The Sky Above

Unusually, Rainbow found herself the first to wake up, groggy and stiff. The predawn light cast everything in a bluey, even glow; their fire had long since gone out, its embers cold and grey. She blinked and crawled out from where she’d tucked herself in beside the others, leaving their cozy divot and heading down to the stream below.

She shook herself and splashed some icy water on her face; despite how little she cared to be up at this hour, she’d seen enough with her scouting yesterday to know the wyverns were just around the corner – with a spot of luck, they could be back in Shade by nightfall.

A few pebbles tumbled down the bank as Twilight ambled down to join her, leaving the sounds of grumbling behind. “How’re ya feeling?” Rainbow asked.

“Sore,” Twilight grunted.

Rainbow flicked her tail in amusement – her bestie really needed to exercise more. “I’ll bet. We’re almost there, though, right?”

Twilight nodded sleepily as she splashed some water on herself. “Yep.”

They broke camp quickly, a sense of eagerness colouring their every action: they all knew this was the final leg. With the last of it packed, they left the shelter of the arch and continued on west, their breaths making puffs of fog in the crisp air.

“I’ll stay down here,” Rainbow said: they were only a few turns away from their destination and she hardly wanted to be caught up in the sky when they met the sentries – provided there were any.

“Safest that way,” Squirrel agreed. “And you’re sure the nest is just ahead? It’s not like... I don’t know, just a bunch of them camping or something?”

Rainbow gave her a look.

“Or, uhh... okay, that sounded kind of dumb, didn’t it,” Squirrel blushed.

“Yes,” Rainbow agreed. “Very yes.” The ‘nest,’ such as it was, looked more like a great, shadowy overhanging along one of the canyon’s edges; if it wasn’t for the hoofful of wyverns moving about, and the many, many scratches, gouges and rigas, she might’ve missed it entirely.

“We’ll do the talking,” Twilight said, quick to assure to Squirrel. “They’re not likely to actually be aggressive, although we should definitely expect some posturing, so once again, we’ll do the talking.”

“Good, good,” Squirrel muttered, not looking much happier about things; still, she wasn’t turning tail and running.

They reached a fork of sorts in the gully and took the leftern path. From what Rainbow’d seen, even calling it a ‘gully’ was being generous – it was more that the ground here was so broken, and its boulders and mountain arms so big, that any vaguely clear space was almost by necessity a shallow canyon.

Shrubbery dominated the area, the plants barely half their height but their branches thick and sprawling. More than once they’d been forced to clamber over great clumps of them, their going slowed immensely as they strode across their tops.

Rainbow huffed when a hoof slipped between the branches, snow slapping her in the belly.

“You could always fly,” Squirrel grumbled behind her, likewise not enjoying herself in the least.

“I’m staying,” Rainbow grumbled back. “I’m not missing this.”

They struggled on, accompanied by the sounds of crunching snow and laboured breaths; occasionally, the heady thump of distant wingbeats could be heard, echoing dully around them. “Should just be over there,” Rainbow said, jerking a wing towards a nearby rocky crest.

Twilight hurried ahead of her and into the lead. “I’ll go first.”

Rainbow didn’t protest – she didn’t really know as much about dragons as Twilight did, after all.

The ground spilled out into a shallow, cobble-strewn channel of sorts; a tall cliff ran the length of the far side, its base undercut by some long-forgotten river, while fire-scorched trees and stubborn, reedy grasses lined its banks. Glimmers of movement danced in the shadowed undercut as the rising sun flickered off multi-coloured scales along the entire length, making the darkness look like so many rainbow eels writhing in a basin.

They stood in mutual silence, even Twilight looking uncertain how to procede. Rainbow fidgeted, her wings furling and unfurling in agitation. She knew they’d been spotted – how couldn’t they’ve been? – and hated the fact that all they could do about it was stand and wait.

“’Posturing’ indeed,” Squirrel muttered, head down and ears folded.

“They’re probably deciding who has to deal with us,” Twilight said, her voice distant and calm. “An uncommonly large nest like this wouldn’t have just a single matriarch.”

Rainbow nodded along as though she’d remembered any of that – she was more into the cool dragony stuff, and not so much their politics.

