The Sky Above

Squirrel found she’d rather enjoyed their little tour through the cuts. “I’m surprised the dyes held up so well,” she said as they laboured their up a different, wider stairwell back to the main concourse.

“Oh, it’s mostly sunlight that causes tapestries to lose their colour,” Twilight chirped before Raster could answer. “And there’s so little down here, of course.”

“Just so, yes,” Raster nodded. She had picked up considerably during the tour, which was nice – it was abundantly clear to Squirrel that the dam really was a chaperon of sorts, and probably didn’t want to be leading them around otherwise.

“Finally got to see some fancy gems, too,” Rainbow half-muttered.

Raster frowned at her. “Crest’s work is of equal quality; gems simply do not have their lustre until worked.”

“I know, I know,” Rainbow assured her. “Although you can’t convince me that that slivery thingy would ever look worth it.”

Raster looked like she wanted to protest the point at first before simply giving a shrug. “No, I suppose not. Whatever it may be, it’ll always look like just another chunk of rock crystal. I never asked Crest why he had it.”

“Sparks says they have magical uses,” Rainbow continued, oblivious to Twilight’s sudden hunted look. “Isn’t that right, Twi?”

Twilight looked like she didn’t know if she should answer or not. “Uhh...”

“Exactly!” Rainbow said, giving a prim nod. “Super magical! Has a big project at home for it and everything.”

“Subtle,” Raster drawled with a roll of her eyes. “But you’ll have to find one elsewhere.”

Rainbow nodded along dolefully. “No kidding. Any ideas where we could find one? Ideally for, you know – cheap?”

Squirrel was fairly certain Rainbow’s paper-thin attempt at cajoling the dam was going to fail without at least a little help. “It’s alright if you don’t want us annoying anybody else over one,” she said, coming up on Raster’s other side. “We were rather abrupt back there, after all.”

Raster shifted her gaze between the two of them, clealy mulling things over before giving a snort. “Yeah, sure – why not. I was... well, perhaps a bit inattentive when Crest first received it?” Her jaw tightened as she blushed. “But I do recall him saying that the tom that had sent him it had originally hoped to get one for cheap from somewhere around Snowbound.”

Rainbow nodded sagely. “Cheap is good.”

Raster shrugged. “Apparently the dealer couldn’t get their paws on it – don’t know why though, and I’m definitely not about to admit to Crest I wasn’t paying attention.”

Squirrel’s attention, however, was still focused on Snowbound. “Might be able to get it ourselves? The one in Snowbound, I mean.”

Despite her ears perking up, Twilight looked skeptical. “That’s really far out of the way...” she trailed off uncertainly. “Plus, if Crest couldn’t get it, I don’t know what chance we would have.”

“It was the dealer, not Crest, that failed,” Raster hastily corrected her.

“It may’ve been for something trivial, too,” Squirrel added.

Twilight hummed, but kept silent.

At some point their stairwell had joined up with others into a wide, well-lit stepped thoroughfare; ahead loomed the very cavern from earlier, now all the brighter from the midday sun. They said their goodbyes to Raster, pausing to watch as she disappeared back down into the lower quarter, before continuing on upwards.

“Well that was nice,” Squirrel said, glancing between the two; neither seemed particularly inclined to respond. “I mean, we’re tourists, right? So seeing touristy things makes sense – the trip home doesn’t have to be an adventure.”

“Right,” Twilight slowly agreed. “It’d be far too far out of our way.”

“Exactly,” Squirrel nodded. She wouldn’t be opposed in the least to stopping off by Snowbound on the way home, but could hardly just come out and say it. “Best we go straight back to Wanderbelle – no detours.”

“Right,” Twilight said a little more hesitantly.

“What’s even in Snowbound, anyways?” Rainbow asked. “Just a bunch of airship stuff?”

“Yep,” Squirrel said. “Some major manufactorums there – it’s way up in the mountains, but obviously that’s not a problem if your ships fly. Lots of rich iron and tin mines in the area, too. It’s really very boring.”

“You’re not being very sneaky, you know,” Twilight grumbled.

Squirrel just shrugged. “I know people there that I haven’t seen in ages – a detour’s fine by me.”

Twilight continued her grumble.

“Any dragons?” Rainbow asked, though it sounded like a question born more of habit than interest. “It doesn’t sound like we’ll be able to check out the ones here; the warren was cool and all but also kinda dull?” She blushed and shot a worried look over her withers. “I mean, super neat and all, but... yeah.”

