Cutter

As could be expected, even older ponies were capable of outrunning a twenty-some-odd-year-old human. Thus, the crew had opened a hell of a lot of space between me and them.

"Cutter!" Rosepetal screamed upon looking back and seeing me lagging behind.

"Run! Just fucking run!" I screamed back, leaping once or twice to swing my arms at her. Looking back for only a second longer, she turned and took off at a full gallop. Pumping my legs as hard as I could, I spared a moment's glance over my shoulder, immediately regretting the action as the Bell-bound had crashed into our ship and capsized it entirely. The Quicksilver practically rolled over as the ghost ship shoved it down under the ice where it seemed to vanish entirely. And still, the ghostly crew ran on, heaving their chains with all their unnatural might.

The unicorn monster leading them remained on their bow and as they stampeded towards us, I could now definitively say that the hacking motion the monster was making was laughter.

Said laughter being high-pitched, whinnying, squeaky, and not at all ghostly was a complete surprise.

"We're gonna skin you alive!" One of the ghost ponies taunted in an abjectly ordinary pony voice.

"Yeah! And then we're gonna boil you in seawater!" A hippogriff added.

"And beat you up!" Someone else chipped in.

"And talk about you behind your backs!" Another offered in a less confident voice. Someone stammered for a moment.

"And deliberately forget your birthdays!" They finally yelled.

"Will you all shut up?" The unicorn hissed, turning back to glare at the other ghosts. "Honestly! Six thousand years and half of you still haven't figured out how to be genuinely menacing!" A large portion of the ghosts recoiled and then seemed to hang their heads with shame. The skeleton shook her head with a sigh and then turned forward.

"Anyway, yeah! We're gonna do horrible things to you and add your souls to the crew!" She clapped her ghostly hooves. "It'll be fun! Like a makeover! A horrible, painful, makeover!" I clenched my teeth and leaned forward to try and gain some extra speed, but the creaking of the ghost ship drew closer and closer regardless.

Up ahead, Gab glanced back for a moment and then whirled around. Spreading his wings he took off like a shot toward me and then past me. I slid to a stop to turn and scream at him.

"What are you doing?!" I yelled before he banked hard and shot back toward me, slamming into my gut, knocking all the wind from my body, and sending us both crashing through the air. I hit the ice hard and continued to slide, with Gab using his wings to propel us faster as he stood atop my chest like a surfboard.

Miraculously, we managed to catch up with the crew like that, and I found myself suddenly slammed head-first into a pile of snow which killed my momentum and threw Gab forward with a squawk.

"Are you two alright?" Rosepetal cried. Before I could stand back up, a horrible and familiar creaking sound caught our attention. Shaking the snow from my head, I saw the looming skeletal unicorn leaning down off her ship's bow to leer at us as the Bell-bound was quite literally right behind us.

"Prepare yourselves for an eternity aboard this ship! Hah hah-! WAH!" She cried. At the last possible moment, the entire ship suddenly lurched forward on its bowsprit with a horrible groan, hanging for a moment before slamming back into the icy water and drifting back. As a result of the sudden stop, the unicorn skeleton was sent tumbling off the front of her ship and fell flat on her face upon the water just before me.

The ghosts and our crew all looked at the prone skeleton with shock and horror for a few moments before she slowly raised her gently swaying head, revealing her dizzy ghostly eyes. After another second, she shook her head and looked down at where our feet and hooves were.

"AW! No fair!" She screamed, jumping to her hooves and desperately prancing in place. "Get back over the water, you cheaters!" Similar cries of disappointment rose up from the other ghosts. I furrowed my brow and released the breath I didn't realize I was holding before sitting up. The rest of the crew gathered close and examined the frustrated ghost for a moment. Looking down, I realized that just past the heels of my shoes the ice was cracking and splitting, revealing the water underneath as well as the fact we'd tumbled onto snow-covered land.

"Right! They're cursed to patrol the waters!" Gab suddenly gasped, jumping forward to point at the water's edge. "They can't step on land!"