It was still some minutes before a head – its scales rich in hue and brass in colour – poked out of the darkness to stare at them; after a tense half-minute the rest of it followed, revealing a long, sinewy body, easily ten times their length from snout-to-tail, that trudged ominously towards them on taloned-rears and thumb-clawed wings. It was silent, apparently content to let them sweat as it got ever closer.

Most of the dragons Rainbow’d seen back in Equus were the far smaller pyres; the only times she’d had anything to do with what few wyverns there were were the couple of times she’d managed to spot one in flight and join them for a time, and even then it was hard to judge size in midair.

That she’d had to dodge irritated gouts of flame both times certainly didn’t help, either.

The wyvern reached them, but kept its peace, content instead to merely stare down at them haughtily. It was a minute at least before Twilight spoke.

“Hello, there!” she said, still sounding as calm as she ever did when her curiousity beat out her senses. “My name’s Twilight! We weren’t looking to trespass, but we were hoping to find a sliver here?”

The wyvern snorted a great, humid cloud of stale breath.

“But, umm... you might know it as a talon?” Twilight said, her ears starting to wilt. “Of Cos? The, uhh, changelings in Shade said there was one around here? Maybe?”

Still no response; worse yet, Squirrel was starting to look alarmed.

“We can trade,” Rainbow said, figuring she was going to have to butt in. “Dunno what, but we can. Can’t do anything if you just stare at us, though,” she added with a glare. She’d never learnt how to read dragons worth a darn, but she had a feeling there were worse things to do than guess. Hopefully.

Rather than answering immediately, the wyvern kicked up the ground beneath them, smoothing it down before settling comfortably on their belly, their great, feathery wings – the primaries easily as long as Rainbow herself – tucked in close beside. “It is rare to see mere ponies so far out from the city,” the wyvern said in a deep, raspy, sibilant voice. “You may call me Quill.”

Silly, as dragons’ names go, but if Quill’s real name was anything like Spike’s, then it was undoubtably unpronouncable. “Rainbow,” Rainbow nodded. “And the one trying to hide behind me is Squirrel.”

There was a surprised snort and hurried shuffle of movement behind her.

“Like Twilight was saying, we’re looking for a sliver,” Rainbow continued, before hastily explaining just what that was. “It’s a magic rock.”

The wyvern – Quill – gave her a blank look, in as much as Rainbow could tell at all.

“It’s not a magic rock!” Twilight said, her voice heavy with indignation. “It’s crystallized mana!”

Quill, with what Rainbow thought might be a bemused expression, looked between the two of them. “We have such a thing,” she said, her voice still too deep to pick up on any inflection. “One of the calves picked it up last summer, I believe.”

“So you still have it!” Twilight exclaimed happily. “That’s marvelous! I don’t suppose you’d be willing to trade?”

“If it’s reasonable!” Rainbow hastily added, thinking of all the horrible fates that befell the people in her books for making hasty deals with dragons. “And no shenanigans, either!”

“Yeah!” Squirrel squeaked out. “Don’t eat us!”

Rainbow huffed and gave her a flick of the tail – she did not need to get derailed right now. “Ignore her.”

Quill seemed to perk up. “So you would be willing to let us eat one of you for the stone?”

“What? No!” Twilight gasped.

The wyvern let out a gusty rumble, its great wings ruffling as it gave the deepest, boomiest laugh Rainbow had ever heard. “Fret not, little ponies,” she chuckled, for lack of a better word. “If that was our wish, then we would have long since done so.”

“Good,” Rainbow said as firmly as she could. “No eating ponies.”

“Indeed.”

Twilight shuffled in place, kicking awkwardly at the ground. “Sooo... how about it? We have... well, not much, really.”

“We’re open to suggestions,” Rainbow added quickly.

Quill looked between the three of them, as though expecting something more. “Did the residents of Shade-Under-Down not better inform you? Certainly you passed through the town on the way here.”

Rainbow snorted, but Twilight beat her to the punch.

“No,” Twilight said with an irritated frown. “They didn’t tell us about a lot of things.”

Quill nodded sagely. “Changelings are peculiar beings. They sought the talon, and would have had it for a trifle, too, but alas, lacked in anything to trade.”

“Surely they had money,” Twilight argued. “Or other supplies – they stood to make more than enough from their client to compensate you.”

“Of what use is money to us?” Quill countered. “And of what use is ‘supplies’? We have all that we need, and acquire for ourselves aught else we might; so, too, do I feel little inclined to tell you the story of their endeavours freely.”

