going?" Glider asked.
Dossier pointed a purple hoof over to me and my cluttered desk. I shrugged in return. "He's been doing fine, from what I can tell. A few questions: the flight laws seemed to baffle the colt, but nothing too bad. A bright foal that one, not a single whine or complaint, passed the initial dread. He reminds me of a few…" Dossier's words petered off. The initial mind surprise to a dull murmur. "... Wherever they are."
The rest of the room followed Dossier's example. Even the satisfaction Glider had been radiating had faded away. There was an air of dread, like the feeling right before you threw up. The knowledge that what followed would not be pleasant and would most likely not be the last time it'd happen made my skin crawl.
"Gee, way to dredge up the past," Freya said. She'd taken to pony watching or watching for ponies, either really from the nearby window. But, seeing the lull in my own monotonous task and the total life-sucking melancholy, she had to, of course, give her two bits. I offered a slow hiss in her direction. She either ignored it or was too concerned with eyeing up the others to notice.
"Sorry, Colt, didn't mean to leech the room dry," Glider said. She wasn't even looking in my direction. Her eyes were glued to the wall between Dossier and me.
"The tension in here could smother a bear." Freya waved a hoof in front of Levvy, who'd made it to the door back to the reception area before the unspoken reminiscence had struck. She had her back to the office, but even still, the way her wings dragged on the floor was proof enough that she'd heard every word.
"I get it, really. It hurts, right like you can't breathe like every memory is a chain pulling you down. It's always there, even when you pretend it's not." I added a rueful smile, only to shrink back when all heads snapped to me.
"What the hay, colt. Who's been feeding you all that? A foal like you shouldn't have that running about your head," Glider said. She was staring at me, a mix of concern and sorrow. A look mirrored by the others who followed her example.
"Glacial, is your sire okay?" Dossier asked.
"He's not wrong, though," Distant Point mused.
"Are any of us okay?" I asked.
"Wrong question," Freya warned.
Right before I was pulled into a hug, I had neither expected nor, for the most part, needed. I mean, a hug is a hug, and all hugs are nice, but I had not expected tonight to have myself nearly crushed in Wave Gluder's hooves.
"Huh?" That was all I got out of my struggle to breathe.
"See, completely wrong question," Freya said and giggled.
"You're not alone, Colt; we all miss them, your dam included."
When Glider's grip loosened, I squirmed my way free of her hold. I would have preferred to keep reading about tax law at this point. I coughed into a hoof and gave the best deadpan stare I could. "I'm not that frail, you know? I miss Dam, but it isn't like she's dead. She's fine. Most of them are fine, right? You get letters, right, Corporal?"
Night Glider nodded. "Every so often. It helps."
"So, maybe one day, they'll come back. But mourning them seems a bit. Defeatist, isn't it? We have to be strong so they can all come home one day."
I was playing with fire, acting unlike any normal foal. I knew that before I even opened my mouth. It was aggravating, being treated like I was too dumb to see the writing on the wall. There was a chance Dam was gone, a chance they would never come back. But then there was this spike that plunged deep into my mind, a stubborn refusal to be talked down to. Hal wouldn't allow it, even if Glacial did want to scream, to let it all out.
The mares were still eying me warily. Glider looked a bit embarrassed, eyes unable to meet mine directly, a hoof idly scratching at an ear. Levvy had managed a snort when I'd gotten free, but the rest were deathly silent otherwise.
"The colt is right; we can't go chiseling tombstones yet. What kind of example does that set?" Distant Point said. She nodded at me with a brave face, except for her eyes. She was searching for something, delving as deep into my head as she could get. Her name was a little too literal for my liking.
"The letters are a lifeline, proof there is still hope," Glider said. Her words sounded recited like she had spent hours saying them to a mirror. It left a lump in my gut. They might be alive, but that didn't mean they were living well. The face of my dam flashed through my head.
"So, how about a patrol? I think the cadet could use a break," Levvy said. She eyed Night Glider, who sagged in surrender.
"Might be a good idea. Some ponies and their games have us a few hours behind. So, hop to it, ladies. Glacial, you and Levvy can take a quick flight around the town and get you used to the routine. Even if she should be cleaning the cells with a fork." Glider pointed to Levvy and squinted so hard her eyes might as well have been shut.
"I could use the practice. I don't get to fly too much. The elders get mad if I'm in town alone. Bunch of nags."
That earned a surprised snort from Glider and a chuckle from the others. I offered an innocent stare and shrug. Then, I trotted over to Levvy and waved towards the door.
"You're a strange one, you know that?" Levvy asked.
I nodded. "Sure do."
"Good, we're all strange around here," Levvy said with a wink. She began walking, and I followed. I wouldn't argue with my seniors on that point. Hay, the whole town was a bit odd. Now, if only somepony could relate to my own brand of crazy.
"So, Corporal Glider said there is a flight routine?" I asked no sooner than the Night House's door shut behind us.
"Yeah, there are rules. I'm sure they're in that pile Dossy gave ya. They're not that hard once you get used to them,' I promise." Levvy nudged me, maroon wings flaring wide. She took one heavy flap and hovered a few hooves off the ground.
I rolled my eyes and joined her. Levvy had an impressive wingspan, similar to Sire's actually. They were a bit longer than needed, but that meant her gliding and maintaining speeds would come easier. That's what Sire said when we'd go flying. Mine, on the other hoof, was barely hitting the typical length for a colt my size and age.
"Let's see how you can keep up, little colt. Need to know what type of flier ya are. Helps put everypony on the right routes and with the right partner."
We'd made our way up and out; we were maybe four or five stories up now. The night air was rejuvenating, and the stars danced in the skies above. The moon was caught under a light cloud cover. In all, it was a night to revel in.
"Oh?" I asked.
"Yeah, since we're such a small group we can't afford to send ponies out on patrols they're not suited for. A waste of time, it is. So, we all have our specialty. I do high altitude sweeps, the only mare in the squad with the wing power for it."
Levvy flexed her wings, face fraught with pride. A pride she most likely deserved. Thestral wings weren't terribly different from pegasi ones. The lack of feathers and shape were the only biological differences. The muscles and structure were similar enough that they were treated the same medically. The leathery membrane meant the wings were light and flexible, designed for aerobatics and snap motions. Meanwhile, feathers allowed for less wasted stamina and higher top speeds. Then there were ponies like Levvy, who made up for the difference when put side by side with the average pegasus.
"So, let's do a quick review of the flight rules, and then we'll see just what kind of flier the Night Guard's one and only pegasus is."
"Now I'm some sort of sideshow attraction, am I? The Night House now presents the one pegasus dumb enough to play night guard," I said. I waved my hooves widely and added a dramatic oohing to the end. Levvy cackled and nodded along with my dramatics.
"That's right, little pegasus, you sure are, and we like ya better for it."
"Ah, look at you two bonding."
My eyes swung to my free side. Freya glided along beside me. She was merrily smiling away, casting a brighter white in night's shadows. I tutted and chose to ignore her. No time for tulpa taunting tonight.
"Now, the first rule of flight sweeps."
So, Leevy began the job breakdown. As she'd said, it was a bit peculiar but not as bad as the jargon in Dossy's write-out. That mare needed to relax on her multisyllabic words and constant abuse of synonyms. It was clear she didn't get enough chances to show off. Levvy's own explanation sounded far less robotic.
The basic rules were simple. One, no sweep can consist of less than two active guards. An exception may be made for training purposes, but even still, it should not become common practice. That made sense. If a real emergency came up and there were multiple threats, having only one guard and a trainee would be trouble.
Two routes are mapped out and should be followed accordingly. This left less chance of getting lost, or for those best suited to certain types of patrols don't get sent out on more difficult or draining flights. That fits what Levvy had mentioned prior. I had a feeling high-altitude flights weren't my preference. Levvy had kept the pace manageable, but my wings were already starting to ache even this early into the flight. Gelding relied on fine muscle control and managing mind sheer and currents. My smaller wings, even accounting for my age, were barely forcing their way through the buffeting. That certainly wasn't helped by my lack of practice. Something that I'm sure wouldn't remain an excuse for long.
Three would be more in line with Dossy's own instructions: the flight laws and ownership of flight space. It turns out that just as an earth pony might purchase acres of land, pegasus would purchase the airspace around their cloud homes. I'd never really thought about that part. The fact that cloud homes could and did move about meant the space was always relative to the clouds themselves and spread out as a sphere from the home itself.
Those three were the short-form ones Levvy thought were worth recalling readily. The rest would come in time and become second nature as I went out on more flights. Flights I'd need to train up for. I became a wheezing, sore mess by the time we made it back to the Night House. The flight hadn't even been an entire patrol.
"You weren't kidding, cadet. You look ready to drop."
I took a deep breath and nodded. "Need more practice," I said between gasps. I had to wonder if my split lineage was making things worse or better. I wondered what I'd feel like now if I'd been born thestral or more thestral than I was.
"Good news then," Levvy said, throwing the Night House door wide. "You're in the right place for plenty." Her overly red self was jarring when we entered the lowlight domain of the thestrals. That and her Grogar-may-care attitude.
"Poor Glacie, you really need to flap those back flappers of yours more often," Freya said, wagging a hoof in mock dismissal.
"Ah, your back."
Levvy and I walked into a waiting Foresight. With a mug in his hoof, he waved in our direction. "Glider mentioned our newest member was out on their first night flight." The smile on his face gave away just how much he'd heard when Levvy and I were outside. Curse thestrals and their immaculate hearing—another trait I wished I had.
"He did just fine for his first time. Not a single complaint. He's got the heart of a fighter this one," Levvy said, patting a maroon hoof hard into my back.
"Oh, well, I'm glad to hear we have a protege on our hooves," Foresight took a long draft of his beverage of choice. "We'll need to train him all the harder for it. No, time for favoritism or idle hooves here." He took a second deeper drink.
"Yessir, we'll give him a good one," Levvy said, nodding along with the sergeant.
"Glider also mentioned a freezing incident," Foresight said, hiding a grin behind his mug. Levvy froze in place in response. I had to hide a growing smile of mine in response.
I coughed into a hoof. "It seems there was some sort of mailing issue, sir."
"Oh?"
I waved a hoof in the direction of the training grounds. "Corporal Glider came barreling through the yard right as I went to freeze a target. The others wanted an example of what I could do, you see. The poor corporal never saw it coming." I dipped my head in shame.
"Up to her flanks, I believe she said," Foresight asked. His gaze drifted from me to Levvy. She gulped and shifted from hoof to hoof. Her blood-red mane made an escape attempt as the poor corporal was caught literally red hoofed
"That's right," Levvy confirmed.
"I did apologize, of course," I added, drawing the pair's attention.
"Night Glider said as much. You were not the ones she took Umbrage with. Private Point is currently cleaning the cells. So, I made sure to save the troughs out back for our other jokester. Of which, should be clean enough to eat from." Foresight motioned with his cup to the office door. "Isn't that right, Corporal Levvy?"
"Aye, sir," Levvy said, snapping a salute before trotting off to whatever trough duty entailed. I doubted it was any fun.
As soon as Levvy was gone, Foresight turned and gave me a once-over. He tutted and seemed to lose himself in thought. It left me to consider what I knew was a certainty moving forward. Physical training, flight training, book learning, and practical use. It felt like any physically taxing job. In such ruminations, Hal's memories stirred. The idea of sending children off to war, centuries of youth being an expendable pool of lives to waste. It left me sour; Equestria wasn't prone to many wars, many skirmishes, and personal battles, but country-spanning fights for survival were minimal. If you don't count incidents like Discord, that was its own type of conflict. That left me wondering if Equestria was due for a civil war of its own. A war of day and night, one brought on not by an alicorn but by the paranoia of change and pointed hooves.
"You okay, Glacial?"
I snapped back to reality. Foresight and kneeled to meet at eye level. His amber eyes bore into mine as I shifted uncomfortably under his scrutiny. "I'm fine."
Foresight pulled back, but his dull look remained. "Your face disagrees."
"Just lost in thought, sir."
"A colt your age should not be thinking about things that do that to your face." Foresight jabbed a navy hoof into my forehead, causing me to stumble back. "It is chilling."
I rubbed a hoof to the spot on my head. Foresight had poked; I leered up at the stallion. "Was that a pun, sir?" I asked.
Foresight blanched, nearly tossing his mug over his shoulder. The jaded stare fell away to bemused confusion.
"Is that really the first thing that stuck inside that strange little head of yours, Colt?"
I gave a wide, toothy grin. "Was there something else worth recalling, sir?" I extended the last word for several seconds, my smile disappearing the instant the last syllable faded into silence. Foresight turned around and walked away. A wise choice.
"No, no, there was not," Freya said. She'd taken to lounging on the reception desk, chin resting on bridged forehooves.
"Right, well, I believe somepony has more reading to do. Hop to it, Colt, don't keep Dossy waiting."
"Sir, don't encourage the cadet to use that word. I do not consent," Private First Class Clean Dossier said, banging her hooves into the desk to emphasize her point. Her gray curls bounced in agreement. A point the sergeant ignored with merciless precision as he whistled his way back to his office.
I rolled my eyes but otherwise complied. All that boring jargon wasn't going to dump itself into the void that was in my mind. Freya followed, floating overhead, smiling and waving to each other guard, to their unbeknownst efforts. Well, Freya and Night Glider, the others were preoccupied, as Foresight had made clear.
"It's not that bad, Private Dossier, ma'am," I said as I made myself as comfortable as possible on the old stool, which I'd be calling mine for the foreseeable future.
"Don't play coy, Colt. You should show your seniors more respect."
"Don't listen to her; she loves all of us, and she knows it," Glider said from her desk across the room.
Though Dossy humphed in response, the hint of a smile tugged at her cheeks. The whole group of guards gave off familiar vibes. One night in, they'd already thrown away any decorum a guard was expected to show in public anyway. In private, those aspirations were disregarded with reckless abandon. It was nice. I shifted my weight in my seat and looked back to the spot I'd stopped at earlier that night, and I couldn't recall anything about its meaning. I'd have to restart from the last page break. I sneered in bored contempt.
So the night went, wrought with endless terms and phrases, many of which I was doubtful many of which were ever brought up. Levvy and Distant Point eventually rejoined the office. Night Glider went on patrol as soon as the punishments were settled. Distant Point followed after Glider's return.
By the time dawn approached, I could barely keep my eyes open. I still planned on finding the others tomorrow, or was it today? At this point, the anxiety of telling them about Hal or the rest did not sit well in my gut. But it'd sit even worse if I let those thoughts linger.
I'd need to tell Father sometime soon as well. Freya certainly wouldn't let the secrets go hidden forever. Something was disconcerting about the way she spoke on unaired thoughts or ideas. She seemed adamant about hearing every last one.
"Glacial."
I looked blearily up from the paper stack I'd stopped making heads or tails nearly an hour before. Foresight cocked a gray brow; I matched him with my own, which was left abandoned behind a mouth-wrenching yawn.
"Yessir?" I asked. I rubbed a bit of the sleep from my eyes. Foresight's brow has yet to fall back in place.
"I believe it is time for a certain colt to go home."
My gaze drifted to the window. The morning sun basked the room in a gentle glow. The others all seemed ready for bed themselves. The Day Guard is already in town or preparing to do so.
"Levvy."
The blur of red jolted up on her hooves. I cracked a smile as she looked about like a lost foal in the market. "Sir?"
"Could you please see our cadet home? Then, you are dismissed, you both look ready to drop," Foresight said.
Levvy nodded along. "My bed, she calls, sir."
Foresight rolled his eyes and jabbed me in Levvy's direction. "Well, you heard the mare. You both have places to be."
The sergeant wasn't wrong. The thought of this afternoon's talks was daunting, but the idea I might pass out in the middle of town was even more so. Levvy was already at the front door before I could even get my hooves under myself properly. Glider offered a lazy wave as I left. If the drool in the corner of Distant's mouth was any indication, she was already out cold.
"Good day, little colt," Dossy said, never even looking up from whatever she was currently reading. Her dedication was admirable if nothing else.
"Sleep well," I said over my shoulder.
I walked into the morning light. The walk itself was a hazy blur, but the last real thing I remembered was plopping into bed. Then the rain came, and I was so very cold, lost in the weaving alleys of a city I could not recall the name of. There was only me, the rain, and the distant howls of a dog behind me.
v
The Night House stood unmarred in the hours since I retired the day before. A big block of stone, and the thestral lunatics it housed. As if to affirm my thoughts, no sooner had I opened the door than I was met with one Private Levvy who was burning a pile of papers three hooves high in the middle of the reception room. She barely turned to give me a cursory look before returning her full attention to the bonfire. The look of serenity on her face as she watched the embers was less than comforting.
"Levvy?" I asked. I dared not approach lest I tempt fate. Levvy, in question, mumbled something but made no outward sign of hearing me.
"Don't bother, she can't hear you."
Foresight stood leaning against the threshold of the office door. A mug, one I am beginning to consider a physical feature of the sergeant, was held high, motioning to his subordinate. I slowly scooted my way around Levvy and her flames and came to a stop beside Foresight.
"What?"
Foresight snickered. "We all have our vices, young Glacial. Some gamble, some flirt, others drink…" Foresight took a long draft of his steaming beverage. "...Levvy burns that which she hates most in this world."
I offer a scowl in return. "Paper?"
"Not just any paper, Colt, paperwork. Mostly unessential or otherwise trite forms or documents we have no use for. We only have so much storage space. So, once a month, Levvy gathers the worthless parchment and cooks it hard and long."
"And she does that inside?"
"She's not allowed to burn outside anymore." He leans down and whispers as loud as he can. "Some concerned townsfolk, you see, thought it might be dangerous and unsightly. So, they crawled their way up the hierarchy and got an injunction to ban Levvy from any sanctioned burnings." Foresight stood back up and nodded.
"And how is doing it in the reception area not accounted for in that injunction?" I was beginning to get a headache. I'd had enough talking for one day and even more questions.
Foresight hummed, waving his mug jauntily. "Bureaucratic loopholes mostly. Not sure if you know what any of that is, but if you look hard enough, you can read between the lines for that sort of thing. Levvy poured over the injunction papers for three days, on her own time, mind you. This was the solution."
"You're all crazy," I said before walking past my commanding officer and into the office. Point, Glider, and Dossy were each at their respective desks doing their nightly duties. It was at that moment a thought crept, raking and writhing into my already strained psyche. I turned around, jaw slack, and pointed past Foresight, who hadn't moved a muscle, to the fire still burning. "Where is the smoke? We should be choking on smoke right now."
A snicker, a snort, a guffaw, and then the breakdown. As everypony present, barring Levvy, burst into laughter. They really were all mad as a hatter. So, I waited. Seconds become minutes as the skeleton crew of Bogwood night's finest calmed their amusement to a more interrogatable level.
"I told you he'd notice," Dossy said. She flipped an ink-stained hoof through her fray mane. It was almost like she was trying to copy the Sergeant’s style. If she ever stained her mane, only she and Faust would know.
"Curse you, Colt, I'm out ten bits on that bet," Glider waved a hoof in idle rage. Though the toothy grin she was wearing told another story.
I shrugged. "That does not answer my question."
"That, my dear Glacie, may very well be the point," Freya said. She'd taken an incorporeal perch on my pseudo-desk's stool. "They're all out to get you, I'm afraid."
"It's not that complicated, Glacial. You've seen Bogweed, yeah? The tall, wiry blue plant that grows all over." Foresight pointed back towards the door.
I nodded. "Yeah."
"It's good kindling and suffocates smoke when used as kindling. Some kind of plant oil or something. A local farmer mentioned it once when Levvy and I were out on patrol. S'why there's no smoke or smell," Point said.
"Oh well, that's neat, I guess." I surrendered the query and made my way to my stool, where I sat promptly and leered out at my audience.
"Any other surprises for me on this fine evening?" I asked the room.
Foresight shook his moppy-maned head. "The night is still young, cadet. Who knows what else our humble troop might think up?" Then, given no chance for follow-up, he trotted off to his office. All of them are crazy. Which tracks. I might be crazy, too.
"You seem a bit…agitated."
Dossier had looked up from her desk, eyes dancing in the shadows of the fading light and the embers that burned bright in the next room over. Even then, the sudden concern was unmistakable—a look that mirrored one much like Father's.
"Long day, lots of personal demons." I let forth a body-wracking groan.
"Your magic is your own," Dossy said. Her tone was flatter than the hoof she slapped onto her desk. "It's as simple as that."
I was stunned by her response. The agreeable murmurs of the other two mares in the room were even more perturbing.
"As weird as your magic is, it is still yours," Glider said with finality.
"Gee, ladies, you sure know how to make a colt feel special." My tone matched my eyes in a confused mix of appreciation and dejected discontent. They meant well, but their execution was lacking. "Besides, druids aren't unheard of, right?"
"Druids?" Dossy asked. I nodded slowly. "Those are just folktales. Druids aren't real."
I balked. "Am I a joke to you?"
Dossier's blank look killed what little amusement I'd taken from recanting a joke I recalled from Hal's memories. At the same time, druids were the only answer I had that fit whatever thought giving a pegasus elemental magicks was a good idea. I couldn't bring myself to just dismiss the whole thing. The thought alone left a sour taste in the back of my throat.
Barely a week, that's all I'd gathered in a week. It wasn't a long time, I knew that. It wasn't something I could rush. There were pieces of this puzzle that were missing from the start. My headache throbbing behind my eyes. I winced, rubbing a hoof between my eyes. If not druids, then what? A genetic or magical accident, simply a toss-up, in the gable of life? I could not and would not believe that. I'd started gnashing my teeth.
"Glacial!"
I snapped back to the here and now. I blinked away, the pain still pounding in my head. I turned slowly to see Dossier leaning past her desk and over mine. Her look was enough to cause me to shudder. The fire was no longer the product of Levvy's ritual or the candles atop the ceiling chandelier. No, this was something all its own.
"Then how?!" I snapped. My entire body shook as I jabbed an accusatory hoof at Dossier. The room went silent. Dossier was in a surprised daze.
I hissed. The regret hit faster than I could react to my own accusation. It wasn't a fair question, and Dossier hadn't done anything deserving of my fury. My mind had been tumultuous for days. My hoof dropped, and I fell back onto my stool.
"Colt."
I sucked in a sharp breath through my teeth. Dossier hadn't moved, but the look in her eye had changed. Her self-assured nature was replaced by a dull sorrow.
"I'm sorry." The room remained drearily quiet. I had no follow-up; I was simply too drained for any level of finesse. The druid thing was merely the final straw. "If the druids weren't real, then what am I?"
I didn't expect an answer for the first time that week. I felt as much a foal as I looked. The sudden wrapping of purple hooves around me did not rebut my opinion in the slightest.
"A foal looking for answers. Something I can understand, truly," Dossy said. The hug was short, but the point was made. She offered a small smile before turning back to her work. That was that, nothing for it. The room returned to its average level of chaos, and I was left mentally exhausted. I really needed a solid lead on my stupid mark and my equally baffling talent. An ideal thought that, somehow, some way, this was Discord's fault earned a bemused snort. If he could pull something like this while in stone, then nothing on Equiss could so much as have touched him. A thought that did not aid in my mind's pleas for mercy.
"What do druids even have to do with your ice?" Distant asked. The mare waved a flippant white hoof at nothing in particular.
"Druids were said to have unrivaled magicks in controlling nature. They were also said to come from all tribes, including crystal and thestral ponies. A pre-unification sect of unified ponies. A pipe dream without any substantial proof," Dossy answered without even looking up from whatever papers she was filing. A twitch of her pale purple ink-spattered ear was the only way one could tell what she was paying attention to.
"Oh, well, that'd make sense."
I nodded along. "If it were true. But that is exactly why I was hoping they were Distant. A hope I'm going to hang onto for now. It's the best answer to my cryomancy, either way."
"Perhaps you are thinking too deeply about your talent, little cadet. Would it change anything if you were a druid or if it were simply a deviation from the norm?" Dossy asked.
It was almost comical. I was sitting in a room of what most of the country thought were deviations from the norm. Thestrals were deviants, half-breeds were deviants, and colts with unexplainable magic were deviants. It wasn't being different that hooked me to the tales of druids. It was not knowing what cosmic lottery I'd been signed up for the day I was born. The day Hal was reborn.
"Ah, give Glacial a break. There is no harm in considering all possibilities. If he's wrong, then nothing changes. Simple as that."
Night Glider smiled at me, ears twitching as Dossier's amber eyes leered up from her work. Distant Point made an apparent effort not to get roped into the stare-off. I think she was still recalling the night prior. To be fair, she cleaned the back really well.
"It is not the fact he seeks the truth that begs me to oppose his views. It is the fact he puts his hope into the least likely answer. Besides, his talent is a marvel, something to be proud of, not suspect of."
A shiver went up my spine at the self-assured glint in my mentor's eye. The type someone gets when they already know they've won the battle. An almost sadistic, toothy grin complimented the look nicely.
"I assume neither of you have anything better to do then?"
The whole room jolted; everypony's eyes flicked to a smiling Foresight, a smile one could see even as he hid it behind a stack of envelopes. I had to resist the urge to wince. Like a group of foals caught trying to sneak sweets after their parents retired to bed. The unfettered sense of despair when your parent is waiting stung hard.
"Swamped, to be frank, sir," Dossy answered. Her amber eyes fell back to her own papers. If the grin still on her lips was proof, I'd say she saw the boss before he made himself known. Thestral hearing was ever the mystery.
Night Glider shrugged. "First sweep is in two minutes, sir. Plus the deliveries you wanted." Glider looked at the envelopes, which the sergeant fanned coolly.
"Very true, Corporal. Though, I do have a request."
He turned to me. "Another sweep lesson?" I asked. I knew the answer. He knew I knew the answer. The only answer he knew I didn't know, I knew, was if I could keep pace with Glider.
Levvy was an endurance flier, which meant a speed one could maintain. Glider on the other hoof was far more lithe, and her wings might have seemed overtrained if she were a pegasus. Combine that with her smaller size, compared to Levvy, and you have a speedster if the Night Guard ever did have one. The picture of a particular prismatic mare from the distant future came to mind. They both oozed confidence and competence in the extreme.
"Exactly. Besides, more things are done out there than looking for conniving criminals. Like." Foresight fanned his envelopes harder. "These."
"Actually, that reminds me." I turned to Glider, who'd already stood preparing for her flight. By this, I meant she was stretching, with bones and muscles popping and flexing in her eagerness to move. "The corporal is always eager for mail calls, right? Mail from the mountains and all that."
"Yeah, we've all got somepony up there to write too," Glider agreed in somber reflection. "Actually, if you wanted to. You could send one up to your dam. Only if you want to, of course. I know that is a bit touchy for some."
Glider couldn't meet my eyes. It was bewildering. She'd gone from a bright idea to regret in less than a sentence. To be fair, I hadn't actually considered writing Dam. I hadn't ever even thought I could. The "Mountains" were always portrayed as a hellish snowscape of death and misery. What courier would ever make such a trek? The answer, in hindsight, had been staring me in my face. A thestral one is who.
"That's actually not a bad idea," I mused. My lack of immediate rebuke seemed to return a bit of pep in Night Glider's step. This made me feel less stupid for not doing something like a letter sooner. "If you don't mind, Sarge."
Foresight scoffed. "Adding a single letter to the stack perish the thought. I'm sure your poor dam would be over the moon. Blessed Luna, be willing."
"Right then, mind waiting a couple more minutes, Corporal?"
Glider rolled her eyes. "It was my idea, you know?"
"Touche."
So to paper I put quill. If one can call it that. My nearly illegible hoofwriting would have been mortifying if I wasn't sure half of Bogwood couldn't write at all. I bit my tongue. That wasn't fair, and I knew it. Even if there were some who couldn't, it was not due to a lack of intellect or capability. Some squires and messengers made such work their living. When one's cutie mark was for writing or delivery, why would the less inclined need to pick up a quill at all? That was the price one paid for knowing what every other pony's destiny was with a glance.
They may not have bothered, but Hal did, and Father made sure Glacial Zero was never helpless, not thoughtless enough to seek aid in something any pony could do for themselves. Dam was where my poor technique came from. In fact, her written skill made mine look like any master's pen stroke. Which meant she'd know mine anywhere. As I would know hers.
I kept my letter brief. I'd wait to see if she got the first before sending a novel's worth to the mountain sanctuary. Foresight and Night Glider seemed confident and encouraging enough to try, at least. I hadn't even noticed the tear before it landed on the paper. A tear that baffled me. Why was I crying?
"A bit too much, dear Glacie?" Freya asked. She had taken a floating position beside me, her head lying over my shoulder. She smiled gently, the wavering breeze in her hug a gentle reminder of her presence. It was soothing in some way.
"A bit," I whispered. A second tear had fallen. It felt almost nice. The older guards said nothing. They pretended not to notice. They weren't very good at it. I caught a pensive look from Dossier. She'd even scooted a hoof or so closer. It made me happy. In a way, I couldn't immediately explain. It simply did, and that was enough.
"Dear Dam,
I should have written sooner, a lot sooner. I didn't know some couriers went up the Faust forgotten mountains the thestrals claimed as their own. Maybe I didn't want to know that it was easier to pretend. I think Father knew; perhaps he even sent letters. If he does, he never told me. I'm not some stupid foal anymore. If Father hasn't talked with you. I got my cutie mark last week. It's a weird one. It might fit up in those mountains you now call home. Cryomancy, not pegasus magic. No pony knows how or why I can use it. That, or somepony, is keeping secrets. I bet the Princess knows. There's a lot I should tell you. If you get this letter, I'll write more. Sergeant Foresight has taken me under their wing and even has me helping at the Night House. They really miss you here. I miss you too, a lot. I hope you get this, I hope you respond. I don't want to forget you, to go so long, I can't recall your face. Father deserves better, too. You did nothing wrong, nothing to be sent away. You deserve better. So, I'll write to you later, so please get my letter.
Love,
"Done," I said. I reread my letter again and, with a somber nod, pushed the letter across my cabinet desk. Night Glider did not give it a second thought. She scooped the paper up, gave it a hearty blow, and folded it crisply. Foresight winked in my direction before turning around and returning to his office.
"Great, now up and at 'em, Colt. We have errands to run and criminals to hunt."
Glider motioned me to follow as she jauntily skipped toward the front door. I had to scramble to not get left behind. She was out the door before I'd even made it to the primary office's own door. Curse my short legs and Glider's perambulations.
Glider was waiting at the door, one hoof on the door handle. She offered a chaste wink and pushed the door wide. She motioned for me to proceed, which I did, and trotted into the quiet night. A night like most in Bogwood. No border toads, or will o-wisps, not a Fire hornet or bogwatcher in sight. A shiver ran through my body, just imagining a bogwatcher. The lanky, black, shadowy creature. Hunched forward like its own weight was too big a chore to hoist. The scythe-like arms and those eyes were whiter than anything Hal or I had ever seen; there were no pupils, just endless emotionless white voids.
I was roused from my overactive imagination with a tap on the shoulder that had me jump several hooves off the ground. The pounding of my heart and the blood rushing to my face were almost enough to drown out the giggling behind me. Both Glider and Freya were failing to suppress their amusement. Which was no surprise.
"Not funny."
That only had Glider snort harder. "A little funny."
"Poor Glacie scared of the big bad Corporal," Freya said between giggle fits.
"Whatever."
My dearest commanding officer took that as a cue and rocketed off the ground with enough force to send up a dust cloud. A mucky, boggy dust cloud that would take forever to get out of my coat. My ascent was far less dramatic. To the point, Night Glider was looping around me as I listlessly climbed into the night.
"Oh, come on, Colt. That can't be your best. Maybe we should hit the training yard first, get a few hundred wing-ups to get you warmed up…" Glider stopped mid-flight and hummed to herself. "...might need to do that regardless. Some endurance laps, too. You're way behind in your flightcraft. Curse that father of yours. He works way too hard."
"That's not really fair. Your wingspan is like double mine. You're also the fastest pony in the group if Levvy was being honest." I crossed my hooves and huffed.
"She was, and I am. We'll wait on those wingups. Errands come first. So, let's flap those wings of yours. Let's see how fast you can really go."
I offered a groan but complied, trying my best to keep up with the whirlwind some in town called Night Glider. Her name was on point. She became a blur in the dark, an unfettered force of nature on wings. She slowed it down a bit so as not to lose me completely, but even going all out, I simply couldn't keep up.
"She's going to fly you ragged if you aren't careful," Freya said. She had matched my pace with ethereally little effort.
"True, but it is good practice. She wasn't wrong about me being behind. I really should be flying more than I do."
Freya waved the comment away. "It isn't like you have much reason to. The town isn't that big, and the swamp is no place for foals, ice colt or not."
"Still—" Freya shushed me.
"She stopped."
Night Glider had stopped, and she wasn't alone.
"This should be fun." I spat the words out like poison on the tongue. My flying technique suddenly seemed very unimportant. Night Glider stared at the mare who'd hailed her. Her own contempt matched my own.
Captain Freezy Breeze, lead Weathermare, and one of the few ponies in town I had no interest in seeing, so help me, Faust. Yet, she was here, face to face with Night Glider. The look the two were sharing was not doing my anxiety any favors. If she saw me sidle up beside Night Glider, the captain did not show it.
"I have places to be tonight."
I'd missed any greetings and made it just in time for the barbs. The older mare's scowl deepened further. An ear twitched as she leaned closer. She was maybe a hooves length from being muzzle to muzzle with my senior.
"And I have orders. So, take them, bat."
Freezy Breeze hoofed a stack of papers against Night Glider's chest. The corporal made no aim to grab them. This earned a growl from Freezy. Her face was becoming red, in contrast to her lighter colors. It would have been amusing if it were anypony anywhere else.
"Excuse me?" Night Glider asked, slowly emphasizing each syllable as she went.
"Take the papers." Freezy jabbed them harder into Night Glider's chest.
I found myself apt to say something. Everything the weathermare said had me grinding my teeth. The fur down my neck and withers were standing on end. While Freezy Breeze made every effort to ignore my presence, Night Glider had noticed, and the look she gave me out of the corner of her eye was puzzling. The intense leer made it hard to meet her gaze for more than a second. I was an unwanted guest in a private conversation, cadet or not.
"The tension in the air is to die for. Such raw emotions. There's a story here, I'd bet everything you own on it," Freya said. She nodded sagely from Glider's other side.
The story was correct. Freezy Breeze made little effort to hide her dislike of thestrals. To the contrary, she'd shout it from the rooftops if she thought it might get them out of Bogwood faster. That was simply Freezy Breeze's M.O. This, though, the look they shared, spoke volumes of a history neither enjoyed. The way their words were barely a whisper even when nopony was around to hear. Well, besides me and Freya.
"Orders would suggest you go through the proper channels for all crown-based missives and determinations. I am not your courier, so back off." Glider swatted Freezy's hoof full of papers away. The venom in her cold, militant response could choke out a viper from ten paces out.
"You're here, and your boss isn't. So, just take the weather reports and get the tarturus out of my skies. You deplorable whorse."
The dam had broken. The thin veneer of civility had crumbled to dust. I was beginning to understand Night Glider's earlier look. This was no place for third wheels. I glanced about to find that if anypony else had been around, they'd been smart enough to find any other place to be. Everypony except for me.
"Like a foal fit twister, but in slow motion. Right, Glacie?" Freya asked. That phrase was almost enough to earn a rebuke. It was a familiar foal's tale. An uppity pegasus foal throws a fit and starts a storm or cyclone in their home, burying everything and everypony inside. It was horse pucky, and everypony knew it. Yet, here, it might be as applicable as it ever had been. Two unstoppable storm fronts had collided, and somepony was about to have a terrible night.
"Corporal, ma'am, we have errands—"
"Cadet!"
If I didn't have ice running through my veins literally, I'd definitely have it metaphysically right now. This time, Night Glider didn't bother looking back at me. She and Freezy were too busy signaling their desperate desire to beat the other to death with their eyes to bother castling even the swiftest look my way.
"So, you went and took in the stray, I see. I almost regret losing my temper the other day. No foal should have to work with the likes of your joke of a guard."
I don't know how to take that. I'd go with rude for now. I was not sure how personal that was meant for me. Though, I'd opened my mouth. So, the debris I caught was squarely on my shoulders.
"Leave the colt out of this, or else."
Freezy cracked a humorless smile. "Is that a threat, Corporal?"
I coughed hard into a hoof. Both mares turned to me. The captain looked on the brink of spitting in my direction. The corporal looked ready to slap me upside my foal head. I wouldn't blame her if she did. I wasn't sure what provoked me to speak. A sudden throbbing need in the back of my head. Something primordial, a force beyond my conscious wit. "The corporal was simply inferring that I wouldn't sit here and silently allow a mare who ran me into the swamp last week to play judicator."
The look I received was grim. Without another word, Freezy Breeze pressed the papers in hoof into Night Glider's and left. It was no victory. The silence applauded my efforts. I shouldn't have said anything. The look Night Glider gave me sat in solemn agreement.
"That was unwise, Colt." Night Glider said.
I nodded. "I agree."
My senior's brow sank. "Do you?"
I nodded again. "Stepped in toad dung, real bad."
Glider scoffed. "More like wyvern dung, cadet."
I tossed what little wry bravado I could off the nearest cumulus cloud and into the swampiest mudhole in a ten-mile radius. "I'm not sure why I said anything at all."
"Because you're a foal that less than a week ago was run out of town by a plothole of a mare. A local legend or not, one who should have known better."
"A tribalist plothole," Freya corrected.
"I'm sorry," I said.
Night Glider dismissed me. "At least you did it while on duty. It might not have ended as well if you were with your friends or, Faust forbid, alone. It was stupid, but it could have been worse." Night Glider shook the papers Freezy had left with her to the heavens.
"Right, you're right. It could have been much worse."
Night Glider mumbled something to herself before looking at the same papers she'd been flailing about. Several seconds passed as her eyes darted down the lines of text. When she concluded, she hummed before mumbling something else. This time, the words Foresight and pain were quite easily overheard.
"Corporal?"
"It's a warning. For a tropical storm. Rolling in through Baltimare in the next few weeks. A right nasty one, too. Captain Breeze wasn't talking out her plot about orders, after all."
"That bad?"
Night Glider stared harder at the storm warning. "Worse."
"So, what's next?" I asked.
"More midnight tussles over Bogwood, perhaps?" Freya suggested.
"Back to the grind, Colt. Back to the grind." The next few minutes were silent as we continued our patrol.
"Corporal?"
Night Glider shook her head. The irritation she'd had since Freezy had flown off still sat on her brow. It did nothing to help the unsettling ache in the back of my head.
"Yes, Glacial?" She'd used my name. She didn't do that often. My heart sank a little. Yet, Freezy Breeze's eyes, that day she'd run off, didn't retreat from my mind's eyes. A contrast of loathing and shame wrestled for control of my face.
"I wanted to ask about Freezy Breeze, or I mean, the why of it all. If you don't mind?"
"The why of it?"
"Why did my 'Special Talent' make her so angry? I'm tired of asking why it doesn't fit in. It is enough to make a colt scream." It was, but screaming into the void didn't solve anything. I wondered if my 'dreams' and 'nightmares' were related. In hindsight, they were stranger than my cutie mark still. Hal was stranger still.
Night Glider's face softened. She smiled gently through tired eyes and a racing mind. She smiled all the same. "Those are good questions. One of the reasons I don't think anypony in Bogwood can answer is that. But that isn't a bad thing if you ask me. Some of us simply have to discover our paths all on our own."
"Not when ponies want you gone even before you got a weird talent. I just want to be left alone, for Father's sake."
That earned a bark of laughter. "For Weathered's sake, huh?
My cheeks puffed out as I leered back. "Yes."
She laughed again. "Colt, Bogwood is a small town. We only have a few local leaders and heroes. A few names that come up. Mrs. Whimsey, Bramble Breach, Mayor Hard Tact, and a couple more. Your sire is near the top of that list, you know? One of the few stallions on it at all."
It was like a slap in the face. She wasn't wrong. The list of local 'legends' was short. Everyone knew the mayor, or Whimsey, or Bramble. I knew Father was somepony all the dock hooves sang the praises of. But I'd never considered what that meant. I'd never needed to, in hindsight. The docks were Bogwood's lifeblood. If one ran the port, one ran the very heart of Bogwood. I wanted to kick my own flank. Everypony that came to Bogwood would know one name.
"I never really thought about it like that."
"Ever wonder why nopony has come pitchforks and torches in hoof to run you and your father out of town like some of the others?" Night Glider's words erred on the line between bitter and pedantic.
"Because they need him," I finished her thought.
"They need him," Night Glider agreed. "But to answer your question. I think you're luckier than you give yourself credit for."
I cock a brow. "How so?"
"Well, have you ever had thestral magic explained to you, past the obvious, the stuff any and everypony knows?"
If I had, I did not recall it. "No, I don't think so."
Night Glider's hoof shot out and jabbed me in the shoulder. "Then, somepony did you a disservice. Half thestral or whole, its knowledge worth knowing."
I rub my almost assuredly bruised shoulder. "Go on."
"Well, let's jump past the ones you likely do know. We are a bit bat-like in appearance, lowlight, not darklight sight, better hearing, and membrane wings rather than feathers. All of that sounds familiar, Colt." It was not a question.
"Yes."
"Well, that's all the easy stuff. The rest is a little less interesting."
She had my attention, and if the smirk on her lip was any indication, she knew it. She also knew that it was something I should have already known, if not by asking, then by looking into it myself. I may only be half-thestral, but I'd still neglected half my history.
"For instance, thestrals can, of course, use clouds and manipulate weather, but not nearly as effectively as pegasi. That's why there are no night weather teams. Thestrals are also the smallest of the pony tribes mostly. Which we are reminded of more often than I care to admit. Oh, and we can also take in protein through meats, as it is semi-omnivorous by nature. That is one of the reasons some ponies insist we're secretly vamponies. A tale that was as old as intertribal relations themselves. That isn't even the strangest assumption some ponies have come up with."
"Like what?" I asked.
"Some believe thestrals can see and commune with the dead. Which, unlike the vamponies thing, came out of nowhere. I don't get it at all. I've never seen any ghosts."
Like a lightning strike it hit before I could put thought to it. The dead, seeing the dead. That was not what I was expecting. Hal's world had thestrals only being seen by those who have seen death. Death, ghosts, connections between two worlds. If thestrals could see the dead, I doubted it'd be seen as a rumor. There were a lot of people and ponies who would have paid top bit for even a moment of closure. The thought was awe-inspiring enough, as was the fact I'd never even considered what thestrals might share between worlds.
"You okay, Colt?"
I blinked back to reality. Night Glider was waving a hoof in front of my face. I snorted and pushed her limb away. "Yeah, just a bit to consider."
Night Glider grinned. "If I didn't know any better. I'd say you looked like you'd seen a ghost yourself. Or maybe you had a sudden need to suck somepony's blood?"
She laughed along with her own jokes. I offered only a pout in return. She meant it as a jest, but I wasn't so sure. "And if I had?"
Glider rolled her eyes. "You'd be the first."
"Anything else, on thestrals, I mean?" I asked.
Glider shrugged. "Our tactile kinetic field is stronger than pegasi and unicorns. Though earth ponies crush us on that front."
"You mean our grabbing field?"
She nodded. "Yep. Oh, and we can't get vertigo. Which is nice."
"Wonder if I inherited that?" I mused.
"That's about it if I'm honest. Thestrals aren't as special or mysterious as some of those cackling nags would have you believe."
It was refreshing to have somepony who was willing to delve into the half of my heritage that was simply taboo amongst the denizens of Bogwood. When one could be hounded, harassed, and shunned for mentioning anything similar to the wrong, nosey old mare. The herding mentality in small towns like ours was something that most were unwilling to rebuff. "Thanks for telling me. Even after I made a foal out of myself with Freezy."
Before I could react, Night Glider had planted a hoof on my head and ruffled my mane with a vengeance. "You are a foal. You'll make mistakes. That's part of growing up."
If only she knew. Which made my idle threat all the worse. I was only making enemies with a mare that had more pull in town than most. If she really wanted to make my life Tartarus, Freezy Breeze absolutely could.
"You think Captain Breeze will see it that way?"
All Night Glider's mirth withered up and died. "Can't say, Colt. But, turning a town on a foal is a tall order. I can't see her caring enough to fight that battle. But she could."
"That's reassuring," I said, offering a whine.
"Even if she does, the Night Guard doesn't abandon one of our own."
I offer her a blank look. "The same guard that some want to run out of town?"
That earned me a swipe to the back of the head. "Too far, Colt."
I supplicate and surrender. "Sorry."
"Right then, back to work, cadet."
I nodded along, but as we made our way into town on whatever errands the sergeant had prepared, a stray thought and idle eye connected a set of dots that left me far colder than any spell—a deep-seated blood-slowing chill down the spine.
"Freya? Freya!"
There was no reply.
The dark bled into the void. The chill touched but never consumed anything in its path. It was both stifling and inspiring. I found myself speechless. I had no idea for how long I'd simply sat there staring up at nothing. A hollowed-out path through chiseled ice stretched out before me.