"Rub it in why don't ya!" One of the ghosts yelled, causing the rest of the ghosts to begin yelling and hurling insults our way. In response, our entire crew heaved a collective sigh of relief.

"Oh, my stars," Zama huffed as she collapsed and draped a foreleg over her eyes.

"Quite a- hoo- quite a lucky break," Holiday mused, shaking the snow from his rear hooves and holding his chest as he panted.

"Nyeh!" Gab stuck his tongue out at the ghosts, causing a few to recoil.

"Oh! I did not get tortured to death just to get 'nyeh-nyeh'd' by some portly old idiot!" One growled with a humph. It was Gab's turn to recoil, gasping as he did so.

"Portly?!" He snapped. The ghost paused and leaned off the side of the ship with a malicious look in her eyes.

"What, you got a problem, Gramps?" She accused, beckoning him closer with a hoof. "Why don't you come out here and gimme a piece of your mind?" Gab snorted hard, shooting a gout of steam from his nose, and stomped toward the taunting ghost until I reached over, grabbed his tail, and dragged him back. He looked at me in surprise for a moment before jolting in realization and looking away with a blush.

The unicorn and I stared at each other before she narrowed her ghostly eyes and slowly drifted back to the ship.

"Just you wait! Next time you set hoof off land, we'll be waiting," she declared, waving her hooves at us for effect. The entire ship began to roll away as the fog closed in around them. "Your souls will be ours!" The fog enclosed the ship as a whole and then shrank into the sea, vanishing entirely. Gab and I shared a look before I noticed Zamaradi carefully approaching the edge of the actual water. She slowly reached out and tapped the water's surface with a hoof.

"HAH HA!" The unicorn skeleton triumphantly bellowed as she snapped up and tried to grab Zama's hoof, catching only air as the zebra immediately leaped back. The ghost hung in the air for a moment with her legs folded across her chest in a tight grip. The water rippled and another ghost's head popped up.

"Didja get 'em?" He asked, before looking at us. "Oh." The skeleton narrowed her eyes again and slowly sank down, jabbing a hoof at her eyes and then jabbing the same hoof at us just before she disappeared again.

"Okay, so the water's fucked," I huffed, pushing to my feet with a painful groan. "At least in these parts."

"Is it too late to change my vote?" Sour Note asked, earning a murmur from the rest of the crew.

"That's why I always abstain," Early declared, brushing his chest with a hoof. "I'm the only one who can still complain." He whirled around and jabbed his hoof at the rest of the crew.

"You all asked for this," he accused.

"Let's kill Captain Cutter!" Pepper chirped, jabbing a hoof at me. Holiday waved his hoof at him.

"Not yet," he grumbled, considering the mountain nearby. "Let's see about these reindeer, first."

Admiring the sun as it steadily dipped down from its midday height and cast its rays in fractured streams through the branches, I leaned against one of the snowy pine trees that decorated the land around us as the crew munched on the patch of berry bushes we'd found untouched by the snow. Granted, they were untouched thanks to the strange canopies made of sticks that were erected over them.

"As lucky a find as this is, this was clearly constructed," Gab declared as he trotted up beside me, idly chewing a leaf in the corner of his mouth. "Somepony lives out here."

"Must be getting close," I mused, glancing back the way we'd come. Despite the trees, we were high enough that I could make out the glittering and icy sea far below. "Wonder if Sombra's followers have had issues with those ghosts?"

"If they're careful, I reckon not," he hummed, sitting down and stamping his hooves together to shake the snow off.
"Considering how they can't even step hoof on land due to their curse, it's also possible they can't sail out of a very specific stretch of the sea, either."

"Namely the one I sailed us into," I murmured.

"Aye, that's the one," he chirped with a nod. However, when he noticed my sour, guilty expression, he shook his head and jabbed my leg. "Ah, don't kick yourself too hard. Who coulda guessed they'd chill the whole damned sea?"

"I'm just relieved everyone made it out alive," I sighed, leaning my head against the tree and staring at the pine needles. "I don't think I could handle it if I got someone killed."