Twilight seemed stumped by that. “We were hoping to use the sliver for a project – there’s a roving, tangled-up grand leyline I think it could help re-anchor.”

Quill looked faintly interested. “A worthy purpose, perhaps, but reality and desires are oft divorced: why would I grant you something real for something you merely intend? The trade would seem imbalanced.”

“Well, what about something else, then?” Rainbow said, doing a quick pirouette as she tried to find something to work with. “We could give you Squi – oh wait, no ponies. Umm...”

“We could ask?” Squirrel huffed, apparently too busy glaring at Rainbow to feel spooked.

“Well,” Twilight chirped, cutting off Rainbow before she could say anything. “If money and supplies and motivations are out... let’s see... pyre dragons are dreadfully fond of gemstones – to a fault, really.”

Quill gave a silent glance at her wings. Quick flick of the eyes, little bit of a huff, Rainbow thought as she did her best her to remember every little interaction she’d had with Spike, his mum, and however many other dragons she’d bumped into in the past. Shifted her weight to the side, too – definitely not annoyed.

As Twilight continued her train-of-thought babbling, the wyvern just stared silently at the three of them, Squirrel not least of all as the mare was starting to get antsy again; Rainbow did her best not to roll her eyes at that – Quill was clearly amused, given how her rears kept clenching and unclenching the earth.

“According to The Eyes of Eagles, intangible gifts were amongst the most valuable to the Catter nests,” Twilight muttered, at some point having fallen to pacing. “Could trade lessons? No, no – no vocational overlap.”

With half-an-eye on Quill – who still looked amused – Rainbow gave Squirrel a nudge. “Haven’t fainted yet?”

“This was a dumb idea,” Squirrel hissed at her, her eyes wide. “I can’t believe I believed you two when you said you’d ‘work it out’!”

Rainbow shrugged nonchalantly. “Twi’s got this! Worst case scenario, we turn around and we’re in Shade by nightfall.” Assuming either she or Twilight could climb well enough, of course.

“Still not happy,” Squirrel grumbled.

Despite how unlikely Rainbow thought that was, she stepped over to stand close by Squirrel’s side in the hopes that that might calm her a bit.

Meanwhile, Twilight’s pacing had only increased in tempo. “Could offer species-unique aid? No – arcanomantic abilities can be mimiced, strength and flight redundant. Accrued maps and contacts? No – maps useless to a sedentary population, contacts superceded by local changelings. Skills? No, no, no...”

“We can cook?” Squirrel suggested suddenly, having begun to shoot worried looks at Twilight. “Food, that is – not us.”

“Yeah,” Rainbow added – it was probably best to head things off before Twilight could work herself up too much. “I’ve still got some great spices, too; dunno if they’ll taste good to you, but still.”

“Could get some peachy plants?” Squirrel added hesitantly. “They taste pretty good.”

“I think they could get those themselves if they wanted to.”

“Maybe they can’t smell them,” Squirrel countered. “Or see them – they were small.”

“Ahh,” Rainbow nodded sagely, still keeping an eye on Quill. “Because dragons are known for their awful eyesight. Of course.”

Squirrel gave her a poke in the side. “Maybe we should offer them your feathers? Could make a nice dreamcatcher out of them.”

“Oh, dragon’ dreams are waaay too big for little feathers like these.”

“That makes no sense.”

“Could trade bickering?” Twilight said, interrupting them. “Somehow? Or silence? Might have higher value.”

Quill shifted slightly at the mention of silence. Did the same thing when Twi shot down the maps and stuff, too... “Oh!” Rainbow exclaimed, her tail swishing – it was kind of obvious in hindsight. “I get it! We can trade stories and stuff, right? About where we’ve been? I’ve heard about that somewhere.”

“Heroes regaling others of their stories are a pretty big deal in the legends around here,” Squirrel added with barely a pause, her own ears perking up. “The changelings wouldn’t’ve been able to trade any more, either, because they wouldn’t have any new ones to tell!”

Twilight looked nonplussed. “That... sounds ridiculous. I know I said wyverns care greatly for these kind of things, but we’re not exactly heroes.”

“Oh, come on, Twi! Quill here even said the sliver’s worth a trifle, and how couldn’t it be fun to trade it for a tale of all the adventures we had to get here! There were monsters and everything!”