Behind the glistening walls, the dark awaited, ebbing and setting like the tide. A force that could only be stalled never stopped. Even so, I felt no desire to leave, run, or hide. It was beguiling. I almost wanted to laugh. Nothing escaped my mouth, though I had at some point started walking. Deeper into the cold, I delved, frost nipping at my ears. At some point, my legs had been entirely consumed in a matching armor of ice. They were nearly indecipherable from the floor they pranced across.
I was grossly aware this was a dream. My mind made no ploy to mask that fact. I was walking down an endless ice cavern in the dark. It, in some ways, was more pleasant, knowing it was all in my mind in some ways, that made it all the worse. I hadn't felt truly alone since before my cutie mark. I'd had, in some way, Hal with me, always in my head. There was also Freya, there to snark and quip, and on some occasions, consul, here in the dark and ice. There was only me. There was only Glacial Zero.
A whistle picked up from behind me. A sudden, heart-pumping fear squirmed into my head, and a thunderous rush of blood filled my ears. The whistle grew louder. I was sprinting now, deeper and deeper into the path.
"What?" It was the first word I'd managed to speak since becoming lucid.
The sound of something heavy and the shrill crack of giving ice sent a second wave of fear and haste. It was coming. It was closer.
"What is it?" I said between panicked whines and gasps of air. I tried to open my wings, but they remained glued to my sides.
"Glaaaaacie!~" The whistle called. It was closer.
I managed to look over my shoulder, but there was nothing. The crashing was closer but hidden in the dark. The faster I ran, the closer it seemed to be. I was lucid and yet still wholly helpless, a hostage to the whims of my mind. I was so very alone.
"Glaaaacie!~ Where. Are. You?" the whistle whispered in my ear. I found it harder and harder to run. My legs weighed down hard, my back felt leaden, and even my wings sagged against gravity. I could feel it creeping, the ice from my legs and wings, the tears frozen to my cheeks.
"Frozen?" I asked nobody. I was, in fact, very much frozen to the spot. A statue glistening in the refracted non-light of the ice cavern.
"There you are!~"
Freya, no, a poorly matched and melting fake. A copy of a copy of a knockoff of a lie. The squelching mess of blackened, frostbitten limbs glided along the floor in an untraceable pattern. The face dipped on one side, the smile stretching from ear to ear, of sharpened teeth. The eyes, just like the last nightmare, the eyes piercing, screaming, fueled by rage and loathing. But, behind those, there was a second pair of eyes that begged, wrapped in grief and misery. I felt sick. I struggled pointlessly in my icy prison.
"Waaaaited!` Sooooo!~ Looooong!~" The 'Not' Freya sang. "Juuust!~ Foooor!~ Yooooou!~ Glaaaaacie!~”
The creature stepped forward, eyes level with my own. Its tongue lulled out as it eyed me greedily. One of its limbs traced a line down my face. I screamed as hard as I could, but it only echoed in my head, where no one could hear it. Lost in the inception of my fears.
“Pleeeease!~ Heeeelp!~”
Then I felt my face meet wood. I was awake, face down on the floor, swaddled in my blankets. My throat was sore, my eyes stung, and frozen tears clung like pen strokes down my cheeks and chin. But I was awake.
When I managed to pull myself free of my covers, I found the sun shining high and bright from my single window. The rays washed me in their dazzling warmth, but it was only ever coat deep. My head throbbed, and the 'Not' Freya's whispers played like a record in my head, in tune with my headache.
It was early for my new schedule, but sleep would not find me even if I wanted to return to bed. No, instead, blankets unraveled, and my head shook off the fog that consumed it. It was time to greet the day. The last few days have been a blur, and the niggling in the back of my head, continued untapered by anything and everything I tried to distract it with.
I had no plans for the day; I'd reached my quota for the week at the Night House. Not that I'd have minded going in. The looks I'd gotten last night made it clear that I wasn't doing a very good job pretending everything was fine.
Foresight had taken more than a few chances to eye me up and hum ominously. He was plotting something, even if my mood wasn't a factor. Dossy and Levvy had not been as subtle. The two herded me around like a lost sheep. The worry and pity in their demeanor only irritate me further.
Now, I was home, alone, and I hated it. The frost trail I left in my wake added a particular blithe commentary to my thoughts. The quiet was the worst part. Even the woods and river outside were eerily still.
"Does everything have to be so bucking complicated!" I yelled. I took the silence as a yes. It certainly wasn't a no.
With nothing better to do, I gathered the bathing supplies in the kitchen, headed out to greet the day, and let the river, hopefully, soothe the ironic fire in my chest.
The calm waters did help a bit. The river was clear as glass, slowly sloshed over rocks, and peaked against my body. My ablutions were as slow and methodical as I could manage: hoof to hoof, neck, withers, and so on. With each area soaked, scrubbed, and soaked again, I almost missed the thin layer of ice topping the water around me. I pretended it was the coming winter, the tropical storm, or happenstance.
I'd grown used to the ice on my forehooves and even my back hooves. It'd become second nature. Today, though, added a new twist to my 'winter' coat. The tips of my wings had frozen stiff, primary and secondary remiges. The feathers darkened to a hue more befitting for frostbite than functional limbs. I let them be, afraid they might shatter or break if preened.
"If Tally says anything, I might strangle her," I said. I sighed and laughed humorlessly. Who was I kidding? Even Azure would notice at this point. I let my wings go limp, treading water as I moved to my flanks.
"One step forward, three steps back, huh, brain?" No answer. I'd have been frightened if there was one. Moreso, if it was helpful. The rest of my bath was left to silence. I returned the soap and scrubbing brush inside, and with no reason to be home, I locked up and slowly flew down the path barely above a glide. The frosted feathers seemed to have little to no effect on my actual ability to fly. Which was a positive at the very least.
Bogwood was a reassuring level of ordinary. The afternoon sun sailed above as the ponies went about their lives. I'd only just sat down on my bench, one that might have a groove in it from my constant use. If it did, I'd never admit to it when a familiar cheery filly came bounding up.
Three days, and Azure had yet to give any quarter. You tell that filly one secret or several, all bundled up as one, and she was in completely. Trying to match her overabundant secrecy and blunt dispersal of that same information in public was exhausting.
"Afternoon, Glace, Hal, both. How are you today?" Azure asked with a wildly exaggerated wink. I planted a hoof so hard into my nuzzle I most assuredly would be bleeding. If my blood didn't freeze in my veins every time Azure brought up Hal. That might be a little too literal. Azure's poorly disguised hinting was becoming far too frequent, considering it'd been three days.
"Afternoon, Azure. Also, please quit announcing Hal as if he's the new word of the day. The point of me telling you girls was for less stress, not more." I grumbled incoherently as Azure all but dismissed my worries with a blink and a smile.
Three days since my reveal and three days since Freya had vanished. It felt too scripted like something would give at the drop of a hat. My patience was threadbare, something even Azure could not miss.
Before anything could boil over, another familiar face joined Azure and my conversation. Wayward had, at some point, noticed us. She had also apparently overheard Azure and me because no sooner had she fluttered over than her weaponized pout was ready and raring to go. Faust, have mercy on us all.
"You don't need to bite her head off, Glacial," Wayward said, wrapping me in a hug. If, by some eldritch provocation, Azure had missed the red flags, Wayward had not. I returned Wayward's hug. She was my rock.
"Yeah, I mean, sorry, I'm just a bit on edge."
"Still scared you're gonna get locked up? Or that the princess will rain down fire?" Azure asked. Both were things worth concern.
"Yes and yes, but also no. A few bad dreams. It's nothing, really."
"Now, Glacial, lying is no way to behave around friends," Wayward said. She offered bop to my muzzle, which I repaid with a huff.
"Not lying, just tired and jumpy."
"I'll say," Azure agreed.
Sergeant Foresight had said as much last night as well.
"Have you told your sire?" Wayward asked.
I'd considered it more than once. "No."
"Well, you should. You trust him, right?" Azure said, flicking a hoof over the other in dismissal of anything I could follow up with.
They were, of course, right, and before she vanished, Freya had been encouraging me to do the same. But if he rejected me, if he decided I'd lost my mind… My friends dismissing or betraying me would hurt. If my own sire did it, it'd destroy me. My body wracked itself in a violent shudder. It was enough to make one sick. The bile in the back of my throat dared me to delve deeper into the pit.
"He deserves to know. But, if he—"
Thwack! I recoiled, hoof waving in pain as I leered at Azure, who'd delivered a hard knock into the carpus of my nearest hoof. She glared back harder.
"No, none of that. If you can trust me, you can trust your dad. He's one of the most reliable ponies in Bogwood. So tell him, or I'll smack you again harder."
As far as Azure was concerned, that was that. I was not sure I agreed, nor did I approve of being smacked at all. But any further discussion would only end up with me getting hit again. Wayward had decided to simply watch. I had a feeling she sided with Azure on this one if the fact that she was stifling a giggle was any measure of her thoughts.
"You two are the worst," I said as I rubbed my new bruise.
"We are not, but those clouds are."
Azure pointed past Wayward and me to the north side of town. Even knowing it was coming did not prepare one for the horizon of thick black clouds. Even miles out, one could hear the rumble and see the flashing of discharged storm clouds. It had run its course through Baltimare and needed to burn off more cloud matter and disperse the leftover water. The wall slowly but surely grew closer. It was enough to send sparks up any pegasi's wings.
"Firstly, you're deflecting, and second, yes, yes it is."
When it hit, it was going to shake the town from plot to acre and back. If we got lucky, it might send the closer pods of border toads, hydras, muck rats, and mudbrewers scrambling for cover for a few weeks.
"I still think you should tell the princess," Azure said, barely above a whisper. It was more for her than directed at me. Even so, it still left a sour taste in my mouth.
I let it be; there is no point in starting fights, and it isn't her choice to make, to begin with. The princess was a gamble, one that Hal and I fully agreed on. That and if Celestia did believe me and take Hal's word as fact, it'd mean unwanted attention when word got out. Though if that were a good or bad thing, it would be better left to more imaginative ponies than I am.
"So, what are your plans for the rest of your day off, Glace?" Wayward asked.
I shrugged. "None, honestly. I'm not sure what to do with myself. I hate admitting it, but I wish Tally was here. I'm sure she'd have some ideas."
"Besides talking to your sire, you mean?" Azure asked. I wished I had a wall to bash my head into. My head was rumbling almost as hard as the horizon's storm. No, on that thought, Azure's head is way harder and thicker than any storm, tropical or not.
"Azure, that's enough. You've made your point," Wayward said.
Azure waved Wayward's words away. "Fine, fine, I just think he should have told his sire first. I promise to stop bringing it up, okay?"
Wayward nodded, turning to me. I nodded along. Azure had a point, so I'd let the subject drop. Though a nice sturdy wall would help.
"What about you two?"
Wayward looked up at the sky and hummed. "I have some errands Dam wanted me to do for her. So, I should probably go soon." Wayward gave me another hug. One Azure joined merrily. One I returned even if Azure didn't deserve it.
"No, that's fine. Maybe I'll head over to the park, maybe practice freezing things. Maybe I'll learn something if I freeze enough trees."
"Or get arrested for tree abuse," Azure said with a giggle.
I nodded. "Or that."
I'd need to find another space for my practice sometime soon. I wasn't sure what would happen if I was approached while freezing trees in the park, but I'm sure they'd find something to stick me with. If I had to guess, some kind of fine. Home was a no-go, and I wouldn't make a mess of the Night House on my off days. The marsh was generally unsafe, and I'd get more than an earful if something happened and Sire found out.
It was times like these where the fact Hal's memories retained the use and conveniences of plumbing and easily accessible sewer systems, which was a bittersweet pill to swallow. I doubt anypony would care if I was freezing waste. Or, I'd end up with another fine, maybe even worse, if I stalled the sewage system.
"What else do you think you'll even learn? I mean, freezing things isn't that complicated, is it?" Azure asked.
"If it is anything like weather control, it's probably harder than it looks," Wayward countered, once again looking at the encroaching wall of clouds.
"I'm sure you've noticed, but I often freeze over. I was hoping I could get that under control. I've just been waiting for someone to chew me out for it. You know?"
Azure snorted, and Wayward coughed. I smiled, and the dam broke. The three of us laughed. The very idea that somepony might throw up a hoof and yell about foals these days was an interesting sight to behold, or at least pretend to behold.
"Mrs. Whimsey might. She's the type of nag to whine about frosty benches or icy hoof trails," Wayward said once we'd settled back down.
"True," both Azure and I said.
"Does it hurt, or can you even get frostbite?" Azure asked.
I tapped a hoof idly on my chin. "No, not really. Honestly, I barely notice it. As for frostbite, Faust knows. If I could, I'd think I'd have already gotten it. That or hypothermia. Both, if the world made any sense."
"That's not fair. Weatherponies would be so jealous if they knew you could be immune to the cold. You stinky cheater." Wayward said. She huffed and turned her nose up in faux disgust, her smile never waning.
"Fair enough. Also, to answer Azure's question. I want to find where the line is on my magic. You know, what can I do before I end up freezing myself or something? I've noticed when I get mad, I freeze more than just my forehooves."
"Huh, now that you mention it," Azure said, waving in absent acknowledgment.
"Well, I'll see you girls later. You know, unless I end up a pony iceberg."
I waved as I trotted off. The girls offered their own goodbyes. I was left alone with my thoughts as I followed the familiar path to the little patch of untamed bog we called our park. I could imagine how hard the local earth ponies and gardener types had to work just to keep it all in check. Marshlands were not to be taken lightly lest ye be consumed by toads.
I'd barely finished my thought before I noticed I'd autonomously found my way back to my little playground of trees and ice. The trees had since I'd last been here, thawed…mostly. They looked a little weathered but still standing. If one didn't know what I'd done, and it wasn't the early onsets of winter, they might notice the little patches of still frost-laden bark near the base of the trees and mud.
The question was where to begin. What was I really doing? Why did I come here at all? I felt ill, and bile bubbled up in the back of my throat, leaving behind an acidic sludge. It was enough to make a colt gag. I told the others I wanted to test my limits to see what I could do if I let it all go. I'd said that, but I wasn't terribly sure I'd meant it.
I'd gotten upset, riled up, and petrified with anger or fear every time. I'd been consumed by the same power I claimed was mine. I'd ended up nearly frozen to the gills the other day. Thoughts of beings like Sombra and Grogar played across my mind. Creatures with insane power that let themselves be consumed by it. Then, the very real image of a wrathful sun goddess sent a shiver down my spine and back.
Was it so surprising that the cryomancer was scared of the very pinnacle of fire and light? Celestia's domain stood in direct contrast to my own. It had taken hours for Azure to thaw my hooves that day in my yard. I couldn't imagine how quickly Celestia could likely melt that same ice.
I tapped a hoof against the closest tree. The bark was cool, but otherwise, it was as nondescript and barky as any other tree I could no doubt find throughout the marshes and local farms. I closed my eyes and hummed in rhythm with my heartbeat. Slowly, I let go of the dam that held back whatever motes and the force that kept magic from doing whatever it wanted. It was amusing on some level. For all that ponies knew of magic. The primordial force that grafted it into reality was a total unknown.
My head rocked back and forth as my humming grew louder. I could feel the bark grow colder, and the wood's texture altered around my hoof and out further. It was slow, controlled, planned, and deliberate, like that of my namesake in the northern seas. Then my humming stopped.
I focused on the niggling thoughts in the back of my head. Freya, Night Glider's dismissive tone as she described old thestral stereotypes. They were folktales and legends told around campfires about the ponies that go bump in the night. That was what Night Glider would have one believe. I was not so sure.
My heart rate picked up. I could feel the tingle on my coat as the ice came to claim my flesh. It was, in no small way, a bit terrifying—the idea that I was slowly encasing myself in a tomb of my own making. It was also enticing to a nearly disturbed level, a clear and natural preclusion to my abilities. I could taste the condensation in the air as the very breaths on my muzzle cloaked the tree before me in a shallow mist.
Then, the ice spiked at a raw escalation following my own wandering thoughts. Freya clawed at my mind's eye, my tulpa, or was she? When had she appeared? What was the first time we'd spoken that she idly floated about giving commentary on every benign thing? I couldn't remember. It felt like always. It couldn't be, though; there had to be a line somewhere, a beginning to it all. My heart was pounding loud enough that it drowned out all other sounds. The ice had hastened, and my hoof glued tight to the tree. I could remove it, stop the ice, stop my thoughts. I could, but I didn't.
My idle worry, idle concern, changed. Fiery hot, all an all-consuming anger. Confusion, the righteous fury of the betrayed. Freya was a liar, or was she? She vanished the minute she'd been found out, or did she? She was never my friend.
The fire died. That wasn't true; my thoughts had turned to poison in my tongue. Freya wasn't my friend? No, I didn't believe that. What was anger fell through to self-loathing. Freya was my friend, but was she even real? Was she the creation and manifestation of a colt who didn't know any better? A colt who was now cursing her name, like any of that same colt's problems were her fault.
"I miss you," I said. I was numb. My hoof fell from the tree. The ice stopped dead. I opened my eyes. I swallowed hard. My eyes traced up from the tree where my little tantrum had gone a bit far.
The ice stretched high, further than the treetops. It clawed at the heavens and petaled out at the end. It was a lot. The tree made up only the very base. The ice itself stood nearly three times that of the tree. It was unmissable. To not see this from town would be nigh impossible. Any pony out and about would notice, given that of an idle eye scanning nowhere in particular.
"I'm so bucked," I hissed through clenched teeth. What was more, what doubled the guilt was I hadn't finished; I'd stopped. More, I had more ice. I hadn't frozen over completely.
That was when I thought to look myself over. As I'd already known, I surpassed the normal frozen hooves. The ice had wrapped itself up my back and past my wings. Wings that had themselves been untouched. It gripped my withers and ran up the back of my neck. Yet, even still, I was not stuck in place. My hooves responded when I slowly backed up, eyes still glued to the tree. I barely felt the weight of what was surely half my weight again in ice.
"What the Faust am I?"
"An excellent question."
I turned slowly. The voice was familiar, one that I was not very fond of. One that seemed all too pleased. Private Dirk, if I recall correctly. The same Day Guard mare from the thief incident. She stood, ember eyes trained on me as I slowly turned to greet her. She looked sick, like she'd had a nasty case of the feather flu. If she had caused lemons to pucker before, now they were imploding into singularities. It was almost chilling how sour one mare’s frown could be. Her tumultuous attitude was only matched by her namesake pointed squarely at my heart.
"Private Dirk."
"Keep silent. You're in a lot of trouble, little colt."
On some level, I was unsurprised by both the ice and the private. I was due a bit of trouble. Since Freezy Breeze, things have returned to an almost dull normality. It was only natural that something would go wrong. Murphy would be proud.
"I'm sorry," I said with a terse chuckle. Dirk was not amused.
"Can I plead the fifth?" I asked.
Dirk's gray brow scrunched so hard I feared she'd end up with premature wrinkles. That would be a shame, honestly.
"Fifth, what, you cheeky cur?"
I fell onto my haunches in my delirium. It'd only hit me just how much ice I'd conjured and how much magic a massive tree spire took. My hooves ached, even under their sheath of ice. Dirk eyed my frozen hooves with a twitchy caution I found almost comical. Oh, behold the evil cryomancer and all his eight-year-old glory. May he freeze your very soul!
"I believe you owe me an explanation for what you've just done," Dirk said slowly, emphasizing each syllable with discordant glee. A deep, unrefined loathing. One need not see her face or hear her words, for her mere presence spoke volumes.
"I froze a tree," I said. I looked over my shoulder at the, yep, still frozen tree. "Would you like me to unfreeze it?" I looked back to Dirk, who seemed in contemptuous recourse on rather brain me or punch the closest nonfrozen tree with all her might. Her left forehoof was shaking so hard it looked as if Dirk might collapse or break into dance. If Hal’s memory served, it could be either. Which, as a trained guard and earth pony, would be rather hard if I wagered.
Dirk took a very long, pained breath. "Yes, Colt, unfreeze the tree."
I offered a curt salute, turned on end, and tapped a hoof to the frost flora. It was like the fluttering of a tundra breeze. The ice gave way to slush and snow-dappled flakes that rode the nearest breeze. It was beautiful in a demure way. It was quick but not instantaneous. It stayed long enough for one who knew it was coming to appreciate the subdued snowfall. I found myself smiling, if only for that moment. I chose not to look back to Private Dirk. I don't think she was smiling, which was all the shame.
"That better, ma'am?" I asked.
"No, Colt, the fact you thought you could vandalize town property, regardless of the cleanup ease, is not okay. Seems Sergeant Foresight has been shirking your supposed training, little Night Guard."
It was in moments like these that Hal's existence was a lifesaver. Should I have been as young in mind as I was in body? As any aghast colt would, I might have dropped a block of ice on Dirk's big, stupid stone gray head. However, in hindsight, she might not have even noticed with how dense she was. I had to resist a smirk even as Dirk paced back and forth.
"Well, that's a shame. I thought I did a pretty good job," I mused aloud. That earned a sharp growl from the mare, turned boar bared down upon me.
"Aye, and did you do well involving yourself in an armed chase? A chase that could have gotten you or the fillies with you killed? You couldn't just make yourself scarce. Right?" Dork was a breath's width from muzzle to muzzle with me. It took a lot not to shuffle backward, flank to the tree. The vinegar Private Dirk spat was enough to perturb any pony. It was also enough to ponder just how well she was in general.
"Are you okay, ma'am?" I asked.
Dirk stopped her snarling and pulled back as if struck. "Excuse me?"
My head tilted, one ear flopping loosely. "Are you okay, Private Dirk, ma'am?"
"Glace."
And so my savior had arrived. Azure Brew came barrelling past Dirk without a second thought. She placed herself between Dirk and me, though I don't think Azure so much as registered anything other than that mischievous gleam in her eye and the target of said glean. That, of course, being me.
"Yes?" I asked.
"That was amazing. It just shot out of the park like a geyser but frozen. What happened?" Azure's hoof grabbed my shoulders and shook me with vigor. Even Private Dirk, in all her untoward humor, looked down at me with a mix of confusion and pity.
"I froze a tree." I swatted Azure's hooves away. "Just zoned out a bit."
"Seriously, but it was, the pony, ugh, colts," Azure sputtered, hooves flying high. I offered a cocked brow but received only more indignation in return.
The shock had seemed to run its course. "Excuse me, miss," Dirk said. Now, Dirk was back to being annoyed. I peered over Azure's shoulder and shrugged to Dirk in return.
Azure had noticed and turned to give Dirk a once over. "Hey, you're the guard from the other day. The really grumpy one."
"Now listen up, filly. All I've been trying to do, what I did back when you got involved with that petty thief, is keep the peace. You and your little coltfriend have made repeated nuisances of yourself. You should be grateful the Day guard is here to keep this marsh clot safe from the endless creatures that call it home, creatures that would devour you whole."
I leaned over, and I hid my muzzle behind a hoof. "I think you made her mad."
Dirk pointed a hoof at me, the simmering pot of her patience now a full boil. I had, in my reckless abandon, gone a tad far. I stepped past Azure, giving Dirk full access to the target of her frustrations. Azure had nothing to do with any of this, and I had no desire to get her in any trouble for nothing at all.
"We're done here. You, little colt, will be coming with me. We'll need to have a nice long chat with your Sergeant. Conduct like this is beyond unacceptable."
There it was. All this from an idle mind and some harmless ice. I rubbed my eyes with my hooves. My head was pounding. The world swayed with dots dancing in my vision. There was something very wrong with all of this, every last bit. Something was missing, like a picture trimmed and cut around a no longer welcomed guest in those memories.
"For once, we agree."
Dirk spun around so fast that the disturbance might register on the tornado scale. I peered past her and Azure from behind me. The newest member of the Find Glacial Zero, while he practices a completely harmless magic club, seemed almost as perturbed as Dirk had been upon finding me.
Corporal Night Glider had arrived. Dirk stared her namesake at my C.O., who returned it with gusto. I had, by this point, fallen into tired apathy. Night Glider took a single step forward. Private Dirk retreated in equal measure.
"That's one of the Night Guards, right?" Azure whispered from behind me.
"Yep, my corporal. Didn't I didn't expect her to be about, but Faust works in mysterious ways. Or, she really hates Dirky, there."
"Cadet Glacial Zero," Glider snapped. I pulled into full attention faster than I had a chance to realize I'd done it.
"Ma'am."
"What is happening here?"
Before I could answer, Private Dirk, with what little authority she could muster, stomped a hoof so hard the ground beneath cracked and cratered. "Your cadet has made a public nuisance is what happened, Corporal."
Night Glider chewed on Dirk's unrequested answer and looked slowly between me and her, then back to me. "Is that true, cadet?"
Dirk balked. Night Glider's lackadaisical query had once again left the adversarial mare on the back hoof. I'd have laughed if I wasn't sure somepony would slap me.
"I did, in fact, make a mess." I pointed to the tree behind me. "And cleaned it up."
"Did you see what your cadet managed in his negligence?" Dirk asked.
Night Glider nodded slowly. "I'm pretty sure most of the town did, Private Dirk Toss. It was incredibly unsubtle."
"And?" Dirk Toss asked. The private had begun grinding her teeth. A fitting name, I'd say if you replaced her name's d with a hard J.
"It was mighty impressive. Not sure why Glacial was sculpting something like that in the middle of the park, but it was impressive, I suppose." Night Glider hummed, tapping a hoof on her chin. She tilted her head back and forth. "Though I'm no artist."
Sculpting a massive wall of ice was hardly sculpting, was it? I looked back over my shoulder to the freshly thawed tree. If there was any sculpture, it was gone now. It reminded me of the ice fort from last week. I let everything get under my skin, and I made a mess. Now, that one instance becomes a pattern.
"You do realize your little troop is going to be charged for this incident, right?" To my surprise, the warning was more conscientious than angry. The grinding had stopped. The shouting had passed. Now, Dirk Toss stood a tired mare, just doing her job. The look Glider offered spoke volumes to her own understanding. Day Guard or Night Guard, when it came to being a sponge for scrutiny and judgment, that was one thing that everypony in the E.U.G. could relate to. Heck, I was a cadet, and I could get it to some degree.
"Sure, if you can find something to stick to whatever icy incident happened. The cadet may or may not have made a scene of some sort. If the Night House has to pay for said scene, then so be it."
"Corporal!" I said, only for Night Glider to raise a hoof for silence. I complied. My vision continued to swim. Dots materialized and dissipated in the corners of my eye.
"Glace, you alright?" Azure asked. She planted herself beside me, allowing me to lean on her, if only a bit. I wasn't sure I could manage it longer without her.
"Not really."
"Must you Night Guard always make everything harder than it needs to be?" Dirk asked.
"No, but it isn't always about being easy."
Night Glider and Dirk Toss shared one more look. Then, as silent as the grave, Dirk started off, passing the corporal and back onto the park's main path.
"Well, that could have gone worse. Right, Colt?" Glider asked.
I shook my head. "I wouldn't know, ma'am. Dirk certainly didn't seem to think so."
"She's just jealous," Azure said, adding a loud harumph. However, her look contrasted poorly with her claims. The filly seemed lost in her thoughts, a war between inspiration and desperation warring across her face.
"She'll no doubt file a report, either way. More importantly, why in the name of Tartarus would you go and make a spectacle of yourself like that?" Glider asked.
"Honestly, ma'am?"
Glider rolled her eyes. "Yes, cadet, honestly."
"I'm just a bit stressed, is all. I let my mind wander off, and my magic followed close behind. I didn't mean to make a scene, I promise."
"A little more than stressed. If I had a guess." Night Glider looked back at the tree and the slush melting away at its roots. "We really need to get that magic of yours under control soon. The Night House can't afford to pay a fine every time you lose focus."
"Of course not. I wouldn't let you even if you could." I said, standing as straight as my swaying frame could manage.
That earned a bark of laughter from the corporal. She waved my bravado away. "Of course, you'd say that. You're your dam's foal to the last. But like I said the other day. We Night Guard stick together."
"Even when a colt makes a scene," Azure added with a grin.
Night Glider nodded. "Even then, young filly."
"Oh geez, I appreciate the vote of confidence, ladies."
I needed a nap.
"Who knew we had an artist in our ranks and one with an ego so big he had to share his work with the whole town?" Distant Point snickered, jabbing a hoof into my side with frequent intensity. I considered whether my senior officer wanted a first-hoof experience of what an artist could do. The laughs from the others, besides Glider, who seemed done with the whole event, Were not helping at all.
"Aye, and what a beauty that was. Too bad The Day Guard hate fun," Levvy added from my other side. I was boxed into a beguiling mare sandwich. The two had all but marehandled me the minute I walked into the office. I spent the rest of yesterday and most of today out cold. The pun notwithstanding.
"Ladies, please," I said with a huff. I wiggled as best I could but to no avail. I was utterly unambiguously stuck being snuggled by two of the most annoying mares I knew. Which, in hindsight, could be worse.
"I still can't believe they billed us for something that was cleaned up for free." Dossie bemoaned. While Levvy and Distant were making the most of the awkward situation. Dossy was ready to choke the next Day Guard she saw. As Glider predicted, Dirk had sent in a report, and the subsequent bill had been hoof delivered by a very grim-looking squire.
"No kidding," I said. It did not matter what world or when bureaucracy was the root of all evil. There was nothing I was more confident in than that. "You'd think they were holding that bill on standby or something."
A mighty sigh and the sloshing of a bottle signaled the unimpressed entrance of our C.O. Sergeant Foresight. Who had, as soon as he'd read the Day Guard's complaint, filled a brandy bottle to the very tip with the blackest, tarriest, cough-inducing coffee I'd ever seen, heard, felt, or smelled. Its very presence brought gravity to the room faster than any spell ever could.
The sergeant took a four-second swig of his poison and groaned again. "They probably were, Colt. They were always primed for fines long before you were even born. Before I enlisted or Her Highness ever plotted for the eternal night. The Day Guard could leech a lamprey dry," he said, taking another draft of his bottle.
"So, it's not a thestral thing?" I asked.
"Nope, just nobles and bit pinching, power-mad foals," Dossy hissed between closed teeth. I am unsure which is more irritated or irrational between her and Foresight.
"Next time, you should freeze the light lover's Dayhouse doors shut. Let's see them deliver a notice about that," Levvy said. She tittered away, the idea playing across her unfocused eyes.
A sudden room-shaking thunderclap sent everypony on edge. One might have mistaken it for an earthquake if the event horizon didn't light up with fingers of lightning grasping for the land beneath them with desperate hunger.
The storm had already reached the Moores. The whole town was shuttering up and keeping unnaturally quiet. On my way into town, the guard and the weather team were the only folks not holed up. Even the docks were on essentials only. The ships were few and far between, but only some seafarers would be in the know. That tropical storm had twisted a bog-standard downpour into something far worse. The farms would be struck within the hour, and the rest of the town not long after. Tomorrow would be the worst of it when the horrid wave of rain and wind would crush us under its wrath.
A second thunderclap flickered the chandelier's candles, leaving the room a battlefield of shadows and light. The attitude in the room had done a complete one-eighty. The levity had died, and the Sergeant's eye gleamed with a tired resolve. The others seemed equally anxious. It breathed a chilling edge to the whole of the Night House.
"So, what's the protocol for a storm like this?" I asked.
"I suppose you wouldn't have gotten to that part of your reading. An oversight. I should have moved it forward when we got that notice from Freezy Breeze," Dossy said. She idly pointed to my stack of still unread regulations.
"A crash course it is, then. Ladies, please release the cadet. Playtime is officially over," Foresight ordered. Levvy and Distant did as they were told, and I was finally free from my bat mare prison.
I stretched, back popping satisfactorily with a single hop and flutter. I made my way to my stool and drummed my hooves across the pile before me.
Foresight plotted his way before my makeshift workspace and plopped himself onto his plot. He eyed Dossy's stack of papers warily. "Normally, we leave the weather to the weather team, as I'm sure you'd guess."
"Right."
"Well, in times like these, where the storm becomes something less manageable. The guards, both Day and Night, are often drafted into helping when and where we can. The more bodies at work, the less likely somepony gets hurt by the approaching disaster."
"So why aren't we?" I asked. I pointed to the window in time to see a pair of Captain Breeze's underlings fly by.
"Too far out, hasn't even hit the farms yet. If lucky, the weather team will break the storms into more manageable but more frequent rainfall." Foresight took a gulp of his drink and idly watched the dark clouds moving ever closer through the window.
"Too bad Freezy ran you off, Glacial. Or you could just freeze the storm into submission," Distant said from her desk.
"You think he could?" Glider asked.
Distant Point shrugged, looking at me for confirmation. I shrugged back. "No idea. I did freeze that one cloud, but that's…" I pointed toward the rumbling gray wall and its slow parade into town. "…That is a lot more than one cloud."
"You froze that tree real good. I think that was more than a single cloud's worth," Levvy offered. She grinned wickedly.
"That would be quite the feat," Dossier said, not even looking up from her work to do so.
"Have you even found your limits, Colt?" Foresight leaned over the table, eying me hard. I couldn't meet his gaze, trying and failing to find anything else to deflect. "And why not?" Foresight's questions continued.
"Dirk is a pretty good reason," I mumbled back.
"Glacial." Foresight sat back. His voice had softened. He reached over and pulled my chin forward to match his gaze. "Would you, for posterity's sake, tell me how you think your talent works?"
"Things I touch and things that are touching those things freeze?" I offer.
"Hmm, I wonder if that's true."
Foresight let me go and stood up. "Well, regardless. If and when the Weather team requests our aid. Which they will. We'll be put in the positions of batting down the hatches, getting those who are in the danger zone somewhere safe, and cleaning up what is left in the storm's wake. Which we'll do with gusto. Right, Night House!?"
"Yessir," the rest of the thestral quintet agreed.
Foresight smirked and looked back down at me. I offered a polite cough, did the best sitting salute I could, and mirrored my peers. "Yessir."
"You really should find that line of yours, cadet. If you don't, you won't be prepared for what comes from crossing it. Though, maybe I'm just being a tad pessimistic. Comes with getting one of the day dwellers' complaints. They are always the same."
"Right, I'll do that."
"If it helps, Glacial. I think you give yourself too little credit. No matter what Private Dirk thinks. Your special talent is just that, special. Treat it as such."
I slowly turned to Dossy and left with no comeback, made worse by the fact she still hadn't looked up from whatever was staining her hooves tonight. I ran my tongue over my lips but chose to remain silent.
On one hoof, Dossy had a point. My talent was remarkable, sure, that I'd agree too. The issue is, is it being special a good thing? Is it worth the trouble that seems to tail me ever since I'd gotten my cutie mark? I wasn't so sure.
"So, that aside. I wonder how long until we get the next round of letters? Sure, it'll be after the storm, but I wonder if the boss wrote one?" Distant Point leaned forward, watching as I pondered it.
"I think Sire would like that. You know, if we aren't washed away beforehoof," I said, waving my hooves in mock terror.
"If you don't freeze the whole thing solid," Glider scoffed.
"After that, maybe I'll freeze the sun too. The thing is too bright anyhow."
Levvy snorted and nodded eagerly. "Oh, that'd be nice. A roundabout way of getting eternal night. Now, if only that parasite that stole our princess away thought outside of the box like that. Her Highness might be here and not," Levvy's words trailed off.
"The stars shall aid in her escape," I mumbled. If anypony heard me, none commented.
"It'll be fine. We've survived worse. Bright Whimsey leaves even the worst storm lacking. That vile nag," Glider said. She waved a hoof in mock jubilance. I couldn't help but crack a smile. If there were anything in Bogwood that could unite its citizenry, it would be the disdain all sane ponies had of Bright Whimsey and her friends.
"By the way. Since everypony seems so curious, and I can't say this is a good thing, I don't think the tree was my limit. I just sort of stopped."
"Leave it be, Glacial. We were teasing. There is no pony in the room who would expect you to really freeze a whole storm front," Glider said. She offered a gentle smile and a flippant wave of her wing.
My magic dismissed or not, something else set my coat on edge. A feeling like eyes burning in the back of my head left a sour taste in my mouth. It was as if the very room was peering down on me, judging my every move. Every direction was another vector for that feeling to amplify, evolve, move, and forecast its eerie presence. I was unsure when the feeling started, if it'd been there and neglected, or if it had been presiding there before I'd recognized it.
Reading my unholy stack of work did little to appease the feeling. I found myself scanning the room more than once. Yet, the others were busy with whatever nonessentials they had. There would be no flights tonight. Criminals are not immune to being drowned nor unseen enough to avoid the Weather team as they worked late into the night. As the minutes ticked by, the feeling only grew sharper.
"Glacial, are you okay?" Dossier had finally looked up from her work, and the ridge on her brow did not dictate that the work was done. No, she stared at me like one might a wounded pup. She seemed to jostle in her seat as she debated whatever it was she thought was going through my head.
I shook it off. "I guess."
Dossier was unimpressed. "You guess?"
I look around the room. "Just a feeling, really, like we're being watched."
Dossier frowned and scanned the room. "The Weather team?" she asked.
I hummed in dissatisfaction. "I am not sure."
"Could be nerves. We did ruffle your feathers a bit earlier. You know we meant nothing by it, right, Colt?" Distant said.
I nodded. "I know. Even if the lot of you have a good point with me knowing my limits. I know you didn't mean anything by it. But I don't think that's it. It just feels like somepony has had their eyes glued on me for a bit. Could be wrong, I guess,"
"No worries, ya little troublemaker. We'll have more than a few words for anypony daft enough to come after our favorite cadet," Levvy said, raising her voice loud enough that I heard the creaking of wood from Sergeant Foresight's office.
"That we would," Dossier agreed.
I couldn't help but giggle. I prayed for mercy to any monster lurking under my bed. These crazy mares would be waterboarding the poor thing before it knew what hit it. That was if waterboarding existed at this point in Equiss. If not, I pondered how immoral it would be to suggest it. Probably better, I didn't if I were honest and even half as sane as I pretended I was.
Security aside, the feeling remained. Perhaps it was magical or simple paranoia. I was getting used to the latter. It was almost comforting. The tinge of ice trailed from my ear tips down the back of my neck like the threading of my veins. It was a new feeling; for the most part, the ice had always gone up from my hooves. To think it could alter its behavior like some defensive symbiote was less encouraging. That said, it did at least provoke a sense of self-preservation. The look on the thief's face from last week recalled in vivid detail. A look of shock and defeat. That time had been instinct. One can only imagine what might become of someone I was attempting to freeze.
A sickening shudder ran up my spine. The threading ice lines throbbed in response. If I were fair, Freezy and Dirk had reason to be suspicious of such magic. Would they feel the same if I were a unicorn? Mayhaps, in an era of superstition and frayed loyalties, power was currency and rumors, a fool's hope.
"Or, maybe I'm wrong," I said, broadly smiling at the mares.
"Or you're overthinking it. I'd rather ya start trusting yourself a bit more. Ya might find that ice in your hooves isn't so scary when ya stop treating it like a right monster." Levvy said. She narrowed her eyes, daring my recourse.
I tapped one of those icy hooves to my chest and gasped. "Why, I never."
"Exactly the issue, I think," Glider agreed.
The storm had reached the farms some time ago. The weather team had been prepped and ready, as Foresight had been informed by one of Freezy's subordinates. The farms could be handled. They were sparse and well-rooted in the marsh. I had to stifle a laugh thinking about the apocalypse itself taking out all creation before it'd rip Forage's farm free from that mudhole. Those less stubborn would be brought back to town where shelters were already prepared and ready.
The marsh would slow the storm a bit, but it was inevitable. So, here I was, walking home for a power nap. According to my oh-so-worried corporal, I was still a foal, and even if I did borderline nothing, I'd need all the energy I could muster. I doubt Father would be all that pleased to know I'd be going out during the storm.
Speaking of. No sooner had I reached my humble home than my dearest sire stood beside the front door. I suddenly had the urge to run headlong into the approaching storm, blindfolded and with wings tied to my sides.
I did my best to avoid meeting his gaze. Though I could certainly feel it on me. As any foal could tell you, the ire of your sire was a fate most unwelcomed. My heart was racing, and he hadn't even spoken yet.
I came to a stop in front of my sire and offered a wary smile. "Good morning."
"Home early? I thought I heard somepony coming down the path," Father said.
I shrug. "Up late?" I asked.
"Early. The storm sat ill on the nerve, as did other things."
Father presented a folded piece of paper, a slip of paper with the royal seal of the Day Guard. It only took a second to put it together, a single instant between instances. The internalized roar that set my blood on fire helped a bit. Father simply waited.
"Well, buck me." That was all I could parse together, something that no parent wants to hear their foal saying. Sea dog or not, Father did not seem amused. His already dry expression darkened, the glint in his eye searching, ripping free, and consuming everything in its hunt. It was like looking at a golem of stone and fury. Beyond that, three was something worse. The tired, defeated disappointment of a loving, worried sire." Well, buck me times two.
"I take it. Do you know what this is?" Father asked.
I wilted under his gaze, reduced to a mumbling mess. "Yes, sir, I do."
"Then an explanation is due. One not from an irate guard."
Father turned and walked inside, not even looking to see if I'd follow. He knows me better than that. So, to my death, I marched. I closed the door behind me and was left in a house far too quiet to calm from the storm that bared down upon it.
Father had taken a seat at the kitchen table, and the folded report left was sitting in the middle. A lantern hung from a hook to one side, filling the cold early morning with an orange glow. A lantern very similar to the one that I'd broken days ago. A time that could have been a lifetime away. I took my seat and leaned forward on the table.
"The same mare from the other day. As I understand it, yes?"
I nodded. "Yes, the same one."
"The one to cause your sculpture to disappear. I doubt a single stallion, mare, or foal in Bogwood did not see it. It was impressive, if unhewn. That aside, a formal complaint is not something one takes lightly."
"I cleaned it up. It isn't like I damaged the town or hurt anypony. I just wanted to let go, destress, be left alone."
Father's iron gaze wavered for a fraction of a second. Then he grunted and picked up the formal complaint, eyeing the folded parchment with dissatisfaction. Then, as quickly as he'd taken it, he ripped it in two laterally. His dissatisfaction melted into a practiced mold. One that wrought down its wrath on unruly sailors and drunken mares of the docks. A rough void. That's what any other would see. As practiced as Sire was with his unwavering resolve, so too was I practiced at seeing the hurt where it all started.
"A reasonable request, if not a realistic, my son. If only it were ever so simple."
I leaned back in my seat and groaned. "I'm just so tired. It's all been chaos since I got my cutie mark. I almost wonder if Discord is at work here."
I barely caught my words before a look of shock and disgust paraded across Sire's face. It wasn't a look he wore often. Brow sullied so hard he might have burst a blood vessel. Dilated eyes, edging and shaking in their sockets. Hooves tensed hard as he forced himself to his hooves.
"You would call at that monster's name? You would assume yourself his disciple? What do you know of that creature's machinations?"
My blood ran cold, gulping at a dry throat. If I'd been afraid before, this was something far deeper. A foal my worry about being punished, but this was not a parent reprimanding a misbegotten foal. This was a matter of faith, or history taught and forged, molded to the plate of everyone's soul. I'd let the mask slip ever so slightly. Hal's thoughts now turned on me like a ballista's bolt through the chest.
Discord's reign was not fresh, but neither was it forgotten. Within a century, some ponies had parents and grandparents who, if not lived those days, passed on what they were taught—who passed on those horrors.
"I just meant. It is complicated, confusing, and frustrating. I didn't mean to—" I said. Father held up a hoof. I went silent. The room felt small and entrapping, and my wings ached. I needed to fly; I needed the sky, the night, and the storm. Anywhere but here, but here I stayed. Instinct battled instinct, and every twitch was an argument between flight and freeze.
"Such horrors are not to be taken lightly. But it is not his name that concerns me, Colt. It is the way in which you said it."
I swallowed hard, even if there was nothing to swallow. Buck me thrice. By the mercy of Faust, I'm sorry. "I don't know what you—"
"Enough." Father did not raise his voice or change his inflection. A single decisive word, a word that would not condone ignorance or disregard. "I have had a feeling for quite some time. A feeling that something has changed in you, my son. I ask only that you be honest. What ails you? Why do you hide from me?"
There, once again, the hurt, the deep-seated, all-consuming despair. Father was not an average stallion. Not by the measure of his peers. Stallions were a minority in Equestria. That I knew it was common knowledge that we were outnumbered, coddled, and protected.
In the same way, one might protect an endangered species. I couldn't say why it was that way; it was only that it was. Stallions were protected and weak. That was the stereotype every mare was taught. Stallions ran the home, mares worked the land, and such. That was not to say stallions did nothing or were forbidden from following their fate. However, stallions like Father, strong, stalwart, and commanding, were few and far between.
But the look in his eye now. The pathetic, pleading torment. That was not Father, not the one I knew. That was the stallion others expected. The poor, hurt, lonely stallion who lived on the edge of town. I hated it. It burned in me the sickening rejection of the stallion posing as my father. It would not stand, and I would not let it. Thus, I did stand on my chair, forehooves on the table. I stood, wings flared.