"Then you should give consideration to surrendering now," someone immediately behind me replied in a very even tone.

"Oy!" Gab yelled.

"Ah!" A crewmate screamed. I clenched my eyes with a sharp, hissing sigh before looking around. Out of nowhere and slipping forward from behind and between the trees came a frankly silly number of dark-eyed white deer, each with a hoof hooked onto a wooden spear. Immediately to my left and leaning forward to leer at me with a purse-lipped expression was another deer. He was close enough that I could see his coat was painted white rather than naturally albino.

"Well?" He pressed, tilting his head and allowing his spear to shift into view. Even if they weren't armed, their antlers all spelled trouble I felt, and so with a huff, I offered the crew a nod before carefully removing the belt my sword was slipped in. Zama grunted at the gesture but made no move against the deer, instead slowly sitting down and glaring at them. The rest of the crew followed suit after a moment, most sitting and raising their forehooves, while Holiday drew his pipe and began smoking.

The deer nearest to me slowly stepped around and looked me and Gab up and down. "Yet more interlopers, come to defile our lands and pillage our homes," he said with a hum.

"We didn't mean to offend, we're just shipwrecked and lost," I replied in a careful tone, gesturing to the bushes. "We lost all our supplies with our ship." The crew murmured in agreement with me, at which the deer shared a look.

"You were attacked?" He pressed, tilting his head.

"Yes," I affirmed, drawing a slow nod from him.

"I see. And what were you doing this far north?" He demanded, looking me up and down. "We patrol every place the trees reach, and with a very particular exception, I've never seen any ponies or whatever you are." I nodded and gestured to the crew.

"We're trying to find whoever's responsible for the crystal ships coming down from this sea," I explained, but before I could continue, the other deer whispered to each other and he furrowed his brow. "Do you know them?"

"They invaded our ancestral home on orders from their dark master, bringing their diabolical magic machines with them," he replied, tilting his head back in consideration of me. "They have been dormant for some time now, but it was obvious they were merely preparing for some grim purpose." I hummed with a nod.

"They've started sailing down south and causing trouble," I said, folding my arms and leaning against the tree again. "It's threatening an operation we're involved in." He raised an eyebrow and looked at his group for a moment.

"Than perhaps we have found the grounds for an accord?" He offered, earning a hopeful murmur from the crew, but I could only shrug.

"I'm not sure what we can do to help you, but if we knew where these guys were hiding, I planned to make contact with our associates," I explained. As the leader considered me one of the others stepped into my view.

"To what end? Can your associates eradicate these interlopers?" She demanded with a sharp glare. "If so, why have they not done so already?" I tilted my head back and shrugged.

"Maybe. At least one of them is pretty crafty, but it's not like we know exactly where they are," I held my hands out with another shrug. "But like I said, I'm not sure how much help we can be now. Our ship was sunk by a ghost ship." The leader furrowed his brow and looked off to the side for a moment.

"You refer to the Bell-bound?" He asked, to which I nodded. "Ah, your ship is not lost, merely taken." I recoiled and shared a surprised look with the crew.

"The cursed crew claims whatever they find in the sea, but they rarely destroy it," he explained, gesturing to the sea. "We have carried murderers and captured invaders to the sea as sacrifices and the crew have accepted them and left our rowboats unharmed." The doe beside him nodded.

"They are quite reasonable in a way," she added. I knit my brow together and brought a hand to my chin with a thoughtful hum. Gab leaned toward me with an expectant look before I nodded slowly and turned to the deer.

"Would you be willing to show me where the invaders are set up? I think I have an idea."

Guided by the deer, we trudged for the entire day along shallow paths dug in the snow. The paths were narrow enough to be hard to spot and allowed us to cross a lot of space without getting nearly as much snow stuck to us as we would have otherwise. Additionally, the paths were planned in such a way as to cut between thicker clusters of trees, giving us frequent and much-appreciated breaks from the wind that howled down from further up the mountain.

The result of all this was that we covered a lot more ground than we might have on our own by the time the sun had vanished below the horizon. Pine Needle, the leader of the deer, turned to me and gestured to the clearing within a circle of trees we'd stopped in.