“I suppose oral histories are the dominant form amongst wyverns... back home, at least,” Twilight said, glancing at Quill as she did. “And wandering thespians are a thing... I still think trading a story for a sliver is patently absurd, however.”

“Noted,” Rainbow said primly. “So whaddaya think, Quill? Like Twilight said, if we get all oral with you, will ya trade us the sliver?”

“Okay, right, no,” Squirrel said, cutting off any possible response from Quill. “Phrasing, Rainbow – phrasing.”

Sometimes it was just too easy. “Riiight. My bad!” Rainbow chirped as she waved off her concerns. “Still, though – how’s that sound, Quill?”

Twilight looked like she wanted to add something, but couldn’t seem to get the words out past her blush.

“Your purpose is sound,” Quill agreed. “And tales unquestionably have value; so, too, is the talon but a trinket; however, let us go somewhere more comfortable, first.” With that said, she turned and lumbered back towards the cleft.

Rainbow blinked at their sudden agreement, but recovered and quickly followed. “Come along, you two!” she shot back over her withers. “It’s story time!”

The crunching of hoarfrost and pebbles pursued her. “I still can’t believe this is working,” Twilight grumbled once she’d caught up. “Stories can’t be currency!”

“Books are,” Squirrel countered. “Lots of fiction novels out there, aren’t there?”

“Well... yeees,” Twilight hedged. “But that’s different.”

“Because of the paper,” Rainbow finished for her. “Very expensive stuff, paper is. Has ink on it, too.”

“Oh, shut up.”

Twilight was... confused, to say the least. While she knew that wyverns grossly favoured the oral traditions – far and again more so than their more book-oriented pyre cousins – she really hadn’t anticipated them being willing to, essentially, swap a sliver for a story; still, she wasn’t about to look a gift-dragon in the mouth.

The cliff loomed tall as they approached. She could make out several dragons – anywhere from a little to a great deal smaller than Quill – moving about in the shadows. Despite how nervous she felt entering a dragon’s nest, her curiosity was starting to get the better of her.

She drifted away a few steps from the other two and towards one of the many rigas set about the undercut; carved into a large, glacial-polished boulder, the symbols – or were they runes? -- reminded her of the arcane glyphs she’d grown accustomed to using in her projects back home, only, perhaps, that these were born of another language. Nevertheless, inlaid with gold and copper as they were, they were beautiful.

“Come along, Twi!” Rainbow called back to her, a wide smile evident on her face. “I’m sure there’s loads more like that inside!”

There probably was. “Coming!”

It took her eyes some moments to adjust as she stepped inside; the ceiling here was remarkably low considering the size of the inhabitants, although given how scratched up and smoothed it was, the wyverns would probably agree. Divots like shallow bowls many metres across littered the floor, many of which bore curled-up wyverns glancing over at them curiously; of much greater interest to Twilight, however, was the far wall.

Lit by strands of wickerlight, the wall was a tapestry of peoples and events etched and painted in equal measure, running the entire hundred-plus-metre-long undercut, showing what Twilight could only guess were the myths and legends of the locals. The work looked to be divided into a hoofful of chunks, with simple, elegant sculptures set in the floor at each barrier.

There was a tinkling underhoof as she found herself walking unbidden towards it through the thin carpet of scales that littered the floor.

“Easy there, Twi,” Rainbow chuckled from beside her. “Let’s maybe ask before wandering through the nest?”

Twilight stopped short. “Oh! Right.”

Quill was looking at her blankly, no more expressive now than she’d been this whole time. “Umm... may I?”

The wyvern – hunched beneath the low roof, her posture distinctly serpentine – seemed to stare right through her. “Yes,” Quill said after some moments, her voice loud and booming.

“Thank you!” Twilight exhaled before bounding off towards the inner wall.

Rainbow watched her go with an easy smile. “Well, that’s her busy for the next while.”

Quill hummed in what Rainbow took to be pleased amusement. “We have not had ponies in here for some decades.”

“Really?” Squirrel said with an interested look. “Who were they? Can’t imagine they were just camping.”

“I had thought you wished to trade your adventures for the stone?” Quill said with an odd, hissing growl; Rainbow couldn’t place it, but it didn’t seem at all threatening. “Would you rather, then, a tale for a tale?”