"Because I'm scared." I hadn't expected those words, those three simple words—the simplest, most unmistakable truth. Father hadn't expected it either. His eyes, those blazing teal eyes—mirrors to the soul, mirrors just like mine. They sat wide and tired beyond time. "I wanted to talk to you, to explain everything, but I was afraid of what you'd think, what you'd say. I didn't want you to hate me."
It was in times like these that I wished Freya was with me. She'd have something punchy to say, something uprising. She wasn't here, so here I stood, waiting for Father to say, to do anything, anything besides stand and stare.
I had not expected him to reach across the table and pull me free into his hooves. I blacked, flailing as he pulled me close. I could almost feel my cheeks redden as I sat slack in his grasp. It was in moments like this that Hal had to be discarded altogether. Glacial Zero was still a foal, a young, stupid child. Father's, Weathered Horizon's silly, little colt.
"Do you think so little of me? What father would strike such fear into the foals? A monstrous sort that is who. I only wish to understand you. To know what sits so heavy on your shoulders that it drags you into night terrors?"
He'd noticed? In hindsight, it wasn't much of a secret. He was up before me most days and now left only just after I returned from the Night House, which is late for our new schedule. I imagine that's my doing as well.
"You noticed?"
He pressed me harder into his chest. "I have."
"It's not going to make sense," I said, half muffled by his coat.
"Does it need to?" That is another point on his end. I took it to the girls: Father deserved the same. Freya had been right about that, too.
"Would you believe me when I say I'm not the same Glacial Zero I was the day before I got my cutie mark? That I got more than just a picture on my flank.
The question stood. For a minute, the room was deathly silent. Father did not release me, balk, scoff, or laugh. He simply sat thinking, reflecting on whatever happened in his big, waterlogged head. Then he hummed.
"Go on."
Well, that could have been a worse answer. Though what he'd heard so far was the easy part, the part that didn't drop one into utter whimsical fantasy and delusion.
"When I put out the fire, turned it to slush and oil, when my flank gained the mark that should have completed me, given me purpose. It came with thoughts and memories that did not belong to Glacial Zero. They didn't belong to a pony at all."
That was part two, and my heart was racing out of my chest. The girls had taken it better than I'd expected the other day, though they were also my age and perhaps a tad whimsical themselves. The young are usually more likely to accept the strange or new.
"What kind of memories?" Father asked. Again, an even-tempered response with no semblance of condescension or patronization. A simple, forward, honest question, in the way only Father could have asked.
"A lifetime, growing up, living, loving, failure, rejection, death," I said. I attempted to play it off to make it less morbid. I stalled just a second on the last part. Hal's death sat fresh even now in the back of my head.
The wait for a response was far shorter than I'd have expected. It was only a beat and a half, a mere second, before a simple question broke the renewed silence. I wasn't sure if I was relieved or terrified.
"And what and who's memories plague your mind, Colt?" Father asked. The question was more firm than he'd spoken since I came home. I felt his muscles stiffen beneath his coat, and his grip on me tightened ever so slightly. But nothing further, still no rejection.
"Human, his name was Hal. He died in the rain, alone. I've dreamed about them. But that isn't all. Hal knew things, things no pony else knows."
It was a roundabout answer, a fishhook to lure in the real prize. Hal and his people weren't the issue, the part that gripped hard to my chest. It had shocked me, even the girls, but that part was only the skin; the meat beneath was far more frightening.
"I take it these memories, these things this 'Hal' knew are important?" Father asked idly. It was almost comical how little interest he'd seemed to have in the history of Hal. A subject to be entertained but not reflected on.
Father loosened his grip a bit, and I pulled away just far enough to look up at him, and he looked down at me. Teal stare met teal stare. There was no anger or disgust; how could there be when he'd had a town of doubt and worry aimed at him for years? If there was any stallion in Bogwood, who'd readily accept the different or outcast. There were few others like Sire.
"He knows things that happen in our future. Things that will, if they happen, change Equestria forever. Things that we'll never see." The bomb was dropped, and the heaviest part of this weight that seemed ready to crush me under its force was offered in part to Father.
"Prophecy?" he asked. "Example."
"Luna's return," I offered with a dejected sigh. "In a thousand years."
"Hm."
I waited, but Father said nothing more. He stared down at me unflinchingly. His eyes twinkled with thought, but those thoughts were kept to himself. I had to get it from somewhere, after all.
"Just, hm?" I asked.
Father shrugged. "I think you dam would like that one."
"Heh." I blinked, eyes wide.
Father's head tilted ever so slightly. "Just, heh," he asked.
"You're taking this way too well," I said.
Father released me in whole. He shook his head. "To some part, it seems a bit obvious, Colt. I knew something had changed with your mark. I could not say what or why. I believe wholeheartedly when you say you are not the same Glacial Zero from before you found your talent. The explanation is strange, like that of a fairytale or frightening fable in the moonlight. However, the manner you carry yourself now does not befit a foal, at least most of the time."
"So you just believe me by default?" I asked.
Father shook his head once more. "Of creatures and prophecy. I will not lie. It sounds like nonsense if one were to hear it in town. The type of hearsay spread at the docks. But, I cannot mistake the look in those eyes of yours. The same look your Dam would have when she told me of her nights on patrol."
Father was not a talker, gossiper, or poet. He didn't have a bardic bone in his body. But it'd be a cold day in Tatarus before he was hoodwinked. His gaze was boring, the type one couldn't help but take seriously. The same look he'd give sea mares who came to port. The same kind that would look down on Father and think they could push him around. They were taught otherwise with a swiftness.
"You should be suspicious. Your son just told you what might be the strangest story ever told in Bogwood. You should have questions, arguments, something."
As I'd delved deeper off the map, the girls had come around into the unknown. Yet, here was my one sire who seemed about as concerned as he would be if I told him I spilled a bucket on the floor. It was beguiling to an extreme. Curse this stallion and his trust in his crazy foal.
"The fact you think so shows a maturity beyond your years, Colt. Whatever happened that day, I would be a fool to ignore. However, I will ask. Are there more?"
I sag and huff. "More what?"
"Insights to the future, if they are as you say." There was the beginning of a smirk on Father's muzzle. A rare dive into his thoughts. The stone shifted ever so slightly.
"The Crystal Empire, Changelings, Tirek," I said, listing the first thoughts that came to mind. Even this far in the past, relative to Hal's memories, I had no idea if the Empire or Tirek would be recent or long in the past. I could only say Luna was here for Sombra, if nothing else, which meant it happened in the last few centuries.
"I'm afraid I know nothing of the like," Sire said. The smirk remained all the same.
"Not a lot of need in Bogwood." It wasn't much of a surprise. The only possible way he could have known such things, even if recent enough. It would be if he went looking or some chatty sailors mentioned it. Even if a sailor had known, one learns to take their stories with a grain of salt.
"True enough, Colt, true enough."
"So, what now?" I asked.
Father reached out and pulled me into another hug. "Not much to be done. As I see it, you are lying through your teeth, and nothing comes of it. Or, your word is true, and it won't matter to us either way. A thousand years is a long life to lead."
"You are too trusting," I said with a chuckle.
"Or my son is far too cynical for a foal." Father tapped a hoof on my head. "Though I do have a single question."
"Oh?"
"If your tale is true, why not tell the princess?"
I groaned into Father's chest. "You sound like Azure." I realized what I'd said a second too late. Father had to.
"So, you've told the filly before me?" I could hear the smirk.
"Fillies," I corrected. "Wayward, Tender, and Tally know too."
"Should I take offense?"
"I was scared."
"Of?"
I whacked Father's chest with the meager might I could manage. "You're being coy for no reason, and you know it."
"That does not answer the question, Colt."
"Of you rejecting me, of being alone." I had, it seems, let fall some dam, and with it, a quiet, solemn trail of tears stained my cheeks. It was a cry of surrender, allowing the twisted grip on your heart to fall away—the type one gets when one stops lying to others and oneself. I cried silently, and Sire held me without a word.
"Never, you will never be alone," Father whispered. "Not so long as I draw breath."
I smiled gently, but my withers were heavy with fatigue, both physical and emotional. Father jabbed me in the side, breaking the encroaching serenity.
"You never did explain why Azure and my thoughts on telling Her Majesty was unpreferred, little seer."
I groaned. "Would you wish to give potentially false hope to a nigh immortal alicorn who controls the very Sun above us? One still grieving over losing the very sister my 'prophecy' is about?"
Father tutted. "To find hope is always with due risk. Hope itself is a fragile ideal. But to be without it, I think, is worse."
I was left with no response. Hope was always paired with the darkest parts of life. One could not exist without the other. "Not all are Alicorns who would need to wait centuries to either find relief or soul-crushing despair. While we may be gone, would it be right to have those of that time be punished for my foalish false-scrying?"
"Should she then live, not knowing that hope still survives?"
"Gah!" A headbutt my father with a weak resolve. "Unbelievable."
"Should I not have hope for Belfry?" Father asked.
Thus, it all circles back around. I gripped my father tight and couldn't help but feel like a right bastard. Celestia was not the only pony in Equestria with heartache and grief. She was not the only one who deserved hope or assurance, prophecy or not.
"I miss Dam."
"As do I, Glacial, as do I."
So there we sat as the sun rose, as the storm raged in the distance. I found myself drifting into a comforting darkness, still clasped tight to Father's chest.
I jolted awake, hooves flailing in mock combat with my fleeting dreams. My breath caught hard as I scanned my surroundings. The last thing I remembered was dozing off in Sire's hooves, which must have been accurate since I was laid atop my bed. However, I had little time to dwell on it as a roof-rocking thundercrack had me jump from my bed, wings flared.
"For Faust's sake," I grumbled. A second thunderclap sent another shiver down my spine, though I remained steadfastly on the ground. "The storm, crap." I had to wonder just how long I was out. The storm had made its way overhead, though it seemed a bit darker and heavier than it was on the horizon. The rain was coming down in sheets. Usually, that meant getting soaked through and stumbling around in the dark. That would have been the case if I hadn't thought up a cheat on the way back home.
I jogged my way into the kitchen. I wasn't sure where Father was at the moment; I'd guess at the Docks. Storms like these were a massive pain for the sea rats that ran about Bogwood. The idea of boats being lost at sea while their crews were pinned in port made me grin. They always strode into town like they owned the place. Karma comes to everyone eventually. I grabbed myself a half portion of day-old bread and stale cheese. The diet of nobles, I'm sure.
A meal hastily eaten, I made my way to the front door. I could hear the rain batting against the wood from inside. I took a deep breath. Time to test a theory. Cryomancy was the art of manipulating ice. Ice is most often formed from water. Water, which was currently falling from the sky. I managed a wider grin as the scene played repeatedly in my mind. The fact was I could change the states of my ice nearly instantly, as long as it was being touched. So if I were to, I don't know, rapidly change the rain back and forth. Well, I chuckled to myself.
Thunder and lightning continued to shake the very foundation on which I stood. I pushed the door wide. The tip of my ears and primaries tingled as I imagined freezing everything directly above me. I stepped into the downpour. The chill ran up my spine and nestled between my wings. Wings spread wide, I waited. I waited for the rain to soak me to the bone, and nothing. Instead of an impromptu shower, I was met with the gentle fingers of a winter mist swirling and crawling around me in a malformed dome.
"Hell yeah!" I pumped a hoof as I laughed loud enough that even the rumble of thunder overhead could drown me out completely. "Foresight said to find my limits, well how about rapid freezing and unfreezing of rain at a constant? How is that for a limit?"
Now, my plan had worked for the most part. The mist might have been better than freezing rain, but it was still damp and thick enough that, combined with the rain and overhead cloud cover, I could barely see two hooves ahead of me. I'd have been completely lost if I hadn't traveled this same path countless times. Well, that and my lowlight vision. Really need to thank Dam for that.
"Beggars can't be choosers," I said. My euphoria faded as I stomped through mud and puddles. If only mud was so quickly dealt with. "Could be worse," I assured myself I'd find a better workaround in the future. A mist done was almost more trouble than it was worth.
I had yet to make it ten hooves into town before I heard a yell in my direction. The mist was thickest directly above me, where the whole process started. So I was left peering about blindly as the voice yelled a second time.
"Hello?" I asked into the dark.
"Somepony there?" the voice asked. It was noticeably closer. Through the mist and rain, I thought I saw the telltale signs of wings flapping and the pony they were connected to.
"Yeah, I'm in the mist."
The flaps grew closer. "How in the name of Faust did you get in there?"
"I didn't want to get wet, so I went with mist instead. To be honest, I'm still wet, so it didn't go quite as planned."
Then, a head poked itself through my misty barrier. A mare with colors so dark, she was almost lost in the store's veil. I blinked at her, and she blinked back. She then reached in and jabbed my side. "Well, never seen anything like this before. Pretty crafty, little colt."
I shrugged. "I live to impress, ma'am." I had to guess she was with the Weather team. However, if she did have any identifying items, I couldn't see them.
"What is a colt like you even doing in this chaos?" the mare asked. She continued to eye me. It was like she expected me to simply vanish at any moment. If I could do it, it would be a decent prank.
"I'm a cadet with the guard, ma'am. I'm reporting in to help as best I can." I offered a salute. The mare snorted and waved my salute down.
"A little young, aren't you, even for a cadet."
I shrugged. "The Sergeant seemed to think I'd be fine."
The mare seemed to weigh her options before sighing and looking over her shoulder. "Fine, but I am following you to the door. I won't be held responsible if a foal gets lost in this Tartarus damned tempest."
"Aye, aye," I said. Then, I started off at a casual trot. After several minutes of walking, the weathermare clearly had an unaired question. One that left her a suspicious mess, something that several other pegasi took note of as we passed. Though they were too busy to do more than watch. I was left pondering the scope of the storm. It was definitely thicker and louder here than back in the moores. If anything, I would have thought the more it used up its payload of water and lightning, the lighter it'd be, not darker.
"Ma'am?" I asked.
The weathermare had been eying the storm as well. My question pulled her attention back, and she looked at me through rain-soaked bangs.
"Yeah?"
"Shouldn't the storm be getting better, not worse?"
She shook her head, bangs flapping wildly. "Was thinking the same thing, Colt. Then, that blasted front came up from the seas, and now, we're in one wicked storm."
The new front was news to me. I hadn't heard anything of the sort before I went home. Which meant nopony had seen it until it was too late. As if in response to my inner dialogue, The wind picked up enough that, combined with the hoof-deep water that sloshed about in the streets, I had to brace just to avoid falling flat on my face.
"Colt, this ain't the way to the Day House," The mare beside me said.
I gave her a bemused smile. "Not going to the Day House. I'm a cadet with Nigth Guard." The look on her face would have been funny if I wasn't struggling to stay standing as she leered at me.
"Really?" she asked. There was nothing else to it. No anger or offense. This mare, at least, was not Freezy Breeze. I had to cringe at myself. Neither this mare nor the Weather Office as a whole should be assumed to share their captain's views. That wouldn't be fair at all.
"Yes, ma'am." I thought to say more, only before another voice pulled my and the mare's attention ahead. Another pony was making their way towards us and gave us both pause.
"Colt, Glacial, that you?"
I had to withhold a snicker. Levvy came plodding through the waterlogged road, waving in my direction. Her reds stuck out even in the blinding rain. The mare beside me balked.
"Yeah, Levvy, it's me. Sorry, I'm running a bit behind."
Levvy came to a stop in front of my dome, waving a hoof at an idle strand of mist that slowly drifted in her direction. "How the heck did you do…whatever this is?"
"Excuse me, you're with the Night Guard, right?" the mare beside me asked.
Levvy gave the mare an idle look and nodded. "That's right, and you are?" Levvy took a single heavy step toward the weathermare.
"Windy Way, with the Weather Office. I saw this colt come into town and wanted to ensure he wasn't swept away in the floods."
Levvy eyed Windy, who took a step worth of flight back. I wasn't sure what to call an aerial step back, and I don't know if such a term even existed. Levvy took another step forward before breaking into a grin. "Well, isn't that kind of ya? I can take the colt the rest of the way. We can't really afford to hold up the weather team, now can we?"
Windy seemed ready to argue but, after several seconds, nodded. "Not in this storm. Well, good luck to both of you. Stay safe." That said, Windy turned and flew up toward the clouds.
"She was nice," I mused. Before I could react, I had a hoof cuff me at the nape.
"Come on, you little troublemaker. You had the others a bit worried."
I stumbled forward and fell in beside my senior. "Really?"
"You're nearly an hour late, and this weather only got worse since you went home." Levvy waved at the storm above us. "Not a pretty one, that's for sure."
"Something about a front from the seas or something, right?" I asked.
Levvy flicked a hoof idly, spraying a line in the same direction. "Not much for weather and the like. Dossy could tell ya better than I. All I know is it is big and nasty." By then, we'd made it to the everstanding, unshakable brick in the middle of Bogwood, the Night House.
"Alright, inside, we got too much work to do to have you twiddling your hooves." Levvy gave me a hearty push right into the front door.
I dropped my mist dome and glowered back at her but pushed the door open all the same. No sooner had I stepped inside than a pair of ink-spotted purple hooves pulled me deeper into the reception room. I flailed in surprise as a very annoyed-looking mare held me at hooves length.
"Not drowned, at least," Dossier said, nose raised high with indignation.
I went slack in her grip. "Not yet," I confirmed.
"Good, because we have too much to do without adding 'find unruly cadet' to it. Now, the four of us better get to it." Dossier turned and pointed to Distant Point, who'd entered the room following Dossier's welcome.
"Night Glider and Sarge?" I asked.
"Already out. I expect Night Glider will bite your head off once the storm is sorted," Distant said with a devious smirk.
"Alright, cadet accounted for, everypony knows their duties," Dossier said, clapping along with her demand.
I raised a hoof politely. "I don't."
"You're with me, Colt. We're gonna do us some straggler hunting," Distant snarked, slapping a hoof to her chest. Her cobalt blues twinked in the dim light of the Night House candles. A feat made all the easier by the natural glow of thestral eyes.
"There are stragglers in this weather right now?" I asked.
Distant nodded. "There are always stragglers. It is also the easiest and one of the least dangerous jobs at the moment. You're still a cadet, and with Captain Breezy's less-than-cordial run-ins with you, we can't have you in the midst of the chaos."
I rolled my eyes and huffed. I pouted on full tilt as I watched Distant merrily explain how hard they wanted me out of the way. Even if they had a good point, it was the principle of the matter. I deserved some darn respect.
"Fine then, I won't share my new super secret 'avoid getting wet' technique."
Levvy giggled and nodded along with me. "It's really something. Seems the foal took Foresight's advice."
Distant's brow furrowed as she eyed Levvy and me. "You can't be serious."
I stuck my tongue out in reply. "Guess you'll just have to find out. Then get nothing out of it, ma'am."
"Don't you dare start with that? You little plot."
"Excuse you, Private?" Distant realized her mistake too late. Private First Class Clear Dossier had taken exception to such language. I applied the best puppy dog eyes I could and gave an exaggerated sniffle.
Distant stood in disbelief as Dossy stepped between Distant and myself. "Distant Point!"
Distant could do nothing but point a stark white hoof at me. "He's a cadet. He can handle a little cursing. That and he is totally faking."
Levvy was biting a hoof so hard I feared she might draw blood in her pursuit to not collapse in a fit of laughter.
"Regardless, we have our assignments. Distant, I expect you to keep an eye on the cadet. Am I understood?" Dossier jabbed a hoof at my assigned lead.
Distant looked ready to argue, but after a brief war of desire and discipline on her face, she simply saluted. "Yes, ma'am."
"By the way, Private Point, ma'am. I was only teasing, ma'am. I will absolutely share my super secret-keeping dry spell with you. We are comrades and all." I snapped another salute. The war on her face from a moment ago returned for a second siege.
Dossy, though, seemed pleased enough to leave the issue there. "Good, now, we have a storm to conquer."
Levvy opened the front door to the raging tempest and waved us out. "Have fun, you two, and try to avoid drowning if you can."
Distant ignored her and trotted out into the elements. "Alright, you little fiend. Let's go."
I skipped along behind her. "Yes, ma'am." The growl Distant conjured was only partially obscured by the thunder overhead.
"So, Distant, care to avoid some rain?" I asked. I didn't wait for a reply; instead, I conjured my dome of mist. It was a pleasant feeling knowing the first time wasn't a fluke. That and the seemingly minute amount of motes to keep it up. The second part, however, was a bit less simple. As will all the ice, or in this case, the rapidly cooling and defusing ice I could conjure, the more and farther it went, the harder it became.
It was like a held sneeze: the more force I put into not letting it go, the easier it was to release. However, the dome grew, and its diameter increased until there was enough room for two. Distant flinched slightly as the mist wrapped her in its cocoon. She was still a bit drippy from stepping out into the rain before me but wasn't soaked to the bone, if nothing else.
"Well, this is different," Distant said, waving a hoof idly at the mist's wall. "How'd you come up with something like this?"
"Dumb luck and trial and error. It was a lot easier than you'd think."
"A bit impractical, though. You can barely see anything through the haze and rain."
I nodded. "True, but I think it is a good first attempt."
Distant hummed before swiping me off my hooves and going airborne. "Once we get past the cloud layer, we'll move closer to the perimeter. Though we'll have to drop your little shield to be able to search the area."
All I managed was a surprised gasp and a grunt as Distant blasted up at a steep incline. The shield barely kept up. Her ever-increasing speed dispersed the vapor almost faster than I could form it. The second we did break through the cloud layer, the rain ceased.
I dropped the dome and wiggled in Distant's grasp. "I can fly too, you know."
"This was faster." It was. "Now, once we get to the edge of the storm, we're gonna meet some of the cloud shepherds who are keeping the rain in as compact an area as possible."
My ear flicked. "Doesn't that mean the rain will worsen the closer we get to the edge? Pressing all those clouds together won't make our job any easier."
Distant scanned the horizon. "No, it won't. That's why guards look for stragglers to begin with. The rain will make navigating and staying warm nearly impossible. A few louts always think they're tougher or faster than they are."
Distant must have seen whatever she was looking for because she sped up, and without warning, she blasted off in a random direction. The flight was two minutes at most. We came to a complete halt within meters of three weather ponies who were discussing something with great gusto, so much so that they didn't even notice our arrival.
"It's getting worse. At this rate, it'll bury the town." one of the weather ponies, a beige mare with the poofiest mane I'd ever seen, said.
"Bogwood has seen worse, Billow," An older mare, gray in coat and mane, said, tapping the nearest cloud. The stormcloud shuddered, releasing a crack of lighting at random.
"Storm Crash, please. We don't have time for any—" Billow's words petered out as she looked in our direction.
"Don't mind us, ladies," Distant said, giving the three weather ponies a limp wave.
"About time. We're already behind schedule," Billow said. She waved to the marshland below. "We caught a few farm folk who got themselves caught in the muck. We could use the extra hooves."
Distant let me go and nodded. The humor had melted away to a somewhat surprising seriousness. I took a spot next to her and waited for her lead.
"Where?"
Storm Crash pointed almost directly beneath herself. "Right below. Three, two mares and a foal. Under an uprooted tree. All earth ponies."
"Glacial," Distant turned to me and pointed to herself. "Keep close and pay attention. This is what being a night guard is really about, these moments."
I nodded and stepped up beside her. "Right."
"Hay of a time to bring a foal around, apprentice or not," the third unnamed pegasus chuckled dryly. Her colors were striking when pinned to the dark found below. Her mane was the gentle pink of a summer sunrise, and her eyes were like the morning mist. She reminded Hal and me of the more common non-alicorn forms given to Celestia. It wasn't a one-for-one, but it was close enough to be striking.
"If not now, then when?" Distant asked. Even so, judging by her pulling a small opening in the clouds to suss out the currently marooned ponies below, she didn't really seem interested in an answer. I was good living without one as well.
"Leave it be, Misty, we've better things to do," Storm said, joining Distant at the new opening. "There's a local miller's shop not too far from here. It wouldn't be comfortable, but it will at least be dry."
Distant nodded. "I'll take one mare. I hope the three of you can handle the other mare and foal." She looked over her shoulder to the three weather mares who seemed ready to dive through the hole Distant made. With an eye roll, she spread the opening to nearly two ponies wide.
"We can," Storm Crash confirmed.
Without looking, Distant took a step forward and fell back into the realm of rain, wind, and muck. Storm Crash followed a second behind. I offered a sympathetic shrug to the other two weather mares and jumped as well. The change was instant. The wind was nearly enough to send me into a tailspin. By the time I'd corrected myself, Distant and Storm Crash had made it to the fallen tree. Exactly as said, three very miserable earth ponies sat huddled in the meager protection of the tree trunk.
"Coming Colt?" Billow asked as she spun past me. Her poofy mane swayed unbothered by the water pouring down atop it.
A thought then struck me. Without a word, a smile tugged at my lip. I glided as evenly as I could down to the evac zone. As the mares spoke amongst one another. I gave the old tree a tap. As soon as my hoof made contact, I willed the trunk to freeze. Then, I projected the ice out at an arch over the soaking mares. It caught them all by surprise. Even Distant, for all her sharp wit and sharper eyes, had to give the sudden lack of rain pouring down on them a second glance. It was lopsided and thinner the further out it went, but a crappy roof in the rain was better than no roof at all. I couldn't help but chuckle as I rounded the tree and winked.
"How's that?" I asked.
Distant looked the arch over and chuckled. "Could be worse."
"The colt did that?" Billow asked.
I nodded eagerly. "Thought the stragglers could use a moment of peace before you soar off with them."
"Do what?" One of the earth mares asked.
Misty rolled her eyes. "Like we were saying, there's a mill nearby. It'll be safe till the rain calms down a bit. It's better than hiding here."
"It'll be quick. We'll nab ya, get you to the mill, and try to get you as safe as we can. We promise, ma'am," Distant said, clapping her hooves together in finality.
The earth mares did not seem convinced but made no attempt to argue. They simply shared an unsure look and waited. The next part was simple enough. Distant grabbed one mare, Billow grabbed another, and Storm Crash spotted her just in case.
The weather team members were fit, but more like an athlete, thin, trim and built for the harsher elements that could come about in their field. Distant Point was athletic, but there was more to it: a thicker layer of muscle, even those of her wings stretched and clenched with a raw power the others simply lacked. It could have been a thestral thing, but regarding those of the Day Guard I have seen, it would make it more a guard trait. Even I'd shaped up a little while training at the Night House. As young as I was, I was undoubtedly in decent shape all the same.
Misty had the foal, and I was left an observer. It left a sour taste on my tongue. I didn't like not doing anything useful. The ice cover I'd made was a pleasant luxury but not much more. I was young, not a leper.
The earth herd was dropped off at the Miller's shop, which was drier than I think anyone expected. It was damp, sure, but not so moist that there was even a ceiling drip to worry about. I think it was the sawdust; that stuff could dry up anything.
"Alright, next round. Are you doing okay, cadet? These winds aren't exactly prime flight conditions. If you need a break—"
I waved a hoof dismissively. "I'm fine. I am a member of the Night Guard, right? I'll pull my own weight." That earned me a ruffled mane, which earned Distant Point a snarl and a smacked hoof.
"Well, second patrol, let's hope we don't find anypony else out today."
"It is never that easy," Storm Crash said. She leered at the storm like one would eye their lifelong rival. It was a challenge to be conquered. Her name made more and more sense. Her wary eyes splashed in water, never blinked, and never gave way to weakness. I'd never seen Storm Crash before tonight, not once. She was older, though, probably older than Freezy Breeze. She was in better shape than most of her companions as well. The other two also seemed to defer to her, like she'd done this a hundred times before. I'd believe it if she had.
I'd dismissed Distant, but my wings shook even before we flew back into the storm's embrace. As much as I'd love to say that the training and patrols I'd been on had prepared me for the storm, the truth was I was still very much literally and figuratively wet behind the ears. In a few months, a year, more, I'm sure I'd be fine, but that was future me. Current me was huffing and puffing and praying. Distant Point should have noticed.
The second patrol barely began before we heard the cries of someone in over their head. I could very much relate.
In that instant, we rounded a pair of shops I didn't recognize. The wealthier part of town had a few more exclusive businesses. Though even the richest ponies in Bogwood were still less well off than most middle class in bigger cities like Baltimare. We encountered two ponies, a stallion and a mare, stuck atop several stacked crates. Crates that, with the rest of the street, had flooded entirely. It must have been three, maybe four hooves deep.
"How in the name of Faust did they even get here?" Billow asked. She pressed a hoof hard into her forehead and said some things that she might have thought were hidden in the rain and thunder. They were not.
"A better question: how did two unicorns manage this situation?" Misty fumed.
"We're on Clever Course Street. I'd have been more surprised if they hadn't," Distant said. She waved idly at the two stuck unicorns. They screamed back, their words lost in the gale.
"The flooding is getting worse, and there are no dropoffs in the area either," Storm Crash said. She waved for us to follow as she drew up alongside the ponies in need.
"About time. I thought we'd end up drowned in these blasted streets." The mare pointed down at the clawing, churning waters with deathly resolution.
"Not now, Triste. Curse the waters once we're nice and dry." Triste's stallion companion swatted the mare on the back of her head, which seemed to spur her hate further.
"What's the call, Storm?"
"Is there somewhere that could be used if the water was routed?" I asked.
The collection of mares and one stallion turned their attention to me. The stallion looked at me pitably, like one might eye a puppy on the side of the road. I responded by mouthing a few choice words. Ones, even in the rain, were unmistakable on the lips.
"Does it matter?" Misty asked.
I nodded. "Sure, I might be able to do something about the flooding if we have somewhere in mind."
"Hah, funny colt." Billow laughed.
Distant jabbed Billow in the side hard. Hard enough to stagger her in mid-flight. Which she barely recovered from fast enough to avoid a very unwanted bath. "My cadet may be able to back up those words of his. So, do we have a location or not?"
Storm Crash coughed and looked back over her shoulder. "There are a couple of warehouses the Weather Bureau uses for leftover drizzles, showers, and chills. Summer and Spring, mostly. Those warehouses are waterproof and built to last."
"Can you show me?" I asked.
Storm Crash only hesitated a second before taking off. I was as best I could right on her contrails. My headache had returned. A deep throbbing that resonated with both my heartbeat and the ache in my wings. The location, in mind, was pretty close, at least. The flooding had the latch and door nice and underwater, mostly. The sidestreet from Clever Course was a mostly empty lot, bordered by some of the larger businesses in the area, which would make perfect anchors.
"What are you thinking, young night guard?"
"Ice."
Storm Crash waited, and, seeing that I had no intent on explaining further, she looked back toward the group we'd left behind. "Perhaps my companion was right."
"Just watch," I said, lowering myself within reach of the flowing waters. I took a slow, deep breath and placed a hoof into the water. "Freeze."
The water obeyed. It started slowly, a creeping pool of ice drifting out from my hoof. The further it moved, the faster it became. The deeper it went, the thicker it grew. I could feel it spreading. It tingled gently as it reached the road beneath. My breath caught, now vapor in the wind. The cold was rapturous, addicting. It crawled up my hooves and between my wings. It nestled and formed a semi-peytral around my chest and back. Then, as quickly as it began, it stopped. As thick as my barrel, a wall of glowing blue ice stood jutting out of the water.
The waters beyond it had already started to slow and receded, pulled free from the opposite road as the current drained itself from the lot. I sat atop my construct, panting hard. The ice that had engulfed me twinkled as the rain bounced off it.
"By the divine, Colt, how did you manage such a feat?" Storm Crash asked.
I shook my head and barked out a sardonic laugh. "I know less than you, Ms. Crash. I just did what came naturally."
"Well, it certainly fulfilled your promise, young colt. I am impressed." Storm Crash offered the faintest twitch of a smile. "I will retrieve the others. Take a moment to rest. You have earned that, if nothing else."
I saluted. "Aye." Storm nodded and was off. Her gray fading into the somber deluge. I repressed both the desire to shout in elation that my plan worked and the need to groan at just how much more draining this had been. The tree had been nearly effortless, though accidental. One might think controlled magic would be more efficient, but what did I know?
The others found their way to the warehouse lot as the waters drained to a leftover pool of water and muck. The area might be gross, but the doors to the warehouse were at least reachable now. I patted my wall and grinned as the others took in the sight of me.
"I told you he could do it," Distant shouted. She was carrying the stranded stallion and was grinning a sharp-toothed smile ear to ear.
"A foal did this?" Billow asked as she passed over me, Triste in hoof. The rescued mare swung slack-jawed in Billow's grasp.
"He did," Storm Crash assured. "Misty, the door if you would."
The remaining mare nodded absently. As she undid the latch on the door, she waved the two rescued ponies in. Neither looked too happy with the mud that wrapped around their hooves the second they were placed down. Though they both strutted their way into the warehouse without a word.
"Good work, Glacial," Distant said, wrapping me in a wing hug. The wet thwack of wet feathers around my back sent a shiver to follow. "Really pushing those limits, huh?"
I shook my head. "I honestly thought it'd be easier. Water freezes really well, better than trees, at least. But this was way more tiring than the other day's accident."
"Really? That's strange."
"Ruminate later. The storm has not broken yet." Storm Crash was airborne before anypony could respond.
"She's relentless," Misty said. She let out a short sigh and took flight. Billow was right behind her. Distant chuckled and released me from her soaked affections.
"Never an idle hoof, right?"
I shrugged. "Not today."
The way back up and over the town was becoming more demanding. My wings protested with every flap. Storm Crash stopped midflight. The sudden slow resulted in the rest of the group stalling as well. All behind the group's de facto leader. A mare that challenged the heavens above to face her. The look she wore now told a very different story.
"Why'd you stop?" Billow asked. Storm Crash pointed a shaking gray hoof to the horizon. The rest of us turned to look as well.
"You were right, Billow."
We didn't even make it above the cloud line. What followed needed elevation, a clear gaze over the horizon. But, even here, being pelted with rain so hard it stung. I had to toss my bangs over my ear. I found it hard to swallow, to do anything but look on struck dumb. The others weren't doing much better. Billow's jaw hung wide. Storm Crash held a hoof above her eyes, perhaps thinking that it was a trick of the eye. I wish it was.
"By the stars." It was barely a whisper. Misty shook her head absently, her eyes still glued to the marsh ahead.
"What is that?" I asked. I did not expect an answer. The whole scene, from horizon to horizon, like the earth had risen as an angered wave, bared down from the swollen, flushed bog that surrounded us in all directions. Forthcoming, it crawled at ever-increasing velocity towards the sole bastion formed from blood, sweat, mud, tears, and ample governance that we called home.
"Luna, have mercy on us all." Those were the only words one could use to describe what drew ever more clearly. The swamp had flooded. A massive wall of mud and water crashed and roared down from the higher wetlands. Lands rarely traveled by pony. There was nothing in that direction, no land, no fortune, no hope. In our domestic efforts to salvage the ports and farms, we'd not paid the wetlands any mind. In fact, we'd not been pressed to even look in the directions of those lands at all. Hubris is the sin we now reckoned for. Hal was reminded of a story of a captain blind to all but a whale as white as bone.
"We can't stop that," It was a whisper. Billow had barely parted her lips. But the words were unmistakable, a truth every pony present knew for sure.
"Bogwood, we need to warn—" I was cut off by the gentle placement of a hoof on my shoulder. I looked to Distant Point, to my senior, a mare who seemed a smirk away from a joke. There was no humor left in the mare. It had been drained, and in its place, dread, a bile concoction that suffocated her very nature.
"We'd never make it," Distant said. Her eyes never left the tide of mud and bilge.
Nonono, my heart was pounding at an irregular tempo. My blood ran cold, a deeper chill than anything I'd ever felt. No, that wasn't entirely true. Hal had, on that night, with the rain, the dog, and the man in the shadows. My icy peytral hummed along to the tempo my heart had set. The very chill of death itself. It was enough to shatter the greatest of wills.
It was a sick joke to be staring down nature itself, to see what was coming, to know what it meant, and to be cast as only an observer. All that water and mud, and for a brief moment, I saw red; then, it changed. The feeling remained, and then the red was replaced with a bright, luminescent blue. I felt my wings stretch wide. Something tugged at my mind. The faintest glimmer. It was said that in the deepest dark, the brightest light shined. This was no light. No, it was cold and deep.
But with that feeling, in the cold, something clicked. Something called in the dark, like a siren. There was no music, only a need. My hooves glistened in their frozen shell. My breath cusped and coiled around my muzzle. I heard something to my side. A distant, indecipherable noise. I ignored it. Then, something grabbed my hoof. I glanced over, everything tinged in frost.
"Glacial."
Distant Point was holding my limb taut. She looked panicked, not like before, not toward the mud and water and death. She was crying. Her whole body shook in matched time to her shaken breaths. Her words barely crossed the space between us, as if they had frozen in midair.
"Glacial, what are you doing?" Her question was desperate. She clamped down on my hoof with what meager strength she could conjure. It was too little. It was too late. "Glacial, please. What are you doing?"
I looked from her back to the oncoming wave of marsh and rain. For a second, I stopped and realized what I was doing, what could happen, and what more it could take. Then, the cold swallowed my doubt, as it had everything else. I pulled my leg free. Everything faded until there was nothing more than me and the surge that sought to drown everything I knew and cared about. If the wave collided, dozens, hundreds would be buried. It made me sick. It dredged up every repressed hiss of boiling anger I could manage. I would not be a victim, not a purveyor, not this time.
"The only thing I can do."
The edges of Bogwood were a sparse place. The deeper into the swamp you went, the more dangerous it became. That was, unfortunately, the only silver lining to the Tartarus that was today. The nearest building was two hundred meters behind me. I hoped everypony had moved inland. One deep breath and I gazed up at the wall of death before me. The earth roared, the very land warping beneath my hooves. The blistering winds and stinging rain left the wall of muck and churning water, a shapeless mass towering over me. Yet, I did not relent, stomping across the crumbling ground through sloshing green water. The puddles and pools froze beneath my hooves. My mane whipped and slapped against my face with every changing gale. Yet I marched on. Deep down past the frost and fear, a voice pleaded in a part of me, begging for sense and reason. I had emptied those reserves some time ago. In some ways, it was peaceful and simple on my grand parade toward the wave of death. I was lost to the madness, the concern, the worry.
The cold froze many things, rationality being the most relevant. The path I took was one few could relate to, and to that fact, I simply didn't care. The horror and reality sat nestled in the back of my mind. I could feel them tugging, struggling to shake me free of this moment of insanity. Yet I trudged on, the gusts alone nearly sending me tossing and churning in their wake. My ice-covered hooves have to anchor themselves between each step to make any progress. The mudslide blanketed all I could survey: a brown, grey, and green sky. Like the heavens themselves had wretched in repulsion. I had never felt so small, so insignificant. Though the world was whipped into a frenzy, I stood blinded, frozen literally to the spot. I was astounded at how quiet it had become.
It was an almost familiar nostalgia; I recalled Distant Point's face, despair, and acceptance. The look of the defeated. It was enough to spur on my crusade all on its own. I was, in fact, very not alone. Hundreds of lives, many with no knowledge of what would come, what would consume everything. The weary but hopeful ponies hunkered down, waiting for the tide to turn. It made me sick. A thick bile crept up my throat. Seconds, mere seconds, until I stared the reaper in the eye. Let it claim what it may, but I would not be the one to blink. First, I would not go quietly into the night.
When Glacial Zero stared out into the storm's heart, he wept; he wanted to beg for their father. He wished for nothing but this all to go away. Hal disagreed; he, I would not die helpless again; I would not lay broken in the rain. I grit my teeth hard enough to taste iron. The time to choose had passed. The mudslide was here. It groaned, and I yelled back.
"Everything freeze!"
The world around me complied. The air frosted, my breath vapor in the air. The hair down my neck and up my spine stood on end, wreathed in ice crystals. Even without looking behind me, I could feel the tingle and the lightning being reflected off the ice in the air. The land beneath me hardened further and crunched beneath my hooves like fresh snow. Then, it expanded, creeping outward. It was slow at first, barely a crawl. It pushed forward from my forehooves and spilled forth, no form or grace. A simple sporadic web of greedy, cold death. It touched the lowest muck of the wetland's refuse within a second. The ice snaked up and expanded in bands. Like a waning snowflake, a curved arch of unique arms stood before the raging storm.
The air misting in its wake. It grew and swelled in response to the tsunami's crashing waters. It had long cast me in its shadow. It promised my death. I planned to make nature itself a liar. I had, without notice, spread my wings wide. My heart had slowed to the point one would mistake it for having stopped altogether. Time slowed, and the world was captured in snapshots between actions like the world skipping frames of animation and points on a line chart. Hal's memory of flipbooks and old-time cartoons. The concept felt so natural, so expected, even as no such thing existed for Glacial Zero.
As my ice grew, more and more of the muddy wave weighed down upon my growing wall. Fear fed my magic, my rage. Yet, the wave did not stop nor stall. It pressed in harder and further. I stamped a hoof hard into the ice beneath it. The collected debris shaped into shrapnel clinked and plinked into the ice, speckling it with a myriad of rotten floral arrangements and bark. The crunch was barely audible in the torrent. Then, it all started to crack. The ice splintered, chipped, and gave way. One frozen limb would splinter to icy dust, only for another to grow in its place. Every woven tendril renewed left me a breath shorter. The cold settled deeper, sharper, up the body and back down. Since I'd discovered my talent. I'd found the cold to be almost wholly muted. It seemed as if I'd become immune to the wind and sheer. That had been proven false.
I pressed in further, screaming into the storm, my words lost in the wind. More and more ice poured, filling in every crack, doubling, tripling the wall over and over again. It wasn't enough; more cracks, splinters, and spider webs of fear were tracing back to my hooves where it all began. My legs had frozen entirely to the ground, up to my withers, back around but not over my wings. My back legs had emulated my forelegs, trailing ice over my flanks and freezing even my tail solid.
I could feel it on my neck, flecking and chipping with every twitch. Even the blood trailing down my lip had frozen over. It only made me angrier. I'd heard nothing, but others told me I needed to know my magic's limits. Well, if it was the last thing I did, I would know just where the line was drawn. My breath came in sharp gasps as I widened the icy shell further as the water fell in grand waterfalls all around me, partially freezing even as they reached the ground.
"More. Come on, More," I said, shifting what weight I could to my back hooves. The wind had picked up, and I feared I'd have been blown away if I hadn't been mostly frozen in place. Tears stung in the corners of my eyes. Everything hurt; my legs, wings, and even my breathing were raw, my throat burning as I pressed the attack.
I could barely see past the permafrost. The shadow that still loomed over me had split; waves, slower and shallower than the main body, sloshed past me on either side. I held enough if only barely, to see the fading spark of hope ignite once more. In the cold, in the ice, well below zero, I was home; this was all that I was. Bogwood would survive, a promise that passed over and over from my swollen, blackened lips. The words were barely a scratchy hiss in the chaos.
The ice shattered from the edges inward. I glared up in the mud and rain. My ice stretched further, sealing itself at every new open wound. My thoughts fogged over, my barely conscious body pumping what little I could cobble together into my magic. It was then that something tugged at my fading sight. A glimpse of white so pure it dazzled even in the maelstrom. It glinted, dancing through the night. The rain and winds could do little to impede its graceful flittering. It grew closer by the second.
"Glacial Zero! You. Big. Stupid. Idiot."
I'd have blinked if my eyelids weren't frozen wide. The voice traveled as if the storm wasn't snarling and gnashing with uproarious rage. The white had stopped right before me, between me and the tsunami.
"What do you think you are doing?"
Freya reached out, waving a hoof through my face. As she did, as if ensnared like a magnet, the frost and ice that had consumed my eyes, muzzle, ears, and neck came free and fell to the ground.
"Are you trying to die?"
"Fre…yah." My throat was raw and numb; I could barely feel my tongue. "You're?"
"So mad at you it hurts. Yes, yes, I am."
A resounding snap reminded Freya and me that there were still things to attend to. The most important thing being that I was still barely holding up a wall of ice. "Not yet."
I willed my magic harder with the meager weight of my mostly frozen body. The ice pulsed in response, buying myself seconds at most. I winced, eyes flitting between Freya and the disaster ahead of me.
"That won't work, not like this. You'll need all of it." Freya said. Her head fell forward, shaking in silent protest. "Glacie, you need more, and I'm so sorry."
"What?" It was all too fast, and my thoughts fogged over as I tried to line up the pieces for today. The moments all blurred into a right mess.
Freya turned to me, floating forward and resting a hoof on my shoulder. I could feel it, the weight, the soft fur, the keratin pressing down on my still-thawing form. The longer she touched, the faster the ice across my body retreated.
"I can feel you," I whispered.
"Do you trust me?" Freya asked.
I could do little but stare dumbly back. Her eyes and mine stuck, gauging our every last move. I didn't know what I'd expected. I had to wonder, was this my mind's last feeble plea for survival, a simple trick as I froze whole? Freya, returning, being at my side in my last moments? Could I afford to think otherwise? Her question hung in the air as the barrier around us continued to give way.
Jaw clenched, I nodded. "Yes."