“There’s always dragons in the mountains if you look hard enough,” Squirrel noted. She had to speak up as they entered the cavern proper and the found themselves inundated in the sudden noise of the daytime market. “Don’t think there are many nearby, though. It’s sort-of kind-of underground sometimes? The peaks and faces aren’t exactly wide up there, so most of it cuts it way back and forth from one side to the other.”

Rainbow hummed contemplatively.

They carried on in silence as they continued their rough tour of the market. Before leaving, Raster had mentioned there were a series of inns near the far side, dug into the rock where it was quiet; they were making their slow way there.

“It probably wouldn’t add too much time to the trip,” Twilight eventually said; she followed immediately with a loud sigh. “But it’s not like we’ve anything to go on – I can’t see how it wouldn’t just be a waste of time.”

They paused by a tall, wide tower near the market’s centre. Looking up, Squirrel could make out the occasional pegasus or gryphon land or take off on one of its many platforms. She’d been up a few such structures before, but only ever for the view. “So where do they form, anyways?” she asked, sitting and slumping against one of its thick struts. “Might help us find one.”

The other two joined her, shucking aside their panniers as they found a seat next to her. “Well, as Crest had said they form occasionally at grand leylines.” Twilight paused to root around for a canteen and take a pull. “The mana there can be so dense that it reaches a sort of tipping point and condenses into something solid. The mechanism behind it isn’t really understood, though – most of what is known is mythological, and far too contextual to be of any use to us right now.”

“And that’s what the Everfree is, isn’t it?” Rainbow asked as she munched away on a snack. “A grand thingy, I mean.”

“Yes,” Twilight nodded. “A grand ‘thingy.’”

They sat and people-watched for a while, not feeling in any particular hurry. Squirrel was fairly content with how things were going – even if they didn’t end up detouring, it was still kind of fun to play tourist with the others. She’d tried travelling to places just to see the sights before, but found that whenever she was on her own, nothing she saw felt... fulfilling, she supposed.

It was nicer when others were present.

“So how’s a sliver going to help?” Squirrel asked idly. “‘Anchor’ is a bit vague.”

Twilight didn’t answer at first, instead taking to awkwardly kneading the ground. “Well... I’m still working on that,” she mumbled. “But I know it can! All my instincts and notes are saying that if I can just get a dense enough ball of mana, I can entangle and ensnare the Everfree leys in it; if I can do that, then the blasted forest will stop moving around and disrupting all the magic around it.” She finished with a loud huff and averted her face.

Silence followed. “Alright,” Squirrel said after a few moments. “A bit of a shaky plan, I’ll admit. There’s no harm in trying, though – right?” She hoped she wasn’t being annoyingly optimistic.

“Exactly!” Rainbow chirped. “You’ll never know if we don’t try, and we can’t try until we get a sliver! So if it’s not, like, a billion bits, then we should totally just get one – and so what if it doesn’t work? We’ll just find something else!”

Twilight gave a put-upon sigh, belied by her growing smile. “Fiiine,” she huffed. “We’ll go to Snowbound, then.”

“Alriiight!”

Twilight stepped up the threshold to a tidy-looking inn. They were in a wide, low tunnel, lit by paper-globed lanterns hanging from thin wires overhead; inns and taverns made up the bulk of the buildings either side, carved almost entirely into the stone. Despite the complete lack of sunlight here, the area was anything but claustrophobic – it looked to her like a great deal of effort had been put into making the surface-born traders and travellers comfortable – it was both well-lit and dotted with planters full of ferns and other low-light plants.

“Think they’ll have something here?” Rainbow asked as they strode inside; this was the third inn they’d checked out, the others being all full up.

Squirrel hummed. “We’ll find something – if nothing else, there’s bound to be something open further in.”

Seeing that it was a gnoll behind the cluttered office-counter, Twilight slowed down to let Rainbow take the lead. “Looks decent here,” she said, taking a look around. “Simple, but clean.”

“About the best thing an inn can be, aye,” Squirrel agreed.

The two of them were still hovering near the door, a few paces from Rainbow, but far enough to let her speak on her own. “Never was very good with ‘dogs,” Twilight muttered to Squirrel. “Or gryphons – could never get the hang of how aggressive they are.”

Squirrel chuffed. “Says the mare that’s friends with a dragon.”

“Spike’s different,” Twilight insisted. “All dragons are, really – you just need to remember to make it abundantly clear that you’re not going to take anything.”

“And what about the ones in the mountains that threaten to bite anyone that goes by?”

“Trespass is theft, to some,” Twilight replied distractedly before raising her voice. “All good, Dash?”