“N-no!” Squirrel squeaked, her ears flat. “J-just the sliver!”

Rainbow tried not to roll her eyes as she gave the mare another nudge. “Geez, Squirrel – chill! If we were really going to get eaten, then it’s not like there’s anything we can do to stop it; why even worry?”

Oddly, Squirrel didn’t look much comforted by that. Shrugging, Rainbow turned back to Quill. “So what’s the plan? Twilight’s got our maps and logs and stuff, and she’s going to be busy for a bit.”

Quill paused for a moment before responding. “Come,” she said, turning to lead them further in. “The navy one will be safe in the meanwhile.”

Rainbow nodded and nudged Squirrel forwards. “Sounds good!” The slight twitching and flicking of Quill’s wings and tail gave Rainbow the distinct impression she was about to show them something interesting. “Looks like we’re about to see the sliver, eh Squirrel?”

Squirrel shot her a confused look. “What makes you say that?”

“Well, it’s obvious, isn’t it? Besides, it makes sense to see before the trade – just in case it’s something else, you know?”

“I guess...” Squirrel mumbled, her head still on a swivel as she took everything in, not least the many wyverns they were now passing by. “There must be dozens in here...”

“Sounds about right,” Rainbow agreed. She smiled and gave a friendly wing-wave to a tiny calf, barely longer than she was, staring out curiously from under a parent’s wing. “Haven’t even heard of any this big back home.”

Squirrel made a funny noise. “How are you so calm!?”

Rainbow blinked. “Because there’s nothing to be afraid of?” She glanced back to see Squirrel looking at her like she was mad. “What?”

Twilight was barely aware of her surroundings as she approached the murals, her horn already aglow as she added her own faeries to the dim wickerlight hanging down in waves like overgrown moss. It was unintelligible, really – she understood the acts depicted well enough, but could hardly hope to apply context – but even a book in another language still had a certain appeal to it.

She’d never been to any nests back home – Spike didn’t live in one – and had no idea if this was common; certainly there’d been some overlap here and there, but this? At least from the looks of it, their fondness for narrative histories was going to be playing in their favour, big time.

Rearing up, she got a good look at a central figure, its wings spread wide as it towered over a cluster of eggs; judging by the rays of light shining out from behind, as well as its beautific expression, she figured it was either some sort of deity, or perhaps the nest’s founder, although given the semi-nomadic structure most nests – back home, at any rate – favoured, the latter seemed unlikely.

“You’re looking at it wrong,” a voice hissed out from behind.

Startled, Twilight jumped a little as she turned to find a smaller, teal wyvern only a few steps away. “Oh! I’m sorry!” she squeaked, beginning to babble before she could reign it in. “I mean... how do you mean?”

The calf – at barely four metres tip-to-tail they could hardly be anything else – snorted. “It would be brighter here if we wished it.”

Twilight blinked before realizing what they meant; culling her light, she turned back to the mural. She didn’t notice any difference at first, bar being distinctly brighter at the top and darker at the bottom, but after pacing a couple steps this way and that, she thought she could make it out. “It’s textured, isn’t it,” she murmured as she leaned in for a closer look. “I couldn’t see it in the even light.”

The wyvern hummed.

While it didn’t seem to make a difference to what was actually there – no hidden shapes or symbols were suddenly visible – it did add to the aethestics of it all. “I wonder if the wyverns around Drizzle had anything like this?”

“Yes,” the wyvern answered simply. “What are we without where we’ve been?”

Twilight filed that away for the moment as she walked slowly down the length of the mural, her teal shadow keeping pace. There didn’t seem to be any sense of linearity to the work – it almost looked like it jumped between events at random – nor could she make heads or tails of just who the dragons were; nevertheless, she found herself enjoying the unexpected find.

“So this is your history?” It looked far too vague and varied for a single nest, but she wasn’t going to get anywhere without asking.

“Some,” the wyvern answered with a curious tilt of his head. “Do ponies not value such things?”

“We do! Greatly! We just... write it in books, mostly,” Twilight said a touch uncertainly – she felt like she was missing something here. “And sometimes statues and folklore; even subtle things like architecture carry history with them.”

The wyvern nodded slowly as they neared a highly-decorated section bearing what looked like a great, roiling natural spring. “This is the --” they made a soft crooning noise “-- which the changelings say is the Fountain of Lys. Does it not resemble your own depictions?”