Freya's face contorted in a mix of shame and pity. Her hoof traveled up my shoulder and came to rest on one cheek. Her other hoof mirrored the placement of the first. Her smile was the last thing I saw before she stepped forward. Freya had flailed about through me in any number of ways before. A hoof through my head, walking through me entirely, and everything in between. The feeling was like a gentle breeze or a sudden cold down your spine.
This time, it was different. There was no gentle breeze, no cold. It was a euphoric second wind, an adrenaline spike that sent a determined scream through every inch of my body. My ice stopped; there were no more cracks, splinters, or spiderweb-like veins through the whole of the wall.
What came next left me shocked and awed. The body is a miraculous thing. It does so much that the ordinary person or pony wouldn't even consider. It protects itself with limiters and failsafes no one would even know to think up. I could not tell if this was much the magical equivalent, a valve to determine how much one could push their magic without it simply exploding, taking the user with it.
If there were such a thing, then this must be what it felt like for such things to tear away—to simply cease. A shield brought down, a door left wide. A blizzard in a bottle, the cork pulled free. If my ice had been a river crashing into the high tide in defiance, what came next was the wails of the ever-freezing storms that consumed what was once the Crystal Empire—the storms that the Crystal Heart warded against. It was addicting.
My ice surged, crashed, pushed, and pressed. Ever-increasing crests of frost slammed harder and harder into the tidal front that sought to wash me away. I hadn't realized I'd stepped forward. No, I sprinted forward, up the ice I commanded, rising like the tide before me. As I did, the ice spread, no longer a simple shield, no, now it devoured. The wave no longer slowed to the sides. Now it froze. I stood at the crown of my hoofmade iceberg and bared down upon the very destructive battering ram that had only moments before claimed my life as forfeit.
"Perhaps you did not hear me before…" I said, throat still raw, words shaky on a numb tongue. "I. Said. Freeze!" The ice beneath me glowed a deep blue, pulsing and growing brighter with every passing second. From my perch, I stared down at what had befallen all in the wave's path. The wetlands were opposite that of the farmlands. Before making it to town, there had been no pony to kill or lives to destroy. It was likely that the farms would remain untouched even if the tide came in full upon Bogwood. The only survivors to spread the tale of what befell the small port town. In almost all cases, the town would have simply been erased with nothing but shattered wood and stone to signify it had ever been there at all. This was not one of those cases; this was not that chance, that stark reminder of what nature can do if ignored or forgotten.
Instead, where a mighty surging disaster of debris, mud, and marsh water once was. There was now a clawing spire of glowing ice, a pulsing, humming reminder that nature could be conquered, that fate could be changed. A gnarled hand reached to the heavens. It begged for help, yet no one came.
This much power was enough to get a pony drunk and addicted. A pony shouldn't have this much power. It was humbling. Atop a mountain of ice, a single foal saved the day. A typical pony would be elated. I just felt cold.
"I'm sorry."
I gasped, a hoof clenching at my chest. Freya stood beside me. She stared back down the path not traveled towards Bogwood. I staggered like I'd been winded by a sudden crippling blow. The world swam. The ice beneath me pulsed harder. I'd barely seen it out of the corner of my vision. Freya simply walked out of me like nothing had happened at all.
"It hurts. I know, but look what you did, Glacie, look what was in you. So much potential, so much ice, a cold beyond anything you could possibly know."
"Freya, what did you do?" I asked. "Where were you?"
Freya placed a hoof on my shoulder and guided me to look back toward Bogwood. I hadn't imagined it before. Freya's hoof was solid, stable, and alive. I couldn't muster any resistance. I simply let her turn me around. Though weaker, the rain still fell, and the thunder flashed with light. The town was still silent and empty, except for the few pegasi and thestrals who did what they could to protect their home. Amongst those ponies, a gathering had collected, maybe a dozen, amongst the weather teams and the guards. Some stood on cloud tops. Others carried on their own wings. One thing in common: they were all staring at me. I could not make out their faces, most were simply shapes in the dark. Even thestral vision had limits.
"Freya, what was that? What did you do?" I asked again.
She laughed a joyless pedantic chuckle. It did not match the tears on her cheeks or the smile, a sad, pitiful smile like that of the damned. I could barely stand. My body protested every pounding in my head, every shifting of my legs.
"I'll tell you later. I promise, when you're safe, when everypony is safe. There is a lot I think we both want to say. You deserve that much. For now, all you need to know is I did it all to protect you, from him, from them all, from the cold."
Her confession made no sense. Vague and cryptic, it foretold harrowing things to come if Hal's memories of fiction were to be believed. Several of the observers had started approaching, closing in as quickly and from as high over the frozen mass as possible.
I watched as three ponies tepidly hovered above my hoofwork. I swayed in the wind, no longer capable of holding myself still. I blinked up at the three. Distant Point headed the trio. She was crying and weeping, her face contorted in fear and relief. I attempted to smile, though my face was still mostly numb. I had no idea if it had come out the way I'd hoped. I tipped back and fell on my haunches. Slowly, Distant lowered herself onto my ice and stood close enough to reach out and touch me, the other two arrivals, Storm Crash, who sported an intrigued smirk and a look of amusement. Then there was Billow, who looked worse off than I did. She was lost, eyes glazed over as she processed the site before her. I was surprised she'd made it to the frozen wave without slamming face-first into the side.
"Glacial, you, you, look at it." Distant pointed a hoof at my hooves. I nodded. As the last of my adrenaline faded, I found myself pressed harder to so much as stand. Words were beyond me at the moment. "Bogwood, you—"
"He saved the whole Faust forgotten town," Storm Crash said. She tapped a hoof below her in emphasis.
"He's a colt," Billow mumbled. Storm snorted and waved her colleague off.
"Made little difference, I think," Storm said, voice raised just a bit. Billow also seemed to notice as she stepped back, muttering something under her breath.
There was no warning, no cramps or acid in the back of the throat. Before I knew what was happening. My body lurched forward, mouth wide, as I vomited hard enough for my entire body to convulse. Seconds passed before it stopped. In a slushy pool was a rather unsightly, sticky red mixture of blood and my portion of bread and cheese. I blinked.
I was on the ground. I stared apathetically to the side. An endless, unmarred bog and rain—a sight seen a thousand times would undoubtedly be seen a thousand more. I could make out voices, though they were distant and contorted, like hearing a conversation underwater.
I shivered and attempted to stand, finding my limbs limp and useless. I felt the slightest ping of worry before giving up on standing altogether. It could wait; I'd just try later. A nap sounded nice; it'd been a while since I'd had the chance.
The rain was nice and cool on my coat and skin. I felt so hot, cold, and numb all at once. It was odd. I wonder why that was? I barely reacted when something pulled me off the ground. I hummed at the damp warmth of whatever I'd been placed on. It was soft, which I liked. I didn't like that the voices were getting louder. My head pounded in rhythm to their chatter.
"Glacial, stay with us. We're going back to town." One of the voices was close, right in my ear. My head pounded harder. I grumbled weakly. A nap sounded nice.
"Billow, find whatever Night Guard you can. They should be around, " a second voice said, grunting when Billow whined. Poor Billow; maybe she had a headache, too.
There was the sound of feathers. Then, something moved beneath me. "The main shelter is back through the shopping district. The doctors should be there," The second voice said.
The first voice said something that I couldn't hear. The feathers got faster. I shifted and swayed as the air rushed past me. I grunted and idly attempted to wave away the wind.
I felt something press down on my hoof and shush me. "Relax, Glacie, just hold still." I nodded absently at the new, softer voice. The little I could see past all the nice, damply warm things were dark and sodden. Everything was so wet. Someone should do something about that. Where was Mr. Golden Sun when you needed him? The lazy jerk.
There was a thud as the rushing wind stopped. Then, there was a lurch as something ahead of me was pushed away. The rain stopped a second later. I never minded the rain, just the wet, but it was nice napping weather—during, but not in—the rain. Who would sleep out in the rain?
"What are you—?" A new voice asked from ahead of my position on the back of the warm first voice.
"We need a doctor." The very voice I'd been thinking about said.
"What happened? Why is the Night Guard bothering us and not doing their job?" I shivered as the shriek of the new speaker sent my head into a throbbing fit. "Well, Storm Crash?"
"Colt's in bad shape," the second voice, Storm Crash, said. That sounded right. My head spun as I tried to picture the pony in question. All that came to mind was a blurry, shapeless gray mass with wings. "The highlands flooded, and a mudslide nearly buried the town; it should have buried us all."
"And it didn't, why?" another voice asked.
"Colt stopped it," Storm Crash said. I felt the need to smile. A fluttering in my chest had my headache stall for a moment. That sounded like something I'd do. If only every pony had stopped the rain, then everything would have stopped.
"Very funny," The shrill voice said. "Now, why are you and that bat here?"
"She wasn't kidding, Whimsey," the first voice said. I felt the entire body beneath me tense so hard I jostled a bit.
"Oh yes, I'm sure a halfbreed colt stopped a town-ending disaster. You foolish beast." Whimsey was closer, her shrill voice louder. The body beneath me moved forward, and the tension in their back and wings doubled.
"Go check for yourself, the damned thing is frozen right there for all to see. Half the damned weather team saw it. Now get me a doctor!"
I'd have recoiled if I wasn't a limp noodle on the seething mare's back. The room had gone deathly quiet. Seconds ticked by without so much as a stray breath.
"Nurse Balm, the colt," Storm roared, stomping along with her command. The silence shattered. A clatter of hooves from all sides, voices talking over one another, caused my headache to return. The thought of a nap out of the rain sounded nice.
"This is ridiculous," Whimsey said.
"Mrs. Whimsey, it's there." The voices all stopped. I managed a choked sigh. I missed the quiet, and I kind of missed the wet, too.
"What?"
"The mud, the ice, everything." The new voice choked back a gulp. A yelp followed as something loudly stomped away. The quiet returned.
"WHAT!"
The stomping returned this time much louder and quicker than when it left.
"Get that thing out of this building, out of this town, out of Equestria."
"Excuse you?" The first voice asked.
"You heard me."
"Nurse Balm, the colt, if you will. Mrs. Whimsey seems to have lost her Faust-forsaken mind. We'll find her somewhere nice and quiet where she can regain her wits," Storm Crash said. She wasn't loud, quiet, actually. But, I heard her in my heart before I heard her with my ears. The room was more peaceful than before. They heard her, too.
"Who do you think you are talking to, you ingrate?"
A loud crack, splintered wood, an ax, here and now? I attempted a giggle. It wasn't much of a giggle, really, more a choked cough, close enough. There was more stomping and yelling. I guess Mrs. Whimsey didn't like it. She went quiet. My head throbbed again.
"Where is my son?!" The tensing beneath me got worse. There was more clattering. It got closer, a lot closer.
"Weathered Horizon, good, you can deal with your foal. Have you seen what that little beast did?" Mrs. Whimsey had become so shrill she whistled. I tried for another giggle. I coughed some more. Where was that nap?
"What did you just say?" An even newer voice. This one was louder than Whimsey.
"And Bramble Broach, another troublemaker. Take the colt and leave."
"And who exactly will force us?" Weathered asked. Weathered might buck the next pony to speak over their own horizon if they didn't watch it. I petered off into another attempted laugh. My head lulled to one side as I tried to make out whatever was beside me. A lot of Gray and some red, more than one set of wings. No pony needed more than one pair.
"Captain Freezy, please sort out these brigands. They are not welcome here—not in my town, not ever."
No response. The quiet was back. I could feel that nap right out of reach. I couldn't reach out anyway, but the thought was nice.
"Captain Freezy Breeze." With a hint of fear, Mrs. Whimsey knickered.
"No." A new voice, Freezy Breeze, if I guessed. I did guess, I did.
"Really?" Bramble asked. She snorted after. The brown blob stepped up and out of sight. The gray blobs moved closer to me and my damp, warm winged bed.
"Captain!"
"The colt stopped a mountain from burying us alive. What would you have me do to a pony like that? I'm not your hired blade. You want him gone, so you do it yourself."
"Wow, I'm surprised after what you did last week. Seems there is a brain between those ears of yours," Bramble said with a laugh.
"This, this isn't. You can't just…" Mrs. Whimsey trailed off.
"Nurse Balm," Storm Crash commanded the pony in question for a third time. This time must have been magical because a new, warm, not damp bed picked me up and put me on its back. I grunted a thank you.
"What happened? The mare that found us at the docks wasn't very talkative. She did a lot of mumbling, though," Bramble asked. My new Balm bed was moving. The noise around me made me think some of the voices were following. I couldn't keep my eyes open. The dark felt nice. My head continued to pound.
"A lot, you saw the ice?" My first bed asked.
"Yes, we did. Glacial's doing, as I understand it," Weathered asked. His voice was pleasant, deep, neither loud nor soft, and there was no room for confusion. My head hurt a little less when he talked.
"He stopped a mudslide from the wetlands; it would have wiped Bogwood off the map—if we were even on one," Storm Crash said. She sounded grumpy. Maybe she needed a nap, too. We could be napping buddies.
"How'd he pull that off? That sounds like something Princess Celestia or Luna, maybe the Magic Guild, would do, but a colt did it? That is insane," Bramble said. She sounded stuck between a laugh and a choked groan.
"The colt did it. We were there, and we saw everything. It was bewildering, surreal." Storm Crash mirrored Bramble to a tee.
"And now?" Weathered asked.
"Too much, he vomited up blood, looked like death. Even if he could stop the mud wave, it doesn't look like his body should have been pushed that hard. I don't think any pony's body would have been prepared for something like that."
"Distant Point is right. After what he did, looking at the colt was painful."
"I see." Weathered said. The world went quiet.
It was nice, dark, quiet, so lovely. I think I smiled. I finally found that nap.
The all-consuming darkness clawed at my vision, devouring it whole. Sound was next, ripped apart and left deaf by the same sobering abyss. In fact, I couldn't feel anything at all. A deathly chill swept across me, a tangible pressure that crushed me from all directions. I couldn't breathe. I took long, gasping breaths, clawing into the dark. Yet, my lungs found no solace, and yet I lived on.
No, living might not be so accurate. If I were alive, then death would be a mercy. If this were death, then I died a fool. So I drifted in the dark; it was somber, dull, and stagnant. Time was as aimless as I'd become. For a while, I counted out the seconds. One by one, I lost count after seventeen minutes or so.
My thoughts drifted from my own existential dread and back to before, to the rain and mud and cold. The day was one sopping wet blur. I'd made the offense of saying I'd discover the limits of my magic. Well, Freya showed me I couldn't even do that right. Was this the result of my efforts? Did Freya know? Just like that, the dread circled back.
"I hope everypony is okay," I thought to myself. The last thing I recalled was collapsing into a puddle of my own congealed blood. I'd stopped the mudslide, at least. Bogwood would live to reek of fish and marsh brush another day.
The thought had me chuckle or as close to chuckle one can offer in a vacuum. I also recounted Freya's return. I still had yet to learn what she'd done or where she'd run off to. I had no doubt she wasn't imaginary at this point. She was more of a Jiminy Cricket than anything. I recant her seemingly natural goading. A snark that never matched the gentle smile she wore. It was effortless and, more often than not, reached her eyes. So, less Jiminy and more Tinkerbell.
I sighed as best I could in the void. Hal's memories were blurred so completely with Glacial's, and at this point, I wondered if there was a line of distinction left to find. A symbiotic fusion that created something but familiar and wholly different.
I wondered if Freya would be able to separate the two. If she could tell when one or the other began and the other ended if they were not one and the same already.
"Wonder what she'll do now?"
A tinkle, like a gentle bell. My coat stood on end, or so I'd imagine. I listened deeply. My heart, if still beating, would have been racing, pounding like a storm, like the storm from before I'd stopped the wetlands from drowning the town. I started counting again. I'd only reached twenty-seven when the tinkle sounded again. This time, closer. A third takes twenty seconds after the second, and a fourth takes thirteen seconds after the third. It was closer with every jingle. Then it stopped. Minutes passed with no change. I felt my stomach sink. I was alone again.
The sorrow did not last long. My whole being jolted as a sudden retching, gnashing, and tearing of something I could not place or describe. I don't think I wanted to. The dark simply cracked lengthwise. I stared up at the torn imaginary seam. Light poured down over me. As suddenly as I was nothing, I was now something once more. My limbs, my face, my sight, and my hearing. Everything was there as if it had never left. In the blinding white of the tear, something moved. A giant mass shifted from the other side. The light bending and scattering as whatever was there placed itself between the light beams and me.
One looks into the void, gazing ever on into infinitum. It is a fathomless, timeless abyss, a place where one could very quickly lose everything, lose themselves whole. It was from this void that one question was asked: Which blinked first? From this rip in reality, from somewhere into the void, a giant, unwavering amber eye glared. The intense hunger in that gaze was a wrathful, desperate demand. I need not ask of the abyss, for it was I who blinked first.
"What are you?" My voice was small, barely audible, even in the void. I didn't even realize I'd said it before it was left free of my throat. It was followed with an eep like a church mouse. It was pitiful. I was pitiful.
The massive eye narrowed slightly. Though even now, it had yet to blink. The mass behind the eye shifted, and the light beams across my face as I continued to stare up. When its movements ceased, the eye narrowed further.
"I have found you."
I recoiled at the sudden voice. Though deep and heavy, the volume did not match the speaker's size. It was conversational like one would have while discussing their day. I had to repress a surprised snort, all the more so when the eye grew closer, nearly consuming the tear completely.
It was then that it clicked. The eye, the stare, just like before. In my nightmare, the one with Freya, the stare, my mouth ran dry as I shrunk away from my observer.
"The cold calls. You can't hide any longer. I will consume you both."
Both? I wanted to ask, to demand, but I couldn't. At one point, I pondered if my nightmares were Nightmare Moon's doing. I no longer wondered as such. Whatever this thing was, whatever this eye belonged to. It was no pony, not even one like Luna.
"It calls, little chill, and I will answer."
"Why?" I whispered.
"Because you belong to me."
The giant eye blinked, and it was gone. The tear was gone, and once more, I was swallowed by the empty quiet of the void. It was comforting in some ways. In the dark, no one could hear me cry.
And These Are What Lie Beyond
I couldn't say when the tears started in the dark and renewed in the sterile cot in which I found myself. I'd barely roused from the torment that was my dreams. No, not dreams, terrors, a deeply vested cancer nestled between my conscious being and unconscious mind. I hadn't moved in some minutes. I'd woken in silent tears, and there I stayed. The haunting memory of a creature that had stared down at me through a rift, in reality, was still very fresh in my mind. My entire body hurt. It throbbed from tail to wing tip. With every heartbeat, it throbbed in a unified rejection of reality. There was no rest to be found in slumber, so there I lie, tears still falling freely, eyes trained on the smokey gray stone above. I recognized the ceiling. It belonged to the local healer. A stuffy, self-aggrandizing unicorn from Marelanta. The one time I'd seen him wasn't long after thestral fever reached a pitch in town. Dr. Soothing Light had been one of the first voices to rally behind said social sickness, ironically. There was nothing to do about it now. I was here, for better or worse.
What I could remember from before I'd fallen asleep was jumbled, more primal responses and emotions than actual actions and places. I know I'd faced the wetland mudslide. I also remember Freya. Everything after that was a festering wound.
A gentle light poured in from the window to my right. It was early, barely past dawn. The lack of rain against the panes or the sound of heavy winds meant the weather had been handled. That was some relief, at least. I took a stiff breath in and let out a whisper of a breath. In the dead silence of the patient room, it may as well have been a scream to Faust herself.
I swallowed hard and made to speak, only to choke back a gagging cough. I took another harder breath, cursing my parched throat. "You really did a number this time, huh, Glacial?"
"You sure did."
I jolted in place, my heart pounding as I slowly scanned the room. Not a soul to be seen. "Freya?"
"Who else would it be, Glacie?" I felt something cool bop me between the eyes. There, hanging halfway through the wall directly above my pillow, was the bane of my existence. I groaned and swatted her hoof away. Her very touchable, not wispy, hoof away. My heart skipped a beat as I lowered my hoof, eyes glued to Freya's.
"Your hoof."
Freya rolled her eyes. "You said the same thing yesterday, Equiss to Glacial. Wake up, you dummy." Freya bopped me on the head again. The hoof is still very cool, colder than any regular hoof, but still very much solid.
"How long?" I asked.
"Sixteen hours or so, you really did tucker your silly ice wizard plot out. Poor Glacie, almost beaten by a little mud and rain."
I reached up and swatted at Freya. My hoof weaved right through her smug face. "Cheater," I said with a pout.
"I'm glad you're awake," Freya said. Her voice wavered. Her gaze lowered, no longer able to match my own exhausted gaze. "I hate what you had to do, what I had to do. You weren't ready. It could have killed you."
I let the words hang in the air. Freya floated still partially in the wall. She was slumped in defeat. Whatever force allowed for her floating seemed ready to falter under its own weight. It stung. Freya had always been so gungho, so confident. That was not the filly next to me now, or maybe this was who she'd always been. I couldn't say.
"If you hadn't, the flood, the mud would have killed—" I couldn't finish, stomach recoiled at the thought; what would have happened if I'd done nothing, saw nothing? The image of the town in ruin, half buried, was revolting. The town center's fountain toppled. My favorite bench now reduced to kindling. The Brew family business shattered wood and glass. All that, without the heartstopping horror of the ponies inside, hiding from the rain, their screams muffled by the bog muck as it poured down their throats. I gagged hard enough that my whole body shook in response. I didn't see her move before Freya wrapped me in a gentle hug, shushing me as I sucked in rasping breaths of air.
"Shhh, Glacie, it's okay. You did it. You saved them, every last one."
For several minutes, there we remained. I gasping for breath, and Freya holding me tight. When the panic subsided, I found myself even more sore than before. The frustration of my panic was enough to spark a sputtering ember of disgust.
"All of them?" I asked. Freya nodded silently. "What happened after?"
Freya snorted. "Everypony saw it, saw the frozen wave, and the looks on their faces were to die for, maybe even literally. I haven't decided if the dark humor is too soon or not. Can an imaginary mass murder be too soon?" Freya tapped her chin and hummed as loud as she could.
I coughed up a chuckle. "Probably," I said between coughing fits.
"Even Captain Freezy turned tail and ran." Freya snickered, waving a hoof in mock grandeur. I raised a brow. "Whimsey wanted you thrown out, and she learned what happens when you mess with Weathered's son." Freya's amusement was gone. The vindictive sneer she gave was unsettling enough that I'd had to look away.
"I can imagine," I concurred.
"That's all you have to say. The ornery old nag wanted to toss you to the wolves or border toads. You can't be serious?" Freya crossed her hooves. She snorted, pulling herself from the wall entirely and floating upside down above me.
I offer a stiff shrug. "I'll be honest. I'd be kind of terrified if some foal went and froze a tornado or turned a pack of wolves into sheep or something. Don't get me wrong, Mrs. Whimsey is disgusting inside and out, but she at least had a semi-reasonable response to something that defies all common sense."
"I still think you're crazy."
I offer a tired smile. "That makes two of us."
"Well, after that, you were carted away to be healed up. Your sire wasn't too happy about seeing the doctor, but you're still here. So, outside of that, the others have been cleaning up the town and checking in on you every so often. You should have seen the faces of some of your friends. I thought Tally might hunt Whimsey down and strangle her. She was here when that whole event happened, and oh dear, she was unhappy."
I flinched. She might have strangled Mrs. Whimsey, but the girls might just kill me with the chewing out I was in for. They might be the ones to figuratively or literally tan my hide. May Faust have mercy on my soul.
"So, while we wait for them. I remember a particular ethereal filly promising me an explanation for yesterday.
The room went still, Freya hung in the air, face bled of what little pigment she possessed. The amusement in her eye died and was replaced by a frail denial. She couldn't meet my eyes as she sat stuck in her head. I bit my lip and left the next move to Freya. It wasn't as if I was going anywhere anytime soon.
"Yes, I suppose I did. But Glace," Freya trailed off. I was unsure if Freya could cry. If she couldn't, she certainly knew how to fool me.
"Yeah?"
"Please don't hate me."
That gave me pause. Yesterday, Freya had been apologetic to a fault. She showed up and was sorry; she supercharged my magic and was sorry, and I passed out, and she was sorry. That was a lot of apologies, but I could understand, given the circumstances. But this felt different. Freya never sounded so lost.
"I don't want to hate you, but I can't promise that. I can't say that knowing the truth won't change things. I don't even believe the girls and my father in terms of how they see me since I told them what happened to me and when I got my mark. Some things can't be unsaid, some things can't be forgotten."
Freya winced hard, her entire form tensed and shifted, flipping from her position upside down to falling me a little too closely. "True," Freya said, eyes still pleading for some level of certainty, assurance, and hope.
I reached out, and my hoof faded through her shoulder. There was a slight resistance, the briefest moment where I made contact where my offered solace made it to where it was meant to be. Freya seemed to notice, a hoof trailing up to touch the same shoulder as I pulled my hoof back out through her withers.
"I promise to hear you out all the way."
Freya nodded, and taking a massive inhale, she planted a smile as easy as one might blink across her lips. "So, first things first, I am not imaginary or a ghost."
I rolled my eyes. "Pretty obvious at this point, but please continue."
Freya stuck her tongue out, swatting an incorporeal hoof through my face as if to slap an offending party. I was neither offensive nor offended.
"So rude. You said you'd hear me out all the way. You didn't even let me get to the good part before you started interrupting. Shame on you, Glacie, shame on you."
I threw a limp hoof to the sky. "Fine, I'm sorry, please continue."
"Well, Glacie, my poor sweet Glacie. I am what you silly little ponies call a wendigo. Well, sort of. The ones you ponies know are a bit… different." Freya trailed off. She offered an awkward giggle and had glued her eyes to the bed beneath her.
"Hmm."
Freya blanched, head snapping back up. "Hmm?"
I nodded. "Hmm."
The vengeance in Freya's eyes was both anticipated and welcomed. The angrier she got, the wider I grinned.
"That's all you have to say. That's all I get. I tell you a secret, THE SECRET!" Freya said. She sighed. She flailed her forelegs in random directions. "My secret. The one you're supposed to be shocked by, scared by, the one that should make you hate me."
My grin did now shift. "Freya, what is in Elysium did you think I would do? Yell, scream, tell you to disappear?"
Freya nodded. "Yes, no, maybe? I expected something."
I shifted my weight and pulled myself forward, wrapping the pitiful wendigo in as good a hug as I could manage. I could feel her, mostly. Cool to the touch, a little wispy perhaps, but there, real, and sobbing softly into my shoulder as I held her.
"I wonder?"
Huh?" Freya asked.
"Is this as tangible as Wendigo come?" I asked.
A snort, a shake, and the two of us start laughing. A gentle chuckle becomes hysterical, anxiety-ridden laughter. Minutes pass as the two of us come to terms with the levity and relief of the discussion. My headache all but vanished, and though I was sore and perhaps just the littlest bit in agony, I couldn't care less.
My answer came in a very tangible hoof, conking me over the head. Freya sat on the bed, not in the bed or over the bed, on the bed. She was still semi-transparent and whiter than the full moon, but she was all there. Though the wisps seemed a feature of her being and not trying so hard to be ghostly. I gently patted the spot she'd hit.
"That's a yes," I said, leering at the filly. Freya sat rocking back and forth idly.
"I can, though I probably shouldn't."
"Why?"
"Well, I can't stay invisible and be completely tangible. They are intertwined, for wendigo, anyway. I can't speak for any other spirits out there," Freya said, smiling as she returned to her former untouchable level.
"Okay, that's fair. So, now that I know what you are, the question is, why are you here at all? You mentioned multiple types of wendigo?"
Freya's smile faltered once more. "It's a bit complicated. But the short answer is, I'm here for you. In a far less disturbing way than that may sound."
"As in?" I asked. I found myself pondering along, what could a wendigo want with some colt in the swamps? More importantly, Hal recalled nothing about multiple kinds of wendigo. We were off the map now, and there were very amenable monsters here.
"I needed your help, need your help, we all do." Freya sat fidgeting in place, hooves tapping together quietly as she stared so hard I wondered if a wendigo could start fires with their minds. You know, regardless of their natural proclivity for cold weather and ice.
"We? As in the wendigo at large?" I asked. Freya's worry was starting to affect me. I felt a sudden need to peer at every shadow, every corner of the room. I swallowed hard and found it harder and harder to meet Freya's still intensely burning stare.
"Yes."
I sucked in between my teeth and nodded for Freya to continue. The shadows were looking even more daunting. I managed to play off the whole secret origin thing, as well as somepony can, anyway. My mind, body, and soul were still exhausted. My eyes had begun to throb, and the light seemed to dim just a bit.
"You know the history of ponies and wendigo, right? The story the ponies preach, the attempt to freeze the world solid to end all ponies everywhere? Well, would you believe that was all the plot of a single ambitious and utterly vile wendigo, just one?"
"A single wendigo… froze three kingdoms solid all by themself?" I could almost taste the turnabout. Freya had, at no point of me knowing her, ever worn a frown as stalwart and as long-lived as now. If she were corporeal, I'd have been worried she would bust a blood vessel. The stress of her glare was enough to rustle the cot blankets alone.
"It was their plan, their grab for power." Freya's frown fell from furious to a somber, quiet sorrow. She sunk into the bed without realizing it. She simply stared at my hooves. "Now, they're the king of the wendigo. A tyrant using powers beyond their means to control every wendigo, to leave them nothing but gnashing teeth and rage." Freya was up to her neck in bedding now. A ghostly tear ran down her cheek.
"All but one, I guess." I pointed to her. She nodded and slowly pulled herself back above the mattress board. "That's a bit of a heavy story to drop on an eight-year-old, you know."
"Says the foal with two unnatural angels on your shoulders."
"Also true."
"You're right, though. My plan isn't the best; it's barely passable, really. I mean, here I lay before a foal, the fate of my entire race. I'm sorry for that. I'm sorry for yesterday."
"I'm going to be honest, Freya. I don't get most of this, I don't get my talent, I don't get Hal, I don't get you or why any of this has fallen on me. I never saw myself as the hero or adventurer type. If things were a little different, I might have ended up with a savior complex by now. I'm on week two of having a cutie mark, and here I am, having frozen a mountain of mud and a wendigo asking for my help. It's almost too farcical to be believed."
"I certainly can't blame you. If I were you, I'd be way more suspect than you've been so far. Like, what the heck is a Wendigo doing here? It has to be a trap. 'Quick, somepony call the guard, the Princess, everyone!' I wouldn't have blamed you if you had."
Freya had managed the traces of her usual smile. I nodded along with her. "Help, she's come to boil me in a stew and steal my soul." I waved my forehooves in mock terror.
"Oh please, you never boil, pony; it's already lean as it is. You braise it, you philistine. Shame on you and your incomplete understanding of fine dining," Freya said, folding her hooves in disgust.
I coughed back a laugh. Then it went quiet. The levity once again crushed under the current of Freya's intentions. I found myself left with nothing, no thoughts or questions. Neither Glacial nor Hal knew a darn thing about wendigo. Why would we? It did not sit well on my mind. The cloudy fog of mush I called my mind anyhow.
"I know it doesn't make a lot of sense. But, you're the only pony I've met in three hundred years who might stand a chance, who might be able to help us. Which is why I may have messed with your magic, just a bit."
I reared back, ears splayed, eyes wide. My already parched throat is now bone dry. I must have heard her wrong. That was my first thought. It didn't last long as the memory of the day prior dashed my denial like waves against the shore.
"You! Did! What!?" I wrapped my hooves over my mouth. Both Freya and I froze. My eyes swiveled in all directions. One second, my heart pounded. Two seconds later, Freya whispered something to herself. Three seconds of dead silence. Four seconds, nothing; if somepony else was nearby, the walls had gone far beyond their means to conceal my shout.
"Glacie, please. Do you want somepony to interrupt us at the crux of the matter? My backstory doesn't do cliffhangers, you daft colt."
That earned a snicker. "Your mouth barely has time for commas, let alone sequels."
Freya swatted at me. "Oh, very funny, you cad."
"So, mind explaining how and why you messed with my magic? I take it that it has something to do with my second wind yesterday and my lack of memories for what happened afterward, right?"
"Yes, and yes."
Freya sat smiling like everything was right with the world. I leaned forward. Freya flicked an ear to the side. I leaned in further. Freya flicked the other ear. The emotional whiplash set in, and I found myself slumping back and into the cot's embrace.
"And?" I asked.
Freya sighed and fell back parallel to me on the cot. "I may have, sort of, given you most of my magic. The day before you got your mark. Which may have… altered it a bit. Well, I assume it did. I obviously have never demagicked myself before, so I'm really working on a lot of hopes and prayers. So, you kind of have both pony and Wendigo magic. Surprise!"
Of course, I did. Of course, Freya gave me her magic; why not? It certainly is not the strangest thing I've dealt with recently. Hal still sits at the top of that list. The whole 'altering the timeline by knowing what is to come' thing was a nightmare to think about.
"Why, though? What exactly was going through your head, Freya? Why, in the name of Faust, would you just give your magic away?" I asked. I was calm, drearily so. Yesterday's events were still fresh, and my tiny foal body was still running on fumes. It had become a trial just to keep my eyes open. If they closed at this point, I'd be out in seconds. Curse my need for sleep.
Hal, on the other hoof, was left beguiled. Of the many things his knowledge provided, wendigo was low on that list. Ancient ice demons were the long and short of it. We collectively had no frame of reference of what this would mean. In a macabre corner of my mind, I wondered if I'd inherit more than just wendigo magic or if it would come with the same stipulations: the need to devour the warmth of pony souls.
"How else would you resist the magic of the Frozen Throne? No normal pony can do that, you know. Though, I bet Celestia could, you know, all that fire and heat." Freya hummed, kicking her hooves toward the ceiling.
"The what? Freya, one thing at a time, please."
Freya tutted. "I gave you my magic to keep you safe. The ice magic created by the Frozen Throne can freeze almost anything. The only thing that it doesn't freeze is another wendigo. So, for somepony to help beat Surt'r, they'd obviously need some wendigo magic of their own," Freya looked over to me. Spirit or not, the look in her eye mirrored my own exhaustion. "Silly Glacie."
"Shorter, who?"
"Surt'r the Mad King of Wendigo, the same monster that tried to wipe out your species. That who. The monster that left me all alone." The room returned to another bout of silence. The weight of the world stripped me of every ounce of will I possessed. I was a prisoner to the crushing force of reality. Something Freya seemed to emulate, something we shared.
"Did you reseal it or whatever you did when you first gave it to me?" I asked.
"I can't; it is undone; it's fully mixed with your own magic by now. The only reason it worked at all is because you were already destined to have cryomancy. All I did was add more. So, going forward, it will be all yours. Which might be a bit much for a foal, so be careful."
"This is ridiculous, you know that, right?"
Freya belted a sarcastic laugh. "I wouldn't have it any other way."
My mind drifted. I hadn't noticed my eyes had closed, and I couldn't bring myself to open them again. The dark was soothing, the simple serenity of nothingness. I think I smiled, but I couldn't tell anymore. How long I had been out this time was even less clear. I heard voices even before my mind could comprehend what was happening. Voices were very close, garbled like they were underwater.
Then, something brushed my hoof, and everything came crashing back down. My eyes snapped open, and my hoof pulled tight to my chest as I yelped. I was met with the shocked face of Azure Brew, who was a tad too close for comfort. If by 'a tad', one meant so close I could taste hazelnuts on her breath.
"You're awake."
"Get off him, you dimwit," Tally said from somewhere behind Azure. It was hard to tell anything with a face full of purple and smiles.
"Make me." Azure's taunt was met by her suddenly being pulled back and off the cot entirely. Now firmly in the clutches of both Tally and Tender, Azure struggled helplessly in their iron hold. "Get off me."
"Nope," Tender said before she added a firm bonk to her unicorn captive's head. "Glace's sire might have tanned your hide if he'd seen you all but suffocating his bedridden foal."
Azure stopped resisting. The sudden realization of Tender's words playing out what I could only guess was a horrifying scene of Sire's wrath. It was a fair argument, too. Tally nodded approvingly at Tender, who returned it in kind.
"Are you okay?" Wayward was the next closest to the cot prior to Azure's capture. She sat hooves on the rim, looking at me with unshed tears shining in her eyes.
"Yeah, I think so."
"That's better than half the weather team and the guard too. The whole town is still cleaning up the streets," Tender said, looking out the nearest window. "The farms got lucky."
"Then there's the new local hero. 'Oh, look, I'm Glacial Zero, and I can freeze a mudslide the size of the main street. Boom.'" Tally puffed up, strutting in place. She'd end up frozen, too, if she didn't watch it.
"I know, it's still sitting there, all threatening too. The whole town keeps staring at it like they expect it to just melt at any second," Azure said. She gave a happy eep as she once again tried to pull away from her keepers. To which she had no such luck. Tender alone had a grip on Azure's nape so tight I could see the veins running up her forehoof.
"Can you blame them?" Tender asked. She gave Azure a jostle, who eeped again.
"Nope."
"Sounds about right," I said, waving idly at nowhere in general. "I barely remember doing it. If somepony told me the whole thing was a fever dream, I'd have believed it."
"But it wasn't. You saved Bogwood," Wayward said, leaning up over the cot, tears still threatening the corners of her eyes.
"Did you know you could do that? Did Hal?" Azure asked. By this point, the filly had recalled the horn on her head and pushed Tender away within Azure's rosy aura. She had joined Wayward in less time than I could process the events occurring.
In contrast to Wayward's barely restrained panic and relief, Azure looked ready to run a marathon. She could barely stand in place, which was pretty close to her usual. However, the look in her eye was one of untold glee and excitement.
"Tally."
"Yes."
"Something else happened, didn't it?" I asked. Tally's brow flung high, ears perked in surprise. I smirked. "Thought so."
"You just woke up, and you're already plotting something. You really are crazy."
"Not a plot in my head, I'm afraid. My brain is mush after yesterday. The last thing I remember is feeling sick and falling over. Then, it is all one big blank."
The look on Tally's face did not sit well with me. The sharp acuity took on a malicious current. Even with her mouth closed, I could see her grinding her teeth. Nopony else paid it any mind or knew something I didn't. That feeling sat worse.
"You don't recall the storm shelter at all?"
I shook my head. "No, I don't. Should I?" Freya hadn't mentioned anything. She hadn't said anything at all after I blasted the muck wave. The room gave nothing up. No two fillies shared a single hot in their collective heads.
"That hag tried to—" Tally said before stopping herself. "It isn't worth remembering."
"Hm, hag, you say. There's only one mare in town worth such a name. Well, like you said, it probably doesn't matter." I stretched and slowly crawled myself to my hooves.
"Are you really well enough to leave bed?" Wayward asked.
"Since when was that choice in the colt's hooves?" Night Glider asked. The thestral and the one and only Bramble Broach strolled in, grin wide and proud. I could only imagine the trouble those two could wreak upon the masses.
"Gee, I wonder."
"Glad to see you up and attem, little Zero," Bramble said.
I offered a wave and smiled. "I try."
"I won't lie, after what Distant Point told us last night. I was expecting you to be out for a week. Not bad, Colt, not bad at all." Night Glider smirked and offered a curt salute.
A salute I returned before nearly toppling to the side and off the cot completely. Right before the collision with the hardwood floor, I'm hefted by my nape by a very amused Bramble. She dropped me on my plot no sooner than pulled me into a loose hug. "Careful now, don't want the new savior of Bogwood dying to a fierce bout with the floor."
"I can take them," I said. I crossed my hooves and frosted the blanket underneath me. The rest of the room laughed.
Now, for my counterattack.
"So, Tally mentioned something happening while I was asleep?" I asked, turning to Bramble and Night Glider. The two shared a not-so-amused look with Tally, who silently cursed my name, herd, hopes, and dreams. The joke was on her; my dreams were already cursed.
"Did she mention Freezy Breeze?" Bramble asked. The fillies shook their heads in unison. However, the question did earn a raised brow and ears at full attention.
"She did something?"
Bramble shook her head. "No, she, well, she did do something, or lack of something, right when we got to the shelter. You were still sort of awake at the time."
"Oh?" I asked. I was still awake?
"Mr. Whimsey, the nasty old witch, wanted you thrown in the marsh and left to die. One guess who she asked to do it." I didn't need a guess. "Well, color me surprised when Freezy said no. She refused, even after the way she's been treating you. Set Whimsey off the deep end."
I grinned with the malicious intensity of a serial hunter cornering their new prey. "Oh, I can imagine." My grin fell. "Wish I remembered it though."
"Hag got what she deserved. Boom, done," Tally said. Her accent had made itself very known, and the pinkened cheeks made it clear that Tally had noticed as well.
"That said, nopony ever did tell me what is happening that has everyone excited, well, mostly Azure, but not everypony here is as blunt as she is."
The room clearly thought I'd forgotten. The joke was on them. No politician was present, though the ladies around me thought they were as clever. One will not deflect my search for catharsis, that is for certain.
"Azure got what she wanted, is what happened," Tender confessed. She and the other fillies, sans Zure herself, looked as if they'd been found stealing from the cookie jar. I hummed; that adage is a bit too far-flung. I really needed to watch my idioms; Hal's own don't often make sense in the times I called my own. I chewed on my lip as I mentally ran off common terms in Hal's time that might get me labeled insane currently.
"As in?" I asked.
"The Princess is here," Wayward answered. She offered a pat on the cot, conciliatory. I wanted to hug her and affirm that it was not her fault. However, the shit-eating grin Azure had took precedence.
"You didn't," I hissed. I pointed a shaking hoof at Azure. My eyes squirted so hard in a perturbed glare that I could barely see the target of my ire. "You didn't."
"Nope, the Princess arrived all on her own. I never even drafted a letter or anything. Isn't this great? Princess Celestia came all the way here to see you, and I can't be blamed for any of it. This is what you get for being a hero, Glace, you dummy."
Azure's grin grew three sizes that day, and her stupid face became three times more kickable, too. In hindsight, the fact Celestia would take note of a foal freezing a mountain of bog sludge does make sense. The point I was trying not to meet her was clearly disregarded by Harmony itself, and the less said about Faust favoring her daughter, the better. However, it was up for debate if Faust had mothered the princesses, and Hal could not attest to it either.
"Great."
"She'll want to know you're awake, Colt. But I'll ask, seeing as you are under my command, cadet. Are you awake?" Night Glider asked. Now, that was some quality military double talk. The trouble was that Night Glider didn't speak in double talk. Not once since meeting her had she ever caught anypony with a catch-22.
"I appreciate that, really I do. But, if the Princess is here. I'd rather not waste her time," I said, stretching hard. The muscles in my back and across my wings moaned in protest. "So, yes, I am very much awake. Even if every bone in my body wishes I wasn't."
Night Glider nodded and, in a single fluid motion, aboutfaced and marched back out the way she'd entered. Azure was right. It was my choice to play the hero. I'd have been several kinds of daft if I thought nopony would notice or report a glacier in the middle of a swamp. I would certainly have brought it up.
"Are you sure, Glacie?" Freya asked. She'd taken a spot beside me. Her look mirrored my own to a tee. Tired acceptance. She asked, but we both knew the answer.
"Yep." I looked at the fillies. "So, anypony speak to Her Highness?"
"No," all four said together. I really wish they'd stop doing that. It really does give me the willies. Like it was all planned, or I'd lost my mind. It could be either, really.
"She's been talking with Captain Freezy and both Day and Night Guard Sergeants all morning. I think she spoke to your sire at some point, too," Tally said. She added a very loud sniff. I wasn't the only one a bit nervous.
Azure was all smiles. Tender seemed nonplussed by anything going on. If anything, she seemed a bit bored. The coloring under her eyes begot a lack of sleep. I really hoped I wasn't the cause. Wayward looked ready to bolt. Every muscle tensed for flight and prepared to jump in front of me in some duty to protect. It was one of the reasons I liked Wayward so much. She never let her more timid nature stop her from doing what she thought was right. That and she gave really wonderful hugs. Speaking of. I hopped down from the clinic cot and, without a word, pulled Wayward into a wing hug. I opened the other expectantly. It took only a second before I was wrapped in an omni-sided cuddle by the silly fillies I called friends.
"I'm glad you're all okay," I said. I got a collection of agreeable mumbles. I could even feel the cool touch of Freya from over my shoulder. As tangible as she'd prefer. I'd take it. Heck, I'd take just about any reassurance this morning.
"Well, aren't you five just the cutest?" Bramble said. The sudden reminder of her being in the room was enough to pull the rest of us back. I felt a slight flush on my cheeks as Bramble cooed, smiling like the devil she was. "Oh, don't get all embarrassed on my account. It's good to see all of you in good spirits. Even if the colt really should be resting."
"Aunt Bramble," Tender whined. The poor filly's face was redder than the rest of us combined. "It's not funny."
"Course not," Bramble agreed. Her smile said otherwise.
"Besides the highlands, did the rest of the storm cleanup go well?" I asked.
Bramble gave a flippant wave. "Some minor flooding and a bit of floor damage. Bogwood might not be pretty, but we are pretty darn tough."
"Mom should already have the shop reopened," Azure said, doubling down on the whole; oh, everything is fine, outside of the hundred tons of filth eclipsing the town vibe they had going. I wanted to press them on the issue; I needed to know the plan to remove the iceberg altogether. If Celestia was here, that'd probably end up falling on her docket. Tarturus knows I'm not unthawing that thing.