"We will camp here this evening," he explained as his deer spread out and used their antlers to shovel snow away. "Please understand Captain Cutter, until you have proven yourself our ally we cannot show you our home."

"Perfectly reasonable," I replied with a nod as I tucked my coat around myself before sitting down in one of the patches they'd cleared. As his deer and my crew worked together to light a fire using some branches the deer had hidden away to keep dry, Stitches trotted up to Pine Needle and gently nudged his leg.

"I'm hungry," she said, causing Needle to recoil with a shocked expression.

"You ate an entire day's travel rations on your own during our last break," he gasped.

"Yeah, but that was forever ago!" She argued.

"Four hours actually," he retorted with a bemused huff before shaking his head. "And anyway, I'm afraid that's already more than I should have given you. Our resources have been stretched thin as of late." Stitches hung her head with a defeated whine before crawling away. Once she was out of the way, I looked at Needle.

"Because of Sombra's goons?" I asked. He considered me for a moment.

"If you mean the interlopers, then yes," he replied before settling onto a dry patch himself. "Their magic has poisoned the land near to where they dwell, and they have long since plundered the orchards and gardens we have tended for generations."

"Ah, then that explains the unhappy welcome we received," I hummed, burying my hands in my coat and scooting closer to one of the fires they managed to start. "Must've been a shock to find us helping ourselves to one of the newer food sources, eh?" A wry and slightly annoyed smile came to his face.

"Indeed. And had your crew been comprised solely of ponies, we would not have bothered speaking with you first," he explained. "My curiosity about you specifically is what saved you all." I hummed in thought, remembering something he'd said.

"You mentioned you don't see ponies up here except for one specific exception," I urged, before raising an eyebrow. "Don't tell me."

"The interlopers, correct," he confirmed with a nod before looking over the crew. "Though having taken the time to observe your crew closely, I can say they have a much grimmer visage than any pony here." He turned back to me with a severe expression.

"They are led by five dark-coated ponies with red horns," he continued, pointing a hoof at me. "These I believe are the magicians who control the ships you are troubled by." Winterberry, the doe who'd stood beside him earlier, approached him before he raised a hoof and then gestured my way. She recoiled and then glared at me before slowly making her way to me, where she stood and leveled an unamused scowl at me.

"Hello?" I offered with a confused tone.

"Greetings," she grumbled back before sighing and then lying on the ground. Before I could ask, she scooted up and huddled up to me. Seeing my shocked face, she rolled her eyes. "Would you rather freeze? It is common for our rangers to do this to preserve warmth." Blinking, I looked around and saw the other deer performing a similar action with each other and the crew, only a few of whom were as caught off guard as me.

Zamaradi was completely unphased as she huddled up with one deer, and Gab had a content smile on his face in response to the doe who'd chosen him.

"Fair enough," I murmured before settling against her.

"But keep your claws to yourself," she accused, drawing a smile from me.

"Hey, I like you already."

I held my hand over my eyes to guard against the midday sun and survey the snow-capped trees rolling down from our vantage point to the glittering sea. On the far end of the water, even at this distance, I could see towering white cliffs, confirming we'd made it to the eastern side of the narrow strait our prey presumably sailed out of.

"This ridge marks the furthest point we dare travel," Pine Needle explained, gesturing to the forest between us and the sea. "From here to the sea, our enemy lurks." I turned to give him my attention as he paced along the edge of the cliff.

"We will be traveling south along this ridge. You will be able to see the enemy's encampment within another day and a half," he added to the audible relief of a few of the crew.

"Finally," Hatch muttered. As I considered the path, Needle turned back to me.

"Now, luckily Captain Cutter, there is a faster and slightly warmer route we can take to achieve the next leg of your plan," he explained with a nod.

"Excellent," I replied, adjusting my belt with a quiet huff. Needle however leaned to look passed me.