Twilight scrutinized the mural: the spring was surrounded by what looked like hills and sharp mountains, calligraphy and interlocking shapes. “It... does not. What is it?”

Here the wyvern paused and looked perplexed, the wickerlight glinting off his scales like so many stars. “The beginning? Of everything? I don’t understand – the world was born of the Fountain; how can you not know this?”

A creation myth! Twilight’s eyes widened, her curiosity sweeping aside her other thoughts. “Oh! I do! It’s just told differently where I’m from. It would be fascinating to hear it, though – perhaps we could share sometime?” She really hoped she’s have time to – oral myths were notoriously difficult to get a hold of.

The wyvern nodded slowly. “A trade of stories, then – if we have time.”

The mural ended abruptly at the entrance to a deeper, larger tunnel, its final imagery of circles above waves bound with flowing script. “Where’s this go?” Twilight wondered, her mind so caught up in moments ago that she’d failed to see it coming. The passage – so wide and tall that not only could it fit any of the wyverns far more comfortably than the undercut itself, it was also necessarily gouged out by claw – was dark, with only occasional patches of wickerlight hanging down from the ceiling to give some sense of depth.

The wyvern made a curious trilling noise. “Surely you didn’t think this was everything?”

Twilight swished her tail in thought. “The divots suggest you sleep out here... and I can’t imagine you’d be happy for long without access to the sky. Hoards aren’t really a thing, at least not in the fairy tale sense... pantry, perhaps? Or a second exit?”

“The latter; I’m surprised you can’t feel the breeze.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not winged,” Twilight grumbled. “I imagine it would be overstepping my bounds to go down it?”

“No, but is it why you came here?”

Twilight spun around, her eyes wide as she tried to spot the other two. “No! Shoot. Where’d they wander off to?” She’d thought they’d been following her, even if at a distance.

“They’re with --” and here the calf made a throaty, warbling sound that Twilight could never hope to reproduce. “They’ll be fine.”

“Ah. Right. I’ll join them, then.” Despite that logically she knew she was safe – or as safe as she could hope to be – she still didn’t like the idea of being separated from the others.

She received a grating noise in response. “This way.”

Twilight had always found herself vaguely annoyed by the draconic languages: they were such a nightmare to pronounce – really, only a gryphon could hope to manage a few words here and there – and the writing wasn’t even phonetic.

Bits and pieces of idle chatter seemed to come and go as they passed the other wyverns and crossed the undercut; unfortunately, she couldn’t work out when, exactly, a conversation had actually ended to know when she could start talking again. It was a somewhat awkward walk later, then, that she spied Quill around the far side of a massive support column. “There you are!” Twilight called out softly as she neared. From where she was it looked like Squirrel and Rainbow were nosing around at something at Quill’s feet.

“Hey Twi!” Rainbow shouted back. “Take a look!”

As she approached, leaving the teal calf to break off to the side, Twilight could make out a dull, off-white crystal of sorts, roughly the shape and size of a durian. “Is that...?”

“The sliver,” Squirrel said with a satisfied nod. “Can you verify it?”

Twilight stepped close and gave it a once-over. It looked about right – if she’d seen this on a mountainside somewhere, she’d have dismissed it as just another chunk of quartz – and it gave her a slight tingling feeling, especially about the horn. “I can check with a spell?” she half-asked, looking up at the looming Quill.

Almost as soon as Quill had nodded, Twilight turned back to the sliver.

“So whaddaya think?” Rainbow asked, stepping back to give her some space.

Squirrel shrugged. “I’m not the unicorn here.”

“Well, yeah, but... still. It looks kinda lame.”

“Seriously?” Squirrel said, side-eying her. “We come all this way and that’s what you’ve got to say? That it looks ‘kinda lame’?”

“Well, it does!” Rainbow pouted. “It doesn’t even look magical! Remember those cursed soulgems we found back in the mine? Waaay cooler.”

“They did have the decency to glow spookily, yes,” Squirrel agreed. “Maybe this thing’ll light up once Sparks does her thing?”

“Maybe,” Rainbow grumbled, still feeling put-out by the lack of showmanship. At least Quill didn’t looked offended by the request to verify it – dragons didn’t much care to have their word called into question.