"So, I have to know. How'd you do it, Colt? I know you freeze things real well, but that much, all at once. As it tries to bury you alive, if I didn't know better, I'd have thought somepony was lying about the whole thing."
I rolled my eyes in Bramble's direction. "Honestly, not well. That's how I did it. I got lucky and nearly killed myself doing it."
"It was quite the sight, though. It is like Faust herself dropped a frozen mountain on our doorstep," Tender said. She tightened her hug just a little.
"Glacial." I pulled myself from the hug pile. Night Glider had returned. "The Princess wants to see you." Night Glider tossed a look over her shoulder, a stern frown chivvied across the corporal's muzzle. One wing twitched as she held the door open.
"Alright, girls, Bramble. I'll see everypony later if I'm not burned at the stake or thrown into the sun."
Freya slapped me across the back of my head. The girls had all begun pouting. I offered a wave over my shoulder and joined Night Glider. The door closed firmly behind us. The town looked sodden, muddy, and disheveled. But still in one piece. Ponies ran to and fro, cleaning up what they could. The day was slightly overcast but otherwise lovely and bright. The air buzzed with that familiar salty tang that wafted from the docks.
"How are the rest of the squad?" I asked. Night Glider's frown worsened as we wandered through town. If she heard me, she gave no sign. I tapped a hoof against her leg, stirring her from her thoughts. "The others?"
"Oh right, the others are all fine. There is a lot of overtime today. We're dead on our hooves, but otherwise, we all survived. You had Sergeant Foresight worried sick. When that weather mare found me, I thought the worst. She mentioned you, and I'd left her in stunned silence a hundred meters back before she could finish her message. Even then, your sire still beat me to the shelter door."
"I don't think Nightmare Moon herself could stop Father from getting there." Father might not be as touchy-feely as most stallions. He didn't really have time to be. But, if you threatened his foal, then there wasn't a thing alive he wouldn't stomp into a paste to protect me. It earned Father an extraordinary reputation. Even before Hal found a place in Glacial's head, I'd seen the way some ponies looked at Sire. The pity, the mocking jeers. They claimed he was no stallion, no father, a fish-loving brute. Father never argued, never even acknowledged the taunts. For every one Bright Whimsey, there were three Bramble Broaches, three Wayward Breezes, and only one Belfry. The comments he got about starting a family with a Thestral weren't much better than those about his own botching of stallion stereotypes. It was those that he did notice and those he shut down with the grace of a sledge.
"Both Sarge and Weathered are with the Princess as we speak. So you won't be completely alone." It was Glider's turn to nudge me out of my thoughts. "Are you sure you're in any condition to meet Her Highness?"
"Nope, but I'm doing it anyway."
Night Glider scoffed. "Whatever you say, Belfry Jr."
"Do you think she'd be proud?" I asked. I hadn't meant to say it out loud. I hadn't meant to think it. Dam was busy trying to save all thestral kind. All I did was freeze some rancid water. A hoof rested gently on my shoulder. Night Glider had stopped mid-stride. The frown she'd been wearing to that point was ripped away. Instead, her gentle, bittersweet smile was far more thorough than any pedantic assurance would be.
"We all are. You did good, Glacial. Your dam would be over the moon. I guess being a hero or a martyr runs in your blood."
The rest of the walk was silent. I caught several workers in town eyeing me when they thought I couldn't see them. I did my best to ignore them. I wasn't patient enough to test what whispers haunt the busybodies today. I saw the Royal Guard before they saw Night Glider and me. Standing picture-esque, in place, living statues, ready and willing to fight and die for their Princess. Night Glider didn't slow; she strode up with the unwavering confidence of somepony far grander.
The Princess had commandeered the auxiliary building behind the town hall. It was smaller and simpler, with no sign of the pomp and frills of the capital. One of the Royal Guards gave us a brief look before nodding slowly. Night Glider stopped a stride short.
"Alright, Cadet Glacial Zero. I leave the rest to you," Glider said.
I had to cough back a laugh. Nopony used my full name. Now, you heard the corporal announce it for all to hear; it was almost surreal. Instead of laughing, I offered a final salute, and, not looking back, I opened the building's door and tried my best not to flinch.
"Ah, Glacial Zero…" That made the second time this morning, and only seconds later, that somepony used my full name. This time, it wasn't as funny. "...Please take a seat."
Author's Note
Well, Folks, here we are. The introduction is finished. Now, we can move on to some more interesting stuff.
Though I suppose, for Glacial, interesting and mind-meltingly frustrating are one and the same.
I truly appreciate everyone who has made it this far. Faust knows I've had a couple of spots where I wondered if I had the wherewithal to actually bring this story to life.
Now, don't get me confused; this story has only barely begun, but humble beginnings set the stage for the world at play. Oh, the places Glacial Zero will go and the many, many things he will see.
Until next time. Thank you all for your time, and have a wonderful day.
The first thing I noticed was the stifling heat. The air thickened into a sauna-like haze, though the room itself was without a single wisp. My entire body slowed as I stared at my speaker. Princess Celestia, the alicorn, the bringer of day, my judge, my jury, and executioner, in a manner of speaking. I could barely choke back a dry breath. Something felt wrong, not physically, for the most part. I still felt like I'd spent yesterday wrestling an ursa, but this was different. In a bad way, a buzzing all around, sweat peeling down the back of my neck.
The Princess wasn't alone, of course. Beside her and almost hidden in her shadow was a unicorn mare with a stack of papers two hooves tall and more ink and quills than I cared to count. Celestia's aide or squire, but I'm not sure which is either or the difference between. Then there was my father, who looked a hair's breadth from breaking the table he sat beside in half. The second he'd seen me that I'd seen him, something in his eyes hardened. Then he blinked, and it was all just gone.
Finally, we came to the two sergeants, Day and Night Guards. Foresight risked a chaste wink but otherwise stood at attention to my father's right. To Father's left was the lead for the Day Guard. I'd only ever seen her once, long before joining the Night Guard. I couldn't recall her name, but the emblem on her peytral was unmistakable, as it was the same pin as Foresight's own. She was a unicorn, as few of those as Bogwood had, a gentle beige coat meshed well with her neatly combed, wavy blonde mane. She'd have been pretty without her stern, undaunted stance, crystal blue eyes forward, not a crease on her brow. It was just the five of us, six if you counted Freya, who floated beside Father and waved at Celestia.
"Glacial." I snapped out of my thoughts. Father waved me over to a spot directly beside himself. Nerves still abuzz, I readily trotted over and planted myself beside my sire. I did everything I could not to look at Celestia, not meet her gaze, and be cast in the shadow of the largest mare in the land. Though it wasn't her size that cast such a shadow, it was her aura. Her presence itself sent clawing daggers down my back.
"We're glad to see you're well enough to join us," Celestia said. She offered a smile. No, that wasn't true. She offered what she thought was a smile, what she thought was gentle, calming, benign. Every cell in my body screamed to run, turn tail, find a hole, and hide as if my life depended on it. It might have.
"It would have been rude to ignore you since you came to Bogwood because of me." I could barely manage an audible croak. My throat was bone dry. I had to bite my lip to stop myself from panting.
Celestia made no move; she sat unreadable. The longer she said nothing, the heavier her aura grew. I was crushed under the weight, the sheer totality of her power. Then, a wing draped across my back, pulling me lazily to the side.
"Apologies, Your Highness. It seems my son is a bit nervous," Father said. He bowed his head, eyes a light in a defiance I'd never seen before. It was chilling, even in the sweltering heat of the annex building.
"Of course, Weathered Horizon, young Glacial Zero had a very interesting day yesterday. We're sure our presence has offered any number of questions. We assure all present that Glacial Zero is not here to be judged. However, to expect we could ignore such a feat, even in a hamlet such as this, would have been folly."
"She's totally judging, by the way," Freya said. She stuck her tongue out in the direction of the Solar Princess. "Be careful, Glacie. This one knows how to string along her machinations."
Freya didn't need to warn me. Hal's memories painted quite the image. An image of a benevolent, caring, matronly ruler. An image that was shattered the moment I'd laid eyes on her, on the real Celestia, the alicorn, the incandescent force of nature. Even out in the hills and marshes, everypony knew Celestia was not to be trifled with. Nightmare Moon's banishment had changed many things. Celestia was chief among them. Her eyes were another thing that stood deeply aghast to the images Hal conjured. What bore into my soul this day were two scorching fires, a blaze that consumed the Princess of Equestria from within. Yet, the outside world moved on, cold to the anger that dwelled in the ancient alicorn.
"What would you ask of me, Your Highness?" My sweat had stopped only because of the sudden wave of cold that rose from my hooves. As if through some unknown instinct, without my knowledge or request, through no magic trigger, my body slowly began wrapping itself in a deathly chill. "I only wanted to protect my home."
With the slightest head tilt and the sudden quickening of the royal aide's quill, Celestia hummed. "Of that, there is little doubt. With power of such caliber, not acting is a crime most foul. Is it not the place of those in power to protect those of lesser means?"
She wasn't asking.
"She isn't asking," Freya said.
"Though for a mere foal to possess such a will, to see such a natural wave of death and not flee, nor fold to the inevitable fate of all mortals, is peculiar. We would ask what brought such power to bear and to what ends you tapped into nature and its fury?"
It was not a request.
"That wasn't a request," Freya whispered. She drew closer, nearly hiding behind me. Her muzzle was a hair's breadth from my ear. The chill had reached my chest and was still rising.
"I don't understand." I did, at least to some degree. It would be the epitome of foolishness to let power like mine walk free and blind. Discord, Chrysalis, Tirek, and Sombra were only allotted their reign by chance and ignorance.
Celestia leaned over the table, her eyes rippled like embers in the wind. "We wish to know, young colt, what drives you? For hope and martyrdom are not sustainable means."
"Your Highness, perhaps these talks are beyond Cadet Zero," Foresight said. He'd stepped up beside my father. The two had their sights locked on Celestia with a disciplined displeasure that only ponies who toiled for a living could. The likes of both Foresight and Father saw a mare of means leering down a colt, and their very instincts sought satisfaction. It amazed me that both could silently challenge the Princess without a doubt. Father's legs had tensed so hard he'd shattered the wooden boards beneath him.
Celestia offered my Sergeant a cursory glance, breaking sight with me and returning a breath I'd not noticed she'd stolen. "Perhaps, perhaps not, but the question needs to be asked. We can only guess what such power cost, the young Glacial Zero. For the power of such scale is not without recourse. If not properly tamed, such power could be the end of your young cadet, or of others, the common pony, you and your unit, his father." Celestia turned to Sire; the force behind her gaze had calmed, but her aura had yet to ebb.
"My son has done nothing but hide in fear that such may occur. You ask what it cost, what my son paid?" Father asked. He had Celestia's attention. If that were good or bad at this point, I doubt any present could say. "He lay on death's door after saving this hamlet. He lay barely breathing, frozen, lips blacked, flecked with his own blood. He was prepared to pay with his very life if he must. Those there, those who saw, claimed as much, one after the other. You know this, Your Highness. You asked many of them yourself."
The scratching of a quill ceased; even the chill I'd wrapped myself in was scorched away. Both Sergeants were sweating, though I doubted it was the heat. Celestia leaned back. She fell flawlessly into her prior seat. Once again, it was unreadable, unfathomable, terrifying.
"Yes, that was the recount of the local observer. A cost few so willingly agree to. On that, we are agreed. It is due to that very knowledge and the clear truth that, with time, this power will surely grow. Who may guess as to what young Glacial Zero could do in a year, or five, or ten? As this is the case, and as his magic is of such a rare breed. He must be taught to control it before his magic controls him."
I had barely heard the end of Celestia's speech. No sooner had she said 'rare' than I was left with an itch to scratch. "Rare magic?" I asked. All eyes were on me once more, a feeling I despised with the intensity of Celestia's domain. "How rare?"
"A subsect of a subsect of the Cryomancy school of magic. A refined form of magic that both sharpens and restricts the magical versatility of said mancy. At the cost of said restrictions, the power and growth of such magic are heightened to an almost unnatural level. If desired, one could count the totality of such users across all fiefdoms of magic in the dozens at most. That is in recorded history, at least. Who would know how rare such powers were long before we took the throne, even before the pony tribes left their lost kingdoms."
Freya shifted behind me, whining miserably. Celestia's answer drew forth a well of fear I'd not known I still possessed. The further she spoke, the less safe I felt. I was frozen in place and not due to any cryomancy. If she spoke the truth, I had little doubt she didn't. Then I was being set a course by Faust, or the damnable tree sitting smugly in the Everfree, or what would be the Everfree? The Everfree's timeline was vague at best. A path I had no interest in, no desire to wander forth on an adventure or to play hero. I'd have given a grave laugh if my company were less severe. Two weeks all it took was two weeks to bring me here. A Sun Goddess' judgment, the fate of the Wendigo, a town that would have drowned in mud. All just dominos falling in reversed succession.
"Your Highness, if I may, What sect would the colt be? At least in recent history, I've never heard of a subsect's subsect?" The Day Guard Sergeant asked.
"Truth in those words, Sergeant Haste. As we've said, it is a rarity upon rarity. To answer your question and for Glacial Zero's benefit. We will explain the magical caste system. As it goes, there are the Arcane magics, such as that they are conceptual and not natural forces at work. This would account for magicks like thaumaturgy, scrying, and illusionary spellcraft. Then there are the Mancies, which are the manipulation of already existing forces, such as fire and water. These are the two largest castes. More than 90 percent of magic users fall within these fields. There are, though, two other castes. Black Magic hosts corrupting magics and a path that any sane pony would do best to not tread. The final is Domain magic, which is wholly unique to entities beyond the scope of normal mortals. Such as Alicorns, amongst others."
Most of what Celestia said was in the books I'd read, regardless of detail. Both the books and Celestia, it seems, wanted to keep the exact craft of Black and Domain magic locked up tight. We can't have the peasants knowing too much, can we?
"From those four, we then delve into the schools and classes of magic. At this time, most of those and what they control are irrelevant. So, we will move to Glacial Zero's school, Cryomancy. From the school, we separate and idealize the techniques and versatility a user may possess. In this case, Glacial Zero possesses a total mastery of the conjuration and manipulation of ice and its various assets. That being the ability to create and release said magic and its form." Celestia looked at me. Her eye traveled down to my forelegs, which were, as usual, frozen solid. "As we can see now."
"That would normally indicate a single subsect, Your Majesty. What would make it any more specialized than a unicorn with a similar skill set and school?" Sergeant Haste looked almost enthralled by the conversation. For a mare who rarely released her death grip on resting hag face, it was almost cute how invested she'd become. The glimmer in her eye, the utter stalwart attention to Celestia's every word.
"The difference, Sergeant, is in how the magic is manipulated, not just in power or reach but the very source of the magic itself. If it was not so, then a pegasus would not possess the means to command it at all."
This was it. This was the question that none of the books I'd had the chance to read discussed: the separation of tribe, what defined the line, and just what I was and how I worked. My thoughts strayed to the tale of druids. If they were real, Celestia might be the only pony alive who could confirm it. Following Sergeant Haste's lead, my tail switched idly as I willed Celestia to get to the point.
"Regarding Glacial Zero's exact circumstances, as unorthodox as they were, and as clearly…" Celestia offered a scrupulous bit of side-eye, her eyes blossoming with a knowing, wary spark. "... Volatile, as the magic would seem. His magic, as we would direct, is tactile in nature and closer to that of earth ponies than unicorns. Correct?" Celestia and Haste both turned to me. So far, Celestia has only restated what I'd long since noted, which was less than enticing.
"Through my hooves, mostly, yes, Princess."
"As we expected. Couple that with the finite control of the very airborne and ground-found moisture to create greater quantities of water and ice than would be possible with your natural reserves of mana, and you host a very unique quotation over cryomancy," Celestia said with all the casual dismissal, of someone claiming the sun is bright.
I was lost. In a single sentence, Celestia had broken down what I'd been unable to even parse in my reading. She'd said I had finite control of moisture. That I'd followed, at least in terms of what words were said in what order, everything that followed was complete gibberish. It sounded like I was somehow cheating, if I was at all honest. Moisture control lessened the mana used. How does that work, and why?
"Princess, I hate to be a bother, but I did not follow that last part. I'm using moisture in the air and not mana?" The simmering heat flared for the briefest of moments. Celestia's gaze left a quiver in my spine as I held up a hoof in question.
"We did not expect a foal to understand the deeper ramifications of such a feat. It would, as is clear it did, come naturally, a simple facet to your talent as natural as one breathes. However, to ensure no such risk, as the one you managed yesterday was taken without due care, We shall explain. In short, young Glacial Zero, your magic is taking advantage of your body's natural abilities. In a way, you are merging the pegasi's natural weather magics with cryomancy, which is closer to that of a unicorn. The merging of these abilities allows you to directly alter the state of moisture and create ice from the traces of water in the air and beneath your hooves. By not needing to alter mana directly into a mancies state, you greatly reduce what mana is needed to create your ice. If you were to wield mana alone, you would have died attempting your bout with nature."
"Oh."
That was that I escaped death through blind luck and youthful stupidity. It made sense, though; My ice never felt like it took much to conjure or shape. I simply decided what I wanted, and the ice did the rest. However, my location might have been doing even more work than any magic I possessed. After all, Bogwood was a sodden mudhole. That meant there was more than enough water to go around. That thought was enough to leave my mouth bone dry, as ironic as that was. Though, as far as I could tell, Celestia had not noticed or chosen not to speak on the whole Wendigo magic thing. If she could read such things at all.
"It seems our young cadet was fortunate," Foresight said. His voice was even, but the look on his face shared a level of hindsight and regret that did not suit him at all. "Thank you for your insight, Your Highness."
"Verily, now, let's move on to the main topics of this meeting. Firstly, we would like a first-hoof account of your encounter with the mudslide and your experience stopping it."
The term 'would like' was ironic, as it would have been more apt to say I would be giving her what Celestia wanted regardless of my desires. It would have seemed charitable if I were the stupid foal I should be at this age. If I were bordering on braindead, I might have believed she meant it. Father had seemed to note her 'request' as well. I feared if it were any other pony in the whole sum of Equestria, they'd be leaving Bogwood in a box.
"Where would you like me to start?" I asked. The longer I sat in the annex building under the overwhelming heat and scalding stare of the thousand-year-old demi-god. I found my will to entrust her with any of my secrets at all dwindled. I wanted to simply say nothing, to omit the truth. Father would more than likely attest to any imagined scenario I came up with. I wanted to say nothing, but I couldn't. If nothing else, Azure had been right. To keep everything from Celestia was a dangerous ploy that could do far more harm than good.
I'd start with the most palatable. If Celestia thought she'd got what she was after, if it fed back into what she wanted to hear, it might be enough for the rest to go unmissed. That thought stapled itself to the back of my mind as I offered a dubious smile at Celestia, one she returned with an unnerving smile of her own. One that looked like what an alien might emulate, or perhaps a homunculus or robot. It had all the correct parts but none of the intent behind them. It was like she'd forgotten how. A thought that left a sour taste in the back of my throat. Like she hadn't smiled for real in eight long, lonely, regretful years.
"As the testimonies gathered prior to this meeting show, you engaged the wave from the highlands alone and against the wishes of your senior officer. That is correct, yes?" I nodded. "Then, once close enough, you created a wall of ice, partially domed and curved, that some of the mudslide's refuse would pour to the slides, slowing the force of the streams and guiding them off to the sides and away from the main roads. Correct?" Another nod. "Then we will begin at what happened once the wall began to break down."
"Panic and doubt, those were first. I didn't think I'd actually stop the mud. That was more than any single pony could do. I wasn't thinking; it just seemed right; it was the right thing to do, so I did it. I didn't want to die, but I wanted everypony in the town to die less. So, I poured everything I could into the wall. It hurt. Most of my body was frozen over. I could barely move, was almost completely blind, and I couldn't, wouldn't stop. That was what I felt, what I did when my wall started to fall apart, Your Highness."
Not a single lie told, not a single wayward thought. Celestia listened intently, the room deathly quiet when I finished. "We see," Celestia finally said. She waved an idle hoof. "What changed?" she asked.
I shook my head. A Wendigo saved the day. If I had heard me say that aloud, I'd have locked myself in a cell. This was the hard part: selling the half-truth. Freya had wrapped herself around me and was pouting. She seemed more crushed by Celestia than I was. I could not speak to the anatomy of a spirit or say what could and could not harm them. I did not need to know as such at this moment. Freya seemed ready to cry. That was enough.
"A spark," I said.
"A spark?" Celestia repeated.
I nodded. "A light that slipped through the seams, a spark in the dark. It was so bright that it could not be ignored. I don't know if it was a second wind or a dying gasp, but the spark lit my path, and suddenly, I wasn't afraid."
Freya had perked up. She was smiling. I'd missed that smile. She'd been frowning far too often today for my liking. Foresight had cracked the barest traces of a smile as well. That was some level of reassuring. The fact Celestia hadn't dismissed me was even better.
"An interesting adage, if nothing else. A concept we'd have thought beyond a foal. You are quite the interesting colt. I take it the spark was enough to push you enough to shatter the presumed barrier you'd thought was your limits?" Celestia was smiling; it was subdued and honest, nothing like the mask she'd been using. It was also old, exhausted, and scared.
Both Hal and I agreed that if anything was seen today, it was the truth. This was Celestia, beyond the flesh, the power, and her crown; this was Celestia at the deepest core she claimed was her very existence. The rest of those present did not miss it. The uncertain and incomprehensible looks on every other pony's face were surreal.
"I believe so, Princess."
Celestia's look shifted just a bit. No longer locked to me, neither was it looking to Father or the sergeants. No, it rested just over my shoulder. It struck with the force of a cannon. My head turned just so. To the spot, Celestia stared at. I gulped. Then Celestia sighed and looked back at me. My heart hammered, and the barest feeling of a cool breeze wrapped around my neck.
"Glacie," Freya whispered.
"Then we will move to the next topic at hoof." The mask was back, and the Princess had turned to Father. "Regardless of the how or why of it all. No foal should have been capable of stopping the mudslide now frozen over your town. Your son has done something impossible. Which can mean only one of few conclusions."
"And that means?" Father asked. Had he just? I wasn't the only one asking. Even if not a word was spoken, if not a sound was made, the question hung above us all.
Celestia ignored said universal query. A feat only one as old as she could. "For instance, Young Glacial had assistance in some measure. If we account for the witnesses, this would seem nearly impossible. That is to say, in terms of conventional aid. There are, of course, ways of contributing without needing to be present or seen."
Freya's hold tightened. If she were corporeal, I'd be choking. I was choking, regardless. Yet, Celestia did not stray from Father, who did not flinch, even as the Princess's implications grew. The prior quandary of Father's own defiance was forgotten.
"Princess?" I asked. I managed what scraps of youthful ignorance I could.
"An investigation for another time. One that may yet be insightful into many possibilities. For now, I merely present theories and nothing more. Other avenues of power exist, and it would be foalish to ignore those on a whim."
"Such as Your Highness?" Sergeant Haste asked.
"Ascension is one such alternative. Though, as it stands, Glacial Zero has not managed such a feat. Even if it would have trivialized this investigation completely."
I had to act to end this train of thought before it came too close to the truth. I knew for certain that Freya was off the table. Celestia was already too heated. If she thought the Wendigo of all things were involved, I doubt I'd live long enough to worry about what might follow.
"Princess, if you could. I'd like to speak to you alone," I said. It all fell back to giving the mare what she wanted, to play a game; she had centuries, if not more, of time to master. I couldn't win, but I could change the prize.
Celestia's brow rose. The arid pressure of her aura squeezed down just a little more complicated. "Oh, and for what reason would we acquiesce such a request?"
"I might know what you're talking about. What might have helped? But, I don't think you'd like others knowing." I scanned the room. Nopony looked interested in being dismissed. Father had reduced the wood beneath him to splinters. Foresight, though unflinching in his guard decorum, shook ever so slightly.
"Glacie, are you sure?" Freya whispered beside me. My ear flickered, but I otherwise made to sign I'd heard her. My eyes were glued to Celestia and hers to mine. The truth was, no, no, not at all. She didn't need to know that, and neither did Celestia.
"So, you wish to speak to us alone? We will admit, you have our interest, but for a foal to be so bold is concerning," Celestia said. I shrugged. She wasn't wrong.
"I can tell everypony if you want. I just feel like it would be a little more concerning for even more ponies to know."
A moment of silence, the hidden machinations of an alicorn's mind, a father who looked ready to punch a hole through the table where he sat, and several trained guards on edge. All wrapped up by a foal who knew far too much and a wendigo on the verge of a panic attack. The scene was beyond surreal. The heat had dipped, though still far beyond what Bogwood would consider normal on the cusp of winter. I felt the niggling itch of Hal's memories playing in the back of my mind. I'd run out of fear, left with only the anxiety of a foal being punished by a less-than-pleased parent if the parent was a walking, talking force of nature.
"Very well."
I blinked, nearly toppling forward in my seat. "Really?"
"Princess, are you sure?" Haste asked.
"Glacial," Father whispered, eyes trained on every single movement, every pony, every breath—the mark of a pony who was used to watching everypony all at once. On the dock, if you weren't watching everything, you were getting robbed by anyone.
"I am. Now, please. Leave the room and take Weathered Horizon with you. You will be informed as soon as we are done," Celestia waved a hoof, and it was so. Slowly, Sergeant Haste and Foresight made to leave. Neither looked happy. Foresight had bitten his lip so hard it had begun to bleed, and Haste gave me a look I couldn't quite parse. Then Celestia's squire stood, tidied up her writing station, and strode without a single hair out of place to the door.
Father looked less inclined to depart. Celestia paid him little mind. He stood but did not move; Father had, in this single meeting, shown a level of worry I'd not seen in a long time. It sat poorly in my stomach. Freya looked no better. She'd watched as I had, as Haste and Foresight ushered Father out. He did not resist, though his eyes seemed to glow in time with my own. A reflection of a reflection. As soon as the door had shut. The silence was more crushing than the heat had been.
"Now, what have you to tell us, young Glacial Zero?" Celestia eyed the door briefly before turning her mask to me. I restrained a hardy cough and smiled.
"Princess, how often do you meet someone who can see the future?" I asked.
"You speak of seers and oracles. I have met many in my time, only a few of which were what they claimed to be." Celestia scoweled at me. The meaning of which was not lost on me. I may as well add telepath to the top of my list of supposed skills. Celestia's patience was thin, and her disbelief in my supposed admission was broadcast for all to see, hear, and feel.
"I am. Though not myself, at least, not my visions. I've seen them and heard them, but they are not my future or my stories told. I have had dreams, ones shared."
The look on Celestia's face recoiled as if slapped. The heat returned to a fever pitch. Even my frozen hooves were sweating. I had begun to regret my decision to tell Celestia anything, even if the future results of silence might have been far worse.
"Visions through your dreams. The dreams of a half-thestral, born the year of Nightmare Moon's defeat. What you share is dangerous, especially for yourself. You do know this, correct?"
"I know how it looks. I do, but these are not visions from your sister. If they were, they'd be working against her, not for her. Which, seeing as her position, would make no sense."
"Glacie, you may want to start sharing the details before the Princess decides to boil you alive with nothing but her simmering disdain," Freya said. She was gasping, her ethereal form blinking in and out of existence. Neither one of us would last much longer.
"Then tell us, what visions have you had, and if not Nightmare Moon, who has shared these prophecies?" One last chance. That was all Celestia had the restraint for.
"Well, the name of the one sharing is Hal, and to be honest, what is shared feels more like memories than dreams or suggestions. They play out as if seen through my own eyes. He knows a lot of things, a lot of things I shouldn't know. But that isn't really important. The first vision is what matters: a prophecy about your sister and her return.
I let my admission hang in the air. It was like I'd told Azure last week. Telling Celestia about her sister was a gamble that could end very poorly and quickly. I knew for sure the prophecy ended up in the main timeline, in a book, so somepony had to come up with it. It'd be kinda twisted to be part of a cycle where I present the prophecy that later Hal would hear, and then I'd learn from him. That is if you ignore the multiverse theory. A concept Hal found confusing, which meant poor little Glacial Zero's tiny foal mind wasn't going to be any help in explaining that if I needed to. I prayed I wouldn't need to.
"You tread brittle ground," Celestia said. The irritation had vanished from her face, her eyes downcast, ears twitching as she seemed to weigh my words. Her own lost an afterthought. Her threat was hollow, as was the pout she'd taken. I would have breathed a sigh of relief if I weren't sure that'd do more harm than good. Celestia tapped a hoof on the table. "What does your prophet say? What does it tell of my sister?" the faintest ember of hope warred against her own better judgment. Eight years alone was a long time to tell yourself how you deserved to lose the one you were supposed to care for most. A sense of nostalgia danced in the back of my head—the thoughts of Hal's nightmares in the city with the dogs and hunter.
"I know, Princess, I know it can't be easy, not knowing when, if ever, you'll see them again. It wasn't just your sister who has left Equestria a little lonelier." The memory of Dam before she'd left. The way she tried to hide her worry. The smiles, laughs, the times she'd tell me it'd be okay. All lies, all so fake, even to me back then. I took one hard breath and let it release from between my teeth. 'on the longest day of the thousandth year, the stars will aid in her escape, and she will bring about nighttime eternal!' That's how it goes."
The ember sputtered, barely a flicker of light in a storm of grief. That was how the story, the prophecy, and how it was all meant to be. I wanted to leave it there. I felt my hooves dig into the wood beneath me. My teeth ground so hard I could hear it over my heartbeat. That was all how Hal had seen it play out. I disagreed.
"There's more."
I'd spoken before my brain could even comprehend my mouth moving. The ember shone on, if only barely. Celestia looked at me, her tired, listless gaze starkly contrasting to the mare I'd been speaking with moments before as if my words had simply erased her anger, discontent, the cold, calculating facade of the Princes of the Sun. All that was left was a sad, tired mare, older than anything I'd ever seen and twice as unwavering. A mare who had truly seen and done it all. At least all that could be done as of now. The heat remained, a sweat-inducing frothing, arid wave exuded from Celestia's existence.
"More?" Celestia asked.
Thus, the timeline shifted ever so slightly with the next words to leave my mouth. Though, was my being here proof it had already changed? Would everything or anything Hal had predicted happen at all? I was becoming too used to wondering such things, too familiar with not knowing how every butterfly wingbeat could change the world.
"Unless the light of six elements together free her from the nightmare she'd trapped herself in all those years ago." I was no poet, but I couldn't let Celestia believe it was all over, all for naught. The ache in my heart beat in rhythm with her own."
The ember remained. No, it had grown, if only a little. The storm around it raged, but the spark of hope was fermented, made real, made true. So, there, Celestia and I sat in awkward silence. Neither could meet the other's eye, so I took to looking at everything, anything else. When the silence broke, Celestia offered a gentle cough and sat back to her imposing fullest. She looked down at me, the tired, wary fear hidden once more.
"You believe this prophecy? You would stake your claim on such a far-reaching tale? You believe my sister will return, that she can be saved?"
I nodded once. A single moment of unwavering commitment. "I do."
"What of this, Hal, a second-hoof prophecy from one you've never met. Who are they to know such things, to have the gumption to claim such fraught truths? A millennium is a long time, colt, one that will have let all who've heard your words be left in the dust. All, but we, the ones who will reap the woe of false words once the thousandth year has come."
So it came to pass, the exact thing both Freya and I had feared. The risk of sharing such facts with the only pony who will live to regret them if I was wrong. It was a sickening, gut-wrenching disgust that settled in my stomach. I wouldn't be there to see the look on Celestia's face when she held her sister for the first time in a thousand years. I will not be there to see Luna acclimate to a new and confusing world. All I could do was trust Hal and trust myself.
"I trust Hal; he's taught me a lot; he's my friend, part of me, so if you can, please trust him too. We all want Luna back. Dam told me stories of her, you know, the stories of the stalwart warden of the night who protected everypony from monsters and brigands alike. I'd like to meet her too, to say thank you for all she's done."
I barely noticed the tears, the hitch in my voice, and my body shaking. Wendigo, prophecies, princesses, all of it. I wiped a hoof across my eyes. If Bogwood weren't already a sodden mess, and my hoof wasn't frozen, I'd have only achieved making my hoof damp. The tears didn't slow. I sat and cried. I hadn't heard her move or seen the Sun Goddess rise and walk around the table. I nearly jumped out of my seat when a large white, feathery, warm, soft wing wrapped me gently in an embrace.
"That is enough, young Glacial. You've said enough. I believe you, I believe you believe in this Hal, and for now, that will have to be enough." Celestia bent down face beside my own. "And thank you to you and your mother for recounting my sister with such kindness. I'd have liked you to have met her as well. I promise the stories do her little justice."
I planted my face into Clestia's side and cried to my fullest. Celestia made no move to retreat or end my weeping. She stood proud, shushing me as she gently held me in her wing. I could feel something else—a ghostly hoof holding me tight from the side opposite the Princess.
"It's okay, let it all out, you silly little colt," Freya whispered.
Sometime later, the door to the annex building. Before it had even opened wholly to the day, both Sire and Foresight were inside. Both nearly ran face-first into a waiting Sun princess. Both skittering to a stop just in time. She offered both a curious look and tilted ear and nothing more. I sat beside the Princess, smiling as the two grown stallions looked about the room like they'd expected a murder scene—a fair, if not dramatic, expectation. If Celestia had decided to end me, I doubt there would be enough of me left to fill in a thimble.
"Princess, is everything okay?" Foresight offered lamely.
"Should it not be, Sergeant Foresight?" Celestia asked.
"I would hope not, Your Highness," I said. The second Celestia's eyes left Foresight, I could see him wilt. "Our discussion went better than I'd hoped, if I'm honest."
Celestia nodded. "Agreed, now, we cannot tarry any further. Equestria does not halt for the sake of a single town, no matter how odd its happenings."
"No wiser words, Your Majesty," Celestia's secretary said. She'd managed to sneak past all of us in the commotion and took her place beside her Princess with practiced ease. "The carriage is waiting at your leisure."
"Very well, come along. We have places to be."
Celestia made for the door. A waiting Sergeant Haste, at attention, held the door open in her magical grip. The Princess offered her a nod and stepped out into the day, only to come to a complete stop. She turned, looking back at the rest of us. Aside from her secretary, who matched Celestia's pace, not a soul had moved.
"Glacial Zero."
An ear flipped to the side, head tilted just so. I offered a wry smile. "Yes, Princess?"
"Do you not hear us? We are going."
I looked between the stallions beside me, both wearing faces matching my own. Then it hit me: "Wait, you said 'we'? I thought you meant the royal 'we,' or did you?"
Celestia looked about and pressed a hoof to her chest. "Can we not use both?" Celestia asked traces of a smirk on her lips. The recollection of a mischievous princess and her warped sense of humor flashed in my head. It seems the more things might change, the more some stay the same. Somewhere, deep down, the Princess Hal remembered was still there, hiding right behind the surface.
"That's not fair," I said with a huff.
"Is it ever?" Freya asked.
"Princess, what do you mean my son is coming with you?" Father asked.
Celestia looked at my father and then back over her shoulder. "Was it not conveyed that a foal with such power is dangerous, one who would need guidance?"
"You did, Highness," Father answered.
"Thus, he shall receive such guidance. Guidance that cannot be given here. We shall be taking young Glacial Zero to Canterlot so that we might temper his magic before he does something he regrets. As well as finish talks about other topics left unfinished."
Dang it. It seemed my gambit only sort of worked. I wasn't dead, so that was a plus. However, I was being dragged away from home, which was less than a plus. My ears had splayed. Yet, none challenged the Princess. As much as Father might want to, Celestia had a very real and very valid concern. Whenever I attempted to practice around Bogwood, it yielded less than resounding results.
"Princess."
Celestia silently approved my attention.
"How long will I be gone?" I asked.
"We cannot say that teaching is not a concise process. You will be gone for some time. Though when you are learned, you may return with my blessing."
Well, that was that. I was not happy. I scuffed the dirt and tried not to scowl. I only semi-succeeded in my endeavor. Celestia chose to ignore it. A fola will be a foal. I'm sure she'd agree. Yet, the result would not change.
"Don't forget the others," Freya whispered. "Azure might kill you if you don't tell her you are leaving. Tender might even help."
"Princess."
Celestia waited.
"Can I at least say goodbye? My friends deserve that much."
For a moment, I thought she might deny my request. I held my breath and prepared every rebuttal and argument I could think up then as if a breeze gave way to a sudden gale. The look in Celestia's eye shifted. She nodded. "Very well. We shall allot you the chance to say fare well to you hold dear. You will have until the first of the hour to find and inform your friends what is happening. Then we must be off."
"Thank you, Your Highness," I said with a bow.
"Sergeant Foresight," Celestia said, turning to the waiting thestral.
"Your Highness?"
"Please ensure Glacial Zero finds our carriage on time."
Foresight licked his lips and nodded. "Of course."
"Very well, we will be waiting, Glacial Zero." With that, Celestia was off, Aide right behind her. The rest of us have mostly forgotten.
The second she was out of sight, Father embraced me so tightly that I feared he might shatter my spine. "What were you thinking?" he asked.
"I wasn't," I said with a gasp.
"Just like your dam," Father scoffed. "Always the hero, anything to protect others. A virtue and a curse all at once." Then Father released me and sat me back on the ground. "Yet you leave even her greatest efforts floored in mere weeks. She'd be proud."
"Aye," Foresight agreed. "Though, and I hate to part such a heartwarming sight, we will need to get moving if we're going to find all those filly friends of yours."
"They're not my fillyfriends," I said, pointing decisively at Foresight. He smiled and winked. "They're not." He smiled wider.
"Ha, he's got you all figured out, Glacie," Freya said with a giggle. I hated them both.
"Come on, places to be," Foresight waved a wing in no particular direction. "And Weathered. I'm sorry you have been saddled with all of this. I should have done more."
Father didn't respond, so with one more hug, Foresight and I wandered back into Bogwood. This was not going to be fun.
"So where to first, cadet?"
I tapped a hoof to my chin. "We'd better do Tender first. The farm is the furthest out. If we save that till last, there is no way we'd make it back in time."
Foresight hummed. "That makes sense. But, um, Glacial?"
My brow rose. Foresight's typically casual manner had darkened into a caution that seemed opposed to everything I'd ever seen of the Sergeant. It ran a shiver down my spine. For the first time since meeting Sergeant Foresight, I felt afraid.
"Yes?"
"Are you sure you can fly? You've been struggling to walk. You might have gotten out of bed to see the Princess, but that does not mean you are well."
A thought I'd mused up more than once. Just being near Celestia had robbed me of any energy I'd had. It'd have been more accurate to say I'd been limping since the door of the annex building had opened. Everything hurt; even blinking and breathing were a chore.
"I have to. They deserve that, don't you think? The Night House deserves a goodbye, too," I said. I flexed my wings, sending a wave of pain from wingtip to my frogs. "Right?"
Foresight surrendered. "Fine, but when you collapse. You'll be riding on my back for the rest of our little tour around town. You got that?"
I smiled. "Aye, aye, sir." I saluted and took to the air. The only thing I could think up as I let the wind trace down my wings was a solid, concise 'Ow.'
The flight to Tender's home was not a long one. A painful, teeth-grinding, will-crushing tear hidden in the corner of your eye one, but not a long flight. Foresight had his eyes trained on my wings like he expected them to start belting an opera. Yet, for all his worry, I managed to stay airborne. We'd already drawn a few curious observers by the time we landed at the front gate.
Tender, for one, Bramble, and even the twins, the oldest of Tender's siblings, were waiting for us. I offered a limp wave. "Afternoon," I said between haggard breaths.
"I take it the meeting with the Princess went well?" Bramble said.
"It better have. Glace saved Bogwood," Crop said, folding her hooves with a nicker.
"Depends what you consider 'well.' I'm not a pile of ashes, so it could have gone much worse. Or could it?" I hummed. I could be on the moon right now, too, if Celestia could still use the Elements at this point. Hal's memories would indicate no, but better safe than sorry.
"Cadet Zero means yes, yes it did. Even if he did make it far harder on himself than necessary," Foresight offered.
"I did offer to tell everypony present. Even if I think in hindsight, Foresight would have regretted not having the foresight to reflect on hindsight." I said. Everypony present shared a puzzled look. Foresight was the only one to sport both bafflement and disappointment. Let him, that was clever, and they know it.
"What?" Tender Yield, the elder twin and due heir of Forage's bounty in all her glory. She and her fraternal twin, Tender Sow, were both moss green, with lighter green manes and tails. Their attentive brown eyes were identical to that of Tender Crop's and, for that matter, all of the Forage foals. A trait I'd been told in the past had been that way for over a century.
"I think he said Sir Foresight is dumb?" Tender Sow said. On the cusp of stallion, the colt slowed each word to a crawl as he tried not to notice Foresight's glare.
"Yes, yes, he did," Bramble agreed.
"So, long story short, I might have to go to Canterlot for a bit." I had expected a rebuttal or an argument. I had expected the whole Forage family to look on with disapproval. I had not expected to be pulled into a hug so hard I could feel my already battered bones cracking like twigs beneath a stampede of Muck Rats.
"Nope," Crop said. As far as she was concerned, that was that. I doubted Celestia would agree to those terms, however.
"Now, Crop, you can't go and decide a colt's fate," Bramble said, tutting her niece. I offered her a smile. "Until you go and make your herd official." My smile fell.
"But, Aunt Bramble, Glacial nearly died. He's in no shape to be paraded around like a prized pig. He needs time to heal up and not try to get himself killed."
"It was only the once," I said, still struggling in Crop's iron grip.
Bramble shook her head. "That isn't your choice to make. Little Zero's made quite the mess, and he'll need to clean it up."
"On that, we agree," Foresight said. Both adults gave me a knowing look. The kind a parent gives when their foal does something so dumb it's almost cute. The smug smirk and raised brow set my tail into an antsy fury.
Crop finally released me with a grumble. "It's not right."
"Oh, come on, Crop, it'll only be for a bit. Princess Celestia just wants me to learn how to use my magic without hurting somepony else or myself. I'm not super happy to be leaving, but at least it is for a good reason. Right?" I nudged Crop, who only grumbled louder.
"I think Glacial is lucky," Yield said. She offered a broad smile, eyes dazzling in only the way a filly who the illusion and allure of the big city have possessed. "He gets to see how the Princess lives, and he might even get to stay at the palace."
I leaned over and cupped a hoof over my mouth. "She knows about Hal. She's already made it clear she wants to know everything. Which, by the way, Azure is absolutely going to hold over my head until the day I die," I whispered.
Crop attempted to restrain a laugh—oh, did she try. The fact that she still snorted hard enough to alert everypony within a five-mile radius did not help or hide her consternation. It certainly drew the attention of Foresight and the rest of the Forage family.
"Crop, care to share?" Bramble asked. She leaned in and smirked at the now skittish Tender sibling. "Come now, you can tell your family, right?"
"No, no s, he cannot," I said. I stamped hard, nose held high, in outrage. "It would be a breach of our solemn trust. You, oh so, nosey cur." I pointed a hoof hard, the limb shaking as Bramble stared back in dejected surprise.
"A bit much, don't you think?" she asked.
"Nope."
"You two are so strange," Yield said, turning around. "We still have chores to do, so have fun in Canterlot, Zero."
"And good luck with the Princess," Sow said before following his sister.
"Thank you. It is always a pleasure, Sow, Yield." I waved goodbye, shaking my head the whole time. The Forage Herd were the only ponies I've ever met who called me Zero. A habit born from having every other pony in the family share the same first name. Tender, Tender, Tender, and more Tender.
"The others aren't going to like you going either. Hay, they're more likely to fight you on your trip to Canterlot than I ever could," Crop mused.
"That's because Bramble would tan your hide if you tried."
"You're darn right I would. It isn't any of our business what a free-range colt does with his time. Even more so if he is a local hero," Bramble said. Her smirk had evolved into a classic shit-eating grin. I suppose it took a local hero to know one. Even if, by all that is holy, I had no interest in such things.
"I still don't like it," Crop said before she turned and began her march back to her humble little farm to do humble marsh farm things.
"I think it'll do you some good even if the Princess is all but kidnapping you. Not that any of us can stop her, mind you. I'm sure whatever she has planned is for the best," Bramble said, watching her niece as she left.
Bramble was right; we couldn't, and it would probably do me some good. All it cost was Celestia, all but roasting me alive with nothing but a stray look. On that same note, Crop was right about the fact that the others wouldn't make it any easier.
"We really should move on, cadet. We are on a rather tight schedule." Foresight shared a tired look with Bramble. The conspiring sort of look only adults who think a foal was too stupid to read the room make. A universal constant, through all of time and space, some stallions and mares never learned. I may be a foal, but I can read just fine, thank you.
"You're right, and if I don't get to everypony, I'm liable to wish for another mudslide before incurring somepony's wrath."
"Aye, on that, we agree. Glider or Dossy might end me if I let slip you missed a chance to explain yourself."