“Yeah,” Rainbow smiled. She was leaning easily against the counter, the gnoll staring at them owlishly over her shoulder. “Price is good, too – you’ve got the bits?”

“Drams,” Twilight nodded, and in short order they’d gotten their room booked – just the one with a double-bed, but they figured they’d sort it out later.

It was little later that saw them seated in a small dinner restaurant, not too far off the docks. “This all looks surprisingly normal,” Twilight said as she ran a hoof down her menu. “Bit like gryphon fare.”

“Fish, too,” Rainbow said, sounding pleased. “I’m definitely getting something I can’t pronounce.”

“Too risky for my tastes.”

Squirrel chuffed. “Aren’t we about to wander off to Snowbound in the hopes of finding a sliver? Sounds like ‘risky’ to me.”

“It’s different,” Twilight said, waving her off. “I hardly want to get sick because I ended up ordering, oh I don’t know, jellied eels or something.”

Rainbow gagged. “Ew.”

“‘Ew’ indeed.”

“Well, that was nice,” Twilight said. They were taking the long way back to their inn; it was dark outside now, as best as they could tell, but the market itself was no less busy. The day shops had closed, but alleys and streets that’d been empty during the day were now bustling and lit with warmth and colour. They’d toyed with the idea of popping in somewhere for a drink, but given how early they wanted to get back to the docks in the morning, had decided against it.

“The local stuff was worth, yeah,” Rainbow agreed. “Not much different than ‘Canum, I guess – but still.”

Squirrel hummed in agreement. “Have to go way further west than this if you want something really different – the gryphs on the coast there are a bit stubborn about their flavours.”

“Really?” Rainbow shot Twilight an eager glance.

Twilight sighed. “No, Dash, we’re not going to any of the cities there – we’ll never get home if we do.”

“Aww,” Rainbow pouted.

“There’s still some nice food up in Snowbound,” Squirrel said, giving her a shoulder bump. “Desserts, mostly, but still good stuff.”

Rainbow scoffed. “As if desserts would ever just be ‘mostly.’” She’d perked up nonetheless.

“Something we’ll find out in a couple days,” Twilight said. “Supposing any of the ships are heading up there tomorrow.”

“We’ll ask around – if no one’s leaving in the morning, someone will eventually,” Squirrel noted.

“Well, I’m hoping it’s a fair sight sooner than ‘eventually.’”

It wasn’t long before they were leaving the nightlife behind them and passing back into the narrow crevice that’d lead them back to their inn; walkways and gantries crisscrossed the cliffs above, the glow from their lanterns blotting out the night sky.

A cool breeze rustled back at them. “You know,” Twilight began, “while the market’s a bit much for me, this is kind of nice.”

“The warren was neat, too,” Rainbow agreed.

“There’s still the upper and lower sections as well,” Squirrel added. “Some big mines and processing sites down below; supposed to be a river down there – a real, proper fifty-metre-wide one and not just a bunch of canals – though that might just be a rumour.”

“So much to see and so little time,” Twilight mumbled in a sing-song voice. “Almost a pity we’re leaving so soon, sliver or not.”

“But isn’t it best like that?” Squirrel said earnestly. “That way you’ll never get bored and there’ll always be a reason to come back again later.”

Twilight snorted. “Once this is done, we’re heading back home – there won’t actually be a next time, no matter how much there is to do. The sentiment’s nice, though,” she added hastily, having seen Squirrel’s crestfallen look.

“Oooh I know that,” Squirrel said. “My two tourists’ll be off to hearth and home soon enough; surely you have vacations there, though – right?”

Rainbow snorted. “Twi? Vacation? Not a chance.”

“Hey!” Twilight reeled indignantly. “I’ve gone on vacations before!”

“Yuh huh. Liiike when?”

“I’ve gone to Lyonesse several times,” Twilight said primly. “And to Whittler.”

“Whittler doesn’t count,” Rainbow grinned at her. “And I know for a fact all those trips to Lyon’ and the lake were with family.”

“It’s still a vacation even if you’re with family, Dash.”

“It totally isn’t.”

“She’s right, Twilight,” Squirrel agreed with a solemn nod. “It really isn’t.”

Twilight sighed. “Well, I’ll just have to go on a proper vacation when I get back, then, won’t I?”

“Deal!” Rainbow shouted, her grin getting ever wider. “We’ll go to Cloudsdale first, then we’ll hit up Rustle – I’ve heard there’s this place there that does the best omelettes!”

As Rainbow continued planning their next vacation, Twilight could only slouch and wonder what she’d just gotten herself into.