Squirrel settled down on her haunches, smiling as she cast her eyes all about the undercut. Rainbow couldn’t deny it made for an uncommon sight: it was the largest collection of dragons she’d ever seen by far; lit by the uneven glow of wickerlight and set against the backdrop of the trilling and trumpeting of wyverns, to say nothing of Twilight’s own steady murmurs, it certainly made for a unique sight.

“This is just about it, isn’t it?” Squirrel said, her voice bittersweet.

Rainbow sat down heavily beside her. “Yeah. From the looks of it, Quill’s pleased enough with us just being here to give us the sliver pretty much no matter what we say, so that just means... the boring trip back to ‘Canum, I suppose.”

Squirrel shot an amused glance at Quill and Rainbow. “I’ll have to take your word about them being pleased, though it is nice to hear. Still – it’s been a heckuva month, hasn’t it.”

Rainbow thought back to everything they’d been up to since Cherry, and even the things before. “Yeah. Yeah it has.”

Of course, they still had to get back home to Equus, but once Squirrel was dropped off there’d be no reason to stay – they’d been gone more than long enough to keep Cadance happy. “Still a couple places to hit up, first.”

Squirrel hummed and gave an easy shrug. “For me, at least, it’s just Snowbound to Wanderbelle; you two’ll need to check out Calendar on your own, if you still want to – the route’s just no good for me.”

Rainbow shot a look at Twilight, who’d stopped her magicking and was busy chatting with Quill. “Dunno. Would seem kinda dumb to go there, then go east to ‘Canum, then come all the way back again when we head home.”

“Not taking the southern route?”

Rainbow shook her head. “I think Twilight wants to see some new stuff on the way back.”

“Ah.”

It wasn’t long before Twilight was waving them back over.

“All good?” Rainbow asked as she walked over and stared down at the sliver; it looked the same as before.

“Yep!” Twilight chirped, smiling excitedly as she visibly fought to stay still. “It’s perfect! No idea how we’re going to use it exactly but we can work that out later because for right now it’s perfect!”

Rainbow smiled right back. “Great! Now we just need to regale the locals with tales of our epic adventures!”

“Mmhmm,” Twilight agreed, her logbook already out and flipped through. “While this whole thing still seems fantastical, I figure if we spend a minute getting our ducks in a row, sort to speak, then we can get going.”

“I can handle the main stuff,” Rainbow said. “Might not remember everything, but it’s easy enough to lead a story.”

“I can do context,” Squirrel added. “You two spent a whole lot of time bumbling around, after all.”

“Perfect,” Twilight agreed, neatly ignoring that last bit.

As they scribbled down some notes, a small group of wyverns crept up to them, apparently likewise interested in hearing of their travels. I wonder if they get out much, Rainbow thought before dismissing herself. No – if they wanted to, they could fly the entire length of the continent.

It didn’t take too long for them to cobble something together, running the gamut from Cherry right through and back to ‘Canum. By this point they’d built up quite the audience.

“I’ll begin?” Rainbow said, noticing that Twilight was looking a little intimidated. Since she wasn’t protesting, Rainbow tried to work out the best way to start. Here begins the Journey of the Three Ponies? No, no – too lame. On the evening of the fifth of – no, still awful. “Oh, buck it,” Rainbow muttered to herself. “If I’m going to do this, I might as well do it my way.”

Rainbow straightened up and looked over her audience; seeing she had their attention, she took a deep breath. “So! Twilight and me were flying this airship around north of Cherry Point, right? Minding our own business when suddenly bam! Twilight crashes the ship!”

“I didn’t crash the ship!” Twilight said indignantly.

“You were at the helm,” Rainbow countered. “So, like, kwue-ee-dee and all that stuff.”

“I told you before that that’s not what that means.”

“Maybe some context would be helpful?” Squirrel butted in. “As in, where’s Cherry Point, why were you there and where are you even from for that matter?”

Rainbow huffed. “But that’s boring!” She turned back to the wyverns. “Twi and me are from another continent, we came over here for reasons, and Twilight crashed the ship; that’s all a different story though, and we’re doing this one.” Given the quiver of wings and shuffle of talons, Rainbow got the impression the wyverns agreed with her.

“Books have prologues,” Twilight stubbornly pointed out.

“Yeah, which nobody reads.”

“She’s right, Sparks,” Squirrel agreed. “I’ve never even heard of someone who actually reads the dang things.”