"Well, it sounds like you both best be off," Bramble said. She flicked a wing back past the farm gates. "And Zero."
"Yes?"
"She'll miss you, I'm sure."
I scoffed. "I get it, I really do. We all deserve to be a little angry, a bit tired, and overwhelmingly done with this whole muddy mess."
"Yes, we do. Now, go find those other fillyfriends of yours."
I roll my eyes and turn back towards town. "I'll miss you too, Bramble."
So, as shakily as I could manage, I took wing once more. Foresight leisurely fell in beside me. He eyed me auspiciously. "Where to next?"
We still had Azure, Tally, Wayward, and the Night House. Bogwood was built out from the center in a spiral, segmented by the eight cardinal directions. The further you went from the center, the more spread out the homes and businesses became. The north, where the wetlands were, was the sparsest and the eastern streets the busiest, as they more closely settled on the roads that led to and from Baltimare. Even with this in mind, every single pony I needed to see was as far from one another as they could bother being. Azure was most likely at 'What Ails You,' which was closest to the town square and where Celestia was waiting.
Tally worked in the southwest, though the name of her workplace escaped me. Something to do with beans, I think, counting, audits? The thought alone left my brain groaning in protest. Math was dumb, and whoever came up with it was dumber.
Wayward worked with her father on weather, so she could be anywhere in town right now. However, the docks and the mudslide are where the lion's share of the weather ponies are right now unless Celestia shooed everypony away from the frozen mountain of mud beforehoof.
"Sarge?"
"Cadet?"
"Any idea where the weather ponies are? Wayward works with her sire a lot on the weather, which I'm sure means she's somewhere doing something productive right now," I asked. I flailed a hoof toward the mud mountain, which, even from the farthest edge of town, was unambiguous in just what a danger a hundred tons of mud and sludge could do should it, for any reason, become less frozen.
"If I had to guess, Shopping District or the docks. They got hit the worst, well, aside from, you know, the wetlands. Ms. Brew's shop is near the town square, right?" I nodded in affirmation. "And the smart filly?"
"Writ Tally," I offered. "She works on business audits, bits, and math."
"Right, we might want to see her first. At least we know where to look." Foresight tucked and wing and pivoted out from our course towards the town square and off west. "Toward the Scholar District, yeah?"
"That's right."
I glided lazily into position to Foresight's side. My wings creaked and ached with each subtle twitch, in every breeze, with every breath. I was one stray flap from falling out of the sky, which would prove my oh-so-caring sergeant right, which might be the only thing keeping me in the air. Pure immature, spite, let it not be said, Glacial Zero gave in to peer pressure."
Freya flew past, smiling all the while. "I have a feeling Tally might wallop you when you tell her what you're doing. That filly might be logical most of the time, but you seem to bring something far scarier out of her whenever you do something oh so 'Glacial' of you," Freya tittered.
I had to stagger my response, my wings nearly giving out as I shifted hard to glare at Freya. "Did you just use me as a verb?"
"And if I did?" Freya asked. She fluttered her lashes and pouted coyly.
"I will end you," I said, taking a half-hearted swing at my ghostly companion.
"You will try, Glacie, of that I have no doubt."
"You okay, Colt?"
I slowly turned back to Foresight, who was watching from the corner of his vision. "Yeah, just thinking out loud. Sorry."
Foresight dismissed my ramblings for the moment. "Right, well, we're coming up to the Scholar District; where does that filly of yours work?" He gestured to the buildings below us.
"Bean something. I've never actually been there before. I never needed to. I've never been in the Scholar District at all, really."
Foresight rolled his eyes and turned back to the streets below. "Beans, hm. Really wish I had the head for names now."
"Don't you patrol around here?" I asked.
Foresight jabbed a hoof to the street below. "The streets, yes, I don't do interior inspections, well, not often. Public property and buildings owned by the crown get a once-over every so often. The rest is left alone unless something goes wrong."
"That makes sense, I guess."
"I could always invade everypony's privacy if you want. Being a spirit gives me plenty of time to learn secrets and phase through walls," Freya said, waving a hand through my side. I had a feeling she just liked phasing through me in general. It wasn't like she was doing anything I hadn't already known she could do.
"Earth ponies memorize businesses and street names more often. Ya know, hoofing it and all. It's just common sense. You really should try it more often."
I nodded. "That's a fair point."
Tally smiled back. "Glad you agree."
"Right, so maybe we should…" I blinked and looked to Freya, who shifted and shimmered as she shared the exact space where another pony was now occupied. A certain bean counter, whose toothy grin could outshark a shark. A grin that grew wider as she noted I'd put two and two together. Which is math, and therefore, dumb that I did such a thing.
"Right, well, looks like we won't need to be hoofing anywhere. Apologies, Ms. Tally, but your lesson is officially no longer practical," Foresight said.
"True," Tally agreed. "Now, what brings our local hero to my side of town?"
I crossed my hooves as best I could in midair and pouted so hard I may have pulled a muscle. "Our Princess, actually," I said.
"Oh?"
"She's decided I am to accompany her back to Canterlot. I've been told to say my farewells lest I drown in regrets."
The silence was deafening and glorious. The abject confusion that fell away into an inconsolable anger that consumed Tally was my finest work yet. It almost made one forget the reason for such an announcement. Tally had a way of bringing out the bullheadiest parts of others. None had landed with such poignant severity in all the time I'd known her, in every debate, argument, teasing, and jest. In some ways, it was art, and in others, ghastly. It was as if the day's more mind-numbing topics faded into a more nostalgic routine.
I waited with bated breath, tail flicking in the wind as I idly glided over the rows of businesses and homesteads below. However, as all things are, the peace was fleeting, fragile, and shattered by the only one I knew who had no sense or appreciation for such mastery of our craft.
"You broke her," Freya yelled to the heavens between fits of laughter. She'd flipped onto her back and kicked out wildly as she held her stomach in revelry. While she was the ruination to my grandest victory, she was followed in kind, even if unknowingly.
"Dear Faust, Colt," Foresight said behind a hoof. He tried his best to hide his own amusement at Tally's flumixation.
"She did what?" Tally asked. Her tone was calm, icy, and static. It was little more than a whisper in the early winter breeze. Her face, however, wore the thunderous fury of the worst storms across the high seas. A fire burned in her eyes as Tally slowly roused herself from her stupor. I may have gone a tad far with my delivery.
"The Princess has decided I need a proper teacher for my cryomancy. So, she is taking me, against my own wishes, back to Canterlot. While I'm sure the studying part would be helpful, I'm unsure about the deeper reasoning behind her decision."
"What did you do?" Tally asked. She'd covered what little distance we had midair and was less than a muzzle's reach from ramming her skull into mine. "Besides the obvious."
I let out a sigh and pointed to a nearby cloud. "Might as well take a seat. My wings are going to give out any second."
"Exactly as I said they would," Foresight added. Both he and Freya had returned to reality. Foresight was chomping at the bit for that oh too-sweet 'I told you so.'
"Fine," Tally said.
No sooner had my rear been planted on the fluffy bouncy of a Bogwood standard issue, Stratocumulus. We rarely had anything else. The severity of the marsh's humidity and connection to a port line meant the more delicate cloud breeds just didn't stay solid long enough to get any use from. Some locals considered them too thick and gray to be anything but dour. I disagreed. Stratocumulus were perfect clouds to find the silver lining, dark enough not to fade to the sun's rays, leaving the light bending around rather than shining through the cloud cover.
"So, I'll start with the big reveal. I may have told her about a certain secret or at least some of it."
Tally's lips pulled into a tight line as she glared down at the roads below. "Which parts?" she asked.
"The part Azure wanted her to know."
Tally nodded, wrapping a hoof over her forehead. "That's what I thought. So she knows about—" Tally waved her unused hoof in a noncommittal circle at her temple.
I nodded. "The first one, yeah, she knows. Though I think she was going to have me trained and thus go with her regardless of the other thing."
"Agreed. Whatever the Princess was thinking was way bigger than a little colt and his dreams of the future," Freya said. She'd taken a spot between Tally and me and wrapped us both in a fragile hug.
"Much bigger." Tally agreed.
"Meaning I…" My thoughts ground to a complete halt. Tally shifted, an eye trailing if for only a split second, not to me, but to my side. The side where Freya still had my shoulder wrapped in her hoof. "... I'm sorry. What did you just say?"
Something danced behind Tally's eyes—a light that shimmered in silver. Then it vanished, and I watched as Tally turned to Freya. Not the look of one looking past Freya, not the look of one checking the horizon, lost to the thing right before them. No, this look was focused, clear, and precise. Regardless of my magic, pony, or wendigo, my blood ran deathly cold, a chill no amount of resistance could numb.
"How long?" Freya whispered.
"Tally?"
"Is something wrong, foals?" Foresight asked. One ear twitched as I was reminded he'd been here at all. Even if things were as they seemed, which was worrying enough, the fact that Foresight was here to witness it meant the vaguer, the better it was all kept. If I weren't already sore and tired, the headache that devoured my mind might be irksome.
"Of course not, sir," Tally said, jabbing me in the side.
"Yeah, sorry, just friendly secrets, that's all." I rubbed my side, eyeing Tally all the while.
"Right, the same kind you told the Princess, I'm sure," Foresight said. He offered a dismissive shrug. "Though, we'll need to go soon if we're going to visit the others in time."
"True, just a minute more, I promise."
Foresight scoffed, "Don't mind me, cadet. Do what you need to."
"You got lucky with that Sergeant of yours. Better he's a stallion, too," Tally said. She offered said Sergeant a smile, who returned it in kind.
"The colt is lucky he's got fillies like you to keep him out of trouble."
"Oh, and who exactly stopped me from nearly freezing myself solid yesterday?" I asked. Both Tally and Foresight stayed silent.
"I did, silly," Freya said, tutting me as she slipped around my side and bonked me on the head. "You are welcome, as it stands."
"Who?" Tally whispered. She spoke just loud enough that I could make out the words and soft enough that Foresight was left blissfully unaware.
"Tally, are you okay?" I asked, whispering back.
"Who is she?" Thus, the pen fell. I strained not to turn to Freya, who, for her part, had floated above me. I couldn't see her face, but I had a feeling she looked as confused as I felt. Tally took a long breath. Her eyes trailed from mine up. I was glad no one could hear my inner thoughts at this moment, as the unintelligible screech would leave most thinking I'd lost my mind.
"You can see me, can't you?" Freya asked. She'd taken a spot in front of me, eyes meeting Tally's own. The air shimmered, and the cool early winter air became frigid.
"Sort of."
"Sort of?" Freya and I parroted back.
"Ever since the time at Azure's when you told us about… the other one. I felt something that day, something cold. But yesterday, when you were brought to the shelter. I could see something no pony else did. A ghost."
"Tally, I know this isn't fair, but we're short on time. Celestia is waiting, and the others deserve a goodbye." I looked over my shoulder at Foresight, who was idly watching the ponies below.
"It isn't fair, no, but it isn't your fault."
"I'll stay for a bit," Freya said, patting me on the head.
"Really?"
Freya nodded and wrapped Tally in a surprised hug. "I told you she would be the difficult one from the start, didn't I?"
Tally flinched. "Are you sure?"
Freya pulled her closer. "I don't mind. It gets a little lonely only having silly little Glacie to talk to, anyways."
"Okay, well, I am clearly not wanted here. And Wayward could be anywhere right now. So, I'll leave you to it." I turned, swatting my tail in the fillies' direction.
"Ready colt?" Foresight asked, having heard my dismissive humph.
Freya and Tally shared a look and smiled back at me. "She's not in the Scholar District if that helps," Tally said. Tally's smile faltered. "And Glacial."
I turned back, ear flicking in the breeze. "Yeah, I know. I'll be careful. I promise."
"You better." Tally's words promised a very unpleasant time should I go and nearly die again. I rolled my eyes and jumped back over to Tally, pulling her into a hug.
"Be nice to Freya. She is such a needy filly."
That earned a choked snortle from Tally and a forlorn gasp from Freya.
"I'll see you later, Tally." With that, I jumped in the air, my wings in only a mild amount of agony. Foresight was already in the air. He eyed the town center in the distance. He was nearly lost in thought when I elbowed him back to reality. "Sir?"
"Nothing cadet. So, Wayward next, yes?"
I glanced back at Tally and Freya, who'd already started a quiet conversation. They'd need to find a more private place to talk if Tally didn't want to look like a madmare talking to the clouds.
"Let's try the Shopping District. Even if we don't find her, we'd be a stone's throw from the Night House," Foresight said, pointing to the aforementioned district's location.
"That sounds fine. We're a little short on time as is."
The flight, if you could call my pitiful gliding flight, was short. Every flight in Bogwood was a short one. Even designed in a spiral pattern, the whole town was compact. The wasting of what little solid land there was in the area was looked down upon. The farmers and merchants especially might flay someone who misused allotted land. The Shopping District was a flooded zone. I spent yesterday morning helping Storm and Billow. It didn't look much better today. The water damage was extensive. The forlorn dismay of several shopkeeps was palpable. Not every business survived the tides. The frozen wave of filth is a monument to just how wrathful free-range weather can be. The whole district was bustling with ponies, cleaning, building, and otherwise, trying to put the pieces back together.
"Everypony was lucky," Foresight said. He watched the crowd below with passive sympathy. "It could have been much worse. A lot of dead ponies." Foresight's gaze stopped on the landbound glacier to the north.
"A lot of dead ponies," I agreed. A lot of dead ponies, starting with me. Celestia had been right. If it had been me all by myself, I wouldn't be here to regret it. I'd been told several times since I'd woken up I was some kind of hero. Those accusations were baseless. It was not I who saved them. Freya did all the heavy lifting. She gambled with her deepest secret and won. Now that I had her magic mixed with my own, I could feel the change. The ice inside my veins, the chill given off from every pore. On some metaphysical level, I was a wendigo or at least part wendigo.
"We'll start a sweep west to east. Maybe we'll see somepony we know who may have seen Wayward. If not, we'll drop by the House first and then make our way towards the—" Foresight's thoughts were derailed by a sudden shout from below us. A shout from one Azure Brew, who looked as obnoxious as ever. "Or we could ask Ms. Brew."
"Or that," I agreed.
"Glace, down here," Azure shouted, waving her hooves frantically. I rolled my eyes, but seeing as my wings felt like they were on fire, I was in no position to ignore her. That and she deserved a goodbye, too.
The second I touched down, I was wrapped in the crushing hooves of my favorite unicorn. "So, how'd it go? Did Princess Celestia give you a medal? Is she going to throw the mudslide into the sun?"
"Well, no, and I have no idea if she can even do that," I answered sequentially. "Though there is some other news. But before that, have you seen Wayward?"
"Yep, she's by the stockhouses. Why?"
Foresight groaned. "This filly, I swear. One second, I'll go grab our wayward Wayward. Might as well get both at once." Foresight, with a single mighty flap, was airborne and, with a second, was over the rooftops.
"What's going on?" Azure asked. Also, your boss is super not funny. He really should leave jokes to the professionals."
"A lot, honestly, but I'll wait for Wayward. There is no sense in repeating myself halfway through. Let's just say Celestia had a few things to say about yesterday." I shrugged. "Also, yes, he is."
"Are you okay, Glace? You look like you're ready to drop," Azure said, shouldering up beside me and pressing hard enough to straighten my wobbly frame.
I shook my head. "Not too far from the truth."
"Glace!" And thusly, I was sandwiched between two fillies. Wayward hadn't given me the chance to even look in her direction before she'd already landed. Foresight trailed behind, blinking away his surprise at Wayward's sudden bout of supersonic speeds. It was something of her calling card. She was quiet and polite, kind and thoughtful. The type of filly who easily disappears in the crown. That was right until she had somewhere to be. Then she was a blur.
"Hey Wayward, glad you could join us," I wrapped a wing around the hugging filly. Which only had her snuggle in closer.
"Are you in trouble? Was the Princess mad?" Wayward asked.
That was an excellent question. An even better question was: what or who she was mad at? Even as I'd been crushed in her desolate heat, I had a feeling that not a single ray, an ounce of that scorching drought, was aimed at me directly. Princess Celestia's eyes had been etched into my mind. Eyes are a weight no pony should need to carry alone. Even with Hal's memories, I doubt Luna could or would come back any sooner than the prophecy predicted. Who, outside of maybe Discord, could pull her back from the void of space?
"Define mad," I said. That earned a firm slap to the back of my head. Azure glared at me as she assaulted me. Wayward only whimpered from under my wing.
"Glace."
"Okay, sorry, no, I don't think she was mad…at me."
"Which means?"
I took a deep, longing breath. Here it was, the long-awaited smugness that would no doubt drown all creation in the satisfaction of one filly and her right to hindsight.
"I told her about, you know who."
"..." silence. Wayward had pulled herself out from under my wing, a tiny pout on her lip as she peered past me to Azure. Who, for her part, stood stock still. You could almost make out the smoke billowing from her ears if one looked hard enough. Then, it came. The smile is wide enough to consume all creations. The jittery jubilation as she bounced from hoof to hoof. The eyes glittering with victory. All pieces are part of the creation of the perfect smug, the ultimate self-satisfaction. It was all over. I'd created a monster.
"I knew it! I told you to tell her; I told you!" Azure devolved into giggles as she pointed at me. I could do nothing but let Azure have her moment. She got what she wanted, even if I'd rather not have had to tell Celestia at all.
"'Yes, you did, and I still think it was a mistake. One I had little choice in, but one I would have rather not have to tell anypony else."
I trusted Azure, Wayward, Tender, Tally, and, of course, Father. Celestia was a different matter. I had no words to describe the aura that she wore, like armor. The more I thought about it, the more I came to a wholly different decision. But that would have to wait.
When Azure finally settled down, I offered her a stern pat on the back. "Feel better?"
Azure nodded happily. "Never better. Maybe next time, you'll listen when I give you advice. You silly colt."
"What did the Princess say?" Wayward asked.
"That I should have died, that something was off, even when I told her about you know who, she seemed skeptical at best. Oh, and I'd be returning to Canterlot with her."
If Tender had been annoyed and Tally had been fuming, the combined fury of the two fillies beside me would rival even Celestia's wrath. Azure's smile fell hard into a disgusted sneer. Her whole body shook as her horn danced with lavender sparks. Wayward was not much better. However, her reaction was far less dramatic. Her eyes had taken on a steely glint as she puffed up her wings. The type of reaction a pegasus only gets when a fight is brewing.
"I'm sorry, Glacial, I think I misheard you. The Princess said she was doing what?" Wayward asked. Her voice had become a monotone. I'd never heard from her ever. It was enough to send a fright up my back. I felt small, between Azure and Wayward, an ant before a tiger, a drowned scream in a flood. I felt sick.
"The Princess has made her decision. One, even if we disagree with it, is not up to us to rebuke," Foresight said from his place nearby. He'd been eerily quiet since he'd found Wayward. His gaze lingered on each filly for a mere second before he cast it to the sky.
"He's right. I need the help with my magic, with you know who, and if anypony can make sense of it."
"It'd be the Princess," Azure finished. She let out a belated groan. "I don't like it."
"You sound like Tender," I said. I scooted out from between the displeased fillies, who did not attempt to stop me. That was a minor miracle, with the way Wayward was watching me.
"I doubt any of us are happy about it," Wayward said. The edge in her voice was subtle, a sharpness that defied conventional means. One that needed no whetstone to slice free.
"No, not really," I agreed.
"What if you were right?" Azure asked.
My brow furrowed. A thousand what-ifs played out in my head, but Azure's question still struck me dumb. "About?"
"What if she gets angry about what you told her? What If I jinxed it? You didn't do anything wrong."
I rolled my eyes. "Even if you did…" I reached out and pulled the downcast filly into another hug. Her rose eyes edged with unshed tears. "... I'll, no, not I. We'll figure it out, all of us. Right, Wayward?" I turned to my fellow pegasus, who'd all but given up the serious mad schtick. No, Wayward, the mad was gone, replaced with a filly whose own unshed tears were not of her own worry but of another's. So, orange joined purple and blue in a trinity of three silly foals hugging away all their problems, as only foals could.
"It'll be okay; Glacial stopped a mudslide; he can stop a princess from turning him to charcoal," Wayward said, a cynical wit hidden between innocent green eyes. She thought no pony could see it, but I did. Well, if it was there at all. I might have imagined it.
"He'll be fine. No reason to worry, young ladies," Foresight said. He wore a tired smile, eyes flickering with amusement as the three of us foals turned to him. "Unfortunately, we do need to get moving. We're running low on time as it stands, and we have one more place to be before the Princess whisks a poor colt away to her castle in the sky."
"He's right. Time stops for no pony."
I pulled myself from their impromptu cuddle session and flapped my wings idly. They were still sore, and even my feathers felt drained and heavy. It was taking more than I'd have liked to admit just to stay standing.
"Do you know when you'll be back?" Wayward asked.
"Not a clue when Princess Celestia thinks I'm no longer in danger of freezing half of Equestria, probably. Weeks, months, too long, really." It hurt, admitting to just how easily I was ripped away from my life in Bogwood. Weeks it took weeks for me to uproot everything I knew. I might have been impressed if it weren't so frustrating. I never wanted any of this.
"Who knows? If you can freeze a sludge wave while under pressure, I bet learning the simple stuff will be easy. I give it a few weeks, a month at most." My dear sergeant had sidled up and patted me on the head.
"Thanks, Sarge," I said through gritted teeth. "Way to raise the bar."
"Always, cadet, the bar never stops rising higher."
"Right, well, we better get going, or Night Glider and Dossy might end me before I even leave Bogwood," I said. Foresight snorted and took to the air.
"You better come back," Azure pointed a hoof to me with a hiss.
"Why is every mare I know crazy?" I took flight before Azure could tackle and throttle me to the ground.
Thus, that made four, with the girls dealt with, I at least wouldn't be leaving anypony plotting my murder while I was away. The longer I thought about Celestia and her potential plans, the less my own achievements or cryomancy seemed to matter. If anything, they felt more like an excuse. I was in checkmate before we'd ever even met.
"How long do you really think I'll be gone?" I asked Foresight as I fell into a glide beside him. He'd yet to pull me onto his back like he'd promised earlier. An empty threat or reverse psychology. Sargeant Foresight was capable of either flavor, depending on his coffee levels.
"Truth being Glacial, longer than you'd hope. If it were less than a year, I'd be floored. But training aside, whatever you told the Princess when we stepped out clearly swayed her one way or another. I pray to Luna you didn't overplay your hoof."
"So do I, Sarge."
Another minute of flight later, a thought crossed my mind: "Sarge, will anypony be at the Night House right now? Shouldn't everypony be out helping with the clean-up?" I could see maybe one guard staying behind in case something came up or somepony dropped by, but that would not solve the whole goodbye thing.
"Normally, yes, that would be the case; however, while you and Princess Celestia were sharing secrets, I may have found Distant Point and told her to have everypony return to base at their earliest convenience. So, most should have returned by now if I had to wager."
"Huh." The Sargeant living up to his name, in more cosmic irony than I cared to contemplate. With Hal's memories, the whole naming convention of ponies and their somehow almost universal relation to their special talent had been something I'd noted more than once. One I've had to repress once or twice lest I go insane.
"Speaking of, The Night House is in sight. I hope you've got your farewell speech planned. I have a feeling our fellow Night Guard aren't going to be too pleased."
I scoffed. "Has anypony been happy about my trip to Canterlot?"
Foresight hummed, tapping his chin. "Bright Whimsey, maybe?"
"Touché."
By the time we landed in front of the oh-so-benign block of stone the Night Guard had called home, I was left just the faintest bit nervous. The collective strain of the day was catching up to my too-young-for-this-nonsense body, and I could really have gone for a nap or two. One thing became very apparent the second I landed. There was no way I'd be getting airborne again today. My wings felt dipped in tar, and my vision was flecked with dots.
"Look sharp, cadet."
With the grace of an angry yak, Foresight threw open the Night House's front door. I never even saw it coming. One instant, I stood beside the Sargeant; the next, I was in the House proper, staring into the less-than-thrilled eyes of one Private Levvy.
"There you are, you little troublemaker. We were beginning to think you and Foresight had gotten eaten by Border Toads. A right shame that would have been."
"Morning, Private, I take it everypony is present?" Foresight said without missing a beat. He smirked and plodded his way into the office.
"Aye, sir."
"Alright, Colt, you've got some explainin' to do. Distant Point said you went and had some private words with Her Majesty. Sounds like a certain colt is in for right trouble."
"Probably," I said, patting one of Levvy's hooves. As such, I was carried by said Levvy into the main office, where the others had supposedly gathered.
"Here comes the little hero now," Night Glider said from somewhere in the room. I could only twist myself so far in Levvy's grip. "Or, would he be the local menace now? Off to the mines are ya, little colt?"
"Probably."
Levvy dropped me to the floor like I was a sack of grain. My poor, sore bottom did not appreciate her brand of tenderness, love, and care. As Levvy had attested, the room was packed. Distant and Dossy were at their desks, not for long, I'm sure, and Night Glider was leaning over Distant's desk tiredly. Wings limp, eyes barely open, and coat and mane bedraggled. That could be given to every guard present. There was little time for self-care when your town was beaten, battered, and wetter than usual.
"Poor colt looks ready to drop," Distant said. She gave a limp wave and continued to do as little as her seated form could.
"You don't look much better," Glider said.
"Tough morning?" I asked.
"Could be better," Dossy said. As usual, she had a stack of papers three hooves high on her desk. The only thing of note was the three separate mugs drained dry beside her. It was a strange thing, in fact. Unlike in Hal's world, coffee wasn't so readily available or as convenient to make; the whole thing was hoof-ground. Foresight had literal bags of beans stuffed in the corner of his tiny office.
Coffee was also primarily a Noble class of luxury. Well, aside from Thestrals. Since it was thestrals, who grew the beans. It was Dam who introduced it to Father, one of the many things he still held on to with her gone. However, in the case of ponies like Foresight, it was an addiction, and sometimes a necessary one, for thestrals who have to be up during the day more than they'd prefer. As far as I was aware, until this morning, Dopssy was not one of those thestrals.
"Well, cadet, don't keep the ladies waiting out with it," Foresight said.
"I met with Celestia and chatted about my frozen art piece. One or two of you may have noticed up north. Then, well, as Distant apparently told you. I had another private conversation about things the Princess was less happy about but more intrigued by. Now, I'm being absconded by said Princess and will be going to Canterlot for a while."
I stopped and gave a big, fake smile. The mares in the room stared back in uniform silence. A trick of the trade I'd yet to learn. Then, a hoof descended atop my head.
"Say again, Colt," Levvy said from behind me.
"I'm off to the big city, ma'am," I said with a salute.
"What in the name of Luna did you tell Princess Celestia that has her taking you back to the capital with her?" Dossy said. She'd stood and looked stuck between horror and revilement.
"I could tell you, but then you might get abducted too."
"Colt!" Private First Class Clean Dossier hissed. Not like a pony may hiss in anger or offense. No, this was far more primal, the hiss of a bat coming down on its prey. The type one dreads hearing in the dead of night.
"I'm serious. I could tell you, nopony has told me I can't. Others know, but if I tell you. I can't promise you'll like what I have to say. That and the fact that we're on a deadline means it would be the abridged version. So, if you want to know, now is the time."
The Night House had a right, should they choose, to know. The Thestral populace had a right to know that Luna was still out there, trapped in the clutches of a parasite. That her banishment was not eternal. The issue was never 'IF' I would tell them, only when.
"Best leave it then, you can tell us when you aren't being marched to the gallows," Night Glider said. The rest of the room remained silent. Thoughts were being had, but as it seemed most of the time, everypony defaulted to their senior. Even Foresight did not attempt to pry my secrets free. Though with him being there for the meeting with Celestia, he'd be the one least likely to demand answers.
"That's probably for the best. Secrets rushed are never as impressive," Dossy said.
"How long will ya be gone?" Distant asked. The poor mare could barely keep her eyes open. She'd propped her head on a hoof and was struggling just to keep the hoof upright.
"Celestia wants to have me trained on how to use Cryomancy so I don't hurt myself or others. So, a while. I'll be back, though, eventually."
"Eventually, he says," Levvy said, bopping me on the head once more.
"If it keeps you from looking like you did yesterday, then I'm all for it. You really were on death's door, Colt. A sight no mare wants to see." Night Glider would have looked righteous if she wasn't as tired as Distant Point.
"Not a sight any pony wants to see, I'll have you know," Foresight added.
"Wait!" Night Glider shot up from her slump on Distant Point's desk.
"Corporal?" Foresight asked.
"The letter."
"The letter?"
Night Glider nodded. "For the colt, he got a 'Letter.'"
My thoughts came to a screeching halt. A letter, for me, could only be from one pony. It hadn't been that long. Days. I'd have expected weeks prior to now. Yet, if there was a letter, it meant somepony rush delivered it.
"Dam." I hadn't realized I'd started crying. There were no sobs, just tears, silent and calm. Nopony said anything. Instead, Night Glider made her way to her own desk and, within seconds, retrieved a simple, folded piece of paper. One she jogged across the room and placed gently in my hooves.
"I didn't read it, not for my eyes. But I'm glad. I'm glad Belfry got it to you today before you left. I hadn't expected a response this quickly. Luna blessed the courier and you on this day."
Without thinking, I unfolded the paper and let Dam's words speak for themselves.
"Dear Glacial,
You surprised me, though you are my son. That means you're smart enough to find all those silly things adults hide from foals. I won't deny I cried when I read your letter, which surprised every pony and everyone else too. Your father has sent a few letters, that's true. He's told me a lot of things, but not about your cutie mark. You'll need to tell me all about it in your following letter. I can't brag to everypony else if I don't even know how you got it. I'm sure there are more than a few bats up here, who'd love to blow some of this blasted snow to Manehattan and back. Night Glider mentioned you in her last letter. I'm happy the Night Guard has taken you in. They're a good bunch, a little odd, but hearts in the right places. Someday, my little colt, we'll see each other again. You, me, your father. We'll be a family again. I may not have done anything wrong, but you don't need to for someone else to be afraid. I can't tell you how happy your letter made me, how much it means to me. I can't wait for your following letter. I'm sure you'll have all sorts of stories to tell me. Until you can tell me to my face, we can sit side by side and talk late into the dawn. I'll be counting down the days until the next courier. I'm so proud of you, and no matter what any of those foals some call Nobles say, that will never change.
Love,
"Love you too, Mom."
I don't recall folding the letter back up or the kind whispers of the others in the room. I don't recall Foresight lifting me onto his back or leaving the Night House. But I do recall the landing. I recall Celestia and her unbearable heat. Next stop, Canterlot.
Author's Note
So, here begins ACT 1 proper. For the brevity of the reader, the story follows, for the most part, a three-act structure, as much as I love the stories that inspired me to write this one. I am not nearly as adept at slice-of-life as they are. Seriously, “Life Finds a Way” Could theoretically go on forever.
I have also noted this as a recurring comment, so I wish to address it. The name of the story, “Frozen Through the Ages,” is not used without intent; however, I fear some may be taking its purpose a bit too literally. It does hold meaning, but it might not be quite what you think it is. I just wanted to curb this quandary before it somehow confuses or upsets readers.
That said, I want to thank you for joining me on this journey so far and wish each and every one of you a Happy Holiday and a fantastic New Year.
High above the clouds of Bogwood, Celestia's royal carriage makes a steady line for the side of Mount Canterhorn. The enclosed box of gold and white shone like a gem in the daylight. It had been some ten minutes since we left my home behind since Father and Foresight waved me goodbye since Freya had metaphorically plopped herself into the seat beside me since Celesia's icy stare broiled me alive from within. It wasn't the same kind of heat as before from the annex building. That heat had been dry, sweat-inducing, and throttling. Celestia's aura now gave off a steady skin-chafing heat that left me shifting in my seat.
The Princess had not said a thing since we took off. Which only added to the uncomfortable atmosphere in which I'd been left to ruminate. Aside from Her Highness, there was also the matter of Tally and Freya. Freya had opted to say nothing. She didn't need to give a reason; with Celestia so close and with plenty of practice, I doubted I could mask my own responses well enough to keep her attention from myself.
The carriage itself was, barring the heat, incredibly cozy. Soft seats, the gentle breeze from the window, the view below as we passed forest, lake, and plains. For Glacial Zero, it was new and fantastic. I'd had little interaction with the world at large; that is to say, Bogwood and the marsh that entrapped it had been my world. For Hal, it was pleasant, peaceful, and idyllic, but not something he'd lacked a reference for. It'd have been a landscape of untamed beauty in any other carriage with any other company.
No, instead, I was left to plot. There was an inevitability to what Celestia would no doubt want from my stay in Canterlot. Aptly, Hal, and what else he knows. I'd barely sidestepped her concern before. I doubt I'd get that lucky again. The agony of what I should or should not tell her about the show's telling of events was beguiling. If I wasn't already drought in a thin layer of froth and sweat, I'd no doubt be in a cold one otherwise.
"Glacie, are you okay?" Freya asked from beside me. The sound startled me out of my thoughts. My eyes darted to Freya, back to Celestia, and then to Freya once more. Celestia hadn't made any note of my reaction, to my nerves' relief.
I shook my head slowly. Freya sighed and lightly wrapped a hoof around my shoulders. "It'll be fine, I promise." I had a feeling neither of us believed that. There were too many unknowns. The biggest of which sat across from us even now.
As if to prove me right, Celestia's eyes slowly turned to peer at me, the sharp, powerful gaze enough to send electric shots down my back and through my tail. "Does something ail you, young Glacial Zero? We've noted how unnerved you seem to be."
A statement that was as mundane as the weather. Celestia seemed only half aware she'd even spoken to me at all. It seemed it wasn't just me lost in thought, which made her attention all the more nerve-wracking. Her secondhoof observations alone left me on defensive. I pressed myself hard into the plush seat behind me. I could feel my legs trembling. This morning, I'd had Father, Foresight, and Bogwood to quell my fears. That was no longer the case.
"As if that's a surprise. Celestia, really thought you'd be happy to be whisked away, stolen from your family and friends? Could she really be so oblivious?" Freya asked.
"I'm fine, Your Highness," I muttered. I squirmed under her gaze. The longer she looked, the more alert she seemed. She'd been dragged out of her thoughts, which only made me squirm harder.
"You need not fear us, colt; we have no intent on harming you." It was a weak reassurance, made all the more apparent as Celestia's gaze softened. "We only wish to understand you, young Glacial Zero, to prepare you for the power you wield."
On some level, I believed she meant that. Celestia may not be the ruler Hal recalled, but neither Hal nor Glacial believed she was actively evil. Hurt, young, compared to the show, tired, angry, scared, all of the above? All of the above? I could believe all of them, but not evil. It boiled down to what she thought of us if she saw us as a threat. In a way, it was sad.
"Can you blame me, Princess?" I asked.
"You fear, revealing your seemingly prophetic benefactor was ill-advised, that you may be punished or imprisoned for your honesty. Are we wrong?" Celestia asked. The heat in the carriage had vanished almost entirely. It was replaced with a vacuum, a nearly unearthly chill. My own chill. The swinging pendulum of temperatures was stark enough that even I shivered slightly. It was an impressive feat that I may have given myself the cold shoulder.
"I do." There was no reason or purpose for lying. I'd lost that privilege the moment I'd told her about Hal at all. She knew, which means she'd have opinions. As far as Celestia saw it, I was a foal in over his head. In reality, I was a foal with the mind of a human in over their head.
"Should we not worry about a being using a foal as a means to deliver their prophecy?"
"That's a good point," Freya said, nodding sagely.
"Because it is about Luna?" I asked. The truth was, I doubted the content of the prophecy would have mattered. I could even see the point of keeping any future sight on a tight leash. The currency of time is one everypony must pay; to earn even a sliver of that back, or paid forward in this case, was something one would wage wars over.
"Because it puts you in danger."
Bingo.
"Does Hal scare you?" I asked. My head tilted ever so slightly, eyes wide and brimming. I met Celestia's magenta gaze, and she met mine.
"Should he not scare you?" Celestia asked in return.
"No. Hal is my friend." I was laying it on a bit thick. The clueless youth angle would only grant me so some leeway. Celestia knew I was more intelligent than I should be or, at the very least, more aware. I'd given that away at our first meeting. Celestia didn't need new reasons to feel suspicious. So, the youth card I'd play till I could do so no more.
"Come now, Glacial Zero, we both know better than that. You may not fear the voice, but you fear what it may lead to."
Thus, the youth card was out the window. Well, at least I tried.
"Princess, may I be honest with you?" I asked. Both Freya and the Princess gave me a dubious look. I could guess Freya's thoughts. I have plenty to hide if I were to be candid. Honesty was at an all-time high premium, going both ways. The whole trip screams of obfuscation. Princess Celestia was scheming, but that was a problem for another time. Though Hal made it quite clear that we would have some profound words if she started sending me on 'adventures' to move dragons off mountains and meddle with Gods of Chaos.
"You speak as if you were not already being honest, young Glacial Zero." Neither one of us believed we were being honest, neither she nor I. It was stupid political games. I was not a fan. Most of this went way over my head, even with Hal and Freya. The only tell I had on Celestia was the radical swaying of her aura's heat output. I wasn't positive if she even knew she was doing it. Or, perhaps I could only tell due to my own radically lowered temperature, two extremes clashing, baring the truth of both for all to see.
"Nopony is always honest; sometimes ponies prefer the lies others tell them, the ones we tell ourselves."
I was walking on very thin ice, no pun intended. I wasn't even sure why I was feeling so brazen. It was like a switch flipped in the back of my head, and all the fear had vanished. Freya had gone slackjawed. A reasonable response if you asked me.
Celestia gave a single hum before nodding for me to continue. The plotting had doubled.
I took a single deep breath and prepared for incineration. "I think Hal scares you. You fear he might be wrong. You fear he might be right even more."
"Glacie, do you smell burning hair?" Freya asked. She gave the carriage an experimental sniff before recoiling. "Definitely burning hair."
"Glacial Zero."
"Yes, Princess?"
Celestia pointed to the seat beneath me, where my tail hung in a lazy, damp heap. Or, it would be if it were not at this very second smoldering. I gave my tail a shake, only for the embers to grow. I look back up to Celestia, who, for her part, was trying to avoid meeting my eye.
"Put it out, you dummy." Freya swatted the back of my head.
"Chill." My tail frosted over from the base to the tip, standing on end as the embers doused instantly. The smell, however, remained. "Huh, that could have gone rather poorly."
"We agree and apologize for said account. We, I, perhaps, reacted too strongly, even if subconsciously. We also cannot deny that prophecy is, perhaps, disconcerting in all facets. The fact it pertains to our sister did little to help such notions."
Thus, Princess Celestia relented a bit. It was a small victory in a war I had no interest in or intent on waging. Celestia was right; prophecy is a dubious measure to gauge. She had every right to be on edge. I certainly would be.
I shook my head. I offered Celestia the best tired beyond my years smile I could. I didn't have to try very hard. "You have no reason to apologize. Well, for the prophecy being stressful. I appreciate the apology for the tail thing, though."
"You are a very strange colt, young Glacial. You will need to forgive my need to understand how such connections were forged. How did this Hal and you become entangled? We would have preferred to discover said secrets throughout your tutelage in Canterlot. But, are you prepared for some level of explanation already, or perhaps that is your seer companion? Either way, you seem less reluctant than I'd have assumed."
"Hmmm." For the first time since meeting the Princess, she was being direct with me, a colt of no means or record. It was surreal on some level. It was clear, to some degree, that she was speaking to Hal and only accounting for Glacial being present. On the other hoof, she had stopped presuming that Glacial was too young or naive to understand her worries. "I believe both Hal and I are in agreement. The reality is that neither of us is completely sure of the 'How' or 'Why' of any of it. Though I can give you the beginning if you care to know it."
"I'm not so sure this is a good idea, Glacie," Freya whispered into my ear.
"Proceed."
A gamble, a chance for this all to blow up in my face. Princess Celestia is not a tyrant or despot; she most likely won't throw me in a cell to rot away or dissect me or anything. She wasn't the soft ruler Hal knew, either. These aren't soft times, Hal recalls at all. This Equestria, this world was rough, hewn from jagged rock, heavy and unrefined. Celestia is still grieving; the Nobles are trying to be rid of the Thestral populace, and I'm here with a Wendigo who expects me to save her whole race somehow. The simplest way to describe it all would be confounding. My head was on the verge of a migraine. Sleep was tenuous at best, and my home was under the watchful eye of a town-destroying popsicle.
"It happened on the day I got my Cutie Mark. One moment, I was just a normal colt with nothing of note at all. Then, I doused a flame with my cryomancy, the how or why of it lost on me. At the same moment, something in my head changed."
"This Hal?" Celestia asked. I had her full attention. The heat in the carriage had cooled to earthly warmth. Freya still looked unsettled but had chosen to say nothing.
"Yeah, Hal. The important part was that I couldn't separate the points of connection. It was all just there as if it had always been there, waiting. Hal and I were connected, and it felt as natural as anything else we had ever experienced. Which made the headache that followed even worse."
"You've spoken to others regarding this?" Celestia leaned forward ever so slightly. A flicker in her eye I couldn't parse twinking ever so slightly.
"Father knows," I answered. She'd know I was lying if I said no pony knew. I could feel it. But, even still, chose to leave the girls out of it. Father was strong; he could bear the weight of Celestia's solar judgment. The others deserved peace of mind.
"And Sargeant Foresight, the Night Guard?" Celestia asked.
"No, I haven't told anypony in the guard. Though I have considered it."
"And when did Hal deliver his prophecy about my sister?"
There it was, the question she'd been waiting to ask from the word go. I'd known it was coming but had no way to prepare. Hal's memories had been there from the very second we became one. All of them, and all the events of Equestria with them. I'd given Celestia hope with my 'prophecy,' something she had been lacking. It was enough for me to drag a hoof down my muzzle. I wanted to add a groan to accompany it, but I thought better. If not for Celestia's presence and the sheer severity of it, I might have passed out on the spot. My body ached. Throbbing along with my heartbeat. One restless night was clearly not enough to recoup everything I'd spent stopping the stupid mudslide. Celestia had mentioned that I should be dead by all rights and that halting the wave of filth should have been more than a colt could handle. My body's exhausted cry for sleep, and tranquility could be mistaken for nothing but complete agreement with Her Highness.
None of that answered the Princess, however. I did not have the luxury of waiting Celestia out—very few did—so I let my bedraggled instinct answer instead.
"The first night, while I slept. At the same time, Glacial Zero and Hal settled into my addled, little mind. The first day was painful. So much to take in all at once." Thus, the stage had been set. Faust provided that I may remember just how much truth I was willing to provide.
"I see. Well, we shall have to continue this conversation, for we are fast approaching our destination. Canterlot should be within sight. "Please, see for yourself." Celestia motioned to the nearest window.
Taking her lead, I shuffled myself to the edge of my bench. The memories of Canterlot and Hal's Canterlot danced in my head. Seeing them through the window of the mind and imagination was one thing. It was another to see something for yourself. With bated breath, I pulled myself over the lip of the carriage door. Freya lounged behind me, a cheeky grin foretelling something I'd be most appreciative of her not pulling. A plotting wendigo was not something my frayed nerves had time for at the moment,
"See the majesty of Equestria's fledgling capital. The height of Equestrian architecture and the work of countless artisans." Celestia's chest puffed out in pride. It was the first time today that a glimmer of Hal's Princess shone through. The baggage and loathing set aside for a passion that lit said Princess in a golden glow.
"Quite the introduction, Prin…cess?" The words died in my throat. My brow furrowed as I leaned further over the window's rim. I squinted, peering towards the encroaching majesty of Mount Canterhorn. Seconds ticked by as I stared befuddled at what lay before me.
"Glacial Zero?" Princess Celestia had sidled closer. I looked over my shoulder at her, brow still thoroughly creased. "Are you unwell?"
"Is, is that it?"
Celestia's head tilted as she considered my question, her face now mirroring mine as she thought up her response. I watched idly, calm, my face drained of all emotion. I waited.
"Beg pardon?"
I turned back to the mountain ahead of us and pointed ahead of us. "Is that it?"
"We do not follow. Do you speak of the Canterhorn?"
I shook my head. "Not the mountain. What is connected to it? Is that Canterlot?"
"What else would it be?" Celestia, in turn, leaned out the window as well and followed my gaze. As expected, hanging from the mountain was 'Canterlot,' or what would one day be Canterlot.
As it stood now, the brilliant white spires, the bright solar themes, the dazzling falling water, and the very nature of the spectacle were missing. Instead, what sat in its place was the barest skeleton of Canterlot. The palace sat in the center and looked as one would imagine; it was clearly the focal point the whole of the city was and would be built around. Now, however, if it weren't for said castle, the rest would look overtly spartan and mundane. However, it is still quite a bit more extravagant than Bogwood, at the very least. If I had not been privy to the supposed future of the city, I may have been impressed. As it stands, I was somewhat let down. It was boring, which may have been worse than something wholly different from the image that burned into my mind.
"Dull," I said. No sooner than the word left my mouth, I realized what I'd just said and to whom. I slowly turned to the Princess, who in turn stared down at me.