"Before we continue, I think you may need to attend to your wayward crewmate," he said, pointing behind me. Turning, I saw Galley off on her own and scanning the forest below us. I waved Gab away as he moved to retrieve her before I approached her myself.

"Galley," I said once I'd made it to her.

"Ah!" She cried, whirling around and looking at me in shock. Her eyes darted back to the forest intermittently and I glanced back over my shoulder at everyone else.

"What is your issue?" I whispered accusingly.

"Nothing!" She squeaked.

"Don't you 'nothing' me!" I demanded, jabbing a finger at her. "You said you were onboard if we came north and you've been antsy ever since we made it here. Talk." She wilted for a moment before scrunching her muzzle with a defiant glare. I folded my arms in response and furrowed my brow. We held our stare off for a short bit before she faltered and then sighed.

"My dad was a sailor during the middle of the operation against Sombra. He transported soldiers to the eastern shores of the Crystal Empire to help keep Sombra's loyalists distracted," she murmured, sitting down and gesturing to the other side of the strait. "He used to write me letters."

"And?" I urged, tilting my head. She hesitated before grumbling.

"He found something he said he was really excited to show me," she finally said before wilting hard. "Before he disappeared."

"Ah," I hummed with a nod. Her ears shot back and she again looked out over the cliff.

"I joined the crew 'cause I thought I'd be able to talk to other sailors who might've known where he disappeared," she said with a quiet sigh. "But nopony on the crew knew anything specific about what all Equestria did against Sombra and we never made port, so I couldn't ask any other crews." I frowned as I considered her words and the landscape she was focused on.

"So, you want to find out what happened to your dad and his treasure, huh?" I asked, drawing a weak nod from her. "Why didn't you tell anyone?"

"I don't want anypony to steal whatever he had if we find it," she replied with a desperate tone. I nodded again before fixing her with a critical leer.

"Well, the ship moves according to popular vote, you should know that," I declared, drawing a quiet whimper from her. "If you want to go on a treasure hunt, you need to be open with the crew." She flinched and hung her head for a moment before I knelt down to look her in the eyes.

"And I'll put my vote in to let you keep whatever it is he found if they're willing to go hunting," I added, gently patting her on the head. She considered me for a moment before giving me a sad smile.

I scanned the fortress Pine Needle had led us to with my spyglass. It was set right up against the shoreline, and there was an inlet that had been converted into a simple port. All along the inlet were ten of what could only be the Crystal Barges. Not a one had any sails, but their general shape was very similar to any ship I'd seen and they visibly pulsed with magic. Like the barges, the fortress was made out of pure crystal, with a glittering wall that enclosed the port on one side and wrapped around the perimeter of the whole place. All inside the perimeter were crystal buildings in a brutalist fashion, arranged in straight lines up to a larger multitiered castle that looked like one solid piece of rock they'd grown right out of the ground.

The crystal walls were hidden to the south by the natural bend of the strait, similar to the Lost Lagoon, only with snow, fog, and icebergs instead of fucking awful heat and charming little bat ponies. I narrowed my eyes at the setup and temperature comparison, wondering if Ben would be willing to move Naysow.

"So, having seen their encampment, do you still think your scheme will work?" Pine Needle pressed. I pursed my lips as I continued studying the place.

"That'll depend on if a certain gaggle of ghosts is willing to play nice," I replied before collapsing my spyglass and giving him a nod. "Shall we find out?"

I gently dipped my toe in the water before snapping my leg back. I watched the water ripple for a few seconds before I furrowed my brow and carefully repeated the action. Instead of leaping out, the unicorn slowly rose out of the water up to just her bony chin and fixed me with a ghostly scowl.

"I'm not falling for it again," she declared before sinking down again.

"I have a question," I said, causing her to pop up again.

"So go to a library!" She spat with a sarcastic bob of her head before vanishing. I knelt at the water's edge.

"We can't give you our souls, but would you be willing to accept someone else's souls in our place and in exchange for our ship? Like, a lot?" I asked. A few seconds passed in silence before she slowly rose up to her nose and fixed me with a narrow-eyed glare.

"Define 'a lot,'" she demanded.