“I read the things,” Twilight muttered mutinously.

“Sure, sure – but you’re crazy, so it’s okay,” Rainbow nodded. “So where was I? Right – so Twilight here had just crashed the ship right into a cliff – a cliff full of pony-eating razor-birds and brambles! We both bailed immediately, Twi here about to fall to her doom before I heroically caught her, and I thought we were going to be okay when suddenly boom! The ship blew up into a gigantic fireball!”

“We are so dead,” Squirrel sighed quietly.

Ignoring her, Rainbow plowed on and soon got into her stride.

“So we leapt out of the canoe, sabres flashing and slicing through the endless waves of mutated thumper monsters!”

“You should’ve seen it!” Squirrel added, her voice low and dramatic. “The way the flames from all those fireballs Sparkle was casting was glinting off of the hundreds of swarming eyes and poison-dripping fangs! They were like a thousand embers flickering in the dark!”

“Yeah! So we were wading through the masses, desperately trying to the reach the deers’ stolen holy chalice when suddenly the earth opened up beneath us!”

“The rapids were pretty rough at this point,” Squirrel said, her hoof tracing a path along one of the many maps they’d laid out on the stone floor. “We weren’t certain we were going to escape at all, nevermind in good enough nick to keep going.”

“I’d patched all the major wounds,” Twilight added, still a touch hesitantly. “And, umm, was working on some tracking spells? It was hard to see the pursueing demigryphs against the clouds.”

“But that’s when we remembered the ten-sigiled glyph the deer shaman had given us for retrieving their relic!”

Rainbow paused to take a few pulls from her canteen while the other two carried on. They were somewhere in one of the mines, now – Rainbow had lost track of which – and Twilight had finally gotten into the spirit of things; admittedly, swarms of insidious, winged moss-monsters were a little weird – it was hard to be scared of plants – but she was somehow making it work.

Their audience looked to be enjoying themselves, which was great, and despite Twilight and Squirrel’s earlier mutterings didn’t seem to mind how ridiculous they were being. Sensing Twilight was about to paint herself into a corner, Rainbow wiggled a hoof to regain everyone’s attention.

“But there was a fork up ahead,” she began once all eyes were back on her. “With just a little bit of sunlight peeping outta one side.”

As fun as it was, though, all things had to end. “And then we saw it,” Rainbow said, her voice hushed.

“Hurricanum,” Twilight continued.

“At last,” Squirrel finished.

Rainbow sat back to see how things had been received: there was plenty of flexing wings, kneading claws and lilting heads; Rainbow thought she could also make out a couple of tail twitches!

Success!

Weirdly, the other two didn’t seem to see it that way. “Are... are they happy?” Squirrel whispered.

Rainbow scoffed and gave her a nudge. “Obviously! We were awesome!”

“It was rather fun, wasn’t it?” Twilight said, already packing her maps back up again. She smiled faintly as she worked. “Hopefully it’s enough for the sliver.”

“We already agreed to the terms,” Quill rumbled reproachfully, having evidently been listening. “But it was a nice story.”

“Hear that, Twi? We’re totally troubadours, now.”

“We could do another gig in Snowbound, maybe?” Squirrel added, having relaxed some. “Would help pay for the convoy.”

“I think not,” Twilight said primly. She then strode up to Quill and the sliver and slowly, carefully picked the thing up in her hooves. Seeing that Quill wasn’t protesting, she thanked him and tucked it into one of her panniers.

Pacing around to stretch her legs, Rainbow took a look outside; despite the exit being more of a whitish bloom than anything else, she figured the story couldn’t have taken much more than an hour, tops. She hurried back to the others.

“Hey – if we left now, we could get back to Shade by nightfall.” She didn’t much care for the idea of curling up in a pit again.

Squirrel, at least, seemed happy to hear it.

“But Dash!” Twilight whined. “There’s so much to learn here! So many questions to ask!”

“Yuh huh. And what’ll they cost ya to have answered?” From the looks of it, the wyverns weren’t going to give long, storied answers for free.

Twilight started to say something, but bit down on her response. “I suppose,” she finally said with an explosive sigh. “Such an odd culture,” she added, having noticed that the crowd had dispersed.

“Well, it’d be boring if we were all alike, wouldn’t it,” Squirrel said. “Wouldn’t be any point to this trip, then.”