"Enjoy your trip to the sun, Glacie. I'll miss you." Freya waved from across the carriage, face plastered with a wicked jubilation—the traitor.
"We beg your pardon? Did my ear deceive us? Did you just claim that the pinnacle of Equestrian architecture is dull?"
I nodded. Celestia's words had been eerily calm. However, the thorough pout and glazed expression revealed her true feelings on the matter. Watching Celestia cross her hooves and leer down at me was borderline comical—especially the less coy version of the Princess of my current time. The heat had literally sapped from the air in the carriage. I found myself wanting to both apologize and laugh at the same time. The latter would most likely be a very poor life choice indeed. So, the former it was.
"I'm sorry, Princess. It's just incomplete. I guess I let my whimsey conjure up a more fantastical image, is all." It was the truth.
"Whimsey?" Celestia's pout wavered.
"Yes, whimsey."
Celestia leaned forward, dwarfing me in her shadow. "Not your seer, friend?"
I was genuinely beginning to regret telling Celestia about Hal. "Maybe."
Celestia leaned back. "We take it; it will be quite the sight, indeed?"
The things I do not to die burning alive. "Without giving away the surprise. Yes, it will be a sight to behold."
Celestia's pout vanished, replaced with a pleased smile. The mask had fallen. It seemed the transition between brooding sister and kind-hearted ruler was not as rigid as I'd thought. I smiled back.
"We look forward to seeing such with our own eyes."
"As will many, Princess." I look back out at the rapidly approaching Canterlot. "I hope I'm around to see it, too." Or something a bit closer. Who knows how long it would actually take to finish the three rings that would make up Canterlot's districts? I might at least see the central ring complete if I was lucky.
"Canterlot's state notwithstanding. We will be landing all too soon. As such, I wish to explain what will occur in the following days."
"You mean my tutelage?"
"Yes, your training is one such subject. So, starting with that, you will find that there are a number of courtly magi who could serve as your teachers. However, we have already selected one for the task. Polaris Glimmer is one of the more adept elementalists at our disposal."
That name struck a chord; I wasn't sure why, but it tickled something in the back of my mind. To what end, I'd no idea. "Do you really think they can help a pegasus learn magic?" As asinine as I'm sure the question sounded. It would have been to me. I could not imagine many pegasi needing such tutoring. On top of the attitude of the high society type, that did not bode well. I dreaded to think of all the tropes Hal's mind could dredge up. Blueblood's many portrayals, for instance. That jerk needed some profound humbling.
"Polaris is one of the most knowledgeable stallions to study magic in over a century. For that reason, he will find you quite an interesting case. Magic of such caliber is rare in stallions of any tribe. As it has been for as long as can be recanted."
I disapproved of such implications. My face must have given away my displeasure as Celestia's brow rose ever so slightly. Was I some sideshow project to be observed? If so, the nobility and Celestia would be sorely disappointed. Celestia's brow rose higher.
"Glacial Zero?" The Princess asked.
"Yes, Princess?"
"Your seat has frozen solid."
I looked down. It had indeed frozen from my rear outward, arcing up and tinting the back of the carriage in a light frost. I sniffed and looked back to Celestia. "It seems it has."
"She struck a nerve, didn't she?" Freya asked.
"We had a missive sent while waiting for you in Bogwood. He will know of his new assignment. We will introduce you before the day's end. Your schedule will be dictated at Polaris' convenience. As will the criteria, for the foreseeable future."
Thus, my frozen seat was duly ignored. As for the rest. "How long will I be studying with Mr. Polaris?" I asked.
"As long as need be. We would suppose something close to a year, if not more."
"Glacie. If you don't stop freezing everything, we might fall right out of the sky. Those poor guards outside deserve better. It isn't like they've done anything wrong," Freya said, tutting in mock disapproval. The mirth in her eyes dispelled any actual disagreement completely. That and the way she waved in Celestia's direction. A frantic, exaggerated flailing like one might give when actually falling from a sickening height. The fact that everypony present could fly did not conflate any worry either.
"That's a long time," I let my irritation bubble over to a tired sorrow. I already missed Sire, The Night House, and my friends.
"It is for everyone’s and everypony's safety. We believe you should understand why we can't simply leave you to your own devices. Yes?"
I did. It was a valid concern and one I believe was wise to handle. That did not, however, mean I had to like it, which I did not. But ultimately, my predicament was my fault. I couldn't make it a single month before the Princess of all ponies snatched me up. Nope, Glacial Zero just had to stand out because he's a big dumb dummy.
"Yes."
"Then know this young Glacial Zero. We will not hold you to such studies any longer than necessary. We are under no illusion that you would abuse your gifts. However, hindsight can blind one to the present."
Once again, a fair point. Celestia might be blunter and less patient than her future self, but I did not believe her evil or cruel. A bit surly, perhaps, but not heartless.
"I know."
"We may not have that long," Freya said. Her mirth was gone. In its place was a chilling severity. She shook slightly as she floated beside Celestia.
"On top of your magical studies. We will also be discussing your connection to 'Hal' in more detail in the near future."
"I thought as much." Once again, I'd need to be highly cautious about just how much about Hal and the future I divulged. The idea that I might alter the future was enough to haunt all my already frightful dreams.
"That said, we should be landing in the next few minutes. We hope you do not find our home to be as dull as the cityscape."
"I think she just held a grudge, Glacial. Watch out, lest she suffocate you as you sleep. Oh, the theatrics and drama of a royal court. The intrigue and desire, a place far beyond that of a silly backwater colt."
"I'm sure your home is a sight unlike any other, now and always."
If Celestia was holding a grudge, she buried it nice and deep. Her mask had been remade of sterner stuff, I suspected due to proximity to her seat of power. The heat within the carriage was only slightly suffocating, which beat out our first meeting by leaps and bounds.
"Rightly so," Celestia said.
"Your Highness, we are beginning our descent," One of the Pegasi guards shouted over the wind.
"Princess?"
"Yes?"
"What of high society?" I asked. It was best to curb expectations while I could.
"You speak of nobility and etiquette, correct?" I nodded. Celestia tutted to herself. "You are here on academic merit. We doubt you will have much exposure to the court or the upper crust of society. On the chance you do, you will be with either Polaris, ourselves, or a retainer that we assign to your needs. While that does not mean you will go undisturbed, it does mean you will have some level of assistance should a meeting with nobility happen. You will be fine, young Glacial. Of that, we have little doubt."
This did not bode well.
"That does not bode well," Freya said with a snort.
"Still, if my talent plays out as it has back home. I don't think nopony will take notice."
Celestia smiled ever so slightly. "Perhaps."
She was counting on it, wasn't she? As I stomached that thought, I was made aware of just what lay beneath the facade of the solar matriarch. If a battle she wished, then I suppose I was left with little choice. As a loyal subject of Equestria, it was only right that I gave my Princess precisely what she wanted.
"Totally a grudge," Freya whispered in my ear.
A jarring shake of the carriage marked our arrival at Canterlot Castle, home of Her Royal Highness. A place I'd had no desire to visit prior to the storm and one I was still not very excited to be a day later. I twisted in place, hearing my vertebrae pop as I made to stand. My entire body wobbled as the blood rushed to my head.
"Be at ease, Glacial. Once you've met with Polaris, you will be given leave to rest for the remainder of the evening. We have little doubt that you are in far worse shape than you would willingly admit. Rest, we believe you shall need for what awaits you in the coming months."
It wasn't exactly comforting if it was meant to be at all. If nothing else, having the first meeting with Polaris right out of the gate would relieve some tossing and turning in the near future. If all this stress gives me night terrors, I will not be happy.
The carriage door was opened, and a regiment of two identical rows of Solar guards stood at attention, waiting for their Princess to make her way where she so desired. They bore not a single glance my way. Celestia took the time to leave the carriage so elegantly, nodding to her precession solemnly. I swallowed a lump in my throat and hopped free of the carriage onto Canterlot soil. Well, stone, but the point remains steadfast.
"Look at all the mindless tin soldiers playing pretend. It is so cute," Freya said from her vantage point above me. She pointed from one guard to the next, waving and cheering as if goading the guards to notice her.
"Princess." The secretary from back in the annex building was at the end of the rows. She bowed to her Princess and offered me just the briefest acknowledgments. I nodded back in silent greeting. With the weight of Celestia not pounding me into the ground, I could actually take a moment to observe Celestia's aide. She was a unicorn, go figure, a light yellow mare with black hair tied into a tight ponytail. She was a bit taller than the norm, though, without looking like a twig. She wore around her neck a pair of spectacles on a wire. As nigh invisible as she seemed, her eyes bore a very alluring sincerity—a pink like the setting sun over the ocean.
"Prim Prose, has Polaris Glimmer arrived yet?" Celestia asked. Praise be she who gives a name to the nameless. I was getting tired of referring to Ms. Prose by expository titles. I certainly would not enjoy others doing so to me.
"He has Your Highness. He has taken to the west waiting room as per your instruction." Prim Prose turned and led the way into Canterlot Castle. It was, if nothing else, semi-complete in comparison to the rest of the city. Its vast white halls draped in the finest of furnishings and grandiose display of wealth and prestige. If not, just a bit obnoxious.
"Excellent. We shall meet with him immediately. Glacial Zero is still very weak from his feat or heroics yesterday. The sooner Polaris has introduced himself, the sooner we may move past this anomalous event. We certainly have much to do."
If I were honest, I felt the Princess was talking to herself more than to Prim or me. No, we were an audience for a monologue. She was also correct. I could use some rest, and Celestia, I'm sure, had far more important things to do with her time than foalsit me.
"Of course," Prim said, nodding along unbeknownst to her Princess.
"This is it, Glacie. The big city, where the rich and powerful reside."
I rolled my eyes. Freya had rebounded from her earlier terror rather well. While I was still shaken and shaking regarding what I had set myself upon, training was certainly something I needed. In fact, I was a bit excited. Actually, knowing what I was doing would make events like yesterday far less mind-shatteringly terrifying. That aside, I was less than interested at all in the goings-on of the 'Haves,' for I am proudly a 'Have Not.'
"Glacial." I was torn back to reality by the wary eye of my hostess.
"Yes?"
"Have faith. We believe you have much to offer and to be proud of. Do not lose heart."
Celestia's eyes begged and pleaded for salvation, not her own. The mask had cracked once more. She really did want to believe Hal, so very desperately. So, she put her faith in me. The least I could do was offer the same.
"I'll do my best." I offered Celestia a frail smile. One she mirrored perfectly.
Frayed Nerves and Chilling Thoughts
The walk to the west hall was an uneventful affair—a quiet jaunt from long hall to long hall. It blended together in such a way that the distance and time it took to cross it were incalculable. It was enough to lull me into a trance-like state, where I walked beside Celestia while lost in thought. When Celestia came to a stop, I barely recognized the door before I planted my face against it with authority.
"Glacial Zero?" Celestia asked.
I groggily rubbed my muzzle, eying the door that assaulted me with venom. "Stupid door. You made me look bad."
"Pardon?"
I stepped back and huffed. "Nothing, sorry, lost in thought."
"That said." Prim pushed the door open. "Your guest awaits, Your Highness."
Much like every hall we'd made our way through, the waiting room in question was opulent and spacious. A fireplace that could fit me five times over, windows that reached from floor to ceiling, and a chandelier that would no doubt cost more than the entirety of Bogwood makes in a year. The room's centerpiece was the sprawling display of finery and couches that felt nearly too small for the otherwise ridiculous room. Hal's memories depicted the castle as a bit more functional, though I suppose a thousand years is plenty of time to renovate.
Standing before the unlit fireplace was whom I assumed was my new instructor. Well, with nopony else present, I'd be concerned if the pony who hadn't heard the door open was anypony else.
"Polaris," Celestia greeted. The stallion turned with a start. The stallion in question was an odd sort. The word that came to mind was 'soft' or perhaps 'gentle.' Polaris Glimmer attempted a bow, though it seemed rather stiff. His drapery of a mane danced as if caught in a breeze. The gentle pink locks striped with an almost glowing turquoise band nearly touching the ground even while at his full height. His coat was pink, only a shade or so lighter. He rubbed a hoof against the other, his overly prominent fetlocks dusting the ground as he avoided everypony else's eyes.
"He's so cute," Freya said. She swooned, flopping head over hoof in midair. As dramatic as her response was, her thoughts weren't off the mark. I'd never seen a mare or stallion as overtly unoffensive and unthreatening.
A shock ran down my spine when his dark blue eyes met mine. His eyes held a depth of anxiety and disdain—a threat that contrasted every other facet of his being. In such contrast, I almost thought I was seeing things.
"Princess Celestia. I'm honored you summoned me this day," Polaris mumbled behind a second attempt at a bow. This one was far more refined as if a switch had been set.
"Quite. We, as our missive relayed, have use of your not insubstantial prowess." Celestia motioned to me. "We have discovered a rather interesting magical anomaly in need of observation and instruction."
Polaris nodded, his mane waving in all directions, in an almost parody of Celestia's own ethereal hair. "This is it, the one, the -mancy savant? So young, how interesting." The grin that bloomed across Polaris' face earned a backtrack toward the door so quickly that I wasted no time even turning about. My head found the closed passage with impressive timing.
"Young Glacial Zero has shown an impressive potential. The likes of which are rare indeed. We wish you to teach the colt all you can in the coming months."
"I'd be delighted, Princess." Polaris' eyes were trained on me with scary precision, like one tearing something apart to discover what makes it tick. My skin crawled in protest.
"Princess."
Celestia turned to find me not beside her. A brow rose ever so slightly as she saw me pressed to the secured door as hard as I could manage. "Glacial Zero?"
"Are we sure this is a good idea?" I asked. I knew the answer without recourse and certainly knew that my question was both vague and pedantic. That is the perfect question for an unaware colt to ask. As Celestia eyed me, they made it clear it was not a question expected of me in the least.
"We are certain. Polaris is talented in both the theoretics and the practical application of magic in many forms. Which, while not as adept as many single-class experts in specialized fields. He boasts a far beyond average talent in nearly all fields of magic."
My head fell to full tilt as I tried my best not to look lost entirely.
Celestia huffed and motioned to the sofas in the center of the room. "Please, take a seat. We are confident; Polaris is more than apt to assuage any doubts."
"It's not his skills I'm worried about," I whispered to myself as I passed our oh-so-empathetic ruler.
"Yes, yes, I'm more than happy to answer any questions at all," Polaris said giddily, plopping down on one of the couches. His grin grew wider, and my pace faltered to a near snail-like speed. No, that's not fair. A snail could lap the room faster than I willed myself to the room's center.
"Oh dear, somepony is a bit scared. Oh, the big bad mage is gonna devour you whole," Freya snickered.
I managed to ignore her and instead planted myself on the furthest seat from Polaris. Not that he seemed to notice, instead leaning forward, his eyes glistening with untold horrors. Celestia did not take a seat, only standing behind my own, idly watching as I tried to flee for my life.
"Why so tense, young Glacial?" Celestia said from her spot, peering over my seat's headrest. "What ails you?"
How does one explain the irrational fear of something so metaphysical? For my own sake, I couldn't explain why Polaris' stare fired off every warning in my head that my body had access to. It was ridiculous even to me. I stared down yesterday's Highland disaster with less dread than I had every time my eyes met Polaris Glimmer's. Yet, there was something else behind the vexation and subliminal fear. A nagging tug at Hal's memories. Like there was something I was forgetting. An epiphany that should come with this very meeting.
"I don't know." For now, that's all I can say for sure.
"So, I suppose we should start with introductions, yes?" Polaris cleared his throat. "Greetings, young colt. My name is Polaris Glimmer, and I'm delighted to meet you."
I let out a deep, full-body sigh and nodded in recognition. "It is nice to meet you too, Mr. Polaris. As of the Princess ' decree this morning, I'm Glacial Zero, your new student. It was very thoughtful of her, wouldn't you agree?" My sight trailed up over Polaris, my neck bending back as I looked at Celestia. Who in turn was looking down at me.
"Uh-oh, watch out, Glacie, get too feisty, and you might end up burned," Freya warned. She'd taken to floating atop the chandelier overhead. Nice and out of reach of my vengeance, the wiley little monster.
"We only sought to aid those who needed such tutelage, I assure you." Celestia leered at me. I happily leered back. Freya had a point, but after all the crazy heat she'd been searing me under. A little petty jab was the least she deserved.
"Well, if what Her Highness's letter said is true. You and I will have so much to do. So many tests, so many opportunities to evolve." Though Polaris smiled, eyes sparkling in anticipation. I was swept by a chill, one that left even my frozen limbs shaking. That nagging tickling in the back of my head was now a deep, searing demand for attention.
"Glacie, are you feeling alright?" Freya asked.
I offered a curt shake of the head. "I just can't put my hoof on it," I whispered, hoof scratching at my cheek idly.
"We'll need to start bright and early if we're to get all the tedious tests out of the way. Then, we can start the real learning. Right, Glacial Zero?"
It was odd, even as my mind had drifted from the conversation. Polaris hadn't so much as skipped a beat. Lost in his own little world, he continued talking on. Any questions he asked were dismissed with his next breath.
"Polaris," Celestia said. Her voice was like forged iron. The second the words left her lips, Polaris became as silent and attentive as a statue. "Please collect yourself. You've left young Glacial behind. You will have plenty of time to discuss your planned lessons upon daybreak. For now, please keep your thoughts concise. Glacial Zero is still recovering from his ordeals. Agreed."
There was no room for argument or dismissal. The heat had blistered back into reality. The oppressive wave sent me into a dry, coughing fit. While Polaris' gaze only glistened further. He stared at Celestia like the devout before their god. I doubted he was the first to look at Celestia with such devotion, but to see it firsthoof. Was surreal. Perhaps it was simply the conversations I've had with the Princess in the annex building or the carriage, possibly Hal's own memories, but for the life of me, I could not fathom Polaris or his intent.
"Of course, Your Highness, my apologies."
"All the same, thank you for taking my studies so seriously, Mr. Polaris. I know this must have been a bit sudden and a bit inconvenient. So, I'm sorry if I'm a bother."
And just like that, the trance subsided, Polaris' eyes fixed once more on me, and the spark, the eerie light behind his every glance toward Celestia, vanished into the dark once more. I meant what I said. I'm sure Polaris had other things to do. But if it kept him focused on me, I'd play the humble student.
"Not at all. This is a wonderful experience to be hoofed upon me. I promise to do my best to meet your and Her Highness' expectations."
"He's a strange one, isn't he?" Freya asked.
I nodded. "Of that, I'm sure."
"Introductions aside, Prim Prose."
Like a ghost from beyond the veil of time and space. Said Prim Prose was beside her Princess faster than I could look back to said Princess. I was, in fact, enough to have me hop, if only in my seat. Even Polaris' stare seemed to shift between the place Prim was not seconds ago and the door, which was still firmly closed.
"Yes."
Celestia turned about horn aglow. With a single step, the door was wide. "Please show Young Glacial to his rooms. He will need what time he can to recover his strength. He has much to come in the following months."
Prim Prose bowed, and with that, Princess Celestia was gone. In a single fluid motion, Prim rose back to her full height. She idled a single glance back in my direction. I shrank back and offered a timid smile.
"Come, your rooms are not far." Prim started off only to pause in the doorway. “And Polaris Glimmer.”
Polaris snapped to attention. "Yes, Ms. Prose?"
"You shall meet Glacial Zero here, one hour after sunrise. From there, you will be left to your teachings until sunset."
Polaris offered an eager nod. One Prim did not see as she continued forward once more. I was barely off the sofa before she'd turned into the hall.
"Good evening," I said before following my guide and leaving the bewildering mage behind. No sooner had I placed the doorframe between myself and Polaris than the sudden chill I'd experienced earlier vanished outright.
"Such a strange one," Freya hummed. She danced about the hall as Prim Prose briskly trotted in front of me. Her pace was enough to leave my haggard body pleading for rest.
"Very," I managed between huffs.
"Hurry along, Colt. Neither of us has time to waste."
"She's a bit of a strange one herself," Freya said, encircling Celestia's aid in a loose circuit. "A ghost in the castle, an eye for the sun."
"Scarier than any ghost," I mumbled. If Freya or Faust above, Prim heard me, neither made any inclination. Which, for the time being, was probably for the best.
The following walk to my appointed chambers was less of a walk and more a quickened trot as my shorter, sore legs fought to keep pace with Prim Prose's nigh supernatural stride. Freya seemed to enjoy my struggle as we rounded another identical corner into another identical hall. I could not imagine the efforts of a potential thief making any more sense of this place than I was at this point.
By the time Prim came to a stop, I was a panting, frothing mess. I had to appreciate the fact I always looked damp; one of the perks of bog living was to not look like a bedraggled corpse. I only looked like a slightly sodden corpse. It also struck me that though I was far and away from any swamp, my mane continued to be a wet mess. I'd pay top bit for some wise old academic to explain that to me.
"Here we are. The rooms Princess Celestia, in her infinite wisdom, has granted you for your stay. I suggest you not make a sty of them, little colt," Prim said. She turned to look at me, eyes sharp, narrow, and clawing. I smiled up at her and nodded along.
"I wouldn't dream of it, Ms. Prose. My father would tan me alive if I went and ruined somepony else's home."
This earned a half sniff and an agreeable huff. "As well he should. Now, onto your immediate future."
My ears perked, my tail wagging slowly, and every hair on my end stood on end. If I had to walk one more marathon today, I was going to end somebody. I had enough on my mind as it was.
"Her Highness has afforded you the rest of the day to rest. You've been through quite the ordeal the last two days. We can't have you collapsing in the midst of the castle, can we."
My tail ceased its slow arc, and the whole of my body sagged just slightly. Freya offered a snicker from behind me. I paid her no mind. My posture must have been noted by Prim, as her eyes traced me with precision, beyond my or Hal's recollection of ever having seen before.
"Of course," I agreed.
"Upon the morrow, you will be joining Her Majesty for breakfast, where she will explain what she expects from you while you are under her care."
At least there was a plan. I was getting sick of always being in a reactive position. Forethought always seemed much more challenging when you had to do it all alone. 'Freya didn't count.'
"I understand."
"We shall have a maid wake you. Once you've concluded your breakfast, you shall be shown to the study; Mr. Glimmer has been granted your daily lessons." I nodded. Prim gave another half sniff and nodded in return. "Very well. Then, I wish you a peaceful evening."
I was given no time to respond as Prim Prose turned and walked away at a pace that would have left me in the dust, injured or not. My entire frame slumped as I fell to my haunches, mumbling reflective curses all the while. Some of which only a particularly savvy sailor could conjure up. Bless Sire for all his dock-granted wisdom.
"Alright, Glacie, you need some rest. Up we go." I was whisked back to my hooves by a semi-translucent leg. The now corporeal Freya tutting all the while.
"Agreed."
"Good, let's see what the Princess' accommodations look like," Freya made to phase through the door, only for my hoof to latch onto hers.
"I'll rest just as soon as you and I have a chat about Tally." Freya froze in place, eyes blinking like a grounded fish. "You didn't think I'd forget, did you? The fact Tally could hear you is kind of a game changer, you know."
As far as I could tell. Freya's reaction was less reluctance and more; she'd utterly forgotten it had happened at all. If an ice spirit could blush, which would defy her biology, then Freya would have been beet red. I released Freya's hoof and motioned to the door.
"After you."
Freya said nothing, instead sliding through the closed door with the grace of a pigeon planting its humble little face against a sheet of glass. As soon as she'd made it through, I pulled the door wide and joined her in my new home away from home.
The guest chambers were both surprising and underwhelming in equal but opposing ways. The room was larger than the main room of my home back in Bogwood. It was tastefully decored, with simple thematic elements, one can only get when in the House of the Sun. Whites and yellows as far as the eye could see. Carpets covered the floor, a luxury not seen in Bogwood at all. Any attempt at such would be ruined in no time but the muck of the swamps. A large plush bed, several spotless chairs in the corner with a table between. Windows that stretched just shy of floor to ceiling.
A second door led to an indoor restroom. It was strange when one reflected on plumbing in Equestria when one had insight into the future. For instance, you could count the number of indoor latrines in Bogwood on one set of hooves. Bathrooms, even when such a room bath or no, relied on magic and enchantment to be convenient. One needs both room for a sewage canal and aptitude or bit to spend on plumbing crystals to allow for the disposal cycle of your waste. I'd personally never used one. However, Hals' recollections made them seem rather enticing.
"What do you think?" I asked, turning to Freya, who had taken to lapping the ceiling, bartering down onto all she surveyed.
"What could any one pony need so much room for?" Freya asked. Her question was barely audible and most assuredly not directed at me at all. She had a point; it was such a grand waste of opulence. Impractical is the word that came to mind.
"Not a clue," I said. I took a long inhale and plodded course for the nearest chair. Of which was large enough to fit three of me comfortably. The second my rear made contact, I suck several inches into the plush upholstery. "So, while I'm still conscious. You have some explaining to do, 'Ms. Nopony Can See Me'."
"No need to be mean, Glacie. I was planning to tell you, eventually." Freya made her way into my chair, landing on the seat with a puff of released air. She flung out a hoof and jabbed me in the side. "It is really nice, being able to actually sit with you, you know? Don't get me wrong, the ethereal form can be fun, but there is something about direct contact that is just so satisfying."
I rolled my eyes and jabbed her back. "You're stalling."
Freya crossed her hooves and turned her nose to the sky. "I am not."
"Freya."
"Oh, fine," Freya relented, sagging in her spot in the seat. "Even after we talked, neither of us understood it any better than you. Tally was not even that surprised, not even when I told her I was a Wendigo. I'm more curious than anything about that one. A million questions, I barely got to say anything at all."
I nodded along. "That does sound like Tally. That filly needs to know just about everything. But seriously, neither of you had any idea at all?" The idea that Tally could just will her ability to see or hear Freya was beyond acceptance. Things were never that simple. I idly rubbed my chin, and my back hooves kicked out in no particular pattern. Tally or Freya had done something, something that changed Tally's perception, though, as I thought about it.
"She mentioned dreams before. Remember when I confessed to Hal? She thought my visions and her dreams had something in common. Could that have something to do with it?"
Freya leaned back in the plush chair, her hooves stretched high as she made herself comfortable. "If we were talking about your visions and dreams, then maybe. But how would that have anything to do with me?"
"Tally didn't have any ideas at all? That is very unlike her."
Freya waved me away. "It was less she had no ideas and more she had too many. If you ask me, she might just have an affinity for seeing things one should not. Honestly, she'd hardly be the first pony or any creature that could see spirits and such."
"Maybe, but why now? What changed? Do such things change over time? Are there levels of seeing spirits?" Tally was many things, but spontaneous was not one. Either she'd seen Freya from the beginning and had been pretending she couldn't, or it was a recent change. On one hoof, having someone else who could see and speak with Freya was nice. On The other hoof, there were so many missing facts. Once, I'd have to wait till I was done in Canterlot to pursue.
"I don't know. I've never needed to ask. But, if I had to take a guess. I don't think she's been lying from the outset. She was very much interested in me and you and why I am following you around. Which, by the way, I was vague. She'll likely bother you for specifics in the future. So have fun with that."
"Witch." I definitely need to chat with her as soon as I get back. "Did you two talk about anything productive at all?" I flung my hooves high. My mind was beginning to fray at the seams, too much all at once. This was Freya's fault, somehow.
"We agreed you're hopeless. Oh, and Tally wanted to tell the others about me. I wasn't totally opposed to the idea. It isn't like you're not telling your fillyfriends everything else."
"She what? You what?" There went the fray, straight into a tear. My brain was leaking. I felt sick, my head spinning. Too much, too much all at once.
"I think it'd be good for your mental wellbeing. You've been sitting on the edge a bit too often lately." Freya scooted closer and wrapped a hoof over my shoulders. "It's scary. I can't protect you from what you never say, you know?"
My anger shattered. My head pounded as I pulled myself closer to Freya. It was surprising how warm a crazy wendigo could be. So there we stayed. The silence was palpable but unthreatening, politely waiting as Freya and I sat in our plush chair in a plush room in a castle atop a mountain. The silence was in no rush, and neither were we.
A yawn broke up the moment. My whole body shook in a valiant effort to remind me that I was still a walking, talking bruise. I snorted, and Freya shook. I wrapped a hoof over my muzzle. The damn broke as both of us burst into a fit of laughter. My entire body struggled as I gasped for air. The more I laughed, the more it hurt. The more it hurt, the harder I laughed. The howling Wendigo beside me did not help.
"Somepony is sleepy," Freya said between giggles. "Silly, colt."
"Maybe a little," I agreed.
"Well, then you're lucky you have a big fancy bed right over there," Freya said, pointing to the plush bed in question.
"Or unlucky, if you recall, I was abducted here to begin with. Not that Celestia didn't have reasons, but it is just another chain to reel me into the dark."
The humor died, and I found myself being pulled even tighter against Freya. "You aren't alone, Glacie. You have me, and the Night House, and your friends. We'll pull you back up. I promise. You aren't alone."
"I should tell them."
"The girls?" Freya cooed.
"Everyone. Father, the girls, Foresight. I'm tired, Freya. I'm tired of pretending everything is normal. It's only been a few weeks, so look at everything. For Faust's sake, I thought you were imaginary until this morning."
"Silly Glacial, I'm as real as you need me to be. And for the record. I think you should tell them, too." Freya leaned in, cupping a hoof over her mouth. "I think Azure already knows, or at least has a hunch. All your friends are kind of weird."
I cracked a smile and pushed Freya away. "So are you."
Freya nodded. "I did say 'ALL' of your friends for a reason."
"At this point, the only pony I don't want to tell is our humble host. She's riding the edge of sanity, too, you know. Her eyes, sometimes, hurt even to look into. It's like staring into the sun. She needs help."
Freya puffed out her chest and patted my shoulder hard. "Then help her. Nopony else has all these weird insights you have. Be the change you want to see."
I messaged a hoof against my forehead. "Is that even safe? Telling her 'Prophecies' is one thing. Healing a broken heart is a whole other battle. One I do not in any way feel qualified to fight. I'm just some weird colt, as far as Celestia is concerned."
"So, if not you, then who? Who helped her in those visions of yours, hmm? What does Hal have to say?" Freya said. She leaned in, a toothy grin ebbing me on.
"Not a clue. Hal's knowledge is mostly forward in time, not backward or the present for us, I guess." I'm mostly on my own for the foreseeable future."
"Boo."
"How do you think the others will react?" I asked.
"To what?"
I nudged Freya. "To you. If we tell them, well, it is one thing to know about something you'll never see. It is wholly different to befriend a Wendigo. You know, the supposed antithesis to everything ponies know and believe in."
Freya slumped back in the seat. "That, I'm sure it'll be fine. That was so long ago and completely Surt'r's fault. Once we deal with him, we can all start over." Freya said. She'd fallen back into a thoughtful frown. Their eyes glassed over as she lost herself in whatever Surt'r's name brought bubbling up to the surface—memories of a time long ago. One's I had no right to ask.
"I'm still not sure how you think we're gonna beat the entire Wendigo race and best their crazy king. It feels more like a Celestia-tiered problem."
"Well, firstly, with no Wendigo magic, there is no getting anywhere near Surt'r at all. The Frozen Throne would have Celestia frozen solid before she could do much." Freya waved the thought off. A buzzing reminder from Hal had me picture a particular other throne that left ponies defenseless. Though I doubt Surt'r's is in the badlands.
"Then why not give her yours before you gave it to me?" There were so many questions. I could feel my eyes struggling to stay open. If nothing else, the furniture in the castle was almost unnaturally comfortable.
"You ask too many questions, Glacie. Besides, you need to get some sleep. Come on," Freya hefted me up and oh so helpfully floated me over my bed, dropping me face-first into some very, very comfortable pillows.
Freya was deflecting. I did not care for that at all. However, as my eyes drifted closed, I came to the conclusion that I'd have to ask her tomorrow. That sounded nice, and tomorrow it was. My eyes closed, and darkness took me away into the land of dreams.
--
The cityscape was doused in a thick morning mist. Snow drifted in the winter wind. No, not winter; it was mid-June. Yet the snow came all the same. White and gray contrasting the dawn's oranges. It'd have been beautiful if this had been any other day, any other time. Ice clung to my body, keeping me standing. My clothes did little to shield my slowly freezing limbs' from stinging, bitter bite. I gasped for air. The biting chill in the air left me choking on my numbed tongue. I'd choke on it at this rate.
Like my legs, my arms were frozen, held out in an almost mockery of a cross. My hooves tingled, no, hands, right? My head hurt, my made limply tussling around as I shook the fog from my mind. Mane? Another piercing jab in the back of my head.
"Pay attention, Little Chill."
I would have jumped if I could move at all. Instead, all I managed was a grunt. I tried to turn to look at my captor, who even now stood out of sight. Their voice was ambiguous; it gave nothing away. It was closer to a hiss than anything, almost as biting as the sting in my legs. Hooves, legs? My head was a war drum, pounding away to its own beat.
"You're hiding behind other creatures' faces in worlds unknown to us. But it will not save you, Little Chill. In time, you will be found."
Something touched my shoulder. My heart skipped a beat. My vision blurred, and my mind was left to static and an even more frantic drumming. I writhed, trying as hard as I could to pull away. Every strained movement left only one thought in my head: 'Flee.'
"And when we do, you will suffer, as will that little wretch who hides behind you."
"Thaw."
"Who gave you permission to speak."
I paid the voice no mind. My hooves shook in their icy prisons. My fingertips were on fire. "Thaw. Thaw Thaw."
"Petulant, cur."
The voice screamed in my ear. I barely heard it. The ice that held me started to crack. Slowly, at first, lines trailed down my arms from my wrists. The muscles in my hooves tensed. My breath caught in the air, melding with the mist already adrift over the city.
"Thaw!" The ice cracked, and I was free. I barely noticed as I fell to the ground, barely hearing my wings flapping widely. I had little time to explore my victory, and a shadow loomed over me. I gaved into a patch of ice beneath me. My bright teal eyes looked back, and behind me was a mass with eyes that sent every instinct I had on edge. 'Flee', they screamed.
"Running will only make what comes all the more painful. So take wing, run, hide, but in the end, you will be consumed by the cold, Little Chill, and I will enjoy watching you die," The voice spoke as if whispering in my ear, every word crystal clear. It set my body on fire, searing pain from the tips of my toes to the tips of my fingers, across my muzzle, and down to my primaries. I felt bile claw at my throat.
I relinquished control. I was over the edge of the skyscraper before I knew what was happening before I could make sense of the creature behind me before I could understand Surt'r. My wings peeled up, pulling me into a slow decline. I had no destination, nowhere to be, nowhere to go. So, I flew and flew and disappeared into the snow and the mist. In a city that could not see the sunrise, dogs barked in the distance.
A sudden sharp knock, and I found myself bolting from the...the shadow? No, that wasn't right; instead of a city or flying blind, I found myself face-first on the ground, wrapped in blankets so soft and warm as a summer breeze. I struggled in my knotted prison, eyes glued to the floor. My nightmare, if you can at this point, call whatever goes on in my head at night, such, left me shivering. Considering my given state and the fact I spend most days covered in a layer of ice, it was an impressive feat. A second sharp knock spurred me to redouble my struggles.
A mare's voice left me groucing as I toiled. "Sir, this is your wake-up call. You are wanted in the dining hall."
"Yes, yes, I'm trying." Stupid blankets, stupid dreams, stupid waking up at— My thoughts die in my mouth as I noticed that although I was awake and was being called for breakfast, there was a surprisingly low level of light to go around. So little, in fact, that if I didn't inherit my Dam's sight, I'd be lost in the dark.
"It's dark?"
"Well, not completely. The sun's coming. Give it a few minutes, I can almost see it poking over the horizon."
"Freya?"
Freya hummed from wherever she was floating about. "Yes, Glacie?"
I waved a hoof wildly. "Could you help me please?"
"If I must."
A shadow passed over me, and something pulled one side of the blanket taut. I pushed myself against the opposing side, and with a bit of elbow grease, Freya and I managed to unravel the cursed garment enough for me to crawl free.
"Sir." Another knock, this one harder.
It seemed my grace period was up. Plodding over to the door, I pulled the door open and gave the waiting guard my best 'Die in a hole' face I could. The guard said nothing, an expression like solid granite. To that front, the guard in question was a rather forgettable staple white, with a short cropped blonde mane and tail. One of Hal's stray thoughts of identical guards in the castle, indistinguishable from one another, led me to leer at the guard all the harder.
"Apologies," I said. The guard nodded, turned about, and was off with me doing my best to keep stride with the much larger mare. I gave my wings an experimental flat, only to wince. It seemed Foresight might have been right. Flying on already exhausted wings around town did little to help my battered state. "Hooves it is then."
"Poor Glacie, don't go collapsing on me. Weathered might level half the city, or what little there is of half the city if he hears you wound up at a healer on day one."
She wasn't wrong. I could almost see it if I closed my eyes. "I'm fine."
The walk to the dining hall was deadly quiet. As I followed my guide, I started noticing slight deviations in the halls. Yesterday, they'd blurred together, pristine white hall after pristine white hall. It had been unnerving. But, mind a bit less cluttered, this fine still barely brighter than a lone candle in the wind morning. A few things became clear.
"The halls," I said, raising my voice to earn a twitch of the guard mare's ear.
"Sir?"
"They're not really all the same, are they. They're just different enough." A second twitch of the ear. The mare looked back at me for just the briefest second. I smirked.
"And how is that, sir." The challenge cast, I quickened my pace a bit, closing the gap between us as best I could while not cantering after the mare.
I pointed to the wall molding. A seemingly random string of symbols, ending in variations of the sun and moon, was etched across its surface in delicate gold trim. As I walked along with my guard, I noticed a single standout instance of the etchings altering to a near formulaic pattern. "The molding. It is some sort of coding, isn't it?"
The guard's ear twitched again. "It helps, yes." The guard's lip twitched up ever so slightly. "Mighty keen, aren't you, sir?"
I nodded, wings fluffing up as I trotted alongside the mare. "I try, Miss?"
"Private Rally, sir."
"Nice to meet you, Private."
Rally nodded. "Pleasure to meet you too, sir."
If I hadn't spent a week at the Night House, I might have been inclined to tell Private Rally that my name was, in fact, not, nor had it ever been, Sir. As it stands, it would be like trying to squeeze blood from a stone.
The rest of the walk was quick, and not noting the molding, I memorized what I could in hopes of at least finding my way back to my room in the future. However, if I were going to be here for months on end, the habit would solve that issue one way or another.
"The Dining Hall, sir." Rally stepped to the side, standing parallel to the guard, who was at full attention outside the door to said Hall.
The doors were massive, stretching floor to ceiling, embroidered in arcane runes and solar iconography that I'm sure had some importance. I wouldn't doubt that most doors had wards and protections of the magical persuasion. You can't have a massive city capital and not have absurd levels of security. It would be unbelievable if nearly any and every major Equestrian foe and enemy could just stroll through the front door. Hal's foresight was doing my frazzled mind very little in the way of comfort.
"Thank you, Private Rally," I said. I turned to the guards on each side of the hall door. "Ladies." The guard in front of the doors horn lit, and the door slowly swung inward.
"Her Majesty awaits you, sir," the unicorn guard said.
I saluted and marched into the sweltering inferno, the blazing, all-consuming weight of the sun bearing down upon me. I could feel the sweat building, the tension so thick I could suffocate. I would never be ready, but I waited for the aura to crush me nonetheless.
I waited.
I waited more.
I took a second step into the room, then a third.
I waited, but nothing: no heat, no pressure, no aura. I peered down at the long room, with its long dining table and its many posh chairs. The chandeliers hung proudly above. The fine linen adorning the long table. All the way to the head of said table, in an ornate chair far and away taller than the rest. A chair where Princess Celestia sat.
The rest of the room was empty. There were no servants, servers, or guards. There was only Celestia, who had yet to notice my arrival. For her part, Celestia, in all her glory, looked exactly as one imagined—the same pristine white fur, groomed to perfection, the familiar regalia polished to a sheen. The same line of drool in the corner of her mouth as her eyes flickered open was the only sign she was conscious at all. Wait, what?
"Oh my, who knew the Princess of the Sun isn't a morning pony. The poor thing," Freya said.
The wendigo glided through, not around or above, but through the dining table, frogs tapping together as she cooed at the unaware Princess.
"Huh." It was all I could manage as I slowly crept closer, trying as best I could not to interrupt Celestia's power nap. For as long as the dining table was, it only had a few prepared chairs and utensils. Even among those, only one had a chair with enough height that a foal might reach a plate of any kind. A place right next to Her Majesty. "Of course."
Without a word, I trudged ever so slowly toward my dining accommodations. An echo rang in the otherwise silent room with each of my hoof falls. Princess Celestia sat eyeing a stack of papers that sat to one side of her. The other side is bereft with a literal pitcher of jet-black liquid. Steam rose into the morning as Celestia worked. If she noticed I had joined her, I could not tell. Not so much as a single-ear flick. On a positive note, the room wasn't a heat stroke in the making. In fact, it was chilly, which was almost as concerning. I hadn't felt such a creeping cold since before I'd discovered my talent, and even less so after whatever it was Freya did to me the other day.
I stopped just shy of my seat, my brow furrowed as the thought struck me dumb. Should Wendigo magic feel like pony magic? Should I feel it at all? I know I felt something as soon as Freya had unleashed it, but since then,... not a thing, just a seemingly endless bout of nothing.
"You alright, Glacial?" Freya asked.
I smacked my lips and shook the feeling. Not the place or time to lose my mind. I looked over to Celestia. She was still engrossed in her reading. Without a word, I climbed into my own seat and jostled about until satisfied with the placement of the chair's enhanced height—too many pillows and insufficient pragmatism. The whole stupid pile leaning this way and that with every shift of my weight.
"Good morning, Your Highness. I'm sorry if I was a bit tardy," I said, turning to the Princess, who still hadn't looked up from her papers. The papers she hadn't touched since I'd entered. I peered forward, skimming the paper in question. The contents were a jumble of legalese and explanations so dry I felt my lips chapping in response. That said, it wasn't that dense or wracked with double talk. In fact, it didn't even take up the whole page on which it was inked. "Princess?"
My eyes narrowed, teeth clenching as I leaned even further into my stack of pillows. My ear flicked, wings twitching as I stared harder at the solar matriarch, harder, a tail twitch, harder, a wing shook, harder, my eyes burned as I squinted so hard I could barely see anything at all.
"Uh, Glacie?"
"Yes?"
"Celestia is asleep."
I shot back, nearly toppling my unsteady seat as I did so. My eyes shot between Freya, who was idly waving a hoof across Celestia's face, and the Princess in question, who had remained entirely unaware of my observations.
"But her eyes?" I said.
"She's out cold, Glacie, not a thought in that big alicorn head of hers."
I wrapped a hoof around the table, my bottom lip caught in my teeth as I looked around the Dining Hall. It was just Celestia and me. I took a deep breath and felt the ice crawl over my legs. I had to blink away my surprise. I'd thawed in my sleep?
"Faust, forgive me," I muttered, and I raised a hoof high without giving myself a chance to think about it. With every ounce of strength I had, I brought my hoof down on the table.
The sudden force and crack of hoof met finely crafted wood echoed through the room. This was followed by a surprised yelp and the sudden scent of smoke.
Princess Celestia shot up in her seat, the back of her head slamming into her seat's headrest. Wings flew up in random directions. Her horn glowed as the stack of papers she'd been staring at was now consumed in a gentle flame.
If Her Highness noticed, she made exactly zero attempts to correct it. Instead, her eyes shifted with the experience of a foal being caught disobeying their dam. It took only a second for her eyes to spot me, and my shocked face hoof still firmly in place on where it had landed.
"Glacial Zero?" the Princess asked. She shifted in place, pulling her wings back to her sides. Her voice was hoarse, eyes drearily staring at my hoof.
"Yes, Princess?" I asked.
"That noise was of your doing, correct?" The Princess's eyes trailed up my leg and to my own gaze. I made a very active effort to not shrink into my seat and vanish from reality.
"Yes."
The Princess rubbed the sleep from her face. Her ethereal mane barely held in its invisible wind. The aurora seemed pale, in contrast to her norm. Then, magenta eyes never leaving my own, her horn flared to life, and the smell of smoke and gentle sizzle of her flaming stack of work disappeared. I considered checking on her necessary paperwork but decided I liked not being on fire more than I cared if Celestia's morning work was still smoldering.
"Has anypony else been in the room since your arrival?" Celestia rolled her shoulders and took up the regal posture one might expect from our nigh immortal ruler.
I shook my head. "Not since I arrived, no."
Celestia huffed in relief, slumping ever so slightly in her spot. "I see."
"Princess, are you okay?" Even now, the room remained unnervingly cool. There was no trace of yesterday's overwhelming heat; even Celestia woke surprised and confused. I was unsure if I should be relieved or very, very worried, so I defaulted to anxiety. A friend so dear, they get to live in my head right next to Hal.
Princess Celestia's brief relief faded as she sat back to her full height. She paid me little mind. Instead, her horn ignited, and a bell that I had not noticed rose in a yellow aura and shook gently. The quiet tinkle, though barely audible mere hooves away from where I sat beside Her Highness, signaled the arrival of our due morning meal.
No sooner had Celestia returned the bell to wherever she'd retrieved it than the servant doors opened. Several of what I had to assume were the kitchen staff adorned in matching black and white uniforms bustled in, with an utter buffet of plates, cups, pots, pans, and every other sort of meal utensil were quickly hoisted in several flavors of magical aura and arranged in front of us waiting for diners. The smells mixed in waves of delicacies. Freshly baked bread oozing with oils and butter, assorted fruits in a rainbow of seasons and colors. Pots of oat and barley meals still steaming. Light fruit salads and eggs piled high. It was enough to leave the stomach begging and the mouth utterly dripping with drool and desire. Those were only the first course, as baked tarts, pies, and cakes were layered high enough that I completely lost sight of the wait staff.
"Well, one can't say the Princess doesn't know how to feed her guests," Freya whispered in my ear. "I'm almost jealous."
Celestia mustered a frail smile as I all but fell over myself in my hunger. "I apologize, young Glacial. I did not have the opportunity to ask if there was a meal you'd have preferred. As you could tell upon your arrival, I was very much consumed by my work. As you'd agree, yes?"
That was not a question.
"Lest you starve," Freya said. She giggled and twirled between Celestia and me. Her ethereal white body almost blended into Celestia's own white coat.
"Of course, Princess, very important work, I'm sure." I nodded, eyes still enraptured at the feast for both my eyes and, hopefully, my stomach.
"Yes, important," Celestia's mane wavered once more, barely staying afloat as she gazed at nothing in particular. I wasn't sure what I found worse: the oppressive ruler of the day or the forlorn, barely there ruler. Either way, Hal's Celestia left both options less than desirable. However, Hal's Celestia wasn't here. Instead, I should look for Glacial Zero's not angry or depressed Celestia. In the meantime, I was left falling back in my seat silently.
Several minutes passed before Celestia managed to return to the world of the living. "Oh," she whispered, having noted me silently waiting for her. "I'm sorry, young Glacial. Please eat. You had no need to wait for my blessing."
I nodded but chose to remain silent. As I gathered my own breakfast, I noted that in kind, Celestia had yet to so much as touch any of the offerings. The longer I watched her, the more my own hunger waned.
"You really should eat, Glacie. You have your first lesson with Mr. Strange in a bit."
I blinked before Freya's name-calling registered. It wasn't only Celestia that was out of sorts now. Polaris would be waiting after this. While I did want and need lessons in magic. There was something about that very pretty stallion that just felt off.
"Crap," I muttered under my breath, without any more delay. I began my breakfast. To which, I had to admit, the royal kitchen knew how to make a meal. Something one should expect, but when you come from humble beginnings, the quality becomes all the more evident. Even as I ate, I found myself giving Celestia glances every other bite.
She'd seemed to fade back in on herself. Wrapt in whatever important business she'd been engrossed in. I scoffed. Important business be damned. The mask had slipped, and that made one thing crystal clear.
"I don't believe her," I whispered to Freya. "You noticed, too, right?"
Freya nodded. "She's a mess and a half. I can taste her stress from here. It's not half bad. Though I could do with the self-loathing. Way too fatty for my palate."
I let out a wheeze as the oatmeal I'd been chewing found its way into my lungs.
The rudeness of my choking fit drew Celestia back to reality. Where ever, so slowly, she blinked in my direction. "Glacial, is something wrong?" Even her concern was marred by a slow absence that left her gaze empty and distant.
"Sorry, Princess, too much in one bite," I assured her. With a noncommittal hmm, she returned to her nearly untouched food.
"Careful, Glacie, we can't have you dying on us."
I glared at the smiling, all too chipper, lackadaisical, moronic Wendigo beside me. "It's your fault, you demon," I hissed.
Freya's ears splayed as she pouted at me. "You're the one who took too big a bite."
I planted a hoof into my face, hard enough to bruise my cheek. The pain barely registered. "I was choking because you claimed Loathing contains fat. How does that even work?"
Freya's head tilted so hard that if she were anyone else, I'd have thought she'd been hanging on a gallow. "That's how foods work, Glacie. Some are fatty, savory, or high in vitamins. That's just how food works."
A second facehoof. This one was harder, the pain barely a gnat buzzing in the back of my mind. "Freya, your biology is a blight against creation. Stop ruining my meal by having me question the nutrition of emotivores."
"Glacial, did you say something?" A shiver ran down my back as I slowly turned to find Celestia giving me an odd look.
"Should I have?" I asked. I offered the biggest smile I could, eyes glowing in the early morning light. I once again praised my naturally damp coat and mane. It was so very useful in hiding one's nervous sweats. It is all the more valuable when sharing a meal with a goddess in all but title and name. At least one, she chose herself. I'd bet a kidney half of Equestria would call her one if prompted to do so. I certainly would.
Celestia's look narrowed slightly as she stared me down. "Did you?"
"A little." I shrunk ever so slightly in my seat. Even now, not an ember, a single solitary wave of heat. It made her suspicion all the worse for some reason. Like I'd been caught sneaking dessert. Like my dam had caught me red-hoofed.
"Distracted or not, one should not assume we are not listening," Celestia said. She emphasized said declaration with a mouthful of tart, or that is to say, as much as a whole tart could be considered a single mouthful.
"It was nothing, really. I was just thinking out loud. I find it helps make things make sense. Even if the only one normally listening is me." In the back of my mind. I pondered just how far into the hole I would be when, not if, Freya and the rest came to light. As she was now, Celestia did not take me for the type to like being lied to, lies by omission or not. The fact that yesterday's heatwave hadn't struck did, in no way, lessen the presence of Her Royal Incandescence.
"And what pray tell, are your thoughts consumed by this morning? Surely, there are a few problems that are out of our reach. Why not confide in your host?"
That is an excellent question. That is a good point. A corner most comfortable I'd nestled myself into. I had to force myself not to look to Freya. My headache was back in full force. Hal's memories and referencial rememberings ran at fast forward in my mind.
"You didn't sleep well, did you?" I asked. I could not for the life of me, parse where said question came from. I had certainly not commanded such efforts from my wild, liable tongue.
Celestia's raised brow attested to a surprise rivaling my own. A silence stretched between us as Her Highness considered my question. The scent of smoke, like burning pinewood, mixed with the already numerous culinary smells of what dwindling breakfast there was. It was an almost relaxing scent, one that whispered of mountain woods and bonfires—a wholly separate feeling from yesterday's scorching tantrum.
After what felt like hours, Celestia gave a body-shaking sigh, her eyes barely squinting at the table in front of her. She slumped forward, and her regal aura faltered. All I could manage was a blink and a half. A sudden guilt, like one seeing something they shouldn't, left my gut twisted.
"Princess, I'm sor—" Celestia raised a limp leg. The room fell silent once more.
"There are few who would be so bold and fewer who'd admit what we would not. You are not wrong, young Glacial; we, in fact, did not sleep well. We rarely, if ever."
"Sleep well?" I asked.
"Sleep."
"Oh."
"That would explain a lot," Freya whispered.
"It is not as if you are the first to notice, but too few confront us for what they see."
"Defeat so complete is a rare thing. To know you'll live centuries with such defeat must be soul-shattering." Freya placed a hoof on my shoulder. I could feel her frown, even without turning to look. It mirrored my own.
"I don't know what to say." I pushed my plate away. Breakfast was over.
"Then say nothing at all," Celestia stood from her seat. "I do believe your lessons will begin soon. Your escort will be waiting for you." Then she was off, gone in a flash, and I was left with nothing but my thoughts.
"Do you think Hal's prophecy made it better or worse?" I asked.
"I don't know, I don't think she knows either." Freya pulled me into a hug, and I made no attempt to resist. What a way to start the day.
The walk to Polaris' study was a silent, meandering trudge. If Private Rally had any thoughts on the quiet, she did not voice them. Which, considering her job, made sense. Even if it hadn't been her job to keep her lip sealed, I still wouldn't have blamed her. My legs had frozen over to the joint and the subtle crunch of ice was just loud enough that it buzzed in my ears. Freya hovered over me like an umbrella. One day in Canterlot, and I'd already upset Celestia, brought here by her or not, I wasn't doing anypony any favors.
"We're here, sir." I startled myself back to reality. I blearily blinked at the door Rally had stopped beside. I'd need to memorize the path at some point, but that wasn't today. I just hoped Polaris' lessons weren't too bad. My head felt stuffed; it was all the worse that I was becoming used to it. It couldn't be healthy, crushing a foal's body under all this stress. Even if I had more than one mind to take the load.
"Will you need anything else, sir?" Rally asked.
I offered a single sordid look before shaking my head. "No, thank you."
With that, Rally pushed the door in. Nothing else for it, I stepped into the study and steeled myself the best I could. I did not have the luxury of letting breakfast bog me down ad infinitum. The door closed behind me just as quickly as I'd cleared the doorway.
"Ah, there you are."
The study was like most rooms in the castle: large, finely adorned, and oddly cool. The walls were lined with bookcases, filled with what must be hundreds of tomes of every size and sort. My eyes scanned a single row of the closest case beside me. Alchemy, herbalism, thaumaturgy, scrying, and so on. It was a room fraught with magic, magic, and more magic. I'd wanted lessons. Well, if there were any place for such, it was here.
"Come, join me."
Polaris sat directly across from the door's threshold at a finely crafted desk. A desk that was stacked with more scrolls, tomes, and books than any single bookshelf could have held. Even with their sole purpose to do exactly that. So high were the books stacked that if Polaris had not spoken up, I might not have noticed him at all.
"Yes, sir," I said. I plodded myself across the room to the single waiting chair on my side of the desk. Polaris had a somewhat classy set of spectacles on as he slowly scanned whatever tome had his attention.
"So, Glacial, are you prepared for a deep dive into magic in all its beautiful forms? By which, I mean beyond just your cryomancy. After all, the more complete your understanding is, the more versatile both magic and your mind become. If that makes sense," Polaris said. He offered a chaste smile, setting his spectacles on the open book before him.
I tapped a hoof on the desk. "I suppose so, sir." As like yesterday, Polaris was polite, if just slightly nervous. Yesterday, Celestia was present, which made some level of sense. Yet, here and now, that same strange look crept into his eyes. The same uneasy static clung to the air.
"Good, good. Before we begin, though, I hate to waste time. I really do. I wanted to reintroduce myself. If we're to be seeing each other every day in the near future, it is best we understand one another. Yes?"
I nodded. "That seems fair."
Polaris clapped his hooves together. His smile crept just a bit too far up his jaw as he gazed down at me. "Good. So, as you are aware, my name is Polaris Glimmer. I've been asked by Her Royal Highness to help temper the iron of your potential to a fine point. I'm not particularly gifted in any single field of magic, but I am more adept at magic at a fundamental level. One of the few stallions allotted with any level of magical authority in all of Canterlot. It is a pleasure to meet you. I hope that by the end of this assignment, we've both had a chance to learn something worth learning."
Polaris leaned forward, eyes fixed, dilated, searching. His smile edged just a bit larger. His hooves pressed so hard into the wood that I worried he might damage it. I found myself leaning back, my breath catching in the air as my veins froze in motion, hooves shaking even as they were encased in that same ice. Freya floated beside me, mouth pulled in a tight sneer.
Then, as suddenly as he'd leaned forward, Polaris fell back into his seat. "Neither of us wants this to be a waste. That would be disappointing."
"This one is starting to make me angry. He tastes like copper; it's not very pleasant," Freya said. She pressed her ethereal form to my side, shaking her entire incorporeal body.
"Now, why don't you tell me a bit about yourself. I, of course, know who you are and what magic you possess. But the specifics were not provided in Her Highness' letter."
A second greeting, a chance to move things in my favor. The longer I spoke with Polaris, the more something wriggled in the back of my mind. I couldn't place it; I just knew I was missing something, which made my headache all the worse.
"My name is Glacial Zero. I'm a colt from Bogwood, in the fiefdom of Baltimare. I only discovered my talent for cryomancy a few weeks ago. I've been told it is strange but not unheard of for magic like mine to exist. Magic is used by non-unicorns, I mean. You've probably noticed." I gestured at my ever more commonly frozen hooves. It was funny. I was starting to forget they'd even do so. It was nearly autonomous. It simply happened like breathing. A trait and habit I'd had even before Freya boosted my power with her own brand of Wendigo magic.
I could feel it deep down. A second fount of mana. It felt nothing like my normal power. It stirred like an angry storm, reaching out, desperate to be used, to be free. I wondered if others could tell if they could taste the encroaching storm, too. I couldn't place the why or how. I couldn't even tell why Polaris felt so off. That thought wriggled in my head once more, just a bit harder.
"You are quite the case study. Princess Celestia certainly thinks your means are of note. I tend to agree. If the incident the other day was half as impressive as Her Highness suggested. Then I can't wait to see it for myself." Polaris danced about in his seat with a child-like glee. The smile from a moment ago crept back across his muzzle.
"So, Mr. Polaris, where shall we start?" I asked.
"Nowhere good," Freya said, flicking a dismissive hoof at Polaris.
"From the beginning, of course. No, actually, that's not right. Not the beginning. We'll start from your beginning. To understand and evolve, you must know yourself completely. So, we'll be doing a bit of an exercise. Where you show me just what makes you, you."
Polaris rose from his seat. A sparkle in his eyes as he looked over his shoulder to the solely uncurtained window in the room. The sun shone bright, not a cloud in the sky. I suppress a tentative grunt. There was something not right about days like this. Bogwood rarely had cloudless days; gray was the name of the game, and this was not it.
"Come along. I can't wait to see what you are made of, Glacial. Us colts have to try all the harder. Right? Push all the farther. Actions, we need actions." In a wink of his horn, Polaris lifted and deposited saddle bags across his back. He then sashayed across the room, his pretty pink mane flowing this way and that with every step, all in rhythm with his dancing tail.
"Glacie, this stallion is so very confusing. So much dark, so much joy. I can't make heads or tails of it at all." Freya shook her head, flitting about me eagerly. "And he still tastes gross."
I took my time following Polaris, who had already thrown the study door wide and was gone in a blink. I took my time walking into the hall. I noted Private Rally's waiting eyes drifting in the direction of Polaris, who was already nearing the end of the hall.
"Sir?" Private Rally asked.
"I don't think he even noticed," I confirmed. We both stood and waited. I took to counting the seconds. Thirty-four. It took Polaris thirty-four seconds after he rounded the bend to come dashing back eyes in a frantic search for his lost charge.
The second Polaris saw me, he relaxed ever so slightly. "Glacial Zero, if you please."
Polaris waved from across the hall at me. His voice carried surprisingly well with how little he'd raised it. I waved back. I gave Private Rally a hapless shrug, and she returned one.
As I walked, I noted Rally falling behind me. There was a certain comfort to having her at my back, one that even endured: the impassioned eagerness in Polaris' trotting in place. I had to remind myself which of us was the child and the other the educated scholar.
"This way, we'll make our way to the south courtyard. It has plenty of space and won't be very busy quite yet. The gardeners are still in the north at the moment, and the guards only take up around half the available space. Which leaves plenty of room for the two of us. That is, I hope, at least. The fact is, I really don't care for the Royal Guard's Captain. She is always far too loud."
Polaris went on and on, picking apart everything he could about how and why the Royal Guard was constantly hassling him. It would have been interesting if he wasn't speaking so quickly that I only heard every other sentence. I gave Private Rally a quizzical look. She seemed just as lost as I was. Which was relieving. I worried everypony in Canterlot might be crazy.
By the time we reached the south courtyard, Polaris had ranted himself out and seemed to have lost himself in whatever else crossed his mind.
"Well, if nothing else. Your lessons won't be boring," Freya said, offering a conciliatory pat on my back. One that passed right through and out my belly.
"Gee, thanks."
Polaris' attention snapped back to reality. His eyes looked wildly. A rabbit who caught sight of a prowling wolf. I could have sworn I heard him whisper some sort of prayer. I raised a hoof toward my tutor only to pull back at the last second. For the first time since meeting him, I didn't feel on edge. No, to the contrary. I felt kind of sad. Which made even less sense than yesterday's spontaneous bout of terror.
Canterlot Castle's south courtyard was large, really large, larger than the entirety of Bogwood's town square. It was also very flat, a field of deliberately kept grass, with only the occasional shrubbery or tree to break up the monotony. I had to wonder what Polaris had worried about. The Royal Guard had more than enough space to share. Of which, the same guard had taken some residence in the eastern half of said land. The area was littered with target practice and straw dummies. There was also a ring cordoned off with rope, a fighting ring, I suspected, and several layers of cloud above. The western half, in contrast, was woefully unordained.
"The west it is," Polaris said, trotting off toward the courtyard wall.
"An audience, ey? This should be fun," Freya mused, hooved rubbing as she schemed away. I'd have preferred a bit of solitude.
"Mr. Polaris."
My teacher looked back over his shoulder, his pretty pink mane flowing down his neck and twirling in the morning breeze. "Yes?"
"What exactly were you planning to test out here? If you don't mind explaining."
"Ha," Polaris chuckled, his laugh like chiming bells. I felt my brow rising as he waved back in my direction. "Everything, Glacial, power, reflex, scope, versatility. By the time we're done today, we will know every limit your pegasus body can handle. It should be quite enjoyable. Perhaps your guard friend can lend a hoof as well." Polaris twisted to look at Rally, who, in turn, found a very interesting blade of grass that needed her full attention.
"That sounds..." I bit my lip, trying to imagine just how sore I'd be by the time we were done. My guess is a stone's throw from death. "...Thorough."
Polaris pointed at me, eyes twinkling. "Exactly."
We reached the western wall, where Polaris eagerly trotted in place. I looked about, expecting something to happen. Nothing did. I looked to Rally, who was looking for something to happen. It did not. Yet, Polaris continued his prancing.
"Sir?" I asked.
"Right, right, apologies. I'm just a bit eager. It has been a while since I've had something as unique as yourself to study." Polaris fell still. "I study a lot, more than—"
Polaris shook his head and coughed into a hoof. "So, shall we begin?" Polaris' horn was wrapped in a turquoise aura, and his saddlebags flew open. In seconds, he'd drawn forth parchment, quills, ink, a wooden board, several crystals I had no clue about, and a ruler."
"Right, so, what now?" I asked.
"Magic," Freya said, throwing her hooves over her head. "We do magic."
"We'll start from the top down. This means I would like you to show me the biggest display of magic you can all at once. Once we know your maximum, we can better design tests with that in mind. Am I being clear?" Polaris brought his ruler down in a hoof with a loud thwack. His excitement was gone and, in its place, a severity that did not suit his cutesy visage at all. I was caught between bewilderment and an uneasy defiance.
"What about?" I pointed to the guards, who, if they had noticed us, had chosen to ignore us to the best of their abilities.
"Fuh, pay them no mind. They have their own menial duties. So, unless you'd planned to assault those foolish mares, they should keep to themselves. As so shall we." Another thwack of the ruler. Eyes trained on the mares in question, all of his prior excitement died quick, fast, and in a hurry.
Rally took a step closer. The faintest hint of warning was in her tensed stance. Her horn pointed at Polaris, who did not so much as flinch in response.
"That's fine, it'll be fine," I said, placing myself between the guard and scholar. "I just didn't want to be a bother, is all, I promise." I offered a weak smile, hooves pressing in the direction of my companions.
"Sir," Rally said. She relented and stepped back, her horn no longer pointed at Polaris, who had yet to acknowledge Rally's response in the slightest.
"That's Good. Then begin. Do whatever you like, as long as you give it your full effort."
Freya flew in front of me, eyes shifting between me and Polaris and back. "Are you gonna use my magic?" Freya asked. Her voice pitched higher as she spoke. Hitching on the last word. I shook my head, and almost instantly, Freya relaxed in all but her eyes. Those remained indecisive on where she wanted to look and for how long.
"I'll keep it simple then. No reason to open old wounds, so to speak." I said.
I took a deep breath, in through the mouth and out through the nose. The familiar chill of my magic tingled my ice blue coat and across my back to my primaries. All four hooves froze up to the knee, and my tail and mane frosted over to match, the color distorting to an almost frostbite black. I'd hate to look in a mirror; I have little doubt I look ridiculous.
I can't say I hadn't wondered just how far my ice would go when not under the pressure of certain death, that is. "Freeze." So, I let down the dam, the writhing mass of my pony magic set free. Left to claw itself across, each blade of grass clinging to every breeze, reaching to the very heavens above. Celestia had said. My magic used the ambient water in the air and ground to go beyond my purely personal means. Canterlot was not Bogwood. It was not nearly as sodden. If my magic cared, it certainly had a strange way of showing it.
An explosion was the word that came to mind. It was an explosion, frozen solid even as it continued to expand. The sound of dirt being raked away as my ice dug into the ground. It wasn't as wide as the barrier I'd made to stop the mudslide. I had to imagine it was due to intent, unconscious or not. Each frosty peak of my moving glacier stretched like spears in all directions. This was the purest form of my magic, with nothing to control it, to contain it, to shape it. It simply was, and as it poured forth, I could feel my body convulse. I stared out at the endless wave of semi-translucent blues. By the time it ended, I was shaking in place, breath caught between gasps and coughs. I'd have collapsed if I wasn't rooted to the ground.
"Is that enough?" I asked between heaving pants.
"How?" Rally said. She fell to her haunches, eyes wide as she motioned to the mountain of ice. "A pegasus."
"Gee Glacie, you broke your guard, you silly colt." Freya poked at Private Rally's cheek.
I broke the ice around my hooves and stumbled toward Rally, who flinched but otherwise watched with what little guard stoicism she could muster. "Uh, sorry?" I said. "I'm just not very used to going all out. If that makes sense."
"Exceptional. Truly, you've got a talent even greater than the Princess's report would suggest. Second hoof as it was. That is to say, a potential that we can't afford to squander. A domain, truly, a, huh." Polaris' face went slack; all his excitement vanished into a confused squint.
I took a step back and gulped hard. Just like before, like yesterday. It wasn't a fluke, after all. It felt so alien, yet my mind screamed I'd seen it before. Before I could do anything further, Polaris snapped back to reality, blinking hard as he looked my ice over once more.
"I'm sorry. Where were we again?" Polaris shook his head slowly, his voice hoarse as he pondered our conversation. "Let's move on to measuring crystals."
"The what?" I asked. What the Tartarus is going on?
"Did he?" Freya asked. Before I could ask what she meant, Polaris stepped forward, placing himself between Freya and myself, as ineffective as stonewalling would be, even if he knew he was doing it.
"I recorded your mancy. All magic can be measured, including the volume, mana consumption, the rate of mana burn, and so much more. All quite valuable, I assure you." Polaris said, placing a hoof on my shoulder. His horn lit up, and the crystals he retrieved from his saddlebags earlier drifted in a slow orbit around his head. "Each color denotes what crystal measures what. A technique that goes back before the Great Migration."
"Right," I said, moving out of Polaris' grip. "So, anything of note?"
"Besides the massive pile of ice taking up a large section of the courtyard? Do tell."
The sudden influx of radiating smugness that followed the question sent an alien hatred neither of my lives could completely comprehend. The fact that it came from behind me indicated that Polaris hadn't developed some new quirk. My lack of appreciation, not melting into pure disgust, was as kind as I could be to whoever decided they wanted to start a fight.
"Oh, of course," Polaris said through grit teeth. "Captain Conjure, how nice to see you this morning."
"Oh dear, it seems our teacher is in quite the mood. My oh my," Freya said. She offered a nod in the direction of this one Captain Conjure. I took a single deep, rueful breath and turned to the new arrival. Well, arrivals, the Captain was not alone.
"I'm sure it is, Polaris Glimmer. I heard you were in the castle, but I didn't expect such a mess this early in the morning. I didn't even have to guess who was playing with power outside their control. Only one stallion in Equestria is that vain."
Captain Conjure was a steely unicorn in an almost literal way. She decked in full shiny silver armor, adorned with steely blue accents, an iron gray coat tripped to the last hair, and a silver mane short and slicked in some oil or another. That would be impressive, even awe-inspiring, if it weren't for a single transfixing point of the mare's smug face. Beady black eyes, a color rarely seen in ponies, with a look that itself seemed to spit on you in spite. If Celestia had bred an aura of suffocating heat, this mare stirred a primal fear, like being stalked in the dead of night. I hadn't even noticed I'd stepped back far enough to place Polaris between myself and the Canterlot Captain, the one I believe Polaris mentioned earlier.
"I do not like this mare. I do not like her one little bit," Freya said. We were in total agreement at that. I had been wrong priorly. It was, in fact, true; everyone in Canterlot was out of their minds. "She reeks of lies, most of which are to herself."
"Captain, that is hardly fair. I am merely testing my student's magic ratings. The same sort of test you've taken countless times." Polaris had begun to shake, eyes stuck between rage and dejection. A myriad of ticks played out in random conjoined motions, from dock to fetlock.
"Oh yes, your charge. I'd heard something about a foal returning with Her Highness," Conjure said with a haughty sniff. Conjure's eyes trailed from Polaris down to me. I glared back between sharp, constrained breaths.
"Maybe I should freeze her solid. See how she likes it," I muttered.
"This foal managed quite the show for a featherbrain. I wasn't even aware such feats were possible for our feathered peers without clouds and weeks of planning." Captain Conjure approached my ice mound and leaned against it. Her cohorts snickered along.
"Glacie." Freya winked.
I winked back. "Thaw." I tapped my hoof to the ground gently. My ice obeyed. That was one thing that I'd picked up even before the talkies with Celestia. It was far easier to dismiss my ice than it was to conjure. I had supposed I could have thawed even the mudslide had I wanted to. The issue is that I don't know what would have remained, nor where it would have gone had I thawed it. If I had hazarded a guess. A massive splat of mud a mile wide. It would undoubtedly have done less damage compared to its prefrozen form, but it would have been one Tartarus of a clean up. That is in mind. When my current ice returned to mist and vapor, it left no mess to speak of. It did, however, leave Captain Conjure falling face-first into the damp grass.
"Whoops."
"Glacial Zero."
Polaris was no longer shaking, in fact. The drastic change in his demeanor was enough for me to pause, my brow arching so high I worried it wouldn't be coming back down. Polaris was fighting a losing battle with a bout of snorts, giggles, and guffaws. Well, at least he was feeling better. I doubted he'd be feeling so keen when the floored Captain roused from her stunned ingress with the floor.
"Yes, Mr. Polaris?"
"Captain." One of the lackeys had rushed to her senior's side. The others, pulled from their own bafflement, followed suit. "Are you alright?"
The smile faded quicker than it had come for poor Polaris. The fear trickled back in as he eyed the now-rising Conjure.
"That was unwise." Conjure did not raise her voice. She didn't need to. The malice wafting off her was enough to make her message clear all on its own. "Very unwise."
It was strange. As much as I should, as I had moments ago been, now I feel no fear. Instead, a steady rhythm of adrenaline and irritation left me clueless about my sudden bout of mania. Captain Conjure had begun her approach, her black eyes seeking to devour me whole.
"Glacie, you really should stop. Your, my, our power is leaking," Freya whispered. She had shrunk away from me, choosing to place anything or anyone she could between us. Even if Private Rally, who looked seconds from breaking and running for her life, was unaware of her place as Freya's meatshield.
"Leaking?" Oh, I'd thought I'd held back when I summoned the first Ice wave. Something wasn't adding up. "But how?"
A line of thinking brought to a decisive end when Captain Conjure came to a stop a hooves length from my semi-distracted self. The well of magic in me, the same one I'd pulled from, was there, at least in part. I hadn't run out yet; something felt detached.
"Do you think yourself clever, Colt?" Captain Conjure said. She leaned down, meeting me eye to eye.
"Clever? You did say it was a mess, yes? All I did was clean up, ma'am." Even as close as she was, I hardly felt a thing. I simply had nothing to offer. My head hurt; the 'leak,' as Freya had called it, became more recognizable with each second. Conjure seemed ready to flay me. It all felt so distant. I felt so cold.
"Am I to believe a mere foal could so easily command such magic? You may have been brought to Canterlot by Her Majesty's will, but I doubt you are what others claim. I suggest acting with due respect or being taught it in a manner more befitting a misbehaving foal."
Captain Conjure's eyes glinted, still locked on my unflinching form. Her warning was precisely that. To test her, to make another mistake, to push the line just that much farther. Why should she trust me, believe me? She wasn't there. I wouldn't believe it myself if I weren't there to do it. Freya gave up part of herself for that feat. A piece I would hold tight, even if Conjure wished to wage war. I would endure, even if every feeling burned out and froze over. My head pounded, but thanks to the frigid, oppressive, phlegmatic emptiness, My migraine was just static in the back of my head. It could have been maddening if I could feel anything at all. I was so cold; the frigid storm of wendigo magic was relentless, and I felt caught up in its whipping, billowing gales.
"I will do my best to live up to everypony's expectations then. Princess Celestia brought me here to learn, so I will do all I can to learn everything." Where was I really? Freya's eyes were on my back, and Conjure's at my front, a pincer of their confusion and fear. Yet all I could think about was my desire to go home.
"We shall see." Then, as quickly as she came, Captain Conjure turned one hundred and eighty degrees and arched away, her subordinates hot on her heels. Within seconds, both Freya and Polaris deflated on the spot. The tension shattered like glass, and the whole of the courtyard took a collective breath of relief.
"It really is not wise to antagonize that mare. She is as nasty as she seemed and has a habit of finding any excuse to ruin my day," Polaris said. He moved closer to where my inland iceberg had been rubbing a hoof over the grass. "Though, I doubt even she was prepared for your little showing. Certainly an efficient dismissal, if nothing else."
"I have no idea why, but reversing the freezing is way easier than creating it. I barely have to try at all." I sidled up beside my tutor and patted the slightly damp grass beneath me.
"It is almost as if it's, no, Domains aren't that simple," Polaris whispered. One might have mistaken it for a breath if not paying attention. Though to what end his thoughts had was beyond me for the moment. I could feel the storm inside me settling, and as it did, the icy grip on my soul relented, and some semblance of heat returned to my chest.
"I'll admit, that trick with the Captain was amusing. I might even have been impressed if you two weren't so helpless."
I looked back toward the guard's side of the courtyard. It seemed several of Conjure's audience had chosen to stick behind. A pair of younger squires had taken the place of the Captains' yes mares. The first was a relatively thin unicorn filly, a bit too tall for her own good, still growing into adulthood. I'd wager midteens. Her bright yellow, everything was almost hard to look at. Blonde, canary, sunbeam and plenty more. The whites of her eyes and teeth were the only thing breaking up the brighter colors. Even her irises were a dull gold. If there was ever a pony that fit right into a group called 'Solar' anything, it was this filly.
Beside her was an even younger filly, maybe a year or two older than myself. Unlike her companion, who was grinning so hard that she might have split something, The second mare, a gentle maroon-colored unicorn with a darker copper mane, seemed a bit uneasy. She managed a glance my way, then immediately turned to look at anything else, then back to me, the cycle lasting every few seconds before going again. The senior took several proud stomps in my direction. Close enough that there would be no mistaking one another words and enough to give room should something untoward happen.
"I beg your pardon? A trick?" I asked. The idea that somehow I was fooling anypony at the moment with what happened to the Captain was a bit beguiling. I could believe others would mock, belittle, or lie about me or my talents; children could be cruel. The fact this yellow filly was trying to dismiss it outright was almost sad on some level.
"Trick, a pegasus can't just make ice disappear. Not even a unicorn can just will that much matter out of existence. There has to be something more to it. So, how'd you do it?"
There was the unspoken contradiction that Captain Conjure had also aired. In the city of unicorns, why would a pegasus command power that said unicorns can't emulate? I couldn't and wouldn't blame them, after all. I was the exception to prove the rule, which I did not appreciate. I'd have preferred being normal, given the chance.
"Gilded Glory. Maybe we should just leave them be," the younger squire said.
Gilded, a name never suited more to a pony, scoffed and waved a hoof in our direction. "I just want the truth. There is no harm in that. The colt can just admit to it, and we can leave it at that." Gilded smirked in my direction. "Right?"
"Admit to a trick. I suppose. Does this count?" I asked. I tapped a hoof on the ground and watched as Gilded yelped. Her hooves were now frozen to the dirt beneath her. "I'll admit to that if nothing else, Ms. Glory."
I couldn't help a faint smile as Gilded Glory was forced to dig her back hooves in hard and pull, just to watch as I tapped my hoof again, and the ice that had her stuck was reduced to slush. The filly fell on her rear with a gasp.
"That one too."
The younger filly ran to her senior's aid, who made no fuss as she was helped to her hooves. The red that now streaked across her cheeks and muzzle contrasted well with her right yellow coat. Her younger counterpart had found it hard to meet my gaze before; now, she avoided it like she might die if we locked eyes at all.
"You little shit. You're lucky you're a colt, or else I'd—" Gilded growled. She leveled her now glowing horn in my direction.
"Gilded, stop."
"I'd listen to your companion, little filly," Polaris said. I was surprised. The older unicorn had stepped up, his own horn glowing as he eyed Gilded to do something, do anything. There was a depth to his promise, to the wrath yet incurred. The same feeling from yesterday, but targeted at somepony other than me. From the outside looking in, it was even worse.
"He's right." Rally had decided she'd had enough as well. She placed herself between me and Gilded, her horn also alight. The threat of magical combat was an interesting one. With how few unicorns there were back home, such contests bordered on unheard of. I certainly had never seen a magic fight before. A few tiffs via hoof and wing, but nothing more.
At this point, Gilded realized that she was outnumbered and most likely outmatched, too, which was a pity. Gilded's horn winked out. However, the look on her face and the still reddened cheeks remained in full.
"Of course, I apologize," Gilded said between clenched teeth. She offered Rally a brisque salute and turned on heel, trotting back the way she'd come.
"Looks like you made your first rival, Glacie. I'm so proud," Freya said. She waved farewell to my 'rival,' all smiles and rude gestures.
"I'm sorry," the younger squire said. Unlike her senior, she hadn't moved from her spot. "I should have told her to leave you alone. A guard filly shouldn't go around insulting colts. It isn't right."
I dismissed the poor attempt at an apology. "She made her own decisions. It isn't your fault, miss?" I rolled a hoof in her direction.
"Oh, sorry, I'm Prime Parry, Royal Guard in training." Parry's eyes twinkled as she struck a proud salute at full attention. I found myself letting the tension drain from my shoulders as I offered the filly a chaste smile.
"It's a Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Parry. Glacial Zero, Night Guard cadet, and cryomancer from Bogwood." I saluted. The metaphorical ice had broken, and Parry had met my eye for the first time since she and her friend approached my group.
"A Night Guard, really?" Parry asked. The surprise on her face wasn't unexpected, but the awe was new. She took a few tentative steps closer. Her eyes swept over me and locked on my wings. My very clearly feathered wings.
I flexed the wing in question, eyes narrowing ever so slightly. "Yes, they are in fact real. Even if my special talent would suggest otherwise."
It seems maroon or not, crimson could be seen with little difficulty. Just as soon as Parry appeared to gain a bit of bravery, my comment sent her stumbling back the way she'd come.
"Oh, I'm sorry. It's just you said Night Guard, and you're not..."
"Thestral," I finished. Parry nodded. "I'm a child of the night all the same. I assure you. Though I'll admit, I certainly don't look the part."
"Parry!" Our time was up, it seemed. Gilded had noticed Parry not having followed her own retreat. Parry cringed but sullenly turned to see Gilded leering at us.
"I should go. It was nice meeting you, Cadet Glacial." That said, Parry trotted away. I offered a wave, even if she never turned back to see it.
"Look at you, only one day in Canterlot, and you have the mares swooning. I'd watch it. You might make the girls back in Bogwood jealous," Freya said. She giggled into a hoof. I swatted at her weakly.
"Nothing to be jealous of," I mumbled, trying my best not to draw Rally or Polaris' attention. Of whom were staring across the courtyard at the collection of guards. The guards, in kind, poorly concealed their own stares back in our direction.
"All those mares do is cause distractions," Polaris said, clapping his hooves as he turned back to me. The strange look from before was nowhere to be found. "Now, about your readings."
I'd almost forgotten we'd been interrupted. I still had little in the way of comparing any readings given; I didn't even know what a good or bad reading would look like. I froze, and suddenly, terror slammed hard into my thoughts. Just when did the readings stop?
"Glacie?" Freya had noticed. I wasn't surprised. She made a game of reading me like a picture book. The fact Polaris' brow had risen foretold my already tepid ability to hide such feelings all the more apparent. 'Buck!'
"Yes, well, we'll begin with the simplest of the readings. I will explain them as we go. Once we've gauged your base rates, we can focus on raising your lower metrics to more respectable numbers. A feat I'm greatly looking forward to."
"Glacie, what's the matter?" Freya whispered in my ear. Why she felt the need would be a question for later. When we were alone.
"Not now." I mouthed the words. Freya puffed out her cheeks but sat silently and waited. Polaris made no move to question me, and Rally was far too busy eying my teacher. She must have noticed my stop a moment ago as well.
"So, first is output. This being the full amount of transmuted mana into thaums. In short, what is the full amount of magic released in a single use? For you, young Glacial…" Polaris held out a single bright purple crystal. The further from the center the color spread from the center, the more opaque the same purple color became. "The color denotes a series of thaums. In your case, the purple is a metric for any spells that reach over twelve hundred."
I raised a hoof. Polaris tsked but pointed his ruler in my direction. "Is that high?" I asked. In the books I'd read back in Bogwood, denotations were given for thresholds in classic spellcraft. Something like the basic unicorn telekinetic grip hosting a metric of two to four hundred thaums depending on the user and object moved. While something like a mana bolt, one of the most straightforward offensive spells unicorns might use, fell closer to the six hundred range. However, none of these examples discuss a pegasi using an advanced mancy like mine.
Polaris shrugged, tail swishing as he smiled deviously. "I do not know, Glacial Zero. Records of ponies like you are rare, and none on record are a pegasi with cryomancy. That is why we are here, after all. So, it may be high, it may be low. If we use this as even the lowest threshold available for your total thaums produced. Your range for what The Princess described in her missive may scale well into the four or even five thousand range."
"So, we'll be doing this again?" I asked. Four or five thousand for freezing a mudslide. I knew for a fact thaums and their reactions were exponential, but even then, that number felt a little low. Or, I'd simply yet to learn to appreciate the grander concepts of magic. I had a feeling Polaris would be beating it into my skull either way.
Polaris nodded, tapping his ruler under his chin. "Over the first month, I think we'll try once every week. Once we have a more concrete range, we can better utilize the means to expand that range and control more precisely. Now, the second test. The rate of mana used and expended. As in, how quickly your spell actuated and how much mana was wasted doing so." Polaris held up a second crystal. This one is a light orange. The color flickered like a dying light bulb. There goes another Halism. When would ponies come up with the same concepts?
"Should it be winking like that?" I asked.
"Yes, as a matter of fact, the frequency of its 'winks' is the marker for mana erosion. In this case, your expenditure fits within the seventieth percentile. For a starting metric, I've seen far worse. One that can be improved but is not helpless. I'd suspect half the mares…" Polaris pointed out at the guards across the yard. "...over there, fall within similar metrics."
"Good job, Glacie, you impressed the creepy tutor. Maybe you'll get Captain Conjure's approval next. Oh, or that mean filly from earlier. Oh, or your new fillyfriend. Wouldn't that be something?" Freya floated over Polaris, clapping in mock ovation.
"I'm glad you approve, sir." Polaris hummed, levitating the next crystal forward.
"Next is the final reading for today. A gauge of total mana possessed by the caster. Of course, this can't account for any reserved mana, like what is necessary for bodily functions or any missing mana due to overuse or previous use. It will give us a fairly applicable range of mana one can use over the course of an extended period. Once you know how much a cast uses, the quicker it will become second nature to equate what you have left after each casting. A feat unicorns are expected to learn young, so now, you shall also learn it."
The fact that mathematics, both simple and complex, was a part of magic wasn't news. The books from before had given me quite the repeated assurance on that. I'd even jotted down some of the more basic formulas. My simple 'pour everything into one direction' was hardly advanced enough for anything that complicated. Why waste time calculating when you can replace finesse with raw, overwhelming power?
The next crystal was a deep red. Its center churned an icy blue, and the color itself seemed to bleed out of its host and wisp into the air around it. Though the color wasn't pure, in fact, the closer I looked, the more the very center of the glow turned a dull gray. It reminded me of a raincloud, and if the look Polaris and Rally were giving this crystal was any clue to the nature of the test, it could only be a problem.
"Oops." My eye darted to Freya, who had settled beside me. Freya seemed more put off by the abnormality than Polaris. My own nerves had frayed to the last strand. I could feel the cold from before clawing in the pit of my stomach. My head felt ready to split in two.
"Odd, very odd, Glacial Zero. Perhaps the deviation comes from your tribe? A storm cloud caught in a magical storm. There is something poetic here, though I've no patience to find it." Polaris turned to Rally. "Thoughts, Private?"
Rally's eyes snapped to Polaris, and so did her posture. "I'm no scholar, sir."
"Even still." Polaris' ear had begun twitching like mad. His tail swaying in tempo.
"Is it really that strange? I mean, Pegasi have magic too. It is just different," I said, tapping the crystal still hanging in the air before me. The cloud swirled as the crystal shook slightly.
"Something to look into later. You are full of surprises, Colt."
"So, how is my mana, anyway?" I asked.
"Plentiful, even discounting outside stimuli. At least twice that of another mage your age. If it were any less, I doubt you'd have even slowed down that mudslide of yours. Faust must have taken a liking to you. As unreliable as she is and as unimpressed she seems to be with the rest of stallions." Polaris spat on the ground beside him. His horn winked, and the crystal yanked through the air and back into his bags.
I exchanged a worried look with Private Rally. Who mirrored my puzzlement even through her guard discipline. "I'm sorry?" What was Celestia thinking?
"Don't be." Polaris started off toward the same entry we'd come from. "We've gathered what I needed. Come along."
"Rally?"
"Yes, sir?"
"I'm not crazy, right? That stallion has issues?"
"Yes, sir."
Freya laughed, placing herself between Rally and myself. "It's not like you're a bastion of normalcy, Glacie."
I sighed and followed after Polaris, who was standing at the door, hoof tapping impatiently. One minute, he was lively; the next, he was a hurricane in a teapot. One day in, and I couldn't wait to go home. No, that wasn't right. I was ready to go home as of day zero.
No sooner had we reached Polaris than he flung the door wide. "Go rest. I need time to fine-tune your lessons. These findings are also due on Her Highness' desk. By the time we're done, there won't be a mare in this city who doubts what we are capable of." The look was back. The deep, forlorn, hopeless look. The same that sent my every instinct on fire.
"Are you sure, sir? It isn't even noon yet," I asked from a safe place behind Private Rally. The mare, now presiding as a shield, seemed unbothered by it all the same.
"You're still weak. No real means to push your limits if you are already at death's door. Go rest, we will start your tutelage in full tomorrow. And Glacial?"
My head cocked slightly. "Yes?"
"Fear is the mind-killer. I suggest you keep that in mind."
Polaris' horn flashed, and he was gone in a pale pink light. I slowly stepped out from behind my humble guard and breathed a sigh of relief. "Rally."
"Yes, sir?"
"Could we go by the library before lunch?"
Rally shrugged. "I see no reason we can't. Did you have something in particular you were hoping to read about?" Rally rubbed a hoof across her peytral. "I've become well versed in the Canterlot archives as of late."
My brow rose. "Oh?"
She nodded. "I was one of the laborers who filled in the shelves. I know the sections by heart. Even if it was a bit too quiet."
"They made guards do that?"
"Guard, just me, all alone. With nothing but shelves and books, tomes, grimoires, and scrolls from across Equiss." Rally's pride shriveled up and died.
"I'm guessing a punishment?" I asked.
She nodded but did not elaborate. That was fine; everypony was due to their secrets and regrets. By now, I understood that better than most.
"Well then, lead the way. I have a few things I've been meaning to read up on. My home, Bogwood, isn't exactly an academic fortress."
"Aye, sir, this way," Rally said, pointing down the hall opposite the one we'd come from. Thus, we were off. Rally made a very clear effort to move as quickly as she could without leaving me in the dust.
"What did you have in mind, Glacie?" Freya asked. She'd taken to the backstroke beside me, running laps around me as we trotted.
"A few things, a book or two on cryomancy would be nice. Maybe something on dreams and nightmares. But really, I was thinking, Domains."
Freya's eyes flashed with understanding. "So you did catch it? You tricky colt, you."
I winked. "I'm young, not stupid or deaf." The rest of the walk could have been minutes or hours. Hall, turn right, hall turn left, hall turn another left. Pass patrolling guards, get an odd look or two, and promptly ignore them. This castle would never make sense.
"Sir."
Rally came to a stop before a pair of doors similar to those in the dining hall. From Floor to Ceiling, the ornate gold-trimmed doors stood unmistakable amongst the endless identical hallways. Beside the doors was a plaque: Canterlot Royal Archives.
Let the games